**"Alright, everyone buckled in?"** I asked, cracking my knuckles dramatically. "Because we're about to dive into the backstory that started this entire snake sacrifice mess. And trust me, this involves more karma, divine intervention, and educational trauma than any one story has a right to contain!"
The sages were practically vibrating with anticipation. *Good. They're ready for the wild ride.*
"So!" I began, settling into full storytelling mode. "Meet King Janamejaya—grandson of Arjuna, great-great-grandson of Pandu, and the guy who's about to fund the most expensive revenge project in mythological history."
"Picture this," I said, gesturing dramatically. "Janamejaya and his three brothers—Srutasena, Ugrasena, and Bhimasena—are in the middle of this massive, years-long sacrifice on the plains of Kurukshetra. We're talking about the ultimate royal flex: 'Look how pious and wealthy we are!' type of ceremony."
"Sounds peaceful enough," commented one sage.
"OH, BUT WAIT!" I grinned wickedly. "Because nothing in this epic is ever that simple. Enter the most innocent victim in the entire Mahabharata: a puppy."
"So there's this celestial dog—one of Sarama's kids, you know, the divine bitch who works for Indra—and this little guy wanders into the sacrifice area. Now, he's a GOOD dog. Doesn't touch the sacrificial butter, doesn't even LOOK at it. Perfect doggy behavior."
I paused for dramatic effect.
"And the royal brothers? They beat him up. For literally no reason."
The collective gasp of outrage from the sages was beautiful.
"I KNOW, RIGHT?!" I exclaimed. "So this poor puppy runs home crying to his mom, and Sarama—who is basically the divine equivalent of a very protective helicopter parent—shows up and goes FULL MAMA BEAR MODE.
"She storms up to Janamejaya and basically says, 'My son did NOTHING wrong, and you idiots beat him up anyway! Therefore, karma is going to come for you when you LEAST expect it!'"
"Oh no," whispered one sage. "Celestial dog mama curse..."
"EXACTLY!" I pointed at him. "And Janamejaya, being smarter than his brothers, immediately realizes: 'Oh crap, we just got cursed by a divine being over animal abuse. This is going to come back to haunt us SO hard.'"
"So after the sacrifice ends, Janamejaya goes into full panic mode. He's running around Hastinapura like, 'I need a priest! I need absolution! I need someone who can undo divine curses!' Basically, he needs the mythological equivalent of a really good lawyer."
"And he finds this sage named Srutasrava, who has a son called Somasrava. Now, Somasrava is basically the perfect priest candidate—knows all the Vedas, super powerful, deeply spiritual. But there's a catch."
"There's always a catch," muttered Saunaka.
"His dad goes, 'Sure, my son can be your priest and absolve you from almost any sin... except anything against Shiva. But WARNING: he has this one tiny personality quirk—he literally cannot say no to any Brahmana who asks him for anything. Can you handle that?'"
"That seems... problematic," noted one sage.
"Right?! But Janamejaya is so desperate he's like, 'Fine, whatever, as long as he can fix the curse!' Classic decision-making under pressure!"
"But before we get to the main revenge plot, we need to talk about the most BRUTAL educational system in mythological history. Because this story has three of the most extreme student experiences ever recorded!"
I stood up, ready to act out the drama.
"Meet Professor Ayoda-Dhaumya and his three students: Aruni, Upamanyu, and Veda. And let me tell you, this guy makes modern college professors look like kindergarten teachers!"
"First up: Aruni of Panchala. His professor goes, 'Hey Aruni, there's a breach in the water channel of our field. Go fix it.' Simple assignment, right?"
"Sounds reasonable," said one sage.
"WRONG!" I announced. "Because when Aruni gets there, he realizes he can't fix it with tools or stones or any normal method. So this absolute LEGEND of a student thinks, 'Well, if I can't fix it normally...' and he LIES DOWN IN THE BREACH AND BECOMES A HUMAN DAM!"
The sages stared at me in horror.
"He stayed there. In the water. For HOURS. Until his professor finally remembered he'd sent a student on an errand and went looking for him!"
"That's dedication," whispered one sage in awe.
"When the professor finds him and calls out, Aruni pops up from the water like, 'Sorry sir, I couldn't find any other way to stop the leak, so I became the leak-stopper myself! What do you need me to do next?'"
"And the professor is so impressed by this absolute unit of academic commitment that he blesses him with perfect knowledge of all the Vedas and renames him Uddalaka—'the one who rose from the ditch'—as a mark of honor!"
*Time for student horror story number two.*
"But wait, there's more!" I announced. "Because Upamanyu's story makes Aruni look like he got off easy!"
"So Upamanyu is assigned to herd cattle. Simple job, right? But his professor notices he's looking healthy and well-fed, so he asks, 'Hey, what are you eating?'"
