novelraw Arc 1 - Karna-senāpati-nirmāṇa Parva - Chapter 8 - Final Battles of the 16th Day
Arc 1 - Karna-senāpati-nirmāṇa Parva - Chapter 8 - Final Battles of the 16th Day
Vaiśampāyana said:
When the son of Dhṛtarāṣṭra, fearless upon his car, met the son of Dharma, the air itself twanged with bowstrings. Yudhiṣṭhira, steady-handed, pierced Duryodhana as the latter rushed like a storm and called out, “Wait, wait.” The Kuru prince answered with nine keen shafts and even struck the charioteer of the just king; but the son of Dharma replied with a measured fury—thirteen arrows feathered with gold—then, in faultless order, slew the four steeds, struck the driver’s head from its trunk, felled the royal standard, cut the bow, and sheared the scimitar, before lodging five deep wounds in the king. Duryodhana, cast upon the earth and ringed by peril, stood alone for a heartbeat of fate.
Five vows flew from the gentle king,
As law itself took up the string;
Steed, staff, steel, and pride he broke—
And left the wrathful prince in smoke.
Seeing their lord thus stranded, Karṇa the Sūta’s son, Aśvatthāmā, Kṛpa, and other pillars of the Kuru host sped like hawks to his side. The Pāṇḍavas in turn closed ranks about Yudhiṣṭhira, and the field answered with a thousand trumpets and the roar of multitudes. Men matched men; elephants, foremost of tuskers, hammered elephants; chariots wheeled to meet chariots; horses flashed against horses. For a brief and terrible moment the encounter held to kṣatra-dharma—no blow from behind, no craft but courage; then frenzy, like a fever, took the field and all measure fled.
Order cracked like a bow in flame;
Madness wore the warrior’s name;
Front to flank and friend to foe,
Red rivers learned a crooked flow.
Chariot-fighters riddled elephants and sent them to Yama with arrow-straight decrees. Tuskers dragged down coursers and riders, goring and flinging them as storm-waves fling wreckage against a shore. Horsemen clapped their palms, spurred in, pierced running men with lances, and shattered straying elephants from flank and rear. Infuriate beasts seized armored souls and hurled them skyward, or pressed them to the earth till ribs gave way; others, with trained points, speared those who fell, while some were ripped open by footmen who caught their moments of weakness. Amid fleeing infantry casting off bright ornaments, mahouts wheeled their mountains to reclaim the fallen gold, and the beasts, urged cruelly, skewered the grasping hands that reached.
Many were whirled aloft like fans and dropped lifeless; many, standing full before charging tuskers, were torn to tatters. Cheeks, temples, and frontal globes of elephants smoked with spear and dart; ripped and roaring, they folded like hills cleaved by thunder. Horsemen nailed warriors to the ground; tuskers plucked mail-clad charioteers from their cars and smashed them down. Huge elephants, struck with cloth-yard shafts, toppled like broken peaks.
Mail ran crimson, moon-bright crowns
Were lost to dust like fallen towns;
Headless trunks in hundreds swayed—
A ghastly grove by arrows made.
Close at hand they grappled—fists, hair, knees, and blades. Some set heels to chests and severed heads; some hewed at those already falling; some stabbed the living locked with others and never saw whose life they took. Weapons and coats of mail, dyed deep, glowed like scarlet silks in festival—yet this was no festival but the Gāṅgā’s mad flood, its roar filling the quarters of the world. Under such affliction, eyes misted—friend and foe dissolved into one red blur. Each king, fixed upon victory, did the work he deemed he must; reason slipped its tether as heroes harried heroes.
Broken cars, elephants, and steeds lay heaped; earth, slick with gore and flesh, ran with streams of blood and would not bear the wheel. There Karṇa scythed the Pañcālas; there Dhanañjaya reaped the Trigartas; there Vṛkodara crushed the Kurus and their tusker ranks. So did both hosts, hungering for imperishable fame, feed death at the hour when the Sun had passed his noon.
Fame’s fire burned through shade and shield—
Three torches raged across the field:
Karna’s edge, and Jishnu’s rain,
Bhīma’s mace—the day’s dark triune flame.
