✵ I. The Boy Who Could Not Sit Still
By eight, Uyyalawada Narasimha Reddy had acquired a reputation in the village.
Not as "hero" or "future king" or "gifted prodigy."
Those titles would come later, when history had time to catch up.
For now, he was known in simpler words:
"Dora's boy… cannot sit quietly."
He could sit for hours if the topic interested him:
a dispute about water,
a trader arguing about rates,
a story about ancient kings,
a discussion of how many bullocks it took to pull a full cart from the coast.
But ask him to sit and do nothing?
He would squirm, complain, and eventually find some problem to poke his nose into.
One afternoon, his mother found him sprawled on the veranda, staring up at the roof beams with an expression of intense boredom.
"Narasimha," she said, "you look like a lizard waiting for death. What happened?"
"Nothing happened," he groaned. "That is the problem. No market today. No disputes. No festival. Even Rangaiah's cow is too tired to cause trouble. World is lazy."
"World is working," she corrected. "You are the one refusing. If you are so bored, help in the storeroom."
He sat up immediately, horrified.
"Amma, that room is full of sacks and sadness," he protested. "No light, only dust. I will die."
She raised an eyebrow.
"If you can calculate salt profits, you can count our grain," she said. "Go. Your father is inside, checking stock. Take your clever tongue and your slow hands with you."
He dragged himself to the storeroom like a condemned man.
Inside, however, his eyes began to glow.
❖ II. The Storeroom That Was Really a Map
The storeroom was more than a room.
It was a cross-section of the entire estate.
Sacks of grain from different villages, each with a small mark to show origin.
Bundles of cotton thread, rough and un-dyed.
Piled brass vessels, iron sickles, spare tools.
Clay pots of oil. Dried chillies hung from beams.
His father was running a hand over a sack, checking for insects.
"Ah, the lizard woke up," he said without turning. "Close the door. The mice are learning Sanskrit listening to us talk."
Narasimha shut it, squinting in the dim light.
"Appa," he said slowly, "all this… is ours?"
His father shrugged.
"Ours to guard, not to hoard," he said. "Some is for the house. Some is for the village in bad times. Some is for trade. Some is for bribing officials when they become too nosy."
The boy walked among the stacks, fingers brushing coarse cloth, cool brass, dusty sacks.
"How much grain do we lose to rot?" he asked. "To rats? To… stupidity?"
His father snorted.
"Too much," he said. "Even with locks and cats, some always disappears."
Narasimha pursed his lips.
He saw something suddenly:
This was not just a room.
This was security.
This was power.
This was future leverage.
"This is wrong," he muttered.
His father looked up sharply.
"What is wrong?" he asked. "Counting? Work? Or entire world? Choose carefully."
"This," Narasimha said, gesturing around. "All this sitting in one place. Waiting. Doing nothing."
His father frowned.
"Storage is necessary," he reminded. "If we don't keep reserves—"
"I know," Narasimha interrupted, "I know, I listened before. Reserve is good. But why only one reserve? If thieves or Company or bad years swallow this room, we lose too much at once."
He looked around again, eyes narrowing.
"We should have… many small stomachs," he said slowly, searching for the right metaphor, "instead of one big one. If one is cut, body still lives."
His father's brows rose.
"You are saying we should split stock into multiple stores," he translated. "Hidden ones."
Narasimha nodded vigorously.
"Yes. Some near temples, some in trusted farmers' houses, some in caves. Not too much in any one place. Only we, and a few we trust, should know how much in each. Then, if trouble comes, even if one is taken, others remain."
His father studied him for a long moment.
"You think like a man planning for war," he said slowly, "not like a child thinking of sweets."
Narasimha scowled.
"I also think of sweets," he grumbled. "Don't insult me. But I am tired of hearing that one raid can wipe out years of saving. If we work so hard, we should not let one greedy hand undo everything."
