6.099. The ultimate face off begins

Hari Om.

Let us begin the ninety ninth sarga of the yuddha kAnDam by offering our prostrations at the lotus feet of SrIrAma and our sathguru. With three accomplices that accompanied rAvaNa to the battlefield dead, the battle was heading for its culmination. Every demon warrior who has been abetting rAvaNa’s crimes and was hence part of it had been felled by a very spirited vAnara army of rAma. What they lacked in weapons, they made up in improvisation, enterprise, determination and devotion. The ten-headed demon king was defanged and isolated and headed for a one-to-one combat with the peerless rAma who never tasted defeat on the battlefield. The omens indicated his end was not far. Onwards…

rAvaNa was extremely outraged to see the fall of mahOdara, mahApArSwa and the mighty virUpAksha in the great battle. He prompted his charioteer and said –

“I shall avenge the grief caused by the death of the ministers and the siege of city by vanquishing the duo of rAma and lakshmaNa. In the battle, I shall uproot the tree called rAma which yields the flowers and fruits called sItA. The warriors sugrIva, jAmbvAn, nala, kumuda, mainda, dvivida, angada, gandhamAdana, hanumAn and sushENa are the branches of that tree”.

रामवृक्षं रणे हन्मि सीतापुष्पफलप्रदम् ।

प्रशाखा यस्य सुग्रीवो जाम्बवान् कुमुदो नलः ।

द्विविदश्चैव मैन्दश्च अङ्गदो गन्धमादनः ।

हनूमांश्च सुषेणश्च सर्वे च हरियूथपाः ॥

With those words of his, the glorious chariot took off with the supreme warrior raising a huge din which filled the ten quarters and reverberated across the earth, mountains and forests. With a loud roar he approached rAma. He launched the terrifying weapon called tAmasa that was deadly and began massacre of the vAnaras. Fearing their lives and unable to withstand the attack, they ran helter skelter and that raised huge dust. Seeing the hundreds of vAnaras thus felled by rAvaNa, rAma swung into action. Having scattered away the vAnara army, rAvaNa approached and beheld rAma who stood undefeated along with lakshmaNa. They looked like lord vishNu and indra. His eyes beautiful as fully bloomed lotuses, his arms long, the repressor of the foes, rAma stood leaning on his bow that looked tall as if touching the skies!

ततो राक्षसशार्दूलो विद्राव्य हरिवाहिनीम् ।

स ददर्श ततो रामम् तिष्ठन्तमपराजितम् ।

लक्ष्मणेन सह भ्रात्रा विष्णुना वासवं यथा ।

आलिखन्तमिवाकाशम् अवष्टभ्य महद्धनुः ।

पद्मपत्रविशालाक्षम् दीर्घबाहुमरिन्दमम् ॥

The mighty rAma, along with lakshmaNa saw the vAnara army scattered by the attack of rAvaNa and taking note of rAvaNa who had arrived in front of him, grabbed his bow in the middle and lifting it with delight twanged it. He was so swift and it made such a reverberating sound seemed to shake the earth and hundreds of demons simply fainted upon hearing that.

Entering into the line of attack of rAma and lakshmaNa, rAvaNa resembled the planet rAhu in presence of the sun and the moon. lakshmaNa wanted to fight him first and launched arrows that resembled fire at him. As those arrows rose into the sky, rAvaNa nullified those with his own arrows. He shot down one arrow of lakshmaNa by one of his, three by three, ten by ten and displaying great dexterity he negated lakshmaNa’s attack. Then dodging lakshmaNa and bypassing him, rAvaNa went in front of rAma who stood solidly like a mountain. Beholding rAma with his angry eyes that were blood red, rAvaNa launched an attack with barrage of arrows at him. Swiftly, rAma took his bow and shot down all the arrows that rAvaNa shot at him. They swiftly negated each other’s attack. They moved in circular paths and stayed out of the reach of the other’s attack, undefeated. As they attacked each other, giving expression to their wrath, both of them seemed like yama and all the beings were scared. Glittering arrows clashed with each other and fell from the skies resembling lightning at the end of the summer. The arrows formed patterns in the sky which looked like windows up there.

Eager to outdo and vanquish the other, they hurled swift and sharp arrows and the sheer number of arrows in the skies caused darkness blocking the light of the sun like they were clouds. The battle was tumultuous and unimaginable like it was between lord indra and the demon vRtra. Both of them wielded great arrows and both of them were experts in deploying weapons, both of them had access to a wide variety of astras and they battled each other. They created waves of arrows wherever they moved in the circle and they resembled waves of the ocean aided by the wind.

Releasing arrows from his raudra bow without a break, rAvaNa shot them aimed at the forehead of rAma. Those arrows bothered rAma the least as he took them like the blue lotuses. Then invoking the raudra astra, the valorous rAma shot it from his bow which fell on the armour of the demon and caused him no botheration whatsoever. rAma further attacked rAvaNa seated in the chariot, but the demon repelled those with his own and they fell down on the earth hissing like snakes.

Having shot down, rAghava’s attack, rAvaNa stepped up and deployed the deadly Asura astra aimed at rAma. It emitted arrows which had faces of lions, tigers, crows, vultures, eagles and jackals. Further some more arrows had the tips like the faces of cranes, five faced serpents, dogs, donkeys, crocodiles, cocks and venom spitting reptiles. Encountering that Asura weapon, the scion of the raghus deployed the flaming AgnEya astra which emitted arrows that spit fire, glowed like the sun and had that shape, some with crescent moon tips and some resembling meteors. Yet other arrows had their head resembling the planets and the stars and seemed like streaks of lightning. All those scary arrows of rAvaNa were completely absorbed by the weapons of rAma in the skies.

Watching those astras of rAvaNa rendered futile by rAma who made it look so easy, the vAnaras led by sugrIva and other warriors rejoiced and surrounded him. The son of daSaratha was delighted to see his astras knock off those of the demon and the vAnaras let out boisterous roars and cheered him.