Sañjaya said:
When both hosts locked once more in their appointed arrays, Duryodhana, stung like a serpent, mounted a fresh car and sighted the son of Dharma beneath the white umbrella. “Drive me to him,” he urged, and Yudhiṣṭhira, blazing like an angered tusker, likewise called, “Bring me to Suyodhana.” The kings met breast to breast—two lions in one gorge—loosing swift showers, breaking bows, shattering standards. Duryodhana’s stone-whetted broadhead snapped Yudhiṣṭhira’s bow; the just king, eyes reddened, lifted another and in a breath cut the Kuru’s standard and weapon. Fresh strings sang; gold-feathered shafts crossed like meteors; conchs roared; palms slapped; each watched for the other’s lapse. Flower-red with wounds like bursting kiṃśuka, they pressed on. Yudhiṣṭhira stamped three thunder-strong arrows into the Kuru’s chest; Duryodhana answered with five bright stings and then, fierce-hearted, hurled a blazing dart. Dharma’s son sheared it thrice in flight and stitched five more shafts into the prince, the sundered weapon falling like a flaming brand through dusk.
Bow-song and conch-song rose and rolled,
Two kṣatra fires in a single mold;
Fate held its breath between their blows,
As dharma weighed two rival woes.
Wracked yet unbroken, Duryodhana drove nine keen points home. Yudhiṣṭhira, wrath steadied by restraint, set one grave arrow to the string and loosed. It struck the Kuru lord full, dazed him, and buried itself in the earth beyond. Then, seized by storm, Duryodhana leapt with mace upraised, shadow of Yama in human shape; but the son of Dharma hurled a radiant dart that smote the prince in the chest and toppled him senseless upon his car.
A star went out behind his eyes,
The world-wheel paused in wounded skies;
Steel kissed the breast of Kuru’s heir,
And breath stood trembling on the air.
Bhīma, remembering his vow and the law that bound it, spoke quickly to the elder: “Not by your hand, O King.” Thus checked, Yudhiṣṭhira stayed the finishing stroke. In that heartbeat of peril, Kṛtavarman surged forward to shield the fallen prince sinking in misfortune’s sea. Then Bhīmasena, seizing a gold-bound mace with its pale cords, rushed like thunder at the Bhoja chief. So the battle of that afternoon burned on—each heart fixed upon victory, each arm raised beneath the unblinking sun.
Sañjaya said:
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With Karṇa placed at their head, your warriors—hard to break and hot with rage—turned back and met the Pāṇḍavas in a clash like gods and asuras colliding. The field shook with conchs and drums and the iron music of axe and sword. Elephants, cars, horses, and men hewed one another down; the ground flashed with severed diadems and moon-bright faces, and the blood ran in channels like a sudden river. In that dreadful press of ghost-pale wounds and staring eyes, the plain looked like the precinct of Death at time’s end.
Then your sons and the foremost Kurus, massed with immeasurable might, rolled upon Sātyaki. Karṇa’s shafts, sun-bright, smote the bull of the Sāttvatas; Sātyaki in turn veiled Karṇa’s car, steeds, and charioteer in a serpent-swarm of arrows. Seeing Karṇa hard-pressed, many of your atirathas with elephants, cars, and foot closed to shield him—but Drupada’s sons and the Pāṇḍava chiefs burst through, and the ocean of your host broke white and ran.
At that moment Keśava and Arjuna, their daily rites performed and Bhava duly honored, drove straight for your line, sworn to end their foes. The sight of that white-horsed car, banners dancing and axle roaring like storm-clouds, shook men’s hearts. Standing, bow dancing in his hands, Arjuna packed sky and quarters with arrows till no space remained; cars that shone like heaven’s own were crushed, their riders and drivers sent to Yama; elephants and horsemen went down beneath the iron rain.
Duryodhana alone dashed in to face him. In a blink, Arjuna cut his bow, his driver, his horses, his standard—then his umbrella—and, seizing an opening, shot a life-taking shaft. Aśvatthāman split it in mid-flight. Arjuna snapped the preceptor’s son’s bow, slew his four steeds, and sheared off Kṛpa’s weapon; he cut Kṛtavarman’s bow and bannered team, and, after breaking Duḥśāsana’s bow, turned back to Karṇa. Karṇa wheeled from Sātyaki and struck Pārtha thrice and Vāsudeva twenty times, then again and again; though the arrows flew by countless hundreds, his arms knew no weariness.