His father smiled, the tired kind of smile that only appears when someone feels both old and hopeful.
"All right," he said. "Let us see what your 'many stomachs' look like."
✢ III. The First Secret Storehouse
The first "hidden" warehouse was not a grand underground fortress.
It was a small, unused building on the edge of the village near a rocky outcrop—half storage shed, half forgotten shrine.
It had a good roof, thick walls, and one door.
No one paid much attention to it.
"Perfect," Narasimha murmured when he saw it. "Nobody watches quiet people."
His father arranged for a quiet cleaning and repair, under the excuse of "extra house storage." A few trusted workers moved sacks at odd times, never enough at once to draw eyes.
Slowly, grain, oil, spare tools, and—at Narasimha's insistence—a few of his salt stocks began to flow there.
He made a crude map on a palm leaf:
House store – this much.
Temple side storeroom – this much.
Hidden shed – this much.
He used small marks for each type of resource.
His mother and grandmother watched him one afternoon as he muttered to himself over that leaf, scratching symbols.
"You look like a tax officer," his grandmother declared. "I am afraid."
"I am the opposite," he said loftily. "I am designing a system where our own people do not starve when tax officers visit."
His mother sat beside him.
"Do not forget," she said quietly, "what is stored for others is not for us to eat when we feel like it. Only when they truly need."
He nodded.
"I know, Amma," he said. "If I steal from their future, then what is the difference between me and… them?"
"Them" needed no explanation.
British.
Greedy collaborators.
Men who wore turbans but spoke Company words.
❖
Moving things was only half the work.
The other half was keeping quiet.
That… was harder.
His friends were naturally curious.
"You go with your father so often now," one grumbled. "We just see you disappear with Ramu and sacks. What are you doing? Eating rice in secret?"
"Yes," Narasimha said straight-faced. "I sit on a grain throne and eat all day. That is why I am still this thin."
They laughed and moved on.
Only a tiny handful of people knew the truth:
his parents,
Ramu,
the priest,
and one or two field-owners whose properties hid certain entrances.
The priest did the first small blessing at the hidden shed.
"May this place never be seen by those who come only to take," he murmured, pouring a trickle of water at the threshold. "Let it open for hands that give, close for hands that steal."
Narasimha stood beside him, intensely solemn.
In his chest, the quiet lion purred approval.
✶ IV. Cloth, Colour, and Calculations
By nine, the salt trade had become routine.
He was bored.
"Salt is good," he told his father, "but it is boring. All white. My eyes feel like they are staring at sky every day. I want… colours."
His father eyed him warily.
"How many colours?" he asked.
"Not too many," Narasimha said quickly. "Just… some. Maybe… cloth."
Cloth was a different beast.
Salt was necessity.
Cloth was both necessity and display.
He watched the weavers in nearby villages, their looms clicking and clacking in dim, narrow rooms. He listened to them complain:
"Traders pay late."
"Thread costs more each month."
"Company cloth from mills is coming. They say it will be cheaper. What will happen to us?"
He watched women in his own village run fingers over fabrics in the market, wistful.
"If we had better price," one sighed, "maybe we could buy one extra sari this year."
He watched British officers arrive in finely woven coats, a different world's industry wrapped around their shoulders.
"You want to handle cloth also?" his father asked, when he finally brought it up. "Salt was small. Cloth deals with many egos. Colours make tongues loose."
"All the more reason to step in before someone else does," Narasimha argued. "Right now, local weavers get crushed by middlemen. If we make direct agreements with them… and do not cheat… later, when Company cloth arrives, we will already have loyalty."
His father was silent.
He saw the danger.
He also saw the opportunity.
"You are nine," he said finally. "Most nine-year-olds worry about catching fish, not catching markets."
"I also worry about catching fish," Narasimha said quickly. "They run too fast. Cloth is easier."
His father sighed.
"Start small," he repeated the same warning. "Always small first."
❖
So Narasimha did.
