Colours of My Empire

Without Sorrow (200 years later, Himalayas)

I stuggle to learn what it is I want, I am half concious and my husband will soon come to reduce me to the timeless nothing of unconscious. Strange it is, how he protects the weak humans from my awakening as if they are something of value to him. A laughable thought, value exists only for the lesser beings who all possess a finite amount of time.

A curiousity in the world I have never been allowed is coming to be, Kali yuga is here, the end of the world. It will be the death of My Lord's precious humanity, both our third eyes will open and all will be destroyed.

Difference is; I will be laughing and he will be crying with their remains. I do not understand him, so I watch him often as he meditates on Mount Kailash and his mind wanders to humanity, he enters their minds and finds something beautiful. Even though he is the destroyer of the world, gods and all consumed by him, his love is unstoppable.

I wish to understand that  which is unattainable to me, so I find the will to travel to Earth and search.

I close my eyes and feel my soul leave my body easily, this feat is one of the gods' powers, our souls do not reincarnate but can go anywhere we wish.

I reach human world and fly above the prosperous villages, people walk through the streets and bargain with each other, children run about fullfilling tasks and running errands for their parents' businesses only to slip away every chance they get to play with carved wooden toys, girls stroking the hair of beautifully painted wooden dolls.

A busy marketplace is where I land, the time I was last in a place like this is when I rampaged, there were no smiles, there was blood coating my legs and chest, dual swords and a trident in three of my hands, severed heads were in the other three. Necklaces of bashed in skulls and skirts made of severed arms hung about me.

But this... was very different, the people were prosperous on their own we gods weren't necessary, even the poorest of poor had a gold necklace on their person, earned on their own and showed off with pride.

The marketplace had something even stranger, different looking people, some of them with white skin and thin sharp looking eyes, some of them had brown hair. Different races. Humanity truly has progressed. Pride at our children did prick me, but I wouldn't be able to hold the scene in my sights for very long, I am the goddess of war, of death and chaotic battles and the villages of Bharat lacked the red colour that gave me purpose.

My soul was dragged towards the bloody battle far away where my purpose existed when I saw a small girl, she was clutching scrolls in her small arms, heading towards a strange temple made of wood and stone carvings. Her detemination in forging her own path shone in her eyes and my curiousity grew, that light, even I had lost it.

Then I saw blood and fighting surrounding King Bindusara Maurya's army, the man was an excellent tactician, the poison blue mark on his forehead, a blessing from the gods. All the enemies of Bharat to the East and West were exiled and slaughtered, in that order, their sickened countries were healed and coupled by the Empire.

The new styles of battle were displayed before my eyes and I followed all of them, synchronized formations carried out by the soldiers, communication through certain hand movements passed on messages the same way ants left scent trails. These men actually watched their surroundings unlike the men of the Mahabharat, fools who believed in the existance of war's rules.

Adding moral to the act of killing is a ribbon on a rotting lion's corpse and then sending it back to his wife.

War is destruction, it is suffering and I love it. There is something about the commotion of thousands of men loosing lives at once, something about the whirl of souls whipping through my dark hair and the glow of swords glinting, lines of light slashing at the dark of my face.