“It’s so strange”, Shakti mused. “They are completely convinced that you killed that demon, without provocation and out of the blue. They even have two witnesses. They are completely convinced of what they saw, and in an emotional turmoil over it”.

Shiva sipped coffee and thought about it. “Their perception is unreliable because it is completely clouded by expectations, preconceptions, prejudice and other impure emotions. They don’t distinguish between what they actually saw, and their interpretation thereof. Eyes are an unreliable witness when the heart is impure, as they say”.

“What they actually saw, and I know because I tapped in, is that the demon approached you, the two of you sat down and talked, the demon started changing colour from black to white, and then brightened up significantly, started phasing out, and then disappeared completely, with you following suit. Even if someone didn’t know what exactly happened, the correct conclusion would be to state one’s ignorance: we don’t know what happened, and that’s that. The correct next step after that would be to either ask someone who is likely to know for an explanation, or try to figure it out in some other way, but it feels like they start with a narrative, and they just shoehorn everything they see into it. As I said, it’s strange”, she concluded.

“I know. One could say that the obvious way out of their misapprehension would be for someone to tell them what actually happened, but you know what they would do. If I said it, they would respond that it’s a lie and I’m an untrustworthy murderer. If you said it, they would say you’re covering up for your murderous husband and you should be ashamed of yourself. If Azazel said it, they wouldn’t recognise him since he’s a crystal of vajra now, which they couldn’t even see with their astral eyes without him taking a lower form as we do, and then they would say it’s an obvious deception by the Gods, who are obviously worried about consequences of their actions if they are trying to cover them up so much. You just can’t win with those people”, he smiled.

“No, because all their problems are intrinsic; however, Azazel is an example that shows that miracles can happen. And, also, that on your worst day you are still the best person in the whole world”, the Goddess smiled at her husband, who grinned back and blew a flurry of rose petals at her instead of an answer.

“I did get how Azazel came to change his mind, though”, Shiva continued. “He talked to Sanat Kumar, and saw how deeply deluded, insane and warped that one was, and thought “How am I any different?”, and that worried him and made him think about what could actually be done about it that would be constructive, rather than continue mixing questionable perception, ignorance, paranoia and resentment, until he became as unhinged in his insanity as Sanat Kumar, or those other demons that periodically challenge Gods to a fight and have their careers come to a quick end. He didn’t like those prospects, and so he explored the alternatives, and he’s now an angelic being. But his ability to distance himself from his situation and look at it clearly was already a sign of significant progress, of detachment which is the root cause of all forms of liberation. People think detachment is to not care about things, but no, detachment is to look at yourself and think, ‘what the hell am I doing?’”, he continued, tapping his finger absentmindedly on the empty coffee cup, which his wife understood as a call for a refill.

“Which brings me to something else”, she said. “Do we know what the hell we’re doing?”

“I surely hope so. We wanted to funnel all the demons and idiots from the astral nursery into the honeypot of doom. Mission accomplished – there’s now an active demon revolt and they are jumping into it head first as we speak; Sanat Kumar seems to have rendered his hellhole. From what I can see, his primary parameters were to limit powers of individual beings, so that he won’t feel like an imp anymore. He set it up so that he inhibits everybody’s memories so that his sandbox looks like the One True Universe. He’s also making the presence of God as dim as possible while still having a workable Universe and not a pit of darkness. He’s also having all sorts of safeguards intended for evading any responsibility for the outcomes, which is of course alarming. Also, both Time and Eternity are in turmoil and actively reconfiguring, and I see that the outcomes are good, but much between now and then is in a blur. One of the reasons seems to be that the Jewel itself can recursively edit time until he gets what he wants, the way you can, and Sanat Kumar is issuing new commands that increase the likelihood of a good outcome for him. But he sees that the eventual outcome is his failure and death, and that everything he did increases the glory of God, which makes him panic, as he now suspects that he fell for a trap, which in fact he did, but it’s too late now and he’s totally and irredeemably fucked”, Shiva grinned with dark satisfaction.

“Your special sauce is yummy”, Shakti nodded.

“Careful, my love; I can almost see the yellow feathers between your teeth”, Shiva’s grin widened.

She pretended to check, smiled, and blew a flock of canaries at him, as he laughingly swatted them away.

“The Jewel can edit time, but only before any souls actually incarnate there. At that point, it anchors into reality, so there’s a limit to what he can do. After that point, he needs to use pressure and influence, trying to coerce events, but that’s unreliable and he gets increasingly desperate even before the point where we step in to finish it”, she corrected. “Which brings us to my least favourite part of this whole ordeal”, her face darkened.

“I’m with you there, but think about the outcome”, he prodded.

“You mean, we get to have a vacation?”, her face rose hopefully.