He took a tiny fraction of his profits and some family reserve money—with full, written permission this time—and went to one weaver he trusted.
An old man with thin frame, knotted fingers, and eyes that brighten only when threads passed through them.
"Ayya," Narasimha said respectfully, "if we buy your cloth in bulk at fair price, will you agree that we handle selling in certain villages?"
The weaver squinted.
"You?" he said. "Little lion will sell my cloth?"
"If you don't want help, I will go," Narasimha said with a shrug. "But next year, when Company cloth arrives cheaper, do not curse us. Curse only your fate."
The old man's eyes sharpened.
"You speak like you've seen future," he muttered.
"I listened to traders," the boy replied. "They say big ships bring cloth that is strong and cheap. If we do not prepare, they will drown you."
He made an offer:
A modest but fair price per length,
upfront payments in small portions,
with the Uyyalawada house guaranteeing the rest.
In return, he asked:
certain patterns and qualities to be reserved first for their network,
permission to dye some cloth with colours of his choosing, to test markets.
The weaver thought.
"This is risk," he said. "But so is doing nothing."
He looked at the boy again—not as Dora's son, not as child, but as something else.
"Very well, Narasimha," he said. "Let us see if your words can weave better than our threads."
✢ V. Colours in the Courtyard
The first batch of cloth arrived a fortnight later.
Bundles of soft, plain cotton, neatly folded.
Narasimha, his mother, and his grandmother gathered in the courtyard.
"This is… nice," his mother said, feeling it between her fingers. "Soft. Strong enough. But plain."
"Exactly," he said.
He had spoken to a local dyer—an old woman famous for her stubborn nature and extraordinary indigo.
"Amma," he told her, "if we bring cloth, can you colour it like the evening sky, like deep leaves, like turmeric?"
She eyed him.
"You will pay properly?" she asked.
"Yes," he said. "Not with promises. With coin."
"And you will not then say, 'But I am Dora's son, give discount'?" she pressed.
He held up both hands.
"If I do, you can hit me with your dye stick," he swore. "In front of everyone."
She considered, then grunted.
"Bring," she said.
Now, as the newly dyed cloth lay drying on lines in the courtyard—deep blues, rich yellows, earthy reds—Narasimha watched women walking past pause, stare, whisper.
"Whose cloth is this?"
"Look at that blue!"
"Where did they get this?"
His grandmother smirked.
"You have made our house into market," she remarked. "Soon, I will have to collect rent from you."
He grinned.
"Take rent in cloth," he suggested. "You'll be most colourful grandmother in village."
She swatted him lightly.
❖
He didn't open a shop.
He simply let word spread:
"If you want good cloth, strong and fairly priced, go to Uyyalawada house. Ask for Narasimha."
At first, buyers were few.
Then, as women wore his cloth to wells and festivals, more came.
He kept prices slightly above market cheap cloth—but below the exploitative trader's rates.
He kept quality consistent.
He offered something few others did:
"If it tears within three months from our stitching, bring it. We will see what went wrong."
Sometimes, he would quietly replace a piece from his own profit, if he thought the fault lay with him or his chosen weaver.
"Why?" Ramu asked once. "You lose money."
"I gain trust," Narasimha replied. "Trust is a coin that pays later."
✶ VI. Iron That Watched the Night
Textiles brought colour.
Iron brought sharpness.
He had watched tools and sickles enough to know:
A good blade made the difference between a decent harvest and injury.
But what interested him most was not just farming tools.
It was iron that could become weapons.
He was only nine.
He was not planning armies yet.
But he was already thinking:
If things change… if we must fight… our people should not walk into battle holding sticks while Company holds guns.
He began with sickles and spears.
Sickles were normal.
Spears… less so.
"Why do we need spears?" his mother asked, eyebrows raised, as he examined long shafts of wood with metal tips at the blacksmith's.
