𑁍 Chronicle Note: Time & Turning 𑁍
Years Covered: 1830–1833 CE
Narasimha's Age: ~30–33 years
Rudrama Devi & Rajendra: Born c. 1828–1829 – in this chapter, they grow from toddlers to lively four-year-olds.
Realm Status:
Dakshina Rajya is secure and prospering.
The British hold the north but are wary of the south.
The Treaty of Kesarinagara still holds.
The lion turns his attention from war… to foundations.
I. The Question of What Comes After
By 1830, the memory of cannon smoke had begun to fade from Kesarinagara's streets.
Not because the realm had grown complacent.
Because Narasimha refused to allow it to live forever on the fumes of war.
In the great Sabha Mandapa, the map of Bharat and the wider world was rolled up and set aside for once. Instead, charts of a different kind covered the floor:
tables of literacy rates by district,
lists of local teachers and pandits,
notes on village crafts,
drafts of new curriculum outlines.
On the dais, Narasimha sat cross-legged, bare-footed, crown placed carelessly beside him like any other ornament.
Sri knelt at a low desk, ink on her fingers.
Venkanna leaned on his staff nearby.
Kaveri sat at the back of the hall with a pile of petition scrolls, watching in silence. Two tiny figures were sprawled at her feet:
Rudrama Devi, hair in two uneven braids, making fierce faces at a wooden lion toy.
Rajendra, clutching a chalk shard, quietly copied letters on the cool stone floor.
Narasimha tapped a palm-leaf.
"These," he said, "are reports from our Zilla Sabhas. We have:
gurukulas in many temple towns,
Some Company-era schools we reclaimed,
village teachers teaching under banyan trees,
and none of it is connected."
He looked up.
"We have thrown out the English from the south, but… if in fifty years our children still can't read a simple text in their own tongue, what have we truly won?"
Sri nodded.
"Right now," she said, "only the wealthy, the high-born, or the fortunate get real schooling.
If we want a realm that can survive:
new weapons,
new ideas,
even new… worlds"—her glance flicked subtly upward, where unseen cosmic watchers drifted—
"Then we must make learning as common as monsoon rain."
Venkanna smiled faintly.
"Old Bharat knew the value of learning," he said. "Gurukulas, agraharas, shreni guild training… but it was often narrow—one caste, one path.
The British brought their schools, their 'modern' learning… but tied it to their rule.
You want to keep the best of both and throw out the poison."
Narasimha sighed.
"As always," he said, "I want the impossible."
From the back, Kaveri's voice floated gently.
"You want our grandchildren to stand taller than we did," she said. "That is not impossible. Only… long."
Rudrama Devi looked up at the word "school."
"Nanna," she called, scrambling to her feet and marching over, "when can I go and learn sword and numbers together?"
Rajendra followed, quieter.
"And drawing ships," he added. "And secret codes."
The council chuckled.
Narasimha stared at them for a long moment.
"Soon," he said softly. "Very soon. For you—and for every child from Kanyakumari to Nallamala, from Cochin to Bellary."
He turned back to the charts.
"Then decide with me," he said to the council. "What does Dakshina Vidya look like?"
II. Designing a New Vidya Mandala
The Education Council gathered over weeks: pandits, weavers, blacksmiths, women who managed large households, ex-English-schooled clerks, merchants, mystics, village elders.
It was not a quiet meeting.
1. The Four-Day School, Three-Day Life
A farmer from Nallamala spoke bluntly.
"Maharaja," he said, "we cannot send our children to classrooms six days a week like city folk.
We need:
hands in the field,
help with cattle,
boys and girls to learn our trades.
If schooling demands we give our children fully from dawn to dusk till they are nineteen, it will kill us."
An ex-company clerk countered,
"But without enough time in studies, how will they learn more than we did? If we want engineers, doctors, scribes—"
Narasimha raised a hand.
"Dharma must also be economic," he said. "We cannot pretend our realm is rich enough to let all children become full-time students for years.
So we do this:
Four days of structured schooling.
Three days with family:
fields,
crafts,
helping mothers,
apprenticeships.
That way, learning does not float above life.
It sits inside it."