"'Oh, I beg for alms,' says Upamanyu."
"Professor goes, 'Well, you should give me all your alms first.'"
"So Upamanyu starts giving away ALL his food to his teacher. But he's still looking healthy! So the professor asks again."
"'Oh, I go begging twice,' admits Upamanyu."
"Professor says, 'That's selfish! You're taking food from other beggars!' So now Upamanyu can't do that either."
"But he's STILL healthy! Turns out he's drinking cow milk. Professor says, 'You can't do that without permission!'"
"Still healthy! Now he's drinking the froth from calves' mouths. Professor goes, 'You're stealing from baby cows!'"
"So now this poor student can't eat alms, can't beg twice, can't drink milk, can't even have calf froth. He's basically on the most extreme diet in history!"
"Finally, driven by starvation, Upamanyu eats some random leaves in the forest. Except these leaves are TOXIC and he goes blind and falls into a pit!"
"Oh no!" gasped several sages.
"When the professor finally finds him, Upamanyu is like, 'Sorry sir, I ate poison leaves, went blind, and fell into a hole. But hey, at least I didn't break any of your food rules!'"
"And the professor, finally realizing maybe he went a bit overboard with the restrictions, tells him to pray to the Ashwin twins—the divine doctors."
"So Upamanyu delivers this INCREDIBLE prayer—and I mean incredible, like cosmic-level poetry about the nature of time, reality, and existence—and the Ashwins appear!"
"The Ashwins offer him a divine cake, but Upamanyu goes, 'Sorry, I need to offer this to my teacher first.'"
"They're like, 'Dude, your teacher ate our cake directly when we gave it to him years ago!'"
"But Upamanyu still refuses! So they're so impressed by his loyalty that they give him golden teeth, restore his sight, and promise him good fortune!"
"Meanwhile, the third student, Veda, gets the easiest assignment ever: 'Just serve me faithfully for a while.' And he does. No drama, no extreme suffering, just good old-fashioned dedicated service."
"That sounds much more reasonable," noted Saunaka.
"Right?! So Veda gets his blessing, becomes a successful teacher himself, and decides, 'You know what? I'm NOT going to torture my students like my professor tortured us!'"
"But here's where it gets interesting! Veda takes on this student named Utanka, and he's much nicer to him. When Veda has to go away for some ritual business, he just tells Utanka, 'Take care of the house while I'm gone.'"
"While Veda's away, the women of the house approach Utanka and basically go, 'Hey, your teacher's wife is in her fertile period and he's not here. Maybe you could... you know... help out?'"
"And Utanka—showing the moral backbone his education was supposed to develop—goes, 'ABSOLUTELY NOT. That would be completely inappropriate!'"
"When Veda comes back and hears about this, he's so proud! He tells Utanka, 'You passed the ultimate test! You can graduate now!'"
"But Utanka goes, 'Wait, I want to give you a graduation gift—a guru dakshina—to properly honor your teaching!'"
"So Veda tells him to ask his wife what she wants. And she says, 'I want Queen Paushya's earrings. There's a religious ceremony coming up and I want to look fabulous for it. Go get them!'"
"That seems like an oddly specific request," observed one sage.
"RIGHT?! But Utanka is like, 'Yes ma'am!' and off he goes on what's about to become the most complicated jewelry heist in mythological history!"
"So Utanka is traveling along when he encounters this MASSIVE bull with an equally massive man riding it. The man goes, 'Hey Utanka, eat some of this bull's dung!'"
"That's... unusual," said one sage weakly.
"Utanka's like, 'Um, no thank you?' But the man insists: 'Your teacher ate it! It's perfectly fine!'"
"So Utanka—trusting his teacher's judgment—eats the dung and drinks some urine, and then continues on his journey, probably wondering what exactly they're teaching in these spiritual schools!"
"He gets to King Paushya's palace and goes, 'Your Majesty, I need your queen's earrings as a graduation gift for my teacher's wife.'"
"King Paushya is like, 'Sure, go ask her yourself!' But when Utanka goes to the women's quarters, he can't see the queen!"
"So he comes back like, 'Your Majesty, are you trying to scam me? Your queen isn't there!'"
"And the king goes, 'Ah, you must be ritually impure from eating. My queen is so virtuous she becomes invisible to anyone who hasn't properly cleansed themselves after a meal.'"
*The purification subplot.*
"Utanka realizes he did his post-meal cleanup while standing up and walking around—apparently a major spiritual faux pas! So he sits down properly, faces east, does the full ritual purification routine, and THEN he can see the queen!"
"The queen is super impressed by his persistence and gives him the earrings, but she warns him: 'Be careful! Takshaka the Snake King really wants these earrings!'"
