Pakirappa compelled Senan to visit the Sacred Grove, and Senan agreed to it, but only for once. Senan imagined that the curse from the snakes he killed and the wrath of Naga would vanish if he paid obeisance to the Naga consecrated in the far interiors of the GK estate.
Because Senan knew about his link with the Naga from the astrologers since childhood, he had planned to visit the Sacred Grove at least once. Although he had such temples in his homeland, he had never been there, unable to accept the concept of worshipping snakes. Moreover, they have turned up as a threat or a nuisance before him many times.
He decided to live according to the rules and beliefs of the natives so that the mysterious incidents would not turn into intolerable miseries for him. He found that those who followed it could go in harmony. Chandu, who is a soft-spoken, lean young native with curly hair and a mediocre size, accompanied Senan to the Sacred Grove as per Pakirappa's request. His head bore a small, hanging, curly forest of hair.
He was walking in front, and Senan followed him through the wild plants. A narrow path made by the devotees, who arrive occasionally, was visible through the wild plants and trees. It had been Pakirappa's duty to clean the path leading to Sacred Grove. So, his work ends once a month in front of the Sacred Grove.
'Pakirappa is an ardent devotee of this Naga deity. So he would never harm any snake,' Chandu said.
Pakirappa had asked Senan to make offerings like turmeric powder, gingelly oil, and incense sticks at the Naga. Senan had to pour the turmeric powder on the idol, to light the stone lamp with the gingelly oil, and to pray devotedly to Naga to save him in every danger he had to confront in the forest.
Natives and laborers had already narrated the stories of Naga manifestations with slight variations to Senan, and he was assured of each. But none of them inspired him like the dreams he used to see when he was in Kerala.
When he found a job opportunity in the wild woods of Dakshina Kannada, he was not so bewildered by the fear of snakes, since he meet them in the forests in most of his dreams which turn out to be nightmares for him. To his surprise everyday dreams of snakes had vanished since he turned up in the forest.
Recalling the ever mysterious nightmare among those dreams he had long ago, while being bedridden at his home in Kerala, he asked Chandu, 'Which Naga God is this? Vasuki or Anantha?'
'I've heard that it's Sesh Naga,' Chandu said, and he folded his hands in reverence while saying it.
He had heard that either of them could be worshipped as the king of Nagas since Vasuki is the naga around the neck of Lord Siva and Anantha (Sesh Naga) is the naga on which Lord Vishnu reclines in the cosmic ocean.
'Bairu and the Malakudiyas who practice the antivenom therapy arrive here on the auspicious day of Naga every month to get a blessing from Anantha.'
Before Chandu could complete, Senan asked, 'Why should they seek blessing from Naga?'
'They've said that without Sesh Naga's blessing, neither they would get the plant for anti venom therapy on time nor it would effectively work in the patient,' Chandu said it as if he had either observed or experienced it earlier.
(to be continued)
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Invincible Naga
Mystery / ThrillerSenan had strange encounters with snakes, both in dreams and real life, when he was employed as a laborer in a vast farmland in the deep woods in a remote village in the Western Ghats of Karnataka, South India. Later, he finds that the snake had bee...
