Mahishasura Arrives in His Buffalo Form

In the battle between Mahishasura and Devi, Mahishasura himself is now arriving at the scene.

Having seen his army greatly affected, he assumed his original form of buffalo and attacked Devi's ganas. That's why he is called Mahishasura.

Asuras are Mayavis—they can assume any form they want. There are so many of them, evil even among humans. Who knows whether they are humans for real or asuras in disguise?

Devi's ganas were produced from her own breath. They were her own soldiers. They were part of her. She had not taken the help of the Deva army. She created her own army. Attacking her ganas was like attacking herself.

How will a buffalo attack? With its face itself, head itself, it will strike—with its hooves, with its horns, with its tail even. Many of the ganas fell on the ground.

He struck swiftly. Some of Devi's soldiers he just swirled and threw away. His roaring itself made some of them fall down. His breath caused some to fall down.

After doing all this, Mahishasura rushed towards the Simha of Devi to kill the Simha. That really made Devi angry. So far, she was fighting playfully. But this made her angry.

Mahishasura was plowing the ground in front of him with his hooves. He was roaring loudly, and he was lifting huge mountains with his horns and throwing them.

The way Mahishasura was moving about violently, the ground parched and parted. His tail splashed water from the ocean all around. You can imagine his size—if his tail can splash water from the ocean all around, what should be his size?

His horns scattered the clouds in the sky. He was as tall as the sky, and his heavy breathing blew them away.

Seeing Mahishasura in rage, wreaking havoc like this, Devi Chandika then decided he should be finished off now.

Devi had the rope that Varuna Deva had given her, which he had produced from his own rope and given her. Varuna Pasha is famous. It is meant to tie up and torture evildoers. Devi threw Varuna Pasha upon Mahishasura and tied him up.

What did he do? He discarded the buffalo form and assumed another form.

He became a lion. Devi bound the lion also.

As she was cutting its head, he immediately changed into a human form, wielding a sword and a shield.

Devi pierced his body, his shield, and his sword with her arrows.

He is still not dying, you see.

He became an elephant then—an elephant as huge as a mountain.

Mahishasura, in his elephant form, took hold of Devi's Simha with his trunk. Devi cut his trunk with a sword.

Then he again assumed the form of the buffalo like before, and his violent running around and movements shook the three worlds.

The battle is continuing. We will see more later.

Ramaswamy Sastry and Vighnesh Ghanapaathi