Sri added,
Four days learning how numbers work. Three days touching the grain, those numbers count.
Four days learning about rivers in books. Three days actually walking by canal banks."
The farmer bowed.
"If that is the plan," he said, "then even the poorest will try to send their children."
2. Twin Pillars: Gurukula & Modern School
Saraswati's priests and modern-minded scholars argued next.
A conservative pandit frowned.
"If we build only these 'modern schools' with slates and benches," he said, "our children will forget:
the shastras,
the itihasas,
the language of the gods.
We will grow clever atheists who laugh at their own roots."
A younger scholar, trained in some European-style science, responded,
"And if we keep only old-style gurukulas, our children will be reciting verses by heart while British cannons and foreign machines roll over them in the future."
Venkanna tapped the floor.
"Then we do not choose one," he said. "We do both.
Every village and town that can sustain it will have:
a Gurukula – rooted in dharma, philosophy, classical languages, music, art, ethics.
a Modern School – arithmetic, basic science, geography, mechanical arts, foreign tongues, and accounting.
Children may attend one primarily, but they must learn from both."
Sri looked at Narasimha.
"You spoke of 'arts stream' and 'science stream'," she said softly. "We will create something like that, but with our own spine."
Narasimha nodded slowly.
"We call them:
Parampara Vidya (Tradition Stream) – shastra, dharma, language, history, arts.
Prayoga Vidya (Applied Stream) – mathematics, crafts, proto-engineering, commerce, health.
But every student must take at least one minor from the other stream.
No one walks on one leg alone."
A music teacher grinned.
"So a boy studying engineering must learn some poetry," she said. "And a girl studying literature must at least know how a pulley works."
"Exactly," said Sri. "So that in two hundred years, when men fly in the sky, and storms fall, our people are not split into dry machines and rootless dreamers."
They formalised it:
At lower level (~ages 6–10):
mixed classes under neem trees or in masonry halls;
basic letters, numbers, stories from epics and local lore, and practical tasks.
At middle level (~11–14):
children start leaning toward Parampara Vidya or Prayoga Vidya,
but must attend weekly sessions in both the Gurukula and the Modern School.
At a higher level (~15–17):
deeper specialisation,
apprenticeships in guilds, workshops, temples, local courts, or health centres,
Plus at least one minor subject from the opposite stream.
Above that, they envisioned:
Universities (Vidyapithas) in major cities,
Research Institutes (Anveshana Kendras) near ports, mines, and observatories.
But for 1830–33, the focus was the base of the pyramid:
"A school and/or gurukula in every gramam and town where at least twenty children can gather."
III. A Day in a Village of Learning
In 1832, in a small village in Rayalaseema, a boy named Somu and a girl named Meenakshi began their week.
Somu – Four Days of School, Three Days of Soil
On Sun's second day, Somu woke before dawn to milk the family cow.
His father, tightening the rope, grumbled,
"Quick, boy. School starts when the big shadow hits the well."
Somu wiped his hands and pulled on his simple angavastram.
He slung his cloth bag over his shoulder:
one palm-leaf notebook,
a broken piece of slate,
a stub of chalk,
a small cloth-wrapped roti.
The Modern School met in a long, airy hall built near the village tank.
On the mud-plastered wall, a teacher had chalked:
numbers,
letters in Telugu and Tamil,
a simple map of Dakshina Rajya.
"Today," the teacher announced, "we learn:
How to measure a field correctly,
basic addition and subtraction with grain,
And we read a story of when the King-Protector met the French envoy."
Somu's eyes shone.
He listened, scribbled clumsy numbers, laughed when the teacher dramatised Narasimha's dry answer to a pompous foreigner.
The next day, he sat cross-legged instead at the Gurukula, under a banyan.
A serene old woman—one of the new Gurukula Mahatyis, female teachers accepted by Narasimha's code—chanted lines from the Bhagavad Gita:
"Karmanye vadhikaraste, ma phaleshu kadachana…"
Somu repeated, stumbling over the sandhi.
"What does it mean, Amma?" he asked.
She smiled.
"It means, little lion," she said, "do your work, but do not cling to its fruits.
