If you’re not familiar with the story so far, start here, at the beginning of the series. In Chapter 15, Kitaanu was visiting the kingdom of Parpur when he received a message from Kirumi. Read on to find out what happens next.

The message from Kirumi was a simple one.

“A ROBBERY WILL LEAD TO GREATNESS.”

Was that it? Kitaanu turned the letter over to see if there was any message behind it but it was blank.

Kitaanu decided to stop by Annukkulpuram once before travelling to meet Saanpesh, the king of serpents, whose kingdom lay deep in the south sea.

Just as Kitaanu trudged towards his chamber after a long flight home, his security team, consisting of deadly wasps, stopped him. Now that they were armed with Rogaanu’s specialized goggles, they said that they had sensed some suspicious activity inside.

Spies?

Spies from Batterji.

Kirumi’s wild guess had come true! But where was the greatness in it? Maybe he had to uncover it. He signalled his security to disarm the enemy.

He wanted to talk to the spies.

Translator moskits were called for help. They could tune into both Kitaanu’s flight tone and the bacteria’s chemical signal molecules. After conversing for hours on end, Kitaanu realized that fighting the enemy and getting to know them were two different things.

Bacteri, their king, was a bigger terror than Maharaja Yatoosh. Forced on an exploration mission to help unravel his secret superpower, the bacteria had no clue how to defend themselves.

“Sent without proper training?” Rogaanu gaped at the thought.

“With a blooming population, even a million deaths don’t matter,” Professor Keechad remarked.

The bacteria went hysterical. “We don’t want to die! We are good bacteria! We would like to work for you. Don’t deport us!”

After a lot of closed door meetings, the deportation happened—to the land of humans. On arrival, Lactobacillus and Rhizobium were kept under observation for two months. As it turned out, they were indeed good. One promised to preserve food and the other agreed to fix nitrogen in plants. The humans were happy with the friendly bacteria. So the robbery did lead to goodness, if not greatness.

Soupakki added to the celebration by bringing in invitations from Maharani Makdee, the ruler of Jalapur—the land of spiders, and Princess Chipkali from Lizardwala. Rogaanu teased him since he knew the trips would add to his collection of happy lotion.

But Kitaanu was looking at the calendar. It had been a whole week since Maharaja Yatoosh’s passing and the completion of a week of Kitaanu’s kingship. It was time to address the kingdom.

What did Kitaanu want to tell his subjects? Read Chapter 17 of The Legend of Kitaanu to know how this epic tale ends.