Victory is ours! With triumphant voices, the people proclaimed: bursting forth is ours, death is ours, energy is ours, sacred knowledge is ours. Heaven belongs to us, as do sacrifice, cattle, progeny, and heroes. With this abundance and power, they resolved among themselves, “Let us set apart this one, this descendant, this son of that one. May he not be released from the bonds of misfortune.” Their refrain resounded: “Victory is ours, bursting forth is ours, death is ours, energy is ours, sacred knowledge is ours, heaven is ours, sacrifice is ours, cattle are ours, progeny is ours, heroes are ours. Therefore, let us distribute that one, that descendant, that son of that one. May he not be released from the bonds of non-prosperity.” Again and again, with unwavering conviction, they repeated their litany of blessings and possessions, each time invoking a new bond: the bonds of defeat, the offspring of the gods, Brihaspati, Prajapati, the sages, the descendants of the sages. With each invocation, they sought to bind the chosen one—never to be released from these sacred ties. The chant continued, growing ever more encompassing: May he not be released from the bonds of the Angirases, nor the Angiras descendants, nor the Atharvans, nor the Atharvan descendants. May the bonds of the forest lords and forest beings hold firm; may the seasons, the seasonal periods, the months, and the half-months bind him. Let day and night, the joined day, heaven and earth, Indra and Agni, Mitra and Varuna, and King Varuna himself, all hold their bonds unbroken. With each verse, the assembly affirmed their dominion: victory, bursting forth, prosperity, brilliance, sacred knowledge, heaven, sacrifice, cattle, offspring, and heroes—all were theirs. And with each, they set apart that one, that descendant, that son, whoever he might be, never to release the bonds that connect him to the cosmic order and its guardians. Finally, their proclamation reached its climax: “Victory is ours, bursting forth is ours, prosperity is ours, our brilliance, our sacred knowledge, our heaven, our sacrifice, our cattle, our offspring, our heroes are ours.” In the next breath, they prayed: “May all battles and hostilities be driven away from us.” The gods themselves—Agni, Soma, and Pūṣan—spoke words of blessing: “May you not fall from the world of the righteous.” The people rejoiced, declaring, “We have reached heaven, we have reached the light; we have come together to the radiance of the sun.” They prayed for the sacrifice to yield wealth, for themselves to become wealthy, for abundance to be placed within them. Then, in a spirit of kinship, one addressed another: “O friend, may I choose friendship with you; having crossed even many wide oceans, may the wise one establish the descendant of the father, shining forth, upon the earth as a bridge.” Yet, they reflected, not all who appear as friends truly are—those who do not seek this bond, who change their form, are not true friends. The sons of greatness, the heroes of the Asura, the upholders of the sky—these are renowned across the vast expanse. The immortals themselves long for the single, visible, mortal being. “Let your mind not be set on us,” they counsel, “do not desire to seize our body, O youthful one.” The people resolved to leave the past behind, to speak truth and not embrace falsehood. “Gandharva is in the waters, and the maiden too—may that be our highest bond, may that be our kinship.” In the womb, the creator is the pair, husband and wife; the god Tvaṣṭṛ, Savitṛ of manifold forms, ordains the laws that none can break—earth and sky both know his vessel. They wondered: “Who today yokes the cows to the yoke of truth, the strong, the shining, the long-lived?” Those who are near at hand, in the heart, bringing joy—he who fulfills their service lives. They pondered the mystery of beginnings: “Who knows the first day of this one? Who has seen it? Who here can declare it? The great domain of Mitra and Varuṇa—how shall I speak of the origin of men?” The tale of Yama and his sister Yamī was recalled: Yamī desired Yama, to come together in the same womb, to lie together. Like a wife longing for her husband, she wished to unite her body with his, but Yama broke away, like a chariot wheel on the road. Thus, the spies of the gods, who neither stand nor sit, move about unseen. “Go with another who delights you,” they said. “Break apart with him, as a chariot wheel from the road.” May night and day grant us favor, they prayed. May the eye of the sun measure us again and again. By day and by night, earth and sky are joined with kin—yet Yamī was separated from Yama. “Go on, indeed, to later generations, where wives create offspring. Embrace the arm of a bull, seek a husband, O fortunate one, as you desire.” Thus, through victory, kinship, and the bonds of heaven and earth, the story flows—a tapestry of blessing, cosmic order, and the ever-renewing cycle of life.