कुबेरपराजयः पुष्पकहरणं च

Agastya continued. Seeing the yakṣa chiefs terrified in their thousands, Kubera, lord of wealth, said to a great yakṣa named Māṇibhadra: "Chief of the yakṣas, kill the wicked, evil-minded Rāvaṇa, and be a refuge to our valiant yakṣas who glory in battle." At this, mighty-armed Māṇibhadra, who was very hard to overcome, went into battle with four thousand yakṣas around him. The yakṣas rushed upon the rākṣasas, striking with maces, clubs, darts, spears, lances and hammers. Darting swiftly like hawks, they fought a tumultuous battle, crying out "Now!", "Give it here!", "I will not!", "Hand it over!" Seeing that tumultuous fight, the gods, the gandharvas and the seers who expound the Veda were filled with wonder. Prahasta killed a thousand yakṣas in the battle, Mahodara another thousand blameless ones, and furious Mārīca, eager for battle, felled two thousand in the space of a blink. And Agastya gives the reason: "Where is the straightforward fighting of the yakṣas, and where the fighting of the rākṣasas, which relies on the power of illusion? That is why the rākṣasas prevailed in battle, tiger among men." Here the poet shows the difference between two ways of war: the yakṣas fought an honest, righteous fight, the rākṣasas fought with illusion and deceit, and so the rākṣasas won though fewer in number, a handful against four thousand. The same difference runs through the whole Rāmāyaṇa, in Indrajit's unseen fighting and in Mārīca's magic deer. Kubera does not fight himself at first but sends his general, as a king should; his side fights with its army for as long as it can, and only at the end does he come himself. The four cries give a lively picture of the battlefield, where one man calls for a blow, another refuses to fall back, another asks for a weapon. The feats of Prahasta, Mahodara and Mārīca are counted one by one, a thousand, a thousand, two thousand. And the wonder of the gods, gandharvas and seers, watching from the sky as before, shows how great this battle was.

In the great battle Māṇibhadra met Dhūmrākṣa, who struck him on the chest with a club in anger, yet he did not flinch. Then Māṇibhadra whirled his mace and struck the rākṣasa Dhūmrākṣa on the head, and he fell reeling. Seeing Dhūmrākṣa struck down, fallen and drenched in blood, Daśānana rushed at Māṇibhadra, for he would defend his minister himself. As Daśānana came charging in fury, Māṇibhadra, bull among yakṣas, struck him with three spears. Rāvaṇa, struck, hit Māṇibhadra on his crown, and the blow knocked the crown to one side. From that day, they say, that yakṣa was known as Pārśvamauli, "he whose crown is to one side". When the great Māṇibhadra turned away from the fight, king, a mighty roar went up from the rākṣasas on that mountain. Here again a name is explained, as Saramā's was in the twelfth sarga: the knocked crown was a mark of defeat, yet with it the yakṣa gained a new name. Māṇibhadra could beat Dhūmrākṣa but could not stand before Rāvaṇa, for Rāvaṇa, protected by Brahmā's boon, could not be killed by yakṣas; Māṇibhadra's three spears did him no harm, while one blow of his was enough. Dhūmrākṣa's fall roused Rāvaṇa's anger and shows his care for his ministers. With Kubera's chief general defeated, Kubera himself now had to come.

Then from afar the lord of wealth appeared, mace in hand, attended by his two ministers Śukra and Prauṣṭhapada and by Padma and Śaṅkha, the presiding deities of treasure, so that the lord of riches came to battle with his wealth in bodily form beside him. Seeing his brother in battle, a brother who because of their father's curse had lost all regard for his elders, the wise Kubera spoke words worthy of the Grandsire's line. "Wicked one, though I tried to hold you back, you do not understand. Later, when you reap the fruit of this and have gone to hell, you will know. The fool who in his delusion drinks poison without knowing it learns the fruit of his act only when the poison works. The gods take no delight in anything you do, however righteous it may look, and that is what has brought you to this state; yet you do not see it. Whoever scorns mother, father, brahmin and teacher sees the fruit of it when he falls into the power of Yama, king of the dead. Whoever in this fleeting body does not earn the merit of austerity will repent, the fool, when he is dead and meets his fate. From dharma come kingdom, wealth and happiness; from adharma, only sorrow. So for happiness one should practise dharma and shun sin. The fruit of sin is sorrow, and one must suffer it oneself, here; so the fool who sins does it to his own ruin. No evil-minded person comes to right understanding of his own accord; as a man acts, so he reaps. Prosperity, beauty, strength, sons, wealth and courage are gained in this world only as the reward of meritorious deeds. Since your mind is what it is, you are bound for hell. I shall speak no more with you; that is the rule towards the wicked." Kubera's counsel is like a summary of the teachings of dharma: the inevitable fruit of action, the example of the poison, the fate of those who scorn their elders, the impermanence of the body, the need for austerity, and the different fruits of dharma and adharma. The verse "from dharma come kingdom, wealth and happiness" is well known as a maxim, and so is "as a man acts, so he reaps". His words about scorning mother, father and teacher point straight at Rāvaṇa's fault, for he had scorned both his father Viśravas's words and his elder brother. There is more pity and sorrow in Kubera's speech than anger, since he sees that the curse has robbed his brother of respect for his elders, and he tries to awaken him by dharma before the fighting, as befits his nature. But the language hardens as he goes, from calling him "wicked one", to foretelling hell, to breaking off speech altogether: an elder brother's affection turns step by step to despair. Recalling the rule that one should not converse with the wicked, he ends the talk. These are his last words, and after them there is only battle.

