Chapter 251.

PART 1.

While others are amazed and terrified of the void they are going through, Hatori observes it. He poked and prodded it with his magic. It does not feel like space. He was in space back when he faced that cyborg woman. It did not feel like this. It is entirely different. It feels like a fabric, through which they are traveling. That is the best way he can describe it in words.

The spell to track the fragments is cast. Immediately, they get five results. Four of them are quite distant, and one of them is moving. However, the fifth one is closer to them. "Let's go after the closest one first." Suggested Raven, and everyone agreed with him.

To enter a specific era of time, Samay taught them another spell. Shin casts this spell, and a portal opens. They all enter this portal, and they land in an ancient country. "Dammit. Why do we have to end up in a public place?" Said Hatori, as various people looked at them. It is quite understandable. After all, how often do you see some strange people appearing out of nowhere in the middle of your city?

"Don't kill them." Said Raven casually, as they started to move.

"Have faith in me." Said Hatori.

"We do have faith in you." Said Josh. "Faith that you will destroy this entire city if given a chance."

"Come on now. I've changed, honest!" When they continue to not believe him, Hatori turns to Tom. "You believe me, right?"

"Well," he said, trying to come up with an eloquent answer. Deciding not to fight against his nature, he said what was in his mind. "Do tell me if you need help in destruction."

"See? He is honest, unlike you." Said Josh. "You should learn from him."

"Master Munshi, Kalicharan, you do believe me, right?" Asked Hatori, hoping that these two old men would side with him.

"I'll believe you if you let me turn the corpses into an army. Those will be useful for our battles." Replied Kalicharan.

"We are here." Said Munshi, sensing the fragment nearby. He points to the man who is exiting a bar. "He has the fragment."

The man in question immediately realized that this strange group was after him. What gave them away? You might be asking. Well, maybe their sudden movement towards him? Perhaps the magical pressure they started to exert upon him? Or maybe, when they started to run after him when he started to flee?

Whatever the reason might be, their target is fleeing, and these eight individuals start to give chase. The locals get out of their way in a hurry. Two of them are absolute giants (Josh and Hatori,) while other men are abnormally tall (James, Raven, and Tom,) while the remaining three are still tall compared to them. The ferocity of their spells is also unseen, especially in the middle of the city. The men of the king are nowhere to be found, as they are the only ones who can contend with this group.

The chase continues to the outskirts of the city, where the target uses a spell to overwhelm their sense of sight (Hatori avoided that due to having modified his eyes to make sure this does not happen to him,) and after using an invisible spell, he sneaks away. Hatori sensed the fragment getting away from them further and further, while his friends were healed up by James.

"He went to the wilderness." Said Hatori, pointing to the direction where their target had sneaked away. "Follow me, I can still sense the fragment."

"Even the location?" Asked Munshi. At Hatori's nod, the old man is impressed. "I can sense the fragment, but I cannot pinpoint the location. Looks like my senses are getting dull."

PART 2.

Kushim is experiencing a feeling that he usually feels when the court of the king is involved. And that feeling is the feeling of annoyance.

At first, it was about those stupid laws. "Can't experiment on this, that, and those too!" Then something about taxes (he forgot what exactly they wanted from him. The whole thing made him board and glazed his mind until the entire lecture and threat was over.)

After getting annoyed by these troubles, he shifted his base to the wilderness. He found a nice cave about which no one would complain, installed some repelling wards, added some extra security for preventing other mages from thieving his research, and went on enjoying his days.

Until some strange beast showed up in the middle of his hunt. He might be a mage, but he cannot conjure food out of thin air. Not something eatable at least. He murdered the monster and took the broken piece of crown it had in its hand. At first, Kushim thought it might be some kind of broken treasure of a king, but as he learned later, it was nothing like that. He tried to analyze it and only got weird and confusing results.

Deciding that he will deal with this later, he goes to one of the bars to have a drink or two. Money is something that he can conjure, and what is more, he can conjure permanent coins. Until the king learns about this and makes some other law forbidding this, Kushim plans to abuse this system as much as possible. He ignored the lectures of other mages about inflation, the economy, and money printing bullshit. Those idiots need to get their heads out of the cloud. And keep whatever they are smoking away from him. Clearly, it is not doing their brains any favors.

