After fulfilling his vow, Arjuna offered his respects to Kṛṣṇa and returned to his own city, which was ruled by Yudhiṣṭhira. Meanwhile, Kṛṣṇa, surrounded by his sixteen thousand wives, had ten thousand sons, and their sons and grandsons multiplied beyond counting. Among these illustrious descendants, a verse is remembered: “Eight hundred sons, and ten thousand more, were born; yet Pradyumna, son of Rukmiṇī, was the foremost among them.” The earth itself became filled with these countless Yādavas. Yet, perceiving that the earth was once again burdened, Kṛṣṇa resolved to bring about their end, using the pretext of a sage’s curse. It happened that all the young Yādava men gathered to play along the banks of the Narmadā river. There they saw the venerable sage Kaṇva, deep in austerities. In jest, they caused Sāmba, the son of Jāmbavatī, to appear as a woman by magical means, tying an iron club to his belly. They approached the sage, bowed, and mockingly asked, “Will this one bear a boy or a girl?” The sage, discerning their mischief, grew angry and declared, “All of you will be destroyed by this very club.” Disturbed and fearful, the youths went to Kṛṣṇa and recounted all that had happened and the curse pronounced by the sage. Kṛṣṇa ordered that the iron club be ground to powder and cast into the water. Yet, from the seeds of that iron, great reeds, hard as thunderbolts, sprang up. The remaining piece of the club, no larger than a finger, was swallowed by a fish. Later, a hunter caught that fish, retrieved the iron piece from its belly, and fashioned it into an arrowhead. In time, all the Yādavas—Rāma, Kṛṣṇa, Pradyumna, and others—drank the Varuṇī liquor sent by Indra and became intoxicated. In their drunkenness, they traded harsh words and insults, and soon a fierce quarrel broke out among them. Fighting with those very iron reeds, they destroyed one another. After the battle, Kṛṣṇa, weary, lay down beneath the shade of a wish-fulfilling tree, while a hunter, bow and arrow in hand, kept watch nearby. Thus, all the Yādavas departed from this world, each attaining their respective divine abodes. In this way, after the destruction wrought by the iron club, the one god alone—Kṛṣṇa—remained, surrounded by the remnants of his once-mighty troops. He lay beneath a great tree, contemplating his own true self, Vāsudeva, poised to relinquish his human form. At that moment, a hunter, guided by the inexorable force of time, saw Hari’s lotus foot—marked with the discus, thunderbolt, banner, and goad, and glowing red—and pierced it with his arrow. Instantly realizing he had wounded Śrī Kṛṣṇa, the hunter was seized by terror and remorse. Trembling, he bowed with folded hands and pleaded, “Let all my offenses be forgiven.” Śrī Kṛṣṇa, seeing the hunter’s distress, lifted him up with hands full of nectar and reassured him, saying, “You have committed no offense.” He comforted the fearful man and, in his grace, granted him the Vaishnava world—a realm attained by yogis, eternal, never subject to rebirth, and composed of the essence of the Upanishads. At that very moment, Kṛṣṇa set aside his mortal form. Together with his sons and wives, he assumed a radiant Vaishnava form, resplendent with the five Upanishads, and entered a divine vehicle. He journeyed to the single golden realm of Vāsudeva, surrounded by celestial nymphs, shining with the brilliance of a thousand suns. At this time, Dāruka mounted his chariot and approached Viṣṇu. Kṛṣṇa sent word, “Bring Arjuna, who is like myself, here as before.” Dāruka, on a chariot swift as thought, reached Arjuna. Arjuna, accompanied by the queens, mounted the chariot, performed the necessary rites, bowed, and with joined hands asked, “What shall I do?” Kṛṣṇa instructed him, “O Pārtha, I now go to my own world. You must go to Dvāravatī, bring my eight principal wives—Rukmiṇī and the others—who remain there, and send them to my body.” Obeying, Arjuna and Dāruka entered the city. Meanwhile, the gods, watching from their celestial vehicles in the sky, beheld Kṛṣṇa’s ascent to heaven. Together with the sages, they praised him and showered flowers upon him. Kṛṣṇa, leaving behind his human body—the very cause of the world’s maintenance and dissolution, the indwelling knower of all, the object of yogic meditation, free from suffering, and the essence of Vāsudeva—mounted Garuḍa. Praised by the great sages, he departed. Arjuna recounted all these events to Vasudeva, Ugrasena, Rukmiṇī, and the other chief queens. Hearing this, all the citizens and women of Dvāravatī, along with Vasudeva, Ugrasena, and all of Kṛṣṇa’s beloveds, left their inner chambers and hastened to Hari. Vasudeva, Ugrasena, Akrura, and all the elders of the Yādus relinquished their bodies and joined the eternal Vāsudeva. Revati, embracing the body of Balabhadra, entered the fire; attaining her celestial form, she ascended a divine aerial chariot and reached her husband’s abode, the realm of Sankarshana. Likewise, Rukmaputri with Pradyumna, Usha with Aniruddha, and all the Yadava women, after honoring their husbands’ bodies, entered the fire. For all of them, Arjuna performed the last rites. At that time, Dāruka arrived, riding the divine chariot Sugrīva, adorned with celestial horses and jewels. The celestial Pārijāta tree, the Sudharma assembly hall, and Indra’s realm all ascended to the world of the gods. In that moment, the city of Dvāravatī was swallowed by the great ocean. As Arjuna led the sixteen thousand wives of Kṛṣṇa toward Indraprastha, they were set upon and seized by robbers.