The end of Treta Yuga was near. The emperor of the mightiest city, sat in his palace overlooking his favorite river, Sarayu, even more than Ganga and looked at it with longing. He was now 10,036 years old and it was showing. His brothers had departed the world by submerging it into the Sarayu a few weeks ago. He was missing them. He had missed his wife for close to 10,000 years and he was not tempted when princesses from far and beyond wanted to marry him. He had told them all he would marry them in his next birth, half kidding.
One of his sons, had come from a far kingdom to become the crown prince and take over kingly duties. He was getting tired of his kingly duties, the disputes in his kingdom getting pettier. He could see the signs that the end of the yuga was nigh upon them. He looked over and saw his best friend, Hanuman. He was always in his vicinity, determined to keep him on earth.
He looked far into the horizon and he could see Yama, the god of death himself waiting for him to leave the mortal realm. He had prayed to him that he could lead him to the world beyond as he was denied twice by the indefatigable woman, Savitri of the soul of Satyavan and by the three eyed lord himself of the soul of the great sage Markandeya. He always enjoyed the story of Satyavanan and Savitri and had heard the story from the great sage himself on what transpired with the lord who wields the trident. Yama of course, could not enter Ayodhya as long as Hanuman was around. So he waited patiently outside Ayodhya.
It was the auspicious month to leave the mortal realm and the day of Pournami was coming up the next day. He had just finished praying at the temple of Shiva the day before the auspicious evening of Pradosham. Then a long lost memory came up to him and he smiled. He knew what he had to do.
The next evening, he had finished his prayers and his day’s work, had called his son and spoken to him in private. Then he called his friend Hanuman and told him he wished to speak to him and while he was speaking he was playing with his ring which was given to him by his dear wife after the wedding as a gift. Then the ring fell on the floor and rolled and fell into a tiny hole. It had slipped his hands. Rama was distraught. He asked Hanuman whether he could retrieve the ring. Hanuman who could not say no, immediately invoked his preternatural powers and took the form of a beetle and went down the tiny hole. It seemed forever to go down and he was able to use the force of gravity to go down at a dizzying speed and once he sensed that the floor was coming he slowed down. He then slowly descended into a semi dark place with some lighting at the edge. He used his powers to search for the ring and he sensed a slope and guessing it might have slid, he followed the slope to the direction of the light.
There he saw a snake and recognized him as Vasuki, the king of serpents. He now realized he was in Naga loka, the abode of snakes. He then looked towards Vasuki who nodded to him and pointed him in the direction of the light. He saw thousands of rings stacked in random order. He was shocked.
Then Vasuki addressed him and said, “O great monkey, welcome again. It is nice to see you after all this time.” Hanuman was puzzled. He looked at Vasuki and said, “O great snake!! Tell me why there are so many rings. This is a great mystery to me.”
Vasuki the replied, “O great monkey, for every 4 yugas, there is a Rama, his friend that is you and there is a ring. Since the beginning of time, there have been countless such yugas and I have been entrusted the trinity to be the keeper of this place. Every time you come down here, Rama uses that window of opportunity to leave the mortal realm. It was decreed by Brahma himself that as long as you and Rama in the same realm, he cannot leave. So the devas have figured out a way to have Rama leave mother earth as the Treta yuga ends.”
Hanuman who was now distraught, took leave of Vasuki and rushed back to the palace to the room where he and Rama had had their final conversation. When he came back, he was greeted by Rama’s son. Rama had wanted to apologize for leaving this realm without the final goodbye. He had told him that wherever, the monkey was and his story old, Rama would be there in spirit. Yama himself had come to take Rama back to Vaikunta as a result of his boon he had requested from Shiva during the episode of Markandeya. Rama had jumped into the Sarayu and had disappeared. The people had seen a light come out of the river and head to the outskirts of the city. Yama had kept his word of not coming to Ayodhya out of respect for Hanuman. Hanuman was a student of his dad, the Sun god.
Hanuman, who was visibly upset, took a deep breath, bid good bye to the people of Ayodhya and headed back to the great Himalaya parva’s where he would continue his meditation near the Saugandhika lake. That was close to the grove of Shiva and Parvati and he would not be bothered by living beings. He then resumed his prayers till the end of time as he was a chiranjeevi, an immortal.