Sātyaki burst back, peppering the son of Rādha with ninety-nine shafts and then a hundred. Princes and allies in a ring—Yudhamanyu, Śikhaṇḍin, the sons of Draupadī, the Prabhadrakas, Uttamaujas, Yuyutsu, the twins, Dhṛṣṭadyumna, and the Cedis, Karūṣas, Matsyas, Kaikeyas, with mighty Chekitāna and king Yudhiṣṭhira himself—closed in and stormed Karṇa with steel and bitter cries, intent on his end. Karṇa’s keen arrows shredded their storm, and he beat them back like a gale breaking trees—cars splintered, elephants toppled with their riders, horsemen and ranks of foot cut down. Mangled and weaponless, most of that wing reeled away.
Then Arjuna, smiling, met Karṇa’s weapons with his own and smothered earth and sky with shafts heavy as clubs, jagged as sataghnis, savage as thunderbolts. Under that downpour, your infantry, cavalry, cars, and elephants screamed and stumbled blind; many fell, many fled bleeding.
The sun stooped low to the mountain’s side,
Dust veiled the world, and day’s fire died;
Steel lost its gleam, the conchs grew still—
Night drew her veil across the kill.
Fearing a fight in darkness, your foremost bowmen withdrew, and with them the whole Kaurava host. The Pāṇḍavas, victorious, turned back as well, teasing their foes with cymbals and strings, praising Acyuta and Arjuna, and taking benedictions from all the kings. In their tents that sinless band rejoiced and rested. Out upon the waste, rākṣasas, piśācas, and carrion beasts gathered thick upon Rudra’s playground.
Dhṛtarāṣṭra said, “It seems, O Sañjaya, that Arjuna slew all of you at his will. Even the Destroyer himself, if opposed by him in battle, could not have escaped his wrath. Single-handed he bore away Bhadra; single-handed he gratified the Fire-god. Alone, he subdued the whole earth and made all kings pay tribute. With his celestial bow, he destroyed the Nivātakavachas. Alone, he contended with Mahādeva himself, who appeared before him in the guise of a hunter. Alone, he protected the Bharatas; alone, he propitiated Bhava. By him, O Sañjaya, all the fierce kings of the earth were vanquished. The Kurus, therefore, cannot be blamed — they deserve praise for having faced such a warrior. Tell me now, what did they do thereafter? Tell me, O Sūta, what Duryodhana did after that.”
Sañjaya said, “Struck, wounded, and overthrown from their vehicles, deprived of armour, bereft of weapons, their beasts slain, and their spirits crushed, the Kaurava warriors returned to their tents like serpents whose fangs had been broken. They sighed and murmured among themselves, their glory dimmed, their might extinguished.”
Then Karṇa, sighing like an angry serpent and clenching his hands, looked upon thy son and said:
“Partha is watchful, firm, and wise,
Awakened ever when danger lies.
Deceived were we by his sudden shower,
Tomorrow, O King, shall test my power.”
Thus addressed by Karṇa, Duryodhana said, “So be it,” and dismissed the assembled kings to their tents. Having passed the night in restless hope, they rose at dawn, ready again for battle. Then they beheld the host of Yudhiṣṭhira the just, arrayed according to the laws of Bṛhaspati and Uśanas, vast, resplendent, and unbreakable.
Beholding that terrible formation, Duryodhana’s heart turned toward Karṇa — the mighty-armed son of a Sūta, fierce as the storm, strong as Indra, radiant as the Maruts, and energetic as Kārtavīrya himself. The hearts of all the troops also inclined toward that hero, even as men afflicted with cold turn their gaze toward the Sun.
Dhṛtarāṣṭra said, “When the hearts of all thus turned toward Karṇa, what did Duryodhana do, O Sañjaya? When the battle recommenced after the brief withdrawal of the troops, how did Vikarna’s son Karṇa fight? And how did the sons of Pāṇḍu contend with him? Surely that mighty-armed one could single-handedly slay the Pāṇḍavas with the Śṛñjayas! The might of his arms equals that of Śakra or Viṣṇu, and his weapons are fierce as the fires of destruction. Relying upon him, Duryodhana has placed his heart upon victory.