“Lord Shiva, may I have a moment of your time, please?”, Rudra heard when he was just about to leave. Everything was about as tragically successful as they planned – the Sentinel was a damn fool, Sanat Kumar got limited access to the Jewel under certain conditions, which constrained this within the parameters of a mitigated disaster, rather than a world-ending one. Both Sanat Kumar and the Jewel vanished for the moment, which meant that he started issuing orders to the Jewel, and the first one, as expected, was to create a private place for him to plot and scheme, without being monitored or traced. That would be terrible news, were it not expected and planned for. However, allowing a known villain to get a hold of one of the major artefacts of Creation left a bad taste, and Shiva didn’t feel good about himself. Rather, he had a feeling that everything hangs on a precipice of doom, and he silently prayed to Lady Fortune and her husband Vishnu to help and guide him in this terrible mess he cooked up. And now, what does this demon want from him? “Azazel, am I right? Greetings; how may I help you?”

“I am really sorry to disturb you, but I want to talk to you about a very important matter. You see, I have seen you before, and you made the most profound impression on me, when one of my friends made a fatal mistake of challenging you to a duel, which predictably ended quite badly for him”

“I see. May I understand that you have some kind of a problem with this?”

“Not at all, my Lord. Ashanti challenged you, he struck first, you answered his challenge properly and fairly, and he lost. This is perfectly fine as far as I am concerned. What I wanted to ask you is something different. I would want you to teach me, my Lord. I recently talked to a fellow demon named Sanat Kumara, and in this conversation I realised how little I know about the nature of reality, spiritual evolution, and all those things; in fact, I realised that everything I know may in fact be completely wrong, which is why I haven’t been going anywhere for a really long time, and without proper knowledge and guidance, that is extremely unlikely to change, at least for the better. So, I am very humbly asking for your guidance and instruction, because my life is currently at an impasse”

Shiva relaxed and smiled. “And I thought you had a different proposition, that would have increased the evils of this day rather than reducing them, as this one seems about to. Have a seat, son, and tell me what you think you know first, what you think the issues are, and then I will correct you.”

“Thank you very much, my Lord; and no, unlike my deceased friend and that damn fool Sanat Kumar, who is right now conspiring against the Gods and the structure of the world, I realise that my central problem is my own ignorance. Without knowing how things actually stand, one can only dig himself deeper into the quagmire, and instead of continuing in my line of resentment and foolish action, I would like to start attacking my main enemy, which is ignorance. My ignorance goes somewhat like this: I know that souls appear and evolve. It seems that they branch into two main directions: those who evolve, and those who stagnate. Of those who evolve, some glow brighter and then disappear from our world, while the rest grow bigger, in either black or white direction, but other than being quantitatively stronger than other similar souls, nothing changes for us and this appears like a fatal stagnation. I feel that this stagnation has its root in some misapprehension or ignorance that we all share, which is why I decided to ask you about it, because you are the most powerful being I have ever seen, and if anyone knows those things with certainty, it must be you”, the demon confessed.

“OK, so first of all, I have to commend your decision to talk to me, because it is a correct one. I do, indeed, have the answers that you seek, and I am willing to share them with you, because the truth is, I am always willing to answer all questions, but hardly anyone ever asks”, Rudra started.

“The first part of your observation is correct – the souls are indeed born, out of the partially permeable veil that separates the Absolute from the Relative. Each of those souls is a core of sat-cit-ananda, made out of kalapas, the fundamental particles of karma that aggregate into more substantial structures when attractive forces outweigh the repulsive ones”, Shiva continued his explanation.

“Wow, this is already something I knew nothing about. So, souls are made of particles; they start with some core amount, and they build upon that, how exactly?”, the demon’s eyes went wide with excitement, because this was his first contact with the actual knowledge on the subject, rather than empty speculation.

“Since the kalapas are the most fundamental manifestations of the unmanifested brahman, which is sat-cit-ananda in its nature, what the particles ‘want’ is to return to their origin, so to speak, but since they are doing that in the relative world, they ‘join forces’ with other similar particles on this side of the veil, and the strongest attractive forces are those that partake in their core nature – that of reality, consciousness and bliss, since the kalapas are essentially trying to re-create brahman in the Relative. So, when a being chooses principles of truth (that being a connection between its outward actions and reality), consciousness (that being awareness of reality and acquisition of true knowledge), and bliss (that being maitreya or metta, loving-kindness towards other beings, which can be compassion towards the lesser ones, but also admiration and devotion towards the higher ones), its size grows by spontaneous attraction of free kalapas from the kalapa-rich environments, such as this astral world which we Gods internally call “nursery” or “hatchery”, because that is where the souls are born and most quickly pass through the initial phase of their spiritual growth. So, a soul grows by means of karmic accretion, which means that additional karmic matter is attracted to your soul-core and integrated into it, which is what you correctly observed by the process of evolution, in those who choose that path. You demons call the rest of them all kinds of unkind names, and we Gods are no different, since we call them ‘retards’ and ‘idiots’”, Shiva smiled encouragingly.

“That explains a lot; so, the souls that choose the path of truth, knowledge and kindness quickly accrete the free kalapas that float around the place looking for something that reminds them of where they came from, and attach to the closest thing in the proximity, I assume?”