Having spoken, Kubera struck at Rāvaṇa's ministers, and all of them, led by Mārīca, turned and fled. Then the great lord of the yakṣas struck Daśagrīva on the head with his mace, but it did not move him from where he stood. And so, Rāma, yakṣa and rākṣasa struck at each other in that great fight, and neither was dazed or wearied. The giver of wealth loosed the fire weapon at him, and the lord of the rākṣasas checked it with the weapon of Varuṇa, as fire is quenched by water. Then the lord of the rākṣasas entered into rākṣasa illusion and, to destroy Kubera, took on a hundred thousand forms. Ten-faced Daśānana was seen as a tiger, a boar, a cloud, a mountain, an ocean, a tree, a yakṣa and a daitya. He made many forms, and they could be seen, but he himself could not. Then, Rāma, Daśānana took up a great weapon, whirled a huge mace and struck the giver of wealth on the head. Reeling and drenched in blood, the lord of wealth fell like an aśoka tree cut at the root. Then Padma and the other treasures gathered round him, carried him to the Nandana grove and brought him back to his senses. The fight has three stages: first with maces, where the two were equal; then with divine weapons, where fire was quenched by water; and then with illusion, where Rāvaṇa won. So Agastya's earlier words prove true again: the rākṣasas, relying on illusion, overcome honest fighters. Here we first see Rāvaṇa use the boon he won in the tenth sarga, the power to take any form, and all the forms he takes are huge and terrifying, meant to bewilder his opponent. He strikes from out of sight, as Indrajit would later do. The aśoka cut at the root shows how suddenly Kubera fell. It is fitting that his rescuers were the treasures themselves, for the servants of the lord of wealth are riches. Kubera was not killed, only stunned, for his story goes on, and his revival in Nandana shows the gods' love for him. So the teacher of dharma was beaten by illusion, a defeat of dharma for the moment, which Rāma would one day set right.

Having conquered the giver of wealth, the lord of the rākṣasas, glad at heart, seized Kubera's chariot Puṣpaka as the token of his victory. It was set with golden pillars and gateways of beryl, covered with nets of pearls, and planted with trees that bore fruit in every season. It was swift as thought, went wherever its rider wished, took any form at will and coursed through the sky. Its stairs were of jewels and gold and its platforms of refined gold. It was the gods' own conveyance, imperishable, ever a delight to eye and mind, full of wonders, painted with designs, fashioned by Brahmā, made to fulfil every desire, delightful and unsurpassed, neither cold nor hot, pleasant in every season, and auspicious. Mounting that chariot, won by his valour and going wherever he willed, the evil-minded king, swollen with pride, thought he had conquered the three worlds. Having conquered the god Vaiśravaṇa, he came down from Kailāsa. Having won that great victory by his might, the valiant night-ranger, with his spotless crown and necklace, seated in that supreme chariot, shone like a fire blazing in a sacrificial hall. This description of Puṣpaka recalls the one Hanumān saw in the Sundara Kāṇḍa. This is the same chariot Rāma would ride back to Ayodhyā after the war and then return to Kubera, so its seizure begins a long thread of the story. Three of its epithets show its divine nature: swift as thought, going wherever one wishes, and taking any form one wishes. In saying that Rāvaṇa thought the three worlds conquered, the poet mocks his pride: he beat one brother and thought he had conquered everything. Still, Puṣpaka was a true sign of his victory and the emblem of his splendour. With Laṅkā and now Puṣpaka taken from Kubera, Rāvaṇa's power was complete, and his pride grew with it. And it is with this chariot that the next sarga begins, when its flight is halted and the encounter with Nandīśvara follows.