You study not because the king commands, but because knowledge is a friend that will not abandon you when the harvest fails."
On the fifth day, Somu did not go to school.
He walked with his father to the fields, measuring new plots.
"How many Bigha is this?" his father asked.
Somu squinted, remembered his lessons, and answered.
"That is how your schooling helps me," his father said gruffly. "You did in minutes what would have taken me an hour of guesswork."
Somu grinned.
He liked both worlds:
the chalk and maps,
the soil and sun.
Meenakshi – Parampara, Prayoga, and Balance
Meenakshi, a weaver's daughter, attended both institutions too.
At the Gurukula, she learned:
verses in Sanskrit and Tamil,
stories of queens, sages, and warriors,
music on a borrowed veena.
At the Modern School, she studied:
arithmetic,
patterns of trade,
The basics of loom mechanics.
When the teacher demonstrated how different weave angles changed fabric strength, she sat bolt upright.
"If we change this angle," she said, "and use a slightly tighter thread, could we make cloth harder to cut?"
The teacher blinked, then smiled.
"Bring a sample next week," he said. "We will test it."
In the evenings, she sat with her mother at the loom, fingers moving in rhythm.
"Will you leave weaving to become a 'big officer' in Kesarinagara?" her mother teased.
"Maybe I'll design looms for the entire kingdom," Meenakshi replied. "Then we can weave faster and better. And no Firangi cloth will tempt anyone."
Across Dakshina Rajya, thousands of Somus and Meenakshis walked similar paths:
Four days in the world of letters and stories,
three days in the world of work and responsibility.
The line between the two grew thinner.
That was the point.
IV. The Lion's Universities
While villages learned to read, the cities began to dream larger.
In Kesarinagara, Simha Vidyapitha—the Lion University—took shape.
Not a towering stone cathedral like European schools, but a cluster of:
airy halls,
courtyards,
shaded walkways,
a central library fragrant with palm-leaf and ink.
Its faculties were divided into:
Parampara Vidya Peetham – Sanskrit, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada literature, dharmashastra, music, fine arts, history.
Prayoga Vidya Peetham – mathematics, early physics, proto-chemistry, medicine (Ayurveda + empirical observation), mechanics, navigation.
Samagra Sabha – a joint forum where students from both had to attend debates.
Here, a student specialising in temple architecture also attended:
lectures on materials science,
sessions on flood-resistant design.
A young man learning to build water-lifting devices also listened to:
discourses on Niti Shastra,
discussions on the ethics of resource distribution.
Narasimha personally addressed the first batch.
"You are not here," he told them, "to become parrots that repeat books.
You are here to become:
bridges between old and new,
proof that we can walk into the future without leaving our ancestors' blessings behind.
One day, far in the future, when men fly in metal birds and ideas travel faster than light, I want the South to stand and say:
'We were ready. Our minds were honed. We were not children staring at giants—we were their peers.'"
Some students didn't fully understand.
But others, in quiet corners, felt goosebumps.
A girl from Cochin, studying navigation, whispered to a friend,
"What does he mean, 'metal birds'?"
Her friend shrugged.
"He's the King," he said. "He says such strange things. But if he's right… at least we'll know how to steer ships when those birds fall from the sky."
V. The Army That Was Everywhere and Nowhere
While the classrooms filled, the barracks did too.
Narasimha knew one thing clearly:
"Education will not save you if you cannot hold your borders."
He wanted a realm whose strength matched its schools.
1. Numbers Hidden in Plain Sight
By 1833, Dakshina Rajya's true military structure looked like this:
1 million trained standing soldiers – active, drilled, ready to move.
0.5 million in reserves – men and women who had completed their primary rotation and could be summoned quickly.
Total potential mobilization, with further levies: even higher.
On paper, however, to the outside world:
official reports,
diplomatic statements,
visible parade strength,
suggested an army of "a few hundred thousand" at most.
The deception worked because:
The army was spread across:
northern borders facing Nizam and Company territories,
coastal fortifications,
interior defensive posts,
and because a large portion of the reserve rotated in and out of civilian lives.
2. The Rotation System – A Southern Conscription
In a council of generals, Narasimha laid it out.