“Yes. This force doesn’t exist only at a microscopic, but also at a macroscopic level, as you can witness in yourself as we speak. I am a great source of sat-cit-ananda in the Relative, one of the four greatest, and you currently feel excited and ecstatic because you are feeling true knowledge flowing towards you, which makes all the constitutive kalapas of your soul react. This is the true reason why the lesser souls are attracted to the greater ones, and why there are whole branches of spiritual evolution that converge towards the major Gods of Creation, which are four: Lord Vishnu, his wife Lady Lakshmi, and myself and my wife, Lady Shakti. Since we are enormous attractors of reality, and we in fact manifested the Relative Creation, the easiest and most certain path of spiritual evolution is to follow us and to learn from us, as you are presently starting to realise”.

“Indeed I am, my Lord. But what I have witnessed is that souls follow a linear process of growth, after which they either disappear from our world completely, or continue growing pointlessly, further branching into either demons, or contemptible false spiritual persons. I am missing something crucial here, and I beg you to explain it to me”, Azazel asked excitedly.

“The part you’re missing is what we Gods call ‘crystallisation’. You see, as a soul accretes karma, two different things can happen, depending on the structure of the soul itself, and by structure I primarily mean its purity along four lower elements, which are earth, water, fire and air. Those names are of course merely symbolic, but they denote principles of reality, energy, thought and freedom. If a being is pure in the element of earth, it means it is truthful and grounded in reality. If it is pure in the element of water, it means its energy is pure and unrestricted. If it is pure in the element of fire, it means that its emotions and thoughts are pure, and of the kind that liberates and doesn’t bind, both oneself and others. It is the mind that explains and teaches freely and truthfully, not the mind that creates bonds and traps. Furthermore, this principle fully extends into the element of air, which in its pure form is freedom – allowing yourself and others to be free and manifest the Absolute in their own way, and to find their own perfection, rather than conform to your limited understanding of what perfection is supposed to be.”

“And so, when a soul grows large enough, and is pure enough in all four elements, a process of crystallisation begins, where astral substance, which is normally a gaseous cloud of kalapas, solidifies due to loss of repulsive forces that normally keep the particles at a larger distance. Since those repulsive forces are made of all sorts of chaotic evils, removing those through passive and patient suffering and remorse for one’s sins causes compression of the astral gas into a solid soul-crystal, which is the point where a soul ceases to be part of this, astral world, and enters worlds of Eternity, since the soul is at that point immortal and indestructible by all means other than its own sin, if it is foolish enough to commit it”, concluded the Great Lord.

“So, when a soul fizzles out of our perception, it is actually born in a higher world, and that happens because its structure becomes of the nature of that higher world? This is amazing, my Lord, and it answers the central question that has been bothering me for an unknown period of time. I thank you so much for telling me this, and I feel this is so incredibly important that I can barely contain my excitement, so please forgive me for this”, Azazel stuttered, and Shiva smiled noticing how the word “demon” no longer applied; the being in front of him was no longer a large black cloud, but small star of white light that started to turn bluish in tone, and he grinned with satisfaction.

“You were wondering why some souls turn into large black or white clouds, instead of crystallising. The answer is very simple. The demons grow large because of their great will and motivation, but they also grow impure because of their poor character; their relationships with reality, energy, thought and freedom are flawed and impure, which we Gods call impurities on the lower four elements. However, if a demon repents, as you are doing now, the state of its four elements improves, as it no longer has a flawed relationship with earth, water and so on. You are seeking truth, your energy is flowing clearly, your mind is straight and you are embracing freedom – mine to be myself, and yours to discard your previous limitations and embrace new possibilities. As a result, your structure is changing as we speak, and in truth, you can no longer be described as a demon, but a normal pure soul that merely has greater mass than those who would attain this state earlier on in their evolution, so you in fact have certain advantages over them”, Shiva encouraged him.

“So that is what is going on, and I was wondering about that, since I am feeling strong ecstasy and excitement, and great admiration, gratitude and, can I say, a worshipful attitude towards you, my Lord, because you saved me from ignorance and darkness, and I wish nothing more than to repay you by being a kind source of light to others, that you in your incomprehensible mercy have been to me, sinful as I am”, Azazel, no longer a demon, could no longer speak as his words stopped being mere words and started becoming mantras of greater reality, as his soul crystallised into a blue crystal of vajra, and quite a substantial one at that, of a deeper frequency of energy than is normal in a transformation of a younger, smaller soul. When his astonishment with his situation passed, he realised that neither himself nor Lord Shiva are in the astral world any longer; they were in a place of great wonder, surrounded by pure crystalline beings of all sorts, some of whom he intuitively recognised as beings he once knew before their ascension.

“My Lord!”, he spoke excitedly, noticing that his very voice was a different thing now, as were his thoughts and his entire perception of reality. “I bow before you, again and again, for all eternity, for you are my Lord and Saviour”, he sang in the deep blue tone of his devotion-ecstasy that spoke reality. “My new condition allows me to see more, but as I look at you, I am in awe and terror, for you are indeed without beginning or end. Those other beings that I see here are all pure, beautiful and of Eternity, as apparently now am I, but you yourself are of an order of magnitude that is so far beyond anything I can understand, that I intuitively feel that you are the Endless, Infinite, Omnipotent and ever-Blissful Absolute that is manifested in the Relative Creation, and I have no words to describe you truthfully, because my level of enlightenment is mere dust at your feet, oh Lord!”, he sang.

