Siren's debt

Vengeance Sown in Sand

[Previously on Siren's Debt...]

Dussehra, the festival of good triumphing over evil. But for Alex, the light of Indore's biggest fair turned into a terrifying dream. His uncle, Vikram, tricked him into signing the ancestral land documents and then struck Alex on the head with an iron rod, leaving him dying. As Alex lay in the dust, gasping for breath, he watched his mother and younger sister, Liama, being kidnapped in that black SUV... Now Continue

...

Silence... a silence that had the power to tear the eardrums. This silence wasn't one of peace; it was the silence after a catastrophe that had taken everything.

About 7-8 hours had passed. Indore's grand fairground, which had been crowded with thousands just hours earlier, now looked as desolate and eerie as a crematorium.

Somewhere in the distance, torn, colorful posters fluttered in the breeze, like the wings of a wounded bird. Strings of extinguished lights lay scattered on the ground like snakes.

When the first cold drop of night dew fell on my face, caked with mud and congealed blood, a bolt of lightning struck my body.

"Ah..."

A groan escaped my throat that might have shaken even Death itself. I tried to move, but my body had turned to stone. As I turned my head even slightly, a searing pain exploded in the back of my skull, as if someone had driven a blazing iron rod straight into my brain. Colorful stars danced before my eyes, and then darkness descended.

I clutched my head with trembling, lifeless hands. My fingers were soaked with a sticky, cold liquid. It was my own blood. The injury was so severe that a normal person would have died by now, but perhaps fate had something else in store for me.

I staggered to my knees and sat up.

Everything around me was blurry, as if I were viewing the world from underwater. My mind was screaming, memories flashing through my mind like a broken film reel. That black SUV... Uncle Vikram's savage smile... Liama's innocent, frightened face... and that last scream, still echoing in my ears.

"Mom! Liama!"

I called out my mother and sister's names with all my might, but my voice came out like a broken loudspeaker. There was no one to answer me in that vast field. I stood up like a madman, my legs faltering, but my eyes were filled with madness. I ran towards the spot where I had last seen them.

There were only deep tire marks imprinted in the dust. I searched every corner of the field. I searched for them behind broken swings, among bushes, in the blood-soaked soil.

"Mom... where are you? Liama!"

All I got in response was the rustle of the cool night breeze. My soul trembled.

Unable to bear the desolation of the field, I ran to the main city streets. The streets of Indore, where I'd grown up since childhood, seemed alien to me. It was past midnight, but the city hadn't fully slept. I stopped every passerby, stopped at every tea stall.

"Brother... please listen! A black SUV... my mother and sister... some people took them away!" I grabbed a rickshaw puller's hand.

He looked me up and down—torn clothes, blood-stained face, and disheveled hair. He jerked his hand away. "Get lost, you drunkard! He's fallen somewhere and died, and now he's pretending."

His words pierced my heart like a dagger. I signaled a police jeep to stop, but it sped away as soon as it saw me. This world's indifference broke me from within. I, who once walked with pride in the lineage of King Vikramaditya, was now worse off than a beggar on the streets of Indore.

I had no money, no mobile phone, no strength to stand up to those powerful thugs. My heart was ripping like a saw. Liama... she didn't even know the world well. What would those monsters do to her?

Other there, in a secret, damp warehouse on the outskirts of the city...

Mother and Liama were tied with ropes in a corner of the room. The only thing burning in the room was a yellow bulb, flickering intermittently. Liama's cries had turned into sobs, her throat dry.

Just then, the heavy iron door creaked open. Vikram entered, a glass of wine in his hand. Behind her were the same two tall, burly men who had beaten me.

"Hahaha! Bhabhi ji, this is just the beginning. Don't cry so much, it'll ruin your health," Vikram said, sitting on a sofa.

Mother glared at him, her eyes filled with hatred. "Vikram, you're torturing your brother's soul. God will never forgive you."

Vikram's face suddenly hardened. He slammed the glass on the table. "God? God is for the weak, Bhabhiji. I'm only interested in power and authority. And that 'Ocean'... it's not just an ocean. You probably forgot that Brother was often immersed in ancient scriptures. He discovered something on that shore that had been hidden for thousands of years. That ancestral treasure, that ancient power... it's mine alone!"

He leaned close to his mother's face and whispered, "As soon as this property is legally transferred to my name, I will descend into the depths of that ocean. Whatever is there will make me the most powerful and richest man in the world. And then... there will be no need for Alex or anyone like him."

Alex's helplessness and final destination...

As they walked, the first rays of dawn began to appear in the sky. Giving up, I faltered and reached the shore of the same mysterious sea that had destroyed my entire home. It was the same sea that my father had said was not just water, but a treasure trove of secrets.

The sun's glow was falling on the water, but my eyes saw only ashes. I collapsed on the cold, wet sand. My eyes were no longer filled with tears, for everything inside had been burned to ashes.

"What should I do, Father? I'm so weak..." I tried to scream, but no sound came out.

In anger and frustration, I began picking up stones and small shells lying near me and throwing them into the waves. Each stone was a symbol of my helpless anger.

Suddenly, my hand landed on something as hard as stone, but its shape was strange. I tried to pick it up, but it wouldn't even budge.

"What is this?" I thought. How could a small, fist-sized shell be so heavy? My eyes were fixed on the horizon ahead, where the sun and moon appeared together in the sky—a rare union. I used all my strength, my hand sinking into the sand. The shell... or whatever that mysterious object was, seemed to be pulling me down. It felt as if a demon was hiding beneath the sand, grabbing my hand and pulling me towards itself.

"No!"

I quickly plunged my other hand into the sand and pulled the object out with all my might. As soon as the object emerged from the sand, the ocean waves that had been making noise suddenly became completely still. The wind stopped blowing, as if all of nature had held its breath.

In my hand was a large shell, an ancient black and purple shell with a metallic sheen. Its surface was carved in a way no human could have done. It wasn't stone; it felt alive. A faint heat emanated from its surface, which began to rise in my veins.

Suddenly, from the cracks of the shell, thin, silky, and sharp, thread-like tentacles emerged. Before I knew it, they gripped my palm and wrist with lightning speed.

"Ah! What the hell is this!"

I tried to shake it off, but the shell was digging into my skin. The pain was so unbearable that it felt as if someone was tearing my nerves out alive. Just then, a resounding, heavy, and mechanical sound pierced the silence of my mind. It wasn't in my ears, but directly within my soul...

"As my eyes drifted shut, a terrifying realization hit me: I hadn't found this shell. It had found me. But had it come to save my life, or to claim my soul as the first installment of the debt?"