"For… boar," he said innocently. "And wolves. And British officers who forget their limits."
She gave him a look.
"Repeat that last part again?" she asked.
"Boar and wolves," he said quickly.
His father, overhearing, pinched the bridge of his nose again.
"We will store the spears quietly," he decided. "Not in the open courtyard."
So they did.
In one of the "many stomachs" Narasimha had insisted on creating, iron began to accumulate:
farming tools in front,
sharpened spearheads behind, wrapped in cloth.
The boy made a list.
His father added:
Only trusted houses get these if trouble comes. Others panic and wave them around like broomsticks.
Narasimha nodded.
"Tools are for people who work," he said. "Weapons are for people who think before they hit."
✢ VII. The First Whisper of a Network
By ten, his ventures had settled into a rhythm:
Salt: stable, modest profit, used to keep his eye on food needs.
Cloth: growing, tying weaver communities to his house, creating goodwill.
Iron: slow build, more about quiet preparation than money.
Hidden stores: expanding, with a few discrete nodes in nearby villages.
But something else also began to form.
It started with small requests.
A weaver's nephew in another village who knew when British patrols passed.
A bullock-cart owner who travelled between markets and could carry messages along with goods.
A temple assistant who saw which men met secret at night.
These people began to bring him information, casually at first:
"Dora's boy, I heard in the next taluk, Company planning new tax."
"On the road to Kurnool, some men stopped a cart and asked if grain was being moved to rebels."
"New officer has come. He drinks too much and talks too loudly in the inn."
He listened.
He stored details in his head, then on palm leaves in small, almost code-like notes:
Road to X – now watched. Avoid for large grain movements.
Officer Y – weak to flattery, afraid of superior's letter. Send someone with honeyed tongue.
Village Z – weaver's son can read English signs. Potential future asset.
He did not yet call it intelligence.
To him, it was just being prepared.
But the shape of something larger was there:
The first threads of what, in time, would become Rahasya Mandal—the Secret Circle.
For now, it was just Narasimha and "a few people who knew lots of things."
Even that was enough to begin tilting odds quietly.
✹ VIII. The File Thickens in Madras
In Madras, the same bored British clerk sighed as more reports piled on his table.
He flipped through them lazily.
"Flood dispute in…"
"Minor riot in…"
"Cholera in…"
Then his eye caught a familiar name.
Native report, Rayalaseema region: Uyyalawada chieftain's son (age approx. 9–10) has reportedly begun more extensive trade activities. Handles salt, some textiles, and iron implements. Villagers refer to him half-jokingly as 'small merchant Dora'. Notably, he keeps careful ledgers and seems to maintain popular support by 'fair pricing'. No overt anti-Company statements recorded directly, but family known for subtle resistance. Suggest continued observation.
He snorted.
"A child merchant again," he muttered. "These natives give importance to anyone who can count."
Yet, something made him underline again:
careful ledgers
popular support
subtle resistance family
On another page, another note from a different informant:
The boy is said to have ideas about splitting grain stores and hiding weapons. Could be mere talk. Still, perhaps worth attention.
That, he circled.
He shuffled the papers together, wrote on the cover in English:
Subject: Uyyalawada estate – potential future agitators.
He stamped it, placed it in a drawer, and went on to other matters.
He did not know that years later, that file would be reopened in a panic, revised from "potential agitator" to "key threat."
For now, the Empire only frowned distantly at a boy who sold salt and cloth.
✵ IX. Under the Banyan, Near the Boundary
Not only men watched him.
Other beings, in other corners of the merged universe, had begun to notice the unusual ripples emanating from a small node in South India.
Deep below the Earth, where ancient energy lines crossed, a sorcerer sat surrounded by diagrams.
He was not of any one tradition—his lineage was older than that distinction.
On one of his maps, certain spots glowed faintly, where fate was thin and vulnerable.
Uyyalawada pulsed softly.
"Again," he murmured. "That soul."