"In the future I remember," he said, "some lands have conscription—every youth must serve a time in arms.
We cannot copy it fully; our economy is different. But we can:
Invite volunteers for longer service,
and implement a light, rotating training for others."
The model they agreed upon:
Core Professional Force (Lion Legion, Royal Guard, specialist units):
career soldiers,
rigorous training,
long-term service.
Rotational Citizen Force:
Every district raised men (and some women) who trained:
a few months at a time,
then returned to farms, shops, duties,
repeated every few years.
This way:
no family lost its breadwinner permanently,
But within a generation, a large percentage of the population would:
know basic drill,
understand formations,
not freeze at the sight of an enemy line.
A Rayalaseema farmer named Ranga experienced it first-hand.
For three months of the year, he slept in a barracks, learning:
spear drill,
musket handling,
how to march in formation,
simple field medicine.
His sergeant told him,
"You may be at the plough when trouble comes. But when the signal beats, you will know how to form up, not run in confusion.
That is worth more than any number the enemy writes in his reports."
When Ranga returned home, he brought:
new discipline,
stories,
a sense of ownership.
"The army is not some other people," he told his wife. "It is… us. When the king says 'my soldiers', he means farmers like me who can pick up a spear without shaking too hard."
Across the south, tens of thousands like Ranga rotated in and out.
The effect was quiet but profound:
banditry dropped,
villagers trusted that distant capitals were not their only shield,
The idea of "Bharat's defence" stopped being abstract.
3. The Veiled Navy
The navy grew even more dramatically.
By 1833:
Over 1000 war-capable ships existed.
But only:
500 were openly declared "warships".
The rest:
were merchant vessels built with reinforced hulls, hidden gun ports, and modular fittings allowing rapid conversion to combat roles.
Foreign observers saw:
escorted convoys,
sturdy escorts,
a few larger flagships.
They did not see:
the deep coordination,
where a seemingly harmless spice fleet, if needed, could in days become a formidable strike force.
Training grounds in Cochin, Machilipatnam, and new dockyards along the Coromandel coast rang with commands.
A young sailor from Kerala learned to:
navigate by stars,
fire cannon,
hoist merchant flags of convenience,
Use new signal flags for silent communication.
"Our seas," an admiral told Narasimha, "will not be a British lake again.
If any empire comes with iron ships in the future, they will find we already know how to think like them—even if our hulls are still wood."
VI. Engines, Forges, and the Merchant Web
To sustain:
a million-strong army,
a thousand-ship navy,
expanding schools and universities,
Dakshina Rajya needed more than glorious speeches.
It needed money and machines.
1. Ambani Before Ambani
From his youth, Narasimha had quietly built a Merchant Alliance whose reach:
spanned from Lahore to Lanka,
touched Arab ports and Southeast Asian harbours,
infiltrated European supply chains.
By the early 1830s, his personal and state-linked wealth rivalled what, in another era, would be compared to industrial tycoons and billionaires.
"This money," Sri remarked once, flipping through revenue charts, "could build ten palaces of gold."
Narasimha snorted.
"Then let others build palaces," he said. "We will build:
factories,
foundries,
irrigation systems,
shipyards,
and schools."
2. Trading Where the Hunger Is Deep
Setty, the merchant magnate, presented a report.
"We have mapped demand," he said. "Not just in commodities, but in pain.
Where:
Northern farmers are squeezed for the Company's revenue,
West Asian markets lack stable suppliers,
European mills crave cotton not controlled by their rivals.
We sell where the hunger is deepest."
The Alliance specialised:
sending yarn where mills were starved,
sending pepper, cardamom, and turmeric to markets that paid a premium,
shipping salt and iron to regions under Company control quietly through intermediaries.
Profits flowed back like monsoon rivers into Dakshina Rajya.
They funded:
modern looms in weaving towns,
iron and steel foundries taught by both Indian smiths and foreign experts,
early experimentation with steam engines:
initially for pumping water,
then for mills and, in the minds of some, future locomotion.
In one workshop, a young artisan watched a primitive steam engine hiss and shudder.
"So much fuss for rotating one wheel," he grumbled.
