The King of the Haihayas and his favorite wife Queen Valiria
sat in the river while they drank red wine. Valiria asked the King if he heard
the rumors of the great conqueror visiting the neighboring kingdoms.
“They say he has conquered even more kings than you,” said Valiria.
King Arjuna laughed loudly. “Maybe he has conquered more,
but he will never best me!” he shouted. “Who has been telling you these lies?”
King Arjuna questioned.
“I heard it from the servants,” said Queen Valiria. “They
were whispering in the halls this morning.”
“Tell me, my Queen, do you really think he is any match for
me?” bellowed Arjuna. He began to block the wide river with his thousand arms
and the water began to pool around them. “Look, even the river is no match for me, it
bends to my will.”
Queen Valiria smiled and agreed with her husband. “You are
right, Arjuna,” she said. “He would be a fool to come to our lands and
challenge you.”
Just as those very words rolled off her tongue, Queen Valira
caught sight of a hideous man with ten heads. He came strutting up toward the King
like a cocky rooster. Valiria immediately
knew the rumors were true and prayed the King would crush his swollen ego and
destroy this man’s very soul.
Two of King Arjuna’s royal guards approached Ravana and
asked him to wait until morning before trying to fight their King. “He is drunk
from wine and if you have any honor you will wait,” they said.
Ravana replied, “I care not for the excuses of your pitiful
King.”
King Arjuna overheard Ravana mutter this insult. He quickly
turned and found the nearest tree. He swiftly lifted the tree with all his
might and uprooted it from the ground. He held the tree with five hundred of
his arms. As he charged Ravana he yelled, “I will defeat you with half of my
hands behind my back.”
Ravana was in shock and awe of King Arjuna’s strength.
Ravana stumbled to grab his war mace and attempt to deflect the King’s mighty
swing. He got his mace up to protect himself in time but the King and his tree
vastly overpowered Ravana. The King landed an overhead swing right on the top
of all ten of Ravanas heads! This attack knocked Ravana down to his knees. The King
then picked Ravana up by his torso with a fifty-arm grip. He roared like a lion
and pledged to squeeze the life out Ravana.
King Arjuna was so loud that Ravana’s grandfather overheard
him all the way from the Himalayas. His grandfather rushed to save him and
pleaded with King Arjuna to release him. Queen Valiria asked her king to show mercy on Ravana so that he might tell the rest of the world about the strength of King Arjuna. Eventually the King released Ravana
from his powerful grip and Ravana was free to walk the Earth again.
Ravana never again visited the Haihayas again for fear of
King Arjuna’s wrath.
Author's note:
I chose to rewrite the fight between King Arjuna and Ravana
because I liked how easily Ravana was beaten in the story. Ravana is very
arrogant and I wanted to make his defeat more humiliating.
I added more details about what King Arjuna was doing before
Ravana found him. I liked the idea of King Arjuna having one favorite wife with
whom he could have a more in-depth conversation. I thought it would be very
difficult to have multiple wives in a short story without confusing the
characters. I thought the name Valiria fit in nicely with the time frame and
scenery. If there is another opportunity to write about King Arjuna I would
like to use Queen Valiria again.
I changed the story by adding more dialogue and fleshing out
some of the details. I wanted to keep the major plot points the same and not
distort the ending. Since the original story had some vagueness, it was easy to
accomplish this while still being creative.
I chose this particular image because it perfectly depicts
the defeat of Ravana at the end. I like how his heads seem to be moving so
quickly. It seems that Ravana cannot comprehend how he has been beaten.
Bibliography- Buck, William (1976). "The Thorn in the World's side" Ramayana: King Rama's Way 35-38