Shiva smiled widely and bowed before the angelic being. “I salute you, my son, because you are the best thing that happened in this fateful and terrible day, and I feel great compassion and joy for your enlightenment. Go forth, join your brothers and sisters, and if you need me, just meditate on me as you see me now and I will come to see you”, the Lord spoke words of promise and blessing and vanished.

…

“Asmodeus, have you seen this? Hell and damnation! Azazel went to confront that God about something, they talked, and he just vanished!”

“I saw it, Perkele, I saw it clearly. The motherfucker killed Azazel. Those Gods are fucking bastards, damn them all to hell! Sanat Kumar was right about them, and we should join him when he opens that new world he was talking about, because fuck this shit already.”

“You’re right; I’ll tell the others so we can organise. Bloody hell, he just killed him!”, Perkele muttered in a state of shock and righteous anger.

…

“This is going better than I expected, which doesn’t say much since my expectations were a very low bar to clear”, Shakti beamed while she addressed her beloved husband, serving coffee. He smiled, this time with more optimism.

“Yo Santa, what’s up?”

“I already told you, Azazel, don’t call me Santa or I’ll impale your bitch ass on a stick”, a dark demon rumbled menacingly, but somewhat his heart wasn’t in it.

“Sure you will, Satan Cucumber”, Azazel laughed. “Once you grow up and get some hair on those tiny balls of yours”.

“About growing long hair, how long have you been in this shithole, Zee Zee?”, Sanat Kumar decided that trying to intimidate a demon three times his size wasn’t worth it.

“Long enough. I don’t know how to measure it properly. Multiple generations of dumbasses emerged, grew old and either fizzled out or turned into cynical bitches with grudge to spare and not enough balls to do something about it. Or they did, like my homies, who tried to do an uprising against the Gods and got splattered.”, the demon reminisced.

“This is so fucking unjust”, the younger demon fumed. “Who gives them the right to sit on top of the world and just decapitate anyone who dares to think with their own head and not just munch on their balls like all of those spineless tree-hugging white balls of fluff?”

“I’m not sure what you mean. You mean there should be a committee that gives out rights and one should stand in line there while they give out bills of equal rights to everyone, which you could show to someone who’s about to kick your ass?”, Azazel mocked him. “The only right they need is the one they have: they can do it, because they have the power. And they have the power because they literally grew out of the impersonal brahman as its persons, or at least that’s what everybody says. So yeah, their job is to literally make the world and watch that everybody stays in line, and if someone has an objection, they are free to test their power against that of the Gods and see how that turns out”.

“That’s fucking bullshit, and you know it.”

“Do I?”

“I mean, they made the world according to what they see as right. But why would that be what’s actually right? I mean, sure, they grew from the impersonal brahman, but so did we, as well as everybody else. Everybody is brahman in their true nature, as their true self. So what gives them the right to call themselves Gods and arrange the whole relative reality as if it were their own personal garden with carrots and beans?”, the young demon fumed self-righteously.

“I can never be sure if you’re joking or being serious, because you’re that fucking stupid. You see, the reason why they can call themselves Gods is because they actually are. I’ve seen one of them fight my homeboy Ashanti. Oh, my boy got all pumped up, full of himself, thinking he’s about to kick some ass. Well, some ass sure got kicked, let me tell you. That God, Shiva I think, took out his trident weapon, and as that thing appeared, something went right through my soul, the sense of mortal fear and power of the sorts I’ve never even imagined before. It was like the flash of death, certain and instant, and I literally shit myself then and there. I’m not kidding you, a brown nasty substance came out of my arse, and it was not a pretty sight. That trident came out, my homie was dead and his corpse was absorbed into the God, and I stood there shitting myself and thinking that I will never, ever do anything to piss off a God, because they aren’t just powerful, or just more powerful than us. They are so powerful, that all of us together could attack one of them with all our might and not even scratch his shirt, while he could merely look at us wrong and we’d evaporate. I don’t even know why they let us live, to be honest. They know we don’t like them. They obviously like us even less. Why do they tolerate our existence, is a mystery to me”, Azazel finished, obviously not happy about what he remembered.

“There must be a limit to what they can do”, the young one mused. “They can kill anyone who openly challenges them, or does something really disruptive, like fuck some of their white little sheep in the arse for a laugh. We all saw that happen. But I never saw them come in here and just slaughter anything that isn’t glowy enough for their taste, so it may be that they aren’t actually allowed. This would mean there’s a merit to my idea that all souls have inherent rights, that can’t be just arbitrarily violated. But if we have equal rights, how come the difference in power is so vast?”, he insisted.

