In a humble village, there lived a woman whose life was shaped by ceaseless labor and devotion. Her days were spent gathering cow dung and firewood for fuel, her body draped in a faded blanket, limbs bearing the marks of years spent carrying heavy loads. She was ever occupied, plucking insects from her ears, hair, and hands, and hurrying to collect wild greens for the household—her every moment absorbed in domestic tasks. She tended the cattle, feeding them grass wet with the blue river’s waves, and never failed to mark the house door with sandalwood paste at every opportunity. Always vigilant, she spoke on behalf of the household’s servants and animals, unwavering in her adherence to rules and boundaries—like the shore that restrains the swelling ocean. An old, leaf-colored earring swung from one ear, and she bore the marks of hardship and fear, much like a servant worn by years of toil. Having spoken thus, she wandered through the hollow of her mountain village. As she moved, the goddess Sarasvati herself appeared before her. The woman gestured to the beauty around her: “This flower garden, adorned with clusters of crimson trees, is mine. This blossoming pavilion, shaped like a garden enclosure, is mine. This bank of the lotus pond, entwined with trees and lush grass, is mine as well—this is the tarṇikā called Karṇikā, though its leaves have been eaten.” Her voice trembled as she continued, “This poor one, weakened by fat and deprived of water, is mine; today is the eighth day she weeps with tear-filled eyes. Here, O goddess, I have spoken, lived, stayed; here I have slept, passed time, given, and received. My eldest son, Sharma, weeps in the house; my cow, grazing in the meadow, is milking in the wilderness. In the house, settled for burning, dry and covered with alkaline dust, see this body of mine, called ‘fivefold’—dense and heavy.” She pointed to her kitchen, wrapped in fierce gourd vines, comparing it to another body of her own, a place of thirst and sustenance. Her relatives, eyes reddened from weeping, were bonds tying her to this world; those who wore rudraksha bracelets brought fuel for the fire. She described the landscape: ceaselessly struck by clusters of stones and shells, with waves of lofty form touching the leaves of creepers on the shore. The river’s edges were scattered with spray, swaying grassy patches, and foam rising from the collision of stones, fruits, and shells. The midday sun’s rays, like frost, made everything glisten. The banks were lined with trees eager to offer clusters of blossoming flowers. The radiance of blooming kiṃśuka trees shone like coral, and heaps of flowers seemed to burst forth in delight. Children from the village gathered abundant fruit, carried along by the stream, absorbed in its noisy, swirling eddies. The banks, washed by water and ever cool beneath the dense shade of broad-leaved trees, surrounded a beautiful house pavilion, entwined with flowering creepers and windows shaded by overhanging branches. She spoke of her lord, who abided there—his form like a particle of living space, the master of the earth encircled by the four oceans. “This place,” she said, “was once intensely desired by him, with the powerful force of aspiration: ‘May I swiftly become king.’ O Supreme Lady, in just eight days, through that resolve, he attained a prosperous kingdom, which would normally be gained only after a long time.” She continued, “Here, the vital essence of my husband, the king, remained in my house, situated in space, unseen—like the wind in the sky, or fragrance in the air. Here itself, within the space of a thumb’s breadth, that realm was established as if in the sky; yet my husband’s kingdom extended to a distance of ten million yojanas. We two are space itself, and that kingdom of my husband is also space, O Lady; yet it appears filled with thousands of mountains—oh, what a wonder this illusion is!” “O Goddess, I now wish to return again to my husband’s side; so come, let us go there—what distance is there for those who are resolute?” Having said this and bowed to the goddess, she swiftly entered the pavilion; together, they soared into the sky, dark as a sword, like birds in flight. The sky appeared as if split by masses of collyrium, beautiful with a gentle, single ocean, resembling the body of Narayana, with the pure luster of a bee’s back. They passed beyond the path of clouds, the region of wind, the solar and lunar paths. They journeyed beyond the northern path of the Pole Star, the realm of the Sādhyas, the world of the Siddhas, and crossed over the earth, ascending to the sphere of heaven. They entered the inner realm of Brahma’s world and the sphere of the Tuṣitas, surpassing the world of the cows, the world of Śiva, and the world of the ancestors. Far beyond the distant gods without bodies, they traveled farther than far, until she became somewhat obstructed. She looked back at the sky she had traversed; nothing—moon, sun, stars, or anything else—could be seen below. She beheld darkness, motionless and deep, filled with the hollows of space, resembling the belly of a single ocean, dense as the interior of a mountain. “O goddess,” she asked, “tell me: where has the radiance of the sun and others gone below? How has this darkness, unmoving as the belly of a rock and graspable by the fist, arisen?” Sarasvati replied, “You have reached this extent, this path of the sky; even the radiances of the sun and others are no longer visible here. Just as a firefly is not seen from the bottom of a deep, dark well, so too, from here below, the sun is not seen from behind. Indeed, we have come to such a distant place that even the sun below appears as a mere tiny speck, not visible in the least.” Thus, the woman’s journey, marked by devotion and wonder, revealed the mysterious expanse of the universe, where even light itself fades into the profound depths of space.