The maidservant, her voice trembling with sorrow, spoke: “My master was killed in the night by a thief. The ornaments of the daughter-in-law and all the fine garments were stolen.” Within the upper floor of the mansion, the master’s lifeless body lay fallen upon the ground. Around him gathered his mother, his wife, and his brothers, their hearts broken, weeping beside him. Their lamentations filled the air, as if they were plunged into a vast ocean of grief. O revered guru, Nārada said: Hearing the maidservant’s words, the wandering ascetic ascended the mansion. There, he beheld the dead householder, and saw the family gathered, their cries of sorrow echoing nearby. Moved by compassion and desiring to lift them from the depths of their suffering, the wise one spoke. Vedāyana addressed them: “This grief you feel arises from attachment to the self, mistaking the body for your true being. O mother, tell me truly—this sorrow does not truly belong to either the body or the self. This body is but a collection of elements, brought together by past actions. When those elements are spent, their separation must come; their union through action is what people call birth. “And when that union dissolves, their separation is called death. The wise explain that the coming together and parting of these elements is the cycle of birth and death. Therefore, do not grieve for the body, which is inert and subject to the will of others. Through beginningless ignorance, the living being perceives birth and death. By thinking, ‘I am this body,’ one mistakes the body for the self. But this is not your true nature. When such delusion ceases, one attains Brahman—the pure, formless reality. “Brahman is self-luminous, the cause of the world, yet itself beyond cause. It possesses all qualities, is eternal, knowledge, bliss, and illumines the world by its own light. The tongue cannot taste it, the eye cannot see it, nor can the ear hear it. The nose does not smell it, nor does the skin touch it. It is beyond the senses, self-revealing, the true seer of the self. It is not an object, is beyond the mind, and cannot be grasped by the intellect. “Its incarnations are the pure-natured deities, who serve it, yet even they do not know its true form, which is beyond both being and non-being. Therefore, who, with a misguided mind, would become angry or grieve, aiming at that true self whose origin and destruction do not exist?” Thus ends the two hundred and ninth chapter in the section on the greatness of the Kālindī, in the Uttara-khaṇḍa of the glorious Padma Mahāpurāṇa. Nārada continued: Having instructed them all with words of ultimate truth, that swan-like sage inspired them to perform rites connected to the self. The wife of Mukunda, who was pregnant, wished to follow her husband in death, but the wise one restrained her. Later, taking her husband’s bones, the wife’s brother set out together with the renunciant. Their purpose was to cast the bones into the sacred waters of the Gaṅgā. After a few days, by the will of fate, the brāhmaṇa and the renunciant arrived at the holy place of Indraprastha. “This is the Kośalā,” said the sage, “flowing near Indraprastha.” There, on the ground by the bank of the Yamunā, the two weary travelers lay down to sleep, placing the bundle of bones between themselves. Exhausted from their journey, they soon fell into deep slumber. At midnight, when all the travelers in the camp were asleep, a certain dog arrived, drawn by the scent of cooked food. He wandered throughout the camp, sniffing the cooking pots, licking the vessels, and enduring blows to his head in some places. Struck by someone, the dog fled silently, unable to retaliate, like a man subdued by his own wife. Yet, driven by hunger, the dog returned to the places where he had been beaten, searching for food and vessels. Roaming about, longing for enjoyment, just as a destitute man seeks affection from a courtesan, the dog wandered until he found the two sleeping men. He seized the bundle of cloth from between them, carried it some distance, and tore it open. Finding only bones, devoid of flesh, he cast them into the river. As soon as the bones touched the water, O King, Mukunda himself arrived, riding a divine aerial chariot. He saw his teacher and younger brother asleep, gently awakened them, and, bowing in his radiant form, addressed his teacher. Mukunda spoke: “O Vedāyana, revered teacher, salutations to you and blessings to your younger brother. My bones have fallen here from the palace into this holy place. Having met death, I entered hell and received its results; but by the grace of this holy place, I have now attained a divine state. I have come to bow to you, teacher, who are the embodiment of holiness. Departing, I will go by this divine chariot to the abode of the gods. Having bowed to you, to this holy place, and to my brother, whom I have seen, permit me, for I go to heaven, the source of happiness.” Nārada said: Hearing Mukunda’s words, the teacher Vedāyana, astonished, addressed him as he sat in the celestial chariot. “Mukunda, tell me truthfully: after death, to which world did you go, and from where are you now departing for heaven? What happened there, dear one? Who rules that world? What are its people like, and what is its law? Tell me everything.” Mukunda replied: “I will tell you, teacher, what happened after my death. By the grace of this holy place, memory has now arisen in me.