As the battle raged, the ground was strewn with fallen warriors, their bodies like lotus petals pierced and torn by cruel daggers, bellies ripped open in the frenzy. The terrible dance of Shiva was enacted on the field, tridents raised high, faces fierce and wild in the tumult. The air echoed with the cries of archers, their quivers full, running across the chaos like flocks of birds. Warriors wielded slings and shields, displaying their prowess; others joined in the dance of battle, each step a testament to their valor. Pressed by warriors whose fists struck like thunderbolts, a hero soared through the sky, his chariot cloth billowing behind him like a falcon in flight. Mighty elephants and horses, seized and driven by the goad, charged amidst banners tossed about by heroic kings. The tumult grew, stirred by the fierce blows of clubs and the chaos of combat. The earth itself was churned and dug up by the pounding of tall palaces and towers, while rows of stones throughout the world were shattered by arrows shot from doubled bows. Mad elephants were cut on both sides by saws, their agony filling the battlefield. The ground was strewn with rice grains, as if spilled from a giant mortar, and the army birds—warriors—were bound by chains like clouds in the sky. A rain of arrows descended, a flood of heroic warriors. Plumes danced wildly in the confusion, and the tumult swirled like mountains shaken at the end of an age. Among kings, warriors, ministers, and eager spectators, excitement grew and voices rose. The sky itself shone, adorned with the heads of heroes, appearing like stars—moving lotuses in a lake or a flock of birds in flight. The winds, reddened by streams of blood, made the sky glow like the evening horizon, while warriors, radiant as the midday sun, gleamed amid the clouds. “Sister, what is this sky, filled with straw?” someone asked. “This is not straw, O brave one—these are clouds laden with arrows.” For as many particles of dust as are quenched on earth by blood, so many thousands of years do the warriors’ abode remain in the sky. “Do not fear,” another reassured, “these are not swords shining like blue lotus petals, but the playful glances of Lakshmi, observer of heroes.” The god of love, eager to loosen the girdles of heavenly women longing for the embrace of heroes, had set forth. Arms shone like waving lotus stalks, hands like red buds, eyes intoxicated like flower clusters, and the air was sweet with the fragrance of honeyed blossoms. The goddesses of the Nandana grove, hoping for the warriors’ arrival, began to dance, inviting them with sweet words. The army, fierce as a village woman with wicked deeds, broke the enemy within with hard axes, harming even her beloved. “Alas, my father’s head, with blazing earrings, was carried near the sun by an arrow, as if by Time, like the eighth planet,” mourned one. With both arms raised swiftly, a warrior spun the wheel called Citradaṇḍa, fastened with a chain at his feet, revolving two massive stones. Another, tall as Yama, came from the southern direction, gathering the army from all sides, calling, “Come, let us return as we came, like Yama.” Headless bodies, their heads freshly severed, swarmed with vultures and jackals, danced wildly on the battlefield, arms flailing. In the gatherings of the hosts of gods, lively discussions arose: “Tell, to which other world will these heroes go? Who will go, and from where?” The armies that had arrived were swallowed up like rivers by the ocean, their formations resembling fish and crocodiles—the warriors were in dire straits. The ground was strewn with elephants, their bodies pierced by spears, as if full rains had fallen and gathered among clusters of mountain peaks. “Alas, my head has been taken by a spear!” they tried to say, but only their severed heads uttered, “The head has been taken,” echoing in the sky like birds. “By whom we are being drenched with a shower of mechanical stones, let a net of chains be forcefully cast over this army.” Let all these utterly deluded, half-dead men—your own—be struck down and killed by you, the most wicked, with a blow of your foot. Amid the throng of celestial nymphs, their braided hair tossing in eager excitement, a warrior with a divine body arrived at your side—behold him. On the banks of the heavenly river, among blooming golden lotuses, in the cool shade and gentle breeze of the water, one approached from afar. The peaks of mighty mountains, shattered by the clash of various weapons, roamed the sky with a clamor, like fallen stars. In the sky, where the empty river of space flows, bearing arrows as its waters and swirling like a wheel, even mountains were reduced to tiny rows. On the paths of the planets, the severed heads of heroic kings whirled about, pierced and adorned with the points and barbs of weapons. With banners and lotus-stalks as their ornaments, and arrows stuck fast, the sky became a lake of lotuses, with the wind as its rippling water. In the heap of dead elephants, fearful women vanished like ants among mountains, or like women in the embrace of men. The winds playfully tossed the flowing locks of the Vidyādhara women, who proclaimed the joy of a meeting adorned with supreme and unprecedented beauty. When the parasols were cast away and torn, the moonlight in the sky became their white canopy, fashioned by the ever-glorious form of the moon. At the end of the faintness of death, the warrior instantly attained an immortal body, crafted by his own imagination, just as one enters a city in a dream. Showers of spears, lances, arrows, and discs were hurled in volleys, standing in the sky-ocean like groups of fish, sharks, and alligators—undaunted. The sky, filled with broken parasols and fans cut by arrows, shone as if covered with clusters of full moons gathered together. The sky was adorned by parasols tossed aloft and beautiful, humming fans, their radiance like waves of white geese stirred by the wind.