His disciple, a young man who had just returned from a long journey, knelt.
"Master?" he asked.
"The one the higher ones reincarnated with special favour," the sorcerer said. "He begins to create… structures. Reserves. Networks. He is still far from the front lines of what is coming. But he will matter when the outer worlds press harder."
"Should we intervene?" the disciple asked.
The sorcerer shook his head.
"Not yet," he replied. "Let him grow under his own sky. Too much direct guidance now will make him brittle. He must discover some things by himself. Fate has given him enough… tools."
On a different plane, one of the Vishanti—Agamotto, perhaps, or one of his early successors—glanced at a shimmering scrying circle.
It showed brief flickers:
A boy measuring salt.
Building hidden stores.
Deflecting petty injustice with clever words.
"Is this the one you mentioned?" a voice asked from behind.
"Yes," the watcher replied. "A soul with unusual anchors. Hindu deities have placed their sign on him. Our interference will be limited."
"Does he threaten Earth's balance?" the questioner asked.
"Not yet," came the reply. "If anything, he may hold a part of it later. For now… we simply observe. Drastic actions cause cracks. We have enough cracks between realms already."
The scrying circle dimmed.
Uyyalawada faded from their active attention.
But not from their awareness.
✦ X. Gods Discuss Grain and Futures
In Vaikuntha, the Trimurti and Tridevi met again, this time with the easy familiarity of parents dropping in on a distant child through an unseen window.
They watched Narasimha supervise the discreet loading of sacks onto a cart.
"Those two in front," he instructed Ramu, voice careful, "you say are for house. Those three behind, you say are going to temple. The ones in middle, you say nothing about unless asked directly. If asked directly, you tell truth. Until then… quiet."
Ramu chuckled.
"You'd make a fine smuggler," he said.
"I'd make a tired one," Narasimha replied. "Smuggling is just trade plus more fear. I prefer trade."
Lakshmi smiled.
"He is learning to live in the grey between open and hidden," she said. "Difficult space."
Saraswati nodded.
"His mind is beginning to hold multiple maps at once," she observed. "Where things are. Where people think they are. Where they must never be."
Parvati's gaze flickered between boy and sacks.
"He will have to remember so many mouths," she murmured. "So many who depend on these quiet decisions."
Maheshwara's aura darkened with approval.
"Good," he said. "The more clearly he sees cause and effect now, the less likely he is to waste his long years later on foolish experiments."
Brahma, reading further ahead than the others, saw glimpses:
secret forts carved into hills,
trains moving under his policies,
spy networks tracing lines from Lahore to Lanka, all rooted in this boy's current choices about where to place a single sack.
"Every empire," he said softly, "is built on the back of small, boring choices. Not just the dramatic ones."
Vishnu chuckled.
"And here he is, hating boring work and yet doing more of it than most grown men," he said. "He complains… but he still sits and counts."
Lakshmi's eyes glinted with mischief.
"He will complain to his future queen also, I think," she mused. "About meetings, about files, about men who can't understand simple fairness."
Parvati laughed.
"As long as he does the work, we can grant him complaints," she said. "Better that than a king who smiles all day and lets others bleed in silence."
✵ XI. The Encounter at the Well
One small incident, seemingly insignificant, quietly confirmed the path he was on.
At the village well, women gathered every morning to draw water and exchange news.
Narasimha, passing by with Ramu, overheard one of them say:
"Since Dora's boy started his business, salt and cloth both feel… safer. Before, I used to worry that if my husband fell ill, we'd have nothing. Now… we know they won't squeeze us as much."
Another added,
"He argues like a mad fellow sometimes. But when Company officer came last month and tried to raise tax, he was there, in front, asking such sharp questions that the man backed off a little."
A third woman laughed.
"My son says he wants to be like him," she said. "Trade, fight, then go home and cry about work."
They laughed.
Narasimha flushed slightly, half-embarrassed, half-proud.