Unfortunately, his good time is disrupted. Much like everyone else, he also was gawking at the sudden appearance of these strange men. They were dressed differently, and they were talking in a language that none of them could understand. But one thing was clear to Kushim: these were all mages. Not just any mages, but powerful ones.

Usually, such a group is never formed. But when it is formed, it means trouble for other mages and the public in the surrounding area. Kushim was proven right when they started to come after him. They tried to box him in, but he had enough experience in avoiding the men of the king. Besides, while some seem to be experts in the art of fighting and bullying in this group, others appeared to be out of shape. They were getting in each other’s way, and it gave Kushim a chance to get away.

However, they did not relent. In a peak of foolishness, he cast the first spell. In hindsight, it was a bad idea. It is always better if the enemy casts the first spell. It gives you moral high ground, as well as ample chances of proclaiming your innocence, no matter how brutally you respond.

Kushim also regretted his decision, because while they might have failed to box him in and prevent his escape and failed miserably at the task, the entire group changed into a monstrous team of strong mages who were working well together when the spells started to fly. It took everything he had to escape and trick them into the outskirts of the city to get away from them. He retreated to his lab in the cave, intending to doze off for the remainder of the day and forget this entire day ever happened.

"They appear to be after this fragment." He muttered to himself in the cave. "What is so special about it?" When he thinks about the results of his analysis, he gets a headache. It did not make any sense to him, even after having several shots of his favorite brew.

"Whatever. I am certain they won't find me here." Kushim stumbles, as the cave shook from a blast outside. His wards held on, but barely. "Spoke too soon."

He switched to the scoping spell to see what was going on outside. The man with the golden eyes is screaming, and attacking him. He does not understand what he is saying, but he can understand the sentiment. It is probably something to the effect, "Come out and give us what we want, or else!"

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Others are trying to calm him. "Calm down man," said Josh. "We have him now. He Can't run from here."

"Calm down? Because of this idiot, I had to trek through this humid forest. Come out and give me what I want, or else I will destroy your lab!" Said Hatori, firing another blast from his palm.

Kushim finally realized what exactly was the terrifying thing he had been ignoring. The man with the golden eyes is not using any foci at all. He blanched at this implication and immediately put his energy into making sure that the wards did not fall apart. He stepped outside of the cave to confront these people, but it appears they are not in the talking mood. As soon as they saw him, they began to cast spells, none of which were elemental. All of them are to restrain him and prevent him from running, but he is swift at avoiding them. Except for the man with the golden eyes. He is the only one who is casting lethal spells at him.

Kushim retreats inside once again, but he balks at how easily his wards are taken apart. "I gave you a chance." Said the man with the golden eyes. "But you did not listen."

Kushim is sent flying, and things go hazy for a moment. He is aware that the fragment is taken from him, but he is unable to do anything about it. He regains his awareness, only to watch the group walking outside of the cave, not even bothering to look at the other research he has lying around, to which they don't pay any attention at all.

He got up to go after them and give them a piece of his mind, but he stopped outside to see them disappear into a strange portal. Portals are an insanely difficult bit of magic, requiring too much energy and an entire team of mages to work day and night to send one object to another location. But these people did it so easily. Not only that, but they did it to themselves. They appeared out of a portal, and they disappeared into one.

Deciding that he is not going to bother about people who are so above his level, Kushim prepares to escape. The men of the king are here, and they want some answers. After putting his lab on lockdown, Kushim escapes on an enchanted carpet. "See you losers later." He waved at them, while they fired arrows at him which failed to reach their target.

PART 3.

Josh was trying to place the man they had encountered. He finally remembered who he was. "I think he was Kushim."

"Who is Kushim?" Asked Shin.

"Isn't that the first sorcerer?" Asked Raven. "I do remember he looked different in the pictures."

"Probably because that picture was drawn later." Said Josh. "I think this was before he became a sorcerer, and left the planet later on."

