King of Chakda – Part 1: The Pawn

Rohan Mukherjee had spent four long years confined to a cramped cubicle in Sector V, producing blog posts and SEO articles for an IT firm that paid just enough to keep him alive. His boss, Mr. Sanyal, offered little more than a perfunctory nod; when deadlines were missed, Rohan bore the full weight of the management team's scorn.

"Content writing is the easiest job; you just type nonsense all day," his colleagues would jeer. "Even ChatGPT could do your work better."

Yet, with rent rising and a family in Chakda relying on him, Rohan had no alternative. His meager earnings left him with barely enough for tea and roadside cigarettes.

One rain-soaked evening, after enduring yet another day of professional humiliation when a junior developer's promotion cut deep, Rohan sought refuge in a dim tea shop near his home. It was there that Shibu appeared, an old friend now enmeshed in the underbelly of Chakda.

"Brother, do me a favor. I need you to write a short piece," Shibu said, sliding a crumpled scrap of paper across the table.

Rohan’s eyes scanned the note. It detailed an illicit sand mining operation along the Hooghly, a practice he had observed in his youth yet never truly questioned.

"Has anyone tried to intimidate you?" Rohan inquired, his tone steady and cautious.

Shibu paused before nodding. "This is bigger than you think. The forces behind it are dangerous."

A subtle smirk crossed Rohan’s face. After years of ghostwriting for nameless corporate overlords, this was his chance to create something with genuine impact.

He accepted the assignment.

Within two days, his inbox overflowed with threatening messages. Later, at 2 AM, a stone shattered his window, and soon after, a blood-stained envelope arrived bearing a single, chilling message:

"Stop writing or the next blood will be yours."

For too long, Rohan had been relegated to a background role, underpaid and unappreciated, a pawn in a vast, indifferent game. Now, driven by an unyielding desire to break free, he realized that every pawn that reaches the far side of the board carries the potential to become a king.