After they moved on, Ramu nudged him.
"Did you hear?" he asked.
"No," Narasimha muttered, pretending not to care. "My ears were full of dust."
"Your mouth will be full of ego if I repeat it," Ramu teased. "They trust you. Remember that when you price things."
He scowled.
"I know," he said. "Trust is heavier than grain. Harder to carry."
He touched his chest unconsciously, where the Ichha-Marana boon sat like a second heart.
If they trust me for too long, he thought, I must live long enough to deserve it.
The thought both comforted and tired him.
✢ XII. The Paperweight of Destiny
On his tenth birthday, his father gave him a gift that was not toy, weapon, or coin.
It was a stone.
Smooth, grey, heavy, with faint stripes.
Narasimha blinked.
"Appa," he said slowly, "did you forget to wrap the real gift?"
His father smiled.
"This is the gift," he said. "It is not just stone. It is a paperweight."
The boy frowned.
"For all the papers I will never write?" he asked hopefully.
"For all the papers you will have to hold down when wind tries to blow them away," his father replied. "Listen, kanna. You love moving things—salt, grain, cloth. But as your trade grows, so will your records. So will the information others try to steal. You need something to remind you: some things must be held firm."
He put the stone in the boy's hand.
"Whenever you feel like throwing all your ledgers into the well and running away to become a simple farmer," he said wryly, "hold this. Remember: if you let your records fly, chaos will eat what you built."
Narasimha weighed it.
It felt… right.
Heavy enough to be solid. Not so heavy that it hurt.
"Appa," he said quietly, "why are you always giving me things that make my work more complicated?"
"Because," his father answered, "the gods made you with too much potential. I am just trying to cut it into shape."
His mother watched them from the doorway, a quiet ache in her eyes.
Her son should have been worrying about slates and simple games.
Instead, he held a stone that was really a symbol:
Anchor yourself, or you will be blown about by the winds of your own ambition and other people's needs.
That night, he placed the stone on his small palm-leaf ledger.
It sat there, simple and unmoving.
He stared at it for a long time.
Then he muttered:
"If you are going to sit on my work, at least bring more strength with you."
Deep in his chest, the Ichha-Marana boon throbbed once, like an answering drum.
✶ XIII. Closing the "Growing Merchant Prince" Arc
By the time he neared the end of his tenth year, Narasimha's world had changed in ways that most grown men would struggle to manage:
He had multiple supply lines: salt from coastal traders, cloth from weavers, iron from blacksmiths.
He maintained hidden reserves of grain, tools, and weapons, known only to a small circle.
He had begun to think in terms of routes, nodes, and trust networks.
British eyes had begun to occasionally flick toward Uyyalawada with curiosity rather than complete dismissal.
Mystics and cosmic watchers had filed him mentally as "to be watched later."
And yet, he was still:
a boy who argued every night about the amount of homework,
a son who tried to dodge baths by claiming, "Dust protects skin,"
a friend who would wrestle in the dirt and then go sit in a meeting with his father, pretending to be serious while his knees were still scraped.
He had not yet led armies.
He had not yet openly defied the Empire.
He had not yet worn a crown.
But in the space of five short years, from the first injustice he witnessed to his tenth birthday, he had done something equally important:
He had learned to move resources without losing himself.
He had made his first compromises without betraying his vow.
He had started to build the skeleton of an unseen economic shield that would one day support his visible rebellion.
Above, the gods slowly turned from "structuring his soul" to "watching what he did with it."
Below, the earth quietly adjusted itself, making room for the weight of an immortal rebel king who was still, for now, just a child grumbling about paperwork.
And somewhere in between, in that thin line where choice meets destiny, a future empire sharpened its claws in the dust of Rayalaseema—
while its architect, ten years old and already too tired, muttered before sleep:
"Tomorrow… no new ideas. I will just sit and rest."
He would not.
The universe already knew.