His master, eyes shining, replied,
"Today, one wheel. Tomorrow, perhaps, entire carts without bullocks."
On another day, a Trinetra-linked engineer watched the engine, half-listening to a foreign manual.
He made notes not just on mechanics, but on patterns—ways energy could be harnessed.
Far in the future, when Stark reactors and alien tech would appear, this quiet habit of observation would matter.
3. Industrialising without Becoming Hollow
Narasimha insisted on one thing:
"We will not become slaves to foreign weaving while our own looms rust."
So:
Imported cloth was taxed in ways that protected local weavers,
foreign machines were invited—but adapted to local needs,
guilds were encouraged to blend:
traditional skills,
new tools.
In Tiruppur-like towns-before-their-time, clusters of small workshops produced textiles that could compete even with Manchester fabrics on some counts.
In coastal yards, carpenters learned to:
use foreign-style sawmills,
forge better anchors,
Experiment with copper sheathing.
The result was not a perfect, fully industrialised state.
But it was a realm that:
had its own factories,
understood mechanisation,
kept control over critical production,
so that when global storms hit, it would not shatter like brittle pottery.
VII. The Eyes That Were Seen and the Eyes That Weren't
While schools filled and foundries roared, another process, quiet and invisible, spread across continents.
1. Rahasya Seva – The Visible Shadow
The Dakshina Rahasya Seva, officially established in earlier years, has now matured.
It maintained:
offices in major cities,
attested agents in ports,
liaison officers with the army and navy.
Its duties:
track smuggling,
monitor potential traitors,
watch foreign envoys,
gather information on northern politics.
Everyone who thought they were clever spoke of "the Rajya's spies" as if Rahasya Seva was the entire story.
In Calcutta, a British intelligence officer briefed his superior.
"Their 'secret service' is… annoyingly competent," he said. "We know some of their methods now. We can counter on certain fronts."
He drew a small circle on his map.
"There," he said confidently. "This is the scope of their intelligence web."
He was wrong.
2. Trinetra – The Eye Between the Lines
Beneath Nallamala, in their lamp-lit cavern, Trinetra met less often now—but their work grew wider.
They existed:
In no official charter,
In no published budget,
In no foreign assessment.
Only:
the King-Protector,
Sri,
Venkanna,
a handful of carefully chosen successors,
knew the full chain.
Agents walked in many skins:
a cook on a French ship,
a clerk in a minor Company office in Bombay,
a dockworker in Muscat,
a translator in an Ottoman court,
a merchant's assistant in Cape Town.
Their reports did not clog the main government channels.
They flowed through secret lines:
carried in coded temple chants,
hidden in trade ledger anomalies,
whispered in confessions to trusted "wandering sadhus."
In Kesarinagara, Narasimha listened to a Trinetra handler.
"We have small footholds now," the handler said.
"In:
London—through an Indian lascar who learned just enough English to clean docks and listen,
Paris—through a half-Tamil trader's son,
Muscat and Basra—through old Arab connections,
even in American ports, where a few of our ships have gone chasing cotton prices."
"What do you see?" Narasimha asked.
The handler smiled thinly.
"Patterns," he said. "Europe is changing. Machines. Ideas. Wars.
And somewhere in all of this, forces beyond even their understanding.
We do not yet see the full storm. But we hear the first thunder."
Narasimha looked thoughtful.
"Let Rahasya Seva handle the obvious," he said. "Let them catch smugglers and traitors. Let foreign spies think that by understanding Rahasya Seva, they know our mind.
You… will live between their lines.
You will ensure that when the world shifts—because I know it will—the south is not surprised like a man sleeping under a falling tree."
The handler bowed.
"By your command, Maharaja," he said. "The third eye stays open."
VIII. Little Footsteps in the Palace
All these heavy decisions, all these numbers and systems, would have been unbearable if not for the sound of little feet.
In 1833, Rudrama Devi and Rajendra were four.
They had already claimed the palace as their kingdom.
One morning, Narasimha walked into a side hall and froze.
On the polished stone floor, someone had drawn an enormous wobbly mandala with chalk:
at the centre, a lion shape,
around it, ships, elephants, tiny stick figures.