"Any records of him from the galaxy?" Asked Munshi.

"Not any I know of." Said Josh. "Either he is dead, or he likes his isolation like Hatori."

"He certainly had right instincts." Said Hatori, the lover of Isolation. "No one else could have avoided us like that unless they have encountered a lot of problems in their life where they needed to escape in a hurry."

"But that is not enough to become a sorcerer, right?" Asked Tom. "I mean if you are constantly running away all the time, sooner or later you will end up in a corner."

"I don't think running away is the only thing." Said Hatori. "I think strife is one thing that would constantly push you until you reach a level beyond everyone."

"Of course, you'll think that way." Said Shin. "I am certain there are some peaceful ways as well."

"Besides," Continued Hatori, ignoring Shin entirely, "There is always a chance that he might have something up his sleeve. We didn't corner him hard enough. Remember, even I used to run all the time in the early years of my Academy."

They all shook their heads. Their early school years were not fun. They rather not remember them. Most adults recall their school years fondly, but they don't. Not even Avinash is fond of that time, even though his time was relatively peaceful.

"Do you think he might remember this encounter?" Asked Shin. "I rather not have some sorcerer coming after me because of how harshly Hatori treated him."

"He won't." Said Hatori. "Once all the fragments are gathered, the events will be wiped out, and the timeline will be in order. We will remember this of course, since we will be the ones living after the disaster. It won't alter the past or something like that. If only it did that though..." Hatori trailed off. Good thing Samay told him when he talked to her about this topic. It made sure Hatori did not end up forming some misconceptions.

They all get a faraway look. There are a lot of events they all would like to change. But events of the past are set in stone. Trying to change them is a disaster, like the one they are trying to fix right now.

PART 4.

While the group of Hatori is busy gathering the broken fragments of the time, life goes on in the current time. People are coping with the broken and dysfunctional time, and both sides are having difficulties due to it. Luckily, the day and night order has remained the same.

In India, there is some trouble. It has been long enough that police have mages in their ranks. But the problem is that the criminals do too. As a result, magical battles between these two groups frequently break out. The criminals and police both have an understanding of the destructive potential of magic on the other side. But this understanding is still lacking in India, so the battles are much more violent and destructive.

Naresh and Avinash also had a nasty argument. "It is your problem; you are the one to blame! We are all suffering because of you."

"Is that so?" asked Avinash with a furious tone. "You were singing such a different tone back then. Why did you come crawling to us when your entire cabinet was killed? Why didn't you initiate the hunt for the cyborg criminals by yourself then?"

Naresh leaves the meeting in a huff. Avinash knows that bringing up that whole incident was a low blow, but he has gotten tired of the Prime Minister constantly putting the blame on him and the magical side for everything bad that is going on in his country, even though they have nothing to do with it.

Except for the broken time problem. Avinash cannot wriggle out of it, even if he wants to. Not that anyone knows that the whole thing started from his country. He has kept this hidden from everyone. He would be hemmed in from both sides if that information got leaked.

As if this was not enough, when the news of the blockade came out after it was observed from the other side, it started a whole new wave of panic. "Well, looks like the alien cat is out of the bag." Said Suresh, when he heard about it.

"Damn, pointy-eared bitches! They are cursed I tell you. Nothing has gone well ever since they landed on this world." Ranted Avinash. The whole Fifth War is their fault, as far as he is concerned. The lying worms.

Thankfully, the trio of races consisting of Dwarves, Goblins, and Orcs were ready to interact with the other side and sort out this trouble. Though they refused to contact with the normal people. If only they had a hundred years more. By then, magitech would be advanced enough, he would be retired, and others would take care of these problems for themselves. They at least would be able to impose themselves in the surrounding space territory of their solar system, instead of relying on the tender mercies of other races.

But now, no one can do a thing. Not even the other side, even though they have much more advanced space technology. They couldn't even handle one rogue group in the sphere of Earth, trying to perform a military operation outside of the solar system is a joke that does not sound funny to anyone. So, sitting and waiting is the only option they have left, they are all hoping that this entire incident will soon be over like a bad nightmare.