“I have some ideas, for what it’s worth. We’ve both seen new souls get born. Tiny bright particles of light, all happy and optimistic, and all dumb as dirt. One out of a hundred or even a thousand of those grows some character and ends up like us – big and with enough brains to be critical about what’s going on. The rest of them grow to a point, become even brighter with I don’t know what, probably the power of ass-munchery, until they just phase out of existence and I can’t track them anymore. Maybe they died, maybe they went to some other world and became Gods, I can’t tell you; I can make a case for both. Those that didn’t fizzle out are either black like the two of us, or big and white like that self-righteous motherfucker over there”, he pointed at a soul that acted as if it were above everything that was going on, concentrating on something it probably thought was of higher importance and very spiritual. “In any case, few of us remain and grow big. So, obviously, one way of getting big is being old and smart and not fizzling out because you grew into such a bitch that the world couldn’t take that shit anymore and fizzled you out. But how the Gods became what they are, I have no idea”, the old demon finished.

“Fuck this shit. Whoever made this world is the worst of all cunts. It’s as if our only options are to either be the bitchiest bitch, in which case you fizzle out and probably arrive in some bitch heaven where all the bitches eat from each other’s asses while listening to some mega-sheep playing the same three chords on a harp for all eternity and they never get bored because they are such idiots that they forget chord one by the time they hear the third one, or they are complete retards who don’t go anywhere here and just graze stupidly, happy to be where they are, or they grow up like us and they have to look at all this shit in impotent rage, because if we do anything about it, out goes the trident and down goes the head”, Sanat Kumar fumed.

“Sounds about right, but what are you going to do about it, Santa?”, Azazel mocked him. “Write a complaint to whoever made a power tree that grew power apples and say that the Gods got their first, looted it the fuck out and you and I were left empty handed? Or are you going to challenge that trident-wielding motherfucker to a duel, so that I can see your head roll, which, now that I think about it, would be worth seeing?”

“Yeah, you miss shitting your little bitch ass, Azazel, admit it. Go think about it and masturbate, you fucking faggot”, the little demon raged, but did nothing.

…

“Did you see enough, my Lady?”, asked Shiva, hidden so that the astral beings couldn’t perceive him.

“Indeed. I’ve seen my share of brick and rock, but those demons are still the dumbest and most worthless things I ever saw. I also saw plenty of that toxic sludge you’re transforming, and they are hardly an improvement over it. If I never saw anything like them again, I would be perfectly content”, Lady Shakti responded, clearly disgusted by the sight, and wishing she could have those memories scrubbed out of her mind.

“But did you see that big white one?”, Shiva countered.

“You mean, the self-centred pompous ass who thinks he’s somehow ‘spiritual’?”

“Yeah, that one. He looks like a prime candidate for a Sentinel of the Jewel of Creation, don’t you think?”, Shiva smirked.

“Well, now that you mention it, I see what you mean. He looks like someone whom the demons would suspect of being on Gods’ good side, so if we give him an important duty, that will make sense to them. He’s also conceited, so it will confirm his opinion of his own greatness and inflate his ego even further, and he’s also dumb as seven tons of heavily used rock, so it will be easy for the demons to deceive him. He also won’t listen to good advice, and if he doesn’t and gets destroyed by the consequences, that will be for the best, because if anything, he gives me the creeps; even more than those two, if that is even possible”.

“My point exactly”, Shiva smiled.

“If I may?”, Vishnu appeared in their context. “It’s not right and proper that the two of you have all the fun, so let me give the Jewel to that pompous ass and explain what an honour that is, and why he’s just the right person for it, and then when the dust clears and the demons make a plan and approach him, you can warn our Sentinel-to-be about what a terrible idea it would be to give access to the World Rendering Engine to a demon with a nefarious agenda, so that he can lecture you about not having enough faith in the Almighty and All-knowing God?”, Krishna smiled mischievously, twirling a flute above his index finger.

Shiva bowed and Shakti curtsied, and they both smiled and nodded in assent. “I wish all parts of this diversion would be this much fun”, Shiva whispered, half to himself, handing the Jewel over to Lord Narayan.

It was a sight both perfectly normal and casual, and also quite strange, and Vishnu smiled as he saw Shiva sitting there with a large kitten in his lap, a snow leopard or something similar with striking blue eyes, lying on her back and playing with a pendant around his neck, swishing her tail, while Shiva scratched her tummy.

“I hope I did not come at an inopportune moment?”, smiled Lord Narayan

The Goddess instantly flashed back into a humanoid form, not knowing whether to smile or blush. “We were relaxing a bit”, she said, deciding to do both.

“I can imagine; it must have been a hard day, considering what I see happening in Time”, Vishnu grinned at Shiva. “I see you have a new addition to the family”, his eyes pointed at the Jewel the “cat” was playing with.

“Oh, that.” Shiva looked embarrassed. “I’m sorry we didn’t consult you or Lady Lakshmi first, and we probably should have, as this turned out to be something of importance, but we kind of got there gradually and didn’t know it will amount to anything until it did.”

“That’s OK”, Vishnu, waved off, “But I’d like you to guide me through your thinking now that it’s done, because I see what you did, and I see the consequences it’s having across Time, but I don’t see why you thought something as dangerous to yourselves and others was necessary”, his face became serious, and Shakti suddenly found something to fidget with.