"And Utanka, with all the confidence of youth, goes, 'Lady, no snake can catch me!'"
"Before leaving, King Paushya insists on hosting a feast for Utanka. But when the food arrives, it's cold and has hair in it—prepared by a woman with unbound hair, which is ritually unclean."
"Utanka goes, 'This food is impure!' and curses the king to go blind!"
"The king fires back, 'You're cursing me over clean food, so you'll never have children!'"
"But then they both examine the food more carefully and realize it really IS unclean, so the king apologizes and Utanka forgives him. Classic 'sorry for the mutual cursing' moment!"
"So Utanka sets off with the earrings, but stops to perform his daily ablutions. He puts the earrings down, and this beggar appears and STEALS THEM!"
"Utanka chases the thief, catches him, and SURPRISE! The beggar transforms into Takshaka the Snake King and disappears into a hole in the ground!"
"Exactly like the queen warned him would happen!" noted one sage.
"EXACTLY! So Utanka starts digging frantically with a stick, but it's hopeless. Then Indra—yes, the king of gods himself—takes pity on him and sends his thunderbolt to help!"
"The thunderbolt enlarges the hole, and Utanka follows it down into the LITERAL SNAKE KINGDOM! We're talking about an entire underground civilization with palaces, game courts, entertainment centers—basically Las Vegas, but run by snakes!"
"Utanka tries to negotiate with the snakes using poetry, praising their king Airavata and the whole serpent hierarchy. But they're not impressed."
"Then he sees this WEIRD scene: two women weaving at a loom with black and white threads, a twelve-spoked wheel being turned by six boys, and a man with a magnificent horse."
"And Utanka, being educated, realizes he's looking at the fundamental forces of the universe!"
"He addresses the man—who turns out to be Indra in disguise—with this incredible prayer about the nature of time, creation, and cosmic cycles."
"Indra is so impressed he offers to help! He tells Utanka to blow into the horse, and when he does, FIRE comes out of every opening and threatens to burn down the entire snake kingdom!"
"Takshaka comes running out screaming, 'OKAY, OKAY, YOU CAN HAVE THE EARRINGS BACK!'"
"But now Utanka realizes it's the day of his teacher's wife's ceremony! He's miles away in the underworld with no way to get back in time!"
"Indra goes, 'No problem, ride my horse!' And WHOOSH—divine transportation gets Utanka back to his teacher's house just as his teacher's wife is about to curse him for being late!"
"His teacher is amazed by the whole story and explains everything: 'The bull was Airavata, Indra's elephant. The man was Indra himself. The dung you ate was actually amrita—divine nectar—which is why you survived the snake kingdom! The women weaving were the goddesses of fate, the wheel was time itself, and you basically had a cosmic adventure!'"
"So Utanka graduates with honors, but he's FURIOUS at Takshaka for nearly ruining everything. He marches straight to Hastinapura to see King Janamejaya."
"Utanka finds Janamejaya and basically goes, 'Your Majesty! Why are you sitting around playing politics when there's serious business to handle?'"
"Janamejaya is like, 'What business?'"
"And Utanka drops the bombshell: 'TAKSHAKA KILLED YOUR FATHER! And he interfered with my sacred mission too! Time for REVENGE!'"
"He tells Janamejaya the whole story—how Takshaka bit King Parikshit, how he even stopped the sage Kashyapa from saving the king, how this snake has been causing problems for everyone!"
"Janamejaya hears all this and goes from zero to MAXIMUM RAGE in seconds. He's like, 'THAT'S IT! We're having the biggest, most expensive, most dramatic snake sacrifice in history! I'm going to burn every serpent on earth!'"
"And that, my dear sages," I said, spreading my arms wide, "is how one celestial puppy beating, combined with extreme educational experiences, a jewelry heist gone wrong, and divine intervention, led to the most expensive revenge project in mythological history!"
I grinned at their amazed faces.
"Because remember—Janamejaya was already cursed by Sarama for animal abuse, he needed spiritual purification, his priest's son can't say no to any Brahmana, and now this Brahmana Utanka is demanding snake genocide as payment for his graduation gift quest!"
"It's all connected," whispered Saunaka in awe.
"EVERYTHING is connected!" I confirmed. "The cosmic wheel of karma doesn't mess around! And that snake sacrifice? That's where Vaisampayana told the complete Mahabharata to save the remaining snakes from extinction!"
The sages sat in stunned silence for a moment, processing the sheer interconnectedness of it all.
"So," Saunaka said slowly, "the entire epic we're about to hear exists because someone beat up a dog?"
I nodded solemnly. "Never underestimate the karmic consequences of animal cruelty, my friends. The universe has a VERY long memory."