Rudrama stood back, hands on her hips, evaluating her work.
Rajendra was adding little dots.
"What is this?" Narasimha asked, half stern, half amused.
Rudrama turned.
"This is our Rajya," she announced proudly. "See, Nanna? In the middle is you.
These are ships. These are forts. These are… schools."
Rajendra pointed at the dots.
"And these are secret eyes," he whispered conspiratorially. "They watch everything."
Narasimha stared.
"What kind of children are we raising?" he muttered to Kaveri, who appeared behind him, laughing.
"The kind who will inherit a realm full of spies and scholars," she replied. "What did you expect? Cows?"
He knelt by their drawing.
"Where are the villages?" he asked. "The fields? The wells?"
Rudrama frowned, then quickly added more circles.
"There," she said. "And there. And there."
Rajendra coloured in one dot extra carefully.
"This one," he said, "is a village where a boy will grow up and build big machines that help everyone. Amma told us."
Kaveri blinked.
"I said maybe he or she will build something useful," she corrected. "Not… prophecy."
Narasimha smiled, heart tight.
"In that village," he said quietly, "there is already a school and a gurukula.
Whoever that child is, they will not have to walk in darkness as long as we can help it."
Later that day, he visited a real school construction site on the edge of Kesarinagara.
Workers hoisted beams. Children peered shyly from behind their mothers' sarees.
An old man bowed.
"Raja," he said, "we never thought our grandchildren would see a day when men of all castes and women too could sit and learn together like this. Not just the priest's boy."
Narasimha looked at the half-finished hall.
"This building," he said, "is as sacred as any gopuram.
One day, when gods and heroes from other worlds tread this earth, when names like 'Stark' or 'Xavier' echo in far-off lands, I want our children to stand with them not as beggars of knowledge—but as equals.
For that, we start here, with your grandchildren tracing letters on the floor."
The old man smiled, toothless and bright.
"Then let them write crookedly now," he said. "Straight lines will come later."
IX. The Gods Take Note
High above, once more on the terrace beyond worlds, the divine assembly watched.
Lakshmi observed the new schools, the rotating troops, the growing shipyards, the web of trade.
"He is spending his wealth not merely on temples and rituals," she said, pleased. "But on the foundations of long prosperity."
Saraswati leaned forward.
"Listen," she said. "Listen to the sound of:
children chanting the alphabet,
workshop hammers,
pens, and scratching paper.
In Kaliyuga, such sounds are as sacred as Vedic recitation."
Parvati's gaze lingered on the four-year-old Rudrama and Rajendra.
"They grow," she said softly. "Their father builds a world they can inhabit without drowning. That is all a parent—mortal or divine—can truly do."
Vishnu's eyes were distant, measuring.
"With each school he builds," he murmured, "he shifts the probabilities.
When the Marvel storms arrive—Hydra, S.H.I.E.L.D., alien invasions, mutant awakenings—the south will not be a simple victim.
It will be… prepared in ways even the British could not foresee."
Maheshwara smiled faintly.
"And when the age calls him beyond kingship—when he must walk in other shadows, across centuries—this generation, taught by his systems, will not be empty."
Brahma wrote steadily.
"Chapter," he inscribed, "in which a king chooses to fight ignorance as fiercely as he once fought foreign guns."
He paused, then added a line.
Effect: Echoes through centuries, visible every time a child in the south chooses both roots and wings.
In the years 1830–1833, no great battles shook Dakshina Rajya.
No forts changed hands. No treaties were signed that made foreign courts gasp.
But in those quiet years:
schools rose in villages,
Gurukulas adapted,
universities opened their halls,
factories hummed,
ships multiplied,
soldiers rotated in and out of fields,
spies slipped through foreign streets unseen.
And two small children:
with chalk-dusted fingers,
loud questions,
and lion-blood in their veins,
grew up in a world their father was reshaping, not just with swords…
…but with systems meant to last long after guns grew louder and the sky itself filled with Marvels.
The seeds for a hundred generations were being planted.
They would be needed.
The world had not yet begun to understand what kind of storm was on its way.
✦ End of Chapter 46 – "Seeds for a Hundred Generations" ✦