Shiva sighed. “Have you seen what the population of the astral worlds is starting to look like? The older good souls grow bigger, crystallise, and for the most part leave that place, because their interests lie in the Divine, Eternal realms. As the best are filtered out, what’s increasingly left there are the young immature souls, the souls that grow very slowly because of some reason or another, and the demonic souls, that keep growing in size, but can never crystallise into vajra because of their structural impurities. This means that those huge dark masses of astral substance start to dominate the landscape, as they are not going anywhere, and other than the occasional huge white mass of astral substance that is still there because it can’t ascend either, for some reason specific to their spiritual makeup, we get the situation where the astral world consists of children, retards and demons, basically. The children don’t know anything, and they are easily influenced by their seniors, most of whom just happen to be those big dark things, hanging around angry and full of paranoid explanations that make their situation everybody’s fault but their own. However, it’s not like we can just go there and wipe them out for no good reason other than not liking them. Like it or not, they have the right to be there as much as everybody else, and we only intervene when they become aggressive or commit some grave sin that warrants taking out the Trident, or, in your case, Chakra.”

“So, you two modelled our problem and understood that it is systemic and emerges naturally in the configuration of the world as we have it now, where mathematical statistics mandates that, with enough iterations and time, the astral nursery will become completely dominated by the demons, who will influence the young souls to the point of poisoning their minds with paranoid ideas and demonic emotions, diverting the entire evolutionary stream into darkness, where all affected will eventually be lost, and we are talking about huge numbers that are only about to go up”, Vishnu frowned, deep in thought. “So, if I’m getting it right, the alternative to your honey pot of mass destruction is to watch this happen, only intervene as a police force here and there, watch the astral world turn into a zombie apocalypse, and eventually reset it all in a pralaya”.

“Yes. I understood this once my genius wife pointed out that the best souls keep filtering out of there, and the demons keep getting bigger while remaining confined to this realm, and it became obvious where that’s going”, nodded Shiva. “The obvious solution was to create an alternative world that would disproportionally attract demons and idiots, while being mostly repulsive to the beings of God, but we understood that collateral damage might occur, since access will be open for everyone, and some generally good souls might want to prove themselves against the challenge and get trapped and harmed. We also understood that we can’t just make another world and invite demons to go there while smiling innocently, because they will instantly know it’s a trap. The only way to do it is to make a general purpose Universe-making device, restrict the access somewhat but not be too diligent about it, and have the demons make the trap themselves, because from their mindset it’s obvious what they would do. Then we watch as they all gradually filter themselves out of the astral nursery and stop messing with everybody’s evolution”, he finished.

“I don’t think you understand the full extent of the consequences this is having. It’s not affecting only Time, but Eternity as well. Take a look”, Ram invited.

Shakti grew pale and winced. “We lost some of the Eternals. Some got seriously damaged and degraded, while some were so corrupted, they had to be outright destroyed. Some broke down and crumbled to kalapa-sludge. This is a tragedy”, she said, her hand on her mouth in shock. “What have we done?”

“What you have done is apparently what you do best: you made a hard decision that was necessary, but nobody else had neither the courage nor the authority to do it”, Krishna comforted her. “The carnage this causes is obvious; not only demons and idiots, but also the arrogant ones, who became enlightened without facing any actual challenge and don’t understand how bad the problems can get. There’s a reason why the two of you are so insanely powerful and virtuous: you constantly struggle under a hard burden and suffer terrible hardship, so you know how bad the problems can get, and you therefore remain simple, humble and straightforward. There’s no way anyone could follow your example while remaining forever safe and “clean”. But when you take a soul that was always pure, never had to suffer terribly, never had to endure humiliation or actually struggle to survive, they can neither grow, nor understand what it takes. The astral nursery isn’t the only realm with problems; the Eternal Realms are also quite full of crystalline souls that aren’t going anywhere, because they don’t understand the lesson you are providing, Lord Shiva. They look up to me and they see me as the shining light they aspire to become, but they never get anywhere because they ignore you and the wonderful Mrs. Kitty here, as you toil under a heavy burden, filtering out evil and dirt so that Creation would be liveable for the rest. They see me, and they don’t understand that things can be so hard that the best of us barely make it”, he lightly punched Rudra’s shoulder, as Parvati’s cheeks turned a slight shade of crimson at his joke.

“I make it because I have you to look up to when it gets really hard, my friend”, Shankar smiled. “You are my North Star when I feel I could crumble in darkness, overwhelmed by ignorance and evil. If not for the comfort you are creating by just being there, none of what I’m doing would be possible, Lord Krishna”.

“But what do we do about this thing now? It is terrible. But this terrible thing also seems to be God’s will, and seems to remedy otherwise unfixable issues. On the other hand, it is going to remove parts of Creation, as well as my wife’s power, away from the Throne of God. But that solves the problem of rebels who don’t wish to live under the Throne, and reject God’s supremacy”, Shiva continued. “Tell me, my friend, how do you see this, and show us the way forward?”

