The Gurus of Hastinapur - Part 25

Karna watched the entire scene in horror as his brother fell dead right in front of him. He let out a furious shout as he ordered his charioteer to turn around and attack the boy. Unfortunately, this time too, Karna found himself no match for Abhimanyu. Karna was also defeated the second time he faced Abhimanyu and Karna fled the battlefield...

The Kaurava army now had no one to lead them. With Karna gone, the soldiers ran helter-skelter from the battlefield, just trying to get away from Abhimanyu.

And Abhimanyu was merciless. It did not matter to him who or what was before him. Bodies of elephants, horses, great warriors all lay strewn on the battlefield for the only reason that they had crossed Abhimanyu's path.

*****

Meanwhile, at the edge of the Chakravyugha, Jayadratha was fighting like a man possessed. There was not a single flaw in his technique as he seemed to keep the Pandavas out of the Chakravyugha, with an almost effortless ease. None of the Pandavas, especially Bheema, could believe this.

This was even more difficult for Bheema to accept because he was the one who had single handedly defeated Jayadratha, when the king of Sindhu (Jayadratha) had tried to kidnap Draupadi during their years in the exile. The man who was fighting before him right now did not even remotely resemble that arrogant man, whom Bheema had fought during the exile...This Jaydratha knew what he was doing and had the confidence to check all the four Pandavas.

Bheema wondered what had changed this time to enable Jayadratha to fight him off so effortlessly....

********

Salya had already been defeated by Abhimanyu and he had been taken away from the battlefield by his charioteer. Salya's son Rukmaratha was unable to accept the fact that his father had been defeated by a little boy. He charged ahead in the battlefield, coming before Abhimanyu, hoping that today was the day he was going to outshine his father. 'I am going to take him captive! I am going to bring that boy here bound and then we will decide what to do with him!'

The other Kaurava soldiers encouraged Rukamaratha to go forward, but then Rukmaratha lasted now more than a few seconds as Abhimanyu made short work of the warrior and Rukmaratha fell dead...

Watching Rukmaratha fall had probably been the last straw. The Kaurava princes accompanying Rukamaratha were enraged by Abhimanyu and all of them together attacked Abhimanyu. It was said that there were so many of them that Abhimanyu was lost in the maze of arrows which were fired at him.

For a second, just for a second, Duryodhana actually rejoiced as something in the day's battle was actually going his way....

Whether Abhimanyu knew that he was facing insurmountable odds was something that Duryodhana did not know. But the way Abhimanyu fought, it showed like he really did not care. In reply to the barrage of arrows being fired at him, after cutting down the arrows, Abhimanyu pulled out the Gandharva arrow of illusion, which was taught to him by his father...Abhimanyu looked at the princes and he fired the weapon....

Once the arrow was fired, things went really bad. Already the battle for the Kauravas, in reality, was going really bad and now they had to deal with the illusion that the arrow created. Instead of a single Abhimanyu, the princes saw a hundred Abhimanyus...a thousand Abhimanyus, all over the battlefield. Whichever direction they turned they saw Abhimanyu firing an arrow at them....

The confusion helped Abhimanyu as he lost no time in killing the Kaurava princes who had attacked him.

Duryodhana watched the entire thing as a gripping fear possessed him....Was this boy going to be the downfall of the Kauravas? Duryodhana was unable to cope up with his fear as he turned from the battle and fled.....

Lakshmana, Duryodhana's son watched as his proud father ran away from the battlefield. Karna, Kritivarman, Kripacharya, Ashwattaman, Dronacharya and Shakuni were together trying to contain the boy and were having absolutely no success. Lakshmana, angrily pushed the other warriors aside and came forward to meet Abhimanyu head on.

****

Duryodhana who was already halfway away from the battlefield was alerted by his generals that Lakshmana was in harm's way. Duryodhana turned around as he watched Lakshmana had almost reached Abhimanyu. Not able to believe how foolish his son could be, Duryodhana shouted to call his son back. But then Lakshmana did not hear his father. Looking around wildly, Duryodhana called in his warriors as all of them desperately tried to reach Abhimanyu before Lakshmana could.

But it was a vain effort. Abhimanyu was like a warrior elephant gone berserk, as he killed Lakshmana and he also succeeded in keeping the other great Kaurava Maharathas from reaching Lakshmana.

As Abhimanyu was veering his chariot all over the battlefield, he realized that he had done something impossible. His battle had brought him right back in the beginning. He was back at Jayadratha's force who was stopping his uncles from getting inside the Chakravyugha.

Giving a whooping shout, Abhimanyu started attacking Jayadratha's forces from the inside of the Chakravyugha as he tried to make way for his uncles to get inside....

*******

Duryodhana was speechless as he watched his dead son. He could not believe that his son...the one who had grown up in the lap of luxury, surrounded by all lavishness that life could offer was lying dead in the battlefield.

He finally looked at Abhimanyu, a feral anger building inside him. 'Stop him from attacking Jayadratha!' Duryodhana said coldly. 'Throw everything that we have at him! That boy dies inside this Vyugha!'