Beholding my son oppressed by the Pāṇḍavas, and the sons of Pāṇḍu displaying their power, what did Karṇa do then? Alas, foolish Duryodhana, trusting in Karṇa, hopeth to conquer Kṛṣṇa and the sons of Pāṇḍu! Surely destiny is supreme, for though Karṇa’s strength is great, he could not overcome them in battle. Ah, that fateful dice-game returns to haunt me! These sorrows, born of Duryodhana’s acts, pierce my heart like arrows, O Sañjaya. Śakuni, son of Subala, was once deemed wise; Karṇa ever steadfast to Duryodhana. Yet why must I now hear of defeat and death again and again? None can withstand the sons of Pāṇḍu in battle. They pierce my host like men entering a gathering of helpless women. Truly, Destiny rules all.”
Sañjaya said, “O King, think now upon those wrongful deeds of thine — the deceit of dice, the humiliation of Draupadī, and other grievous acts long past. A wise man, however, should not waste away reflecting on what is done, for such reflection only multiplies sorrow. The fruit thou hadst desired has long departed, for though thou hadst wisdom, thou didst not heed its call.
Many times, O King, wert thou advised against this war. Yet, blinded by folly, thou rejected every counsel. Thy sins — grave and many — against the sons of Pāṇḍu have borne their fruit. Therefore this dreadful slaughter of kings has come. All that is now past. Grieve not, O scion of Bharata. Listen now to the tale of the mighty carnage that followed.”
When night faded into dawn, Karṇa came to Duryodhana’s tent. Standing before the king, that mighty-armed warrior said:
“O King, today I face the son of Pāṇḍu.
Either he shall fall, or I.
Long have our paths been tangled,
Now destiny shall choose its side.”
Then he continued, “Because of our many duties, O King, Arjuna and I have not yet met in true combat. But now, hear me: I will not return without slaying him. Our host is broken, our heroes fallen. Arjuna will surely seek me today, knowing I stand bereft of the dart that Śakra once gave. Hear, therefore, what I deem best.
The energy of my celestial weapons equals that of Arjuna’s. In speed of hand, in range of arrows, in aim, and in valour, Savyasācin is not my superior. My bow Vijaya, forged by Viśvakarman for Indra and gifted to Bhṛgu’s son Rāma, is the foremost of all bows. With that bow Indra defeated the Dānavas, and its twang made the ten quarters tremble. That sacred bow was bestowed upon me by Rāma himself. With Vijaya in hand, I shall meet Arjuna in battle like Indra meeting the Asuras.”
“The bow of gods now rests with me,
The storm shall sound its harmony.
Let heaven and earth behold my might—
Today I end the Pāṇḍu fight.”
He added, “Yet I must speak truth, O King, of where I fall short. Arjuna’s bowstring is celestial; his quivers inexhaustible. His charioteer is Kṛṣṇa himself, lord of the worlds. His car, given by Agni, is impenetrable, drawn by steeds swift as thought. Upon it blazes the Ape-banner, guarded by the Creator Himself. I have not such allies. Still, I shall not shrink from combat.
Let the valiant Śalya, skilled in horsemanship, guide my chariot. He is peerless among drivers, even as I am among bowmen. Let many cars follow me, laden with arrows and shafts winged with vulture feathers. With these preparations, I shall surpass Arjuna in battle. For if Śalya equals Kṛṣṇa in mastery of steeds, and I equal Arjuna in arms, then victory shall be ours. The very gods with Indra at their head shall not withstand me.”
“When Śalya holds my reins in war,
And Vijaya sings its thunder-roar,
Then gods and men alike shall see
The fall of Arjuna—slain by me.”
Sañjaya continued, “Thus spoke Karṇa, the ornament of battle. Duryodhana, his heart gladdened, worshipped him with honour and said, ‘Do as thou deemest fit, O Karṇa. Thou shalt have as many cars and arrows as thou desirest. We and the assembled kings shall follow thee in battle.’
Having said this, thy royal son of great prowess went forth to seek Śalya, the ruler of the Madras, and addressed him in words that glowed like embers of resolve.”