Terrified and desperate, the mighty Daitya approached the battlefield. In the heat of combat, his thousand arms were severed by Vyasa, leaving him standing motionless. At that very place, Maheshvara—Shiva himself—arrived. The two great beings, Shiva and Krishna, came together and engaged in a fierce and tumultuous battle. Intent on destroying Hara, Krishna prepared the Vaishnava weapon, while Shambhu, eager to take Krishna’s life, readied his own divine missile. Krishna unleashed a stupefying missile upon Shiva, who stood on the battlefield, repeatedly yawning for a brief time. Overcome by anger, Shiva then created the Maheshvara fever—a terrifying being with three eyes, three heads, a short stature, three legs, and a frightful appearance. Prompted by Mahadeva, this fever attacked Krishna’s army, breaking their ranks and scattering even the foremost among them. Seeing his army afflicted, yawning, and tormented by pain, Krishna became greatly enraged and created the Vaishnava fever. An even more dreadful battle erupted between the two fevers, raging across all the worlds without finding peace. Eventually, both fevers plunged into the sacred Shipra river, where they attained supreme tranquility. The Vaishnava fever also immersed itself there, and from that time onward, it became an instant destroyer of fevers. Those who immerse themselves in the Shipra with focused minds are freed from all ailments. This truth was declared by Brahma, Hari, and Hara to Vyasa. Whoever listens to this divine story with concentrated mind will receive its blessings. Thus concludes the forty-ninth chapter, ‘The Favor to Fever,’ in the section on the glory of Shipra within the Avanti region, as found in the fifth book of the eighty-one-thousand-verse Skanda Mahapurana. Now, O scorcher of foes, let me briefly recount another tale. In the ancient Kṛta age, there lived a king named Damanona. This king strayed from all righteous paths, reviling cows and Brahmanas, seizing his subjects’ wealth, violating others’ wives, and delighting in the company of prisoners. He broke into cities, imprisoned people, and abandoned the association of the virtuous, preferring the wicked and delighting in unrighteousness. He constantly disparaged dharma, and his mind was set on evil. He even struck the forms of the gods, the Vedas, and sacrificial altars with his feet. Once, wandering in a dreadful forest hunting wild animals, he found no game and was overcome by hunger and thirst. As night fell, terrifying and haunted by horrors, he tied his horse to a branch and sat alone. Suddenly, he wondered at a strange presence, tried to ward it off with his hand, but was bitten. Distressed, he collapsed to the ground and, in that very moment, became a ghost, entering a dreadful accumulation of hells. The attendants of King Yama rejoiced at his fate, while his corpse was devoured by flesh-eating creatures. Such is the tale, O Vyasa, of the consequences of unrighteousness and the glory of the Shipra river.