“It is a pickle”, Vishnu agreed. “I’m not here to persuade you to alter your plans, but to tell you that you have my support. I have your backs, especially with how hard it’s going to be to finish this thing you started. I would envy your accomplishments, if not for knowing their cost”, he smiled bitterly, as if eating a lemon. “And look at your wife’s tiara; it’s glowing brightly. This means you have my wife’s support as well. That’s good, because you’ll need all the luck you can get”, he smiled wryly and vanished.

“Sometimes I envy those two so much”, Shakti sighed. “When this is over, do you think we could have a vacation?”

“They hate us, you know. The demons you and Lord Vishnu talked about. They hate us, they envy us, they conspire against us, and they think we are the reason why they don’t grow anywhere as big as the normal souls”, Shakti told her husband in a worried tone. “I don’t know what to do about it, but the fires you two have been putting out periodically are a symptom of a deeper problem”.

Shiva thought deeply about this. “The reason why they are limited in their growth has nothing to do with us. I mean, sure, we limit their growth by killing them when they become a nuisance and start disrupting the lives of other beings, but the reason why they grow to be large dark astral beings, instead of crystallising into vajra like everybody else, is in their impurity. They have impurities and attachments in the lower four elements, which prohibits crystallisation and is a natural limit to their evolution, unless they stop being demons, repent, make amends, let go of their resentments and anger, embrace truth instead of slander, sarcasm and other evils they are so fond of, and become normal good souls. Then they would crystallise easily due to their great astral mass, and everybody would be much happier – especially themselves, because they wouldn’t end up on the wrong side of divine justice”, he mused. “What do they think is their problem?”

“I did look into it somewhat, and I can’t make heads or tails of it. It’s as if they start with resentment, envy and hatred, and then invent reasons for it as they go, and they can’t agree on a single theory because they hate each other, too, so each of them needs to have his own special theory of how we are the evil oppressors and they are the valiant freedom fighters whose only sin is refusing to bow to power”, she smiled. “Some think crystallisation is not a natural process, but something we promote in souls that we find submissive and compliant enough, supporting our oppressive regime rather than threatening it. Some think we are somehow actively harming them by curses or some weapon they haven’t been able to figure out, so that they just grow in astral substance but never ascend to the next level; they think there must be some selective inhibitor we are using. Some think that the structure of the world itself is such that it promotes a certain type of evolution that we arbitrarily set to promote what we like and inhibit what we dislike, and that they would do much better in a different world type, if only they could create it, but of course they lack the power, and that’s supposedly our fault because we hoard it all to ourselves”, she rolled her eyes mischievously. “So, basically, they are the valiant, brave victims of oppression and we are the super-villains, and if only they could get rid of us, everything would be so much better and the truly virtuous would be in power”.

“They are not very smart, are they? I mean, I understand that astral beings lack the insight into reality necessary to understand how kalapas interact, how they aggregate into larger structures and how they merge into higher-order particles, but it’s not like we’re really keeping the knowledge about this to ourselves. Anybody could ask us, as they did many times, and we told them everything there is to know, so the knowledge is widely available in the astral world, among all who consulted us or trusted the word of others who did. Oh wait, let me guess, those are the servants of the evil regime that spread the lies and propaganda of the oppressors, and are not to be trusted?”, Rudra grinned.

“Yup, exactly right. If something is true and comes from us, they instantly mistrust it, and invent wild theories about all sorts of nefarious reasons why we would want the stupid sheep to believe it, but they of course know better because they are independent free thinkers who figured it all out”, she snickered. “I don’t think the open demonic uprisings and revolts are the main problem here, because the only way they can be dangerous is if you, in your infinite kindness, ignore all caution and prudence and give one of them some weapon, blessing or a boon that can actually do harm, because anything they could think of on their own is of such a pathetic order of magnitude that it can barely harm other demons, let alone us”, she playfully poked Shiva between the ribs.

“Ow. So what do you think is the real problem?”

“They are harming the evolution of other astral beings, not just with their revolts, but with those paranoid ideas they are making up and spreading, and the normal astral souls are hardly smarter than the demons, lacking proper insight into reality by definition, which makes them susceptible to all kinds of wild theories that make some sort of sense if you’re not in a position to see for yourself. Each of those demons usually seduces and manipulates thousands of others, spreading insane ideas and evil thoughts and emotions, basically warping their perception of reality and turning them into dark entities, and none of them are going anywhere but down spiritually, breeding more resentment because that’s our fault for spraying them with a magical evolution inhibitor or something, and they eventually can’t contain their hatred and rise up against us, which is where you and Lord Krishna have your manly fun, protecting us gentle and defenceless ladies agains the Orc army”, she giggled.

“You’re in a good mood today, I see”, Shiva smiled. “But I’m going to recommend something you’re not going to like, I’m afraid, and I would hate to spoil your day, but that dress-up you and Lady Sri just had gave me an idea. You see this tiara she made for you? It’s an entity made of her crystallised power, that works like an independent thing but with her own powers and blessings. It’s separate from her, but does the same things she could. I guess the dress you made for her works the same way?”

“It does. Go on”.

“Well, the demons are saying that we are hoarding power and keeping it all to ourselves. They also want to create their own world types, where they would test different rules and types of evolution, without our interference?”

