Birth of the Destroyer

“Durga!” I heard Shiva call to me as I left. I turned back around. He smiled and said, “Good luck. You’ve got this.”

I smiled back, nodded, and rode my tiger away. It had been a while since I had the chance to do battle, and I was eager. Even better, this enemy was made for me. Mahishasura was a demon who had made a deal with Brahman that he could not be killed by god or man. However, he made no mention of woman.

When I arrived, the scene before me was chaos. Humans and gods and demons fought each other with malice I’d never seen. It was difficult to decipher who was fighting who. After scanning the crowd, I laid eyes on who I was looking for: Mahishasura. His half buffalo, half demon form gave him away.

I began descending into the screams and clashes. I dodged swords, arrows, knives, spears, hooves, and fallen soldiers. Although I kept each of my ten arms occupied, I was quickly overwhelmed. I was taking hits left and right; I began to worry I’d never reach Mahishasura.

Then, he was in front of me. Smiling. I was confused until I felt the stabbing pain in my shoulder; he had wounded me. My vision went red. I was so furious I couldn’t even move. He just stood in front of me, still smiling his awful grin.

Suddenly, my entire essence moved forward, though my body stayed still. I morphed into a new form. My skin turned black, my eyes wild, my stature taller. A being of pure rage.

“Kali,” Mahishasura gasped. “The Dark One.”

My fury overflowed as I swung and beheaded the buffalo demon swiftly. I strung his head on a rope and tied it around my neck as a trophy. But the red didn’t fade from my vision. As I looked around, Mahishasura appeared all around me. Endless copies of him surrounded me as far as I could see. I kept swinging, adding the demon heads to my necklace as I went.

I had no idea how much time had passed. I had developed a rhythm. As I swung my weapons and strung my necklace, I created a dance of sorts. My stomps rattled the earth and my arms scraped the sky. I kept dancing and swinging, dancing and swinging, dancing and swinging. My necklace grew miles long. All the while, my anger never ceased. I would annihilate Mahishasura if it was the last thing I did.

One moment my feet were on solid ground. The next, they were not. I paused my dance to look down. Horrified, I recognized the face of the man I stood on.

“Shiva?” I said, shocked. I stuck out my tongue in embarrassment.

“Dear, please pause for a moment,” he said.

“But I must kill Mahishasura.”

“You already did,” he said, his voice still calm.

Then I looked around–finally really looked–and saw the destruction. Beheaded bodies littered fields for miles. I could see my path clearly, because nothing was left alive.

“Why didn’t anyone tell me I killed him?” I asked, bewildered.

“They tried, but you were beyond reason. No one could get close enough to you and keep their head,” Shiva said.

I looked down at my necklace, adorned with the demon heads. I tied it once more, this time so that Mahishasura’s was in the middle. Indeed, it was his head. My job was done.

With a deep breath, I transformed back into Durga, and felt the last of my rage seep away.

“Thank you for stopping me,” I said. “Let’s go home.”