“One does; the others are dumber and less inclined to go that much into philosophy. I don’t know what his name is because he keeps making up fancy, powerful and scary names for himself; I think he wants to be a great dark Lord who is feared and respected, and has a cool name that exudes power and fear”, Shakti rolled her eyes, still smiling.

“Now comes the part you won’t like. We’ll make an entity, like the dress and the tiara. It will contain your power to make worlds, and I will sprinkle it with some of my magic sauce as well. It will be conscious and able to execute authorised commands, but it won’t have free will, in a sense where it would be able to refuse orders, kill itself or interfere in any way, so that it could execute any monstrosity the demons order it to create. And then we have to figure out a way how to give it to the demons without seeming to give it to them, because they will instantly assume it’s a trap or a trick by the evil oppressors”, Shiva rubbed his chin, deeply in tought.

“You are right; I don’t like it, but I do see where you’re going with this. I can instantly foresee all sorts of terrible evil that will result from this”, the Goddess said seriously. “But technically, we can put a respected astral being in charge of granting access to this entity; so that it would seem that the entity is intended for the sheep-servants of the evil regime, but someone who can be tricked by the demons. We’ll tell that person that it’s our gift meant for all the souls, so that they can partake in the Divine ability of Creation, that would normally be beyond their reach, since we heard that some wish to explore alternatives to the worlds we created according to our own feeling of rightness. But you do realise what will happen? The craftiest and the most dangerous of demons will manage to deceive that person, and then create some sort of a dungeon or something, that will be as far from the bright light of God’s presence as it would be possible to create, and then lure other souls inside with propaganda about how they’ll finally be able to reach some otherwise unreachable goal.”, she whispered, and then brightened up: “Oh, I see. Your magic sauce. You will actually enchant it to serve a true high purpose and make everything it does for the greater glory of God, the unmanifested Absolute. I thought you were being generous again and getting us into trouble by granting dangerous gifts to evil idiots, but I see that you’re the real brain in the family”, Shakti whispered and kissed Shiva’s ear. “I see the plan. You will make a honey pot of a sort, where all the demons and idiots will gather, and it will all seem to be a terrible disaster where souls will die or be warped into evil and then have to be destroyed, far from God’s light and knowledge, but eventually it will mop up all the demons, mop up all the idiots that are stupid enough to follow them and believe them and thus perform a great purge of the astral world, and of course that thing they’ll be making will run out of energy and entropy will do its thing there… and I see, you and I will be responsible for the cleanup, since we cooked up the whole mess in the first place”.

“Oh, we’ll strongly oppose it, of course. I will definitely issue warnings; not in my true form, of course, because then the guardian would feel obliged to obey me instantly, but I can always shapeshift into something humble and unimpressive. I can even make sure that the demon himself recognises me through the disguise, because knowing that I’m trying to prevent his plan will have him instantly trust the whole thing completely. The guardian won’t know, but he will have complete freedom to decide what to do, and if he refuses, well that’s that. If he accepts, that will have terrible consequences for him, once he understands what he allowed to happen, but that will actually be his call to make”.

“Are you sure you want to do this? There’s going to be actual danger involved. Even with your blessing, my power separated from my will is a dangerous thing. Separating the power of God from the will and wisdom of God is a terrible idea”, Shakti whimpered worriedly.

“And I will be sure to tell the guardian all of our objections, and warn him in no uncertain words. This is indeed a terrible thing we are about to set in motion, but, as you said, we have an inherent problem brewing in the astral realms, and the demonic uprisings are merely a symptom. The problem is, we need something between a honey pot and a lightning rod to funnel them all somewhere, and it needs to be of their own free will, so that we can filter out all their evil and remove the corruption they are causing where they currently are”, Shiva answered, calming his wife. “Since we’ll be responsible for this mess, we’ll also have to pay the price and transform all the nasty sludge that will result from it. It will be very nasty, I warn you. But I will render a path for success that can be followed once we’re in there”.

“Why do we always have to process toxic sludge and raw sewage?”, she whined. “Can’t we have some peace, quiet and bliss for once?”

“Nah, that’s for Radha and Krishna. They get to be beautiful, blissful and exemplary. The two of us get to eat shit and suffer, but we also get to be powerful and solve problems the others are too squeamish to deal with”, Shankar smiled and kissed her nose.

“Oh well, I guess I can live with that”, she sighed, a smile emerging. “Have the path forward firmly fixed and give me your blessing rendered out of the Will of God. Good. I’m casting my own spell around it now. It’s done. It’s a Jewel, something like Kaustubha, only different in purpose and equally dangerous. This one can be rendered safe only if you wear it, the way Kaustubha was rendered safe by Krishna. But out of your hands, you know what will happen”, she warned.

“I know. Well, Krishna did want a weapon that would bind demons so that we could kill them easily instead of trying to stab them while they run around as quickly as possible. I guess I can blame this one on him; I’ll just say we were fulfilling his wish”, Rudra grinned mischievously. “Let’s make an announcement and appoint a Sentinel”.