[center][h3]The First Indians[/h3]
[i][sub]Written with Oraculum![/sub][/i][/center]

Wrinkles were cut into Stambh’s visage; if that was not how he had been carved from the chisel of the Rakshasaraja’s mind, then that was how the warmth of distant Itzala in the sky had made him. The sun had also touched the guru over the rest of his body; he was tanned and like the color of sandalwood. And on the topic of sandals, he wore none! No shoes of any kind spared his gnarled feet from the ground’s toll, but it was warm enough in this part of the Indias, so his toes were not afflicted overmuch by cold, even during the cool nights. His heels and the bottom of his toes were like leather, and so he did not mind the small stones and sticks that he had to trod upon as he wandered down the riverbanks and through the forests, over the hills and under the mountains, all across this strange world.

He had done much contemplation already in these early days; while his body wandered alone, his mind strayed so as to keep itself busy. And as he was so clearly crowned with wisdom, clean and always with washed hair and a magnificent beard even as he wore only a modest loincloth, there were many who stopped him as he walked and asked him for his sagely counsel or his thoughts, and he was always glad to speak with another. The path to enlightenment came from enlightening others, after all.

So Stambh looked over at his day’s current student, and his wrinkled brow furrowed. “But look at the brawn of your arms, the richness and thickness of your hair,” he began, “You are built like mine own father! It is a mighty and noble body that you could have. But where he was regal, you are unkempt and filthy here; your smell is not altogether foul, but that dirt does your beauty no justice. Come down here by the river, for your body is unclean and should be washed. That will bring you closer to Purity.”

And as this was a good and eager student, not some undisciplined and rebellious fool like so many of the youths of today, he obeyed the wise guru Stambh and entered the river even though the water was cold and the current was swift. The dirt was at once loosened, and thinking it all swept away, the pupil made to swim back to the bank after only a few moments.

“No,” corrected Stambh, “you must scrub!”

And though the student was cold, he diligently obeyed and began to rid itself of the dirt which clung strongest to it, and of the dirt that was beneath its nails and behind its ears. Meanwhile, the guru had seized a cluster of juniper berries and two rocks, and was mashing a paste.

“Here,” called out Stambh from the bank, “cleanse yourself with the fragrance of this wash.”

And his apprentice came to the riverbank and took up the mashed juniper, but then licked at it and made as if to rub the stuff under his tail.

“No,” instructed Stambh. “like this!”

And so the sage showed the little white-furred rhesus macaque where to apply it, how to produce the fragrance, and how to lather the scent over the rest of its body. But merely possessing pleasant aroma and a clean, well-groomed body did not make for an enlightened being, so there was more work to be done.

The monkey fidgeted, now conscious of the filth that resided in the dirt and the insects all around, where before he had never minded such things. So the rhesus macaque developed a tic in the side of its lip, looking around at the sorrowful state of the tepid Indian wilds all around (for it would be a long time before this land, this mildest of the Three Indias, was cultivated and made into the seats of the greatest of mortal rajas) and think also of its less fortunate brethren, who still frolicked in the great piles of elephant dung for having never been taught better.

That neuroticism was not becoming of an enlightened one, the sage realized. So he looked down at his twitched student and his brow furrowed once more. “Now your body is Pure, but there remains another sort of Impurity about you. It is in your mind. See how you are bound to yourself, how to sway to fro without the shove of the wind, dancing these meaningless and sharp motions? Do you feel the cloudiness of your mind? Those wild thoughts that send you to and fro are like the film of dust that settles atop a stagnant pool, obscuring the clarity of the pristine waters below.”

The monkey stared at Stambh puzzledly, chewing on its thumbnail as it tried to make sense of those words. The sage only shook his head. This was not something easily explained; he whose mind had only ever known turmoil could hardly be expected to understand–let alone cultivate–inner tranquility.

So Stambh seated himself in the lotus position, and gestured for the rhesus macaque to do the same. The monkey expressed some dismay at the prospect of getting down into the dirt now that it was so clean, but the brave and obedient pupil trusted in his mentor, and so overcame his squeamishness and did as was bidded of him. Once the two were seated in that pose beneath the shade of a sandalwood tree, facing one another, Stambh gave his next instructions, “Now close your eyes. And now release your breath…”

Their days of meditation were not easily counted. Though they sought a spiritual awakening, they were as of yet tethered to the physical world, and so in the waking hours of the day they took some breaks to answer the call of nature, drink of the sweet spring water, and to feed upon the abundant fruits and berries of the woodland which were sweeter still. In time, macaque found himself unburdened by thoughts of pain or pleasure. Eventually, the monkey found itself no longer suffering from even the desire to taste sweetness, and so without having been told, it began to feed upon the nuts that were strewn all over the ground; it had no time to climb trees to find the ripest fruits or to mill through the forest looking for what berries had not already been claimed by the yet-unawakened creatures of India.

Yes, the unawakened creatures. They were different from him, the monkey knew, for he was now awake. And with his enlightenment had come a sort of noble calling, a yearning to open the eyes of others that they could see the right path. So he bowed long before his master Stambh, and thanked him in his monkey way, and then took his leave to do just that. It was with pride that Stambh saw his first student gather up the other rhesus macaques of the wild and take the mantle of a disciple, bestowing unto others what was unto him.

Sometimes Stambh would come to the macaque congregation too, to help his disciple Purify them in body and mind. The sage, strange as he looked to those creatures with his human stature, served as a sort of inspiration.

This first monkey-disciple of the sage, through his following the path set by Stambh and through his teaching of others, eventually reached full mastery of the way. When he came to the end of the path, he was fully awake, pure of body and mind and even of soul.

By then, the sage Stambh had wandered to other parts, but tribes of other humans had found their ways to the strange and fertile lands of this India. Seeing the tall men of slender frame and tan faces, the awakened macaques recognized the likeness of their mentor Stambh, and so they made themselves friendly acquaintances.

The humans were of course taken aback by these animals approaching them so boldly and amicably, and doubly so when they observed the strange behavior of the monkeys. But this was a bountiful land, filled with fruit and nuts, and so their curiosity overcame their base nature, and they did not harm the macaques even if the hunters would have been able to make easy quarry of the trusting and passive creatures. The rhesus macaques showed them which plants and nuts to eat, where the best drinking water and bathing spots were, even how to make the juniper wash and bathe.

Some human imitators even began to join in the rituals of these most sacred of animals (for how could such enlightened creatures be anything but holy?), and these went on to become the first yogis.

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After many days, Nawal found at last a mountain to his liking. The first one he had sought to climb had been wholly impassable at the foot; after pushing his way through the forest that surrounded it, relieving his hunger with the large and watery pale-brown mushrooms that grew there, he had found that the incline leapt up suddenly into a steep wall, with no path to be seen, nor even ledges he could have held onto had he been more vigorous of body. If even he had climbed it, he thought, the illuminations he would have found on such a mountain would have been arduous and forbidding, difficult to grasp and impossible to ever be taught, and so had turned away from it.

The second mountain had seemed more promising at first glance. The trees below it had been more sparse, with more yellow needles than green ones in their crowns, and where they ended it was not difficult to find the roots of an inclined ridge that led up around the great stone stalk. He climbed it for two days and two nights, finding along the way small caverns in the rocky face and wide round shelves where he could rest. At noontime on the third day, however, when he had ascended to half of the mountain’s height, he saw that the winding path broke off and rose no further, so that the summit could not be reached. This, he thought, was also a poor place to meditate, for he would come to the cusp of enlightenment and then never be able to take the final steps.

Thereafter, Nawal no longer let his mere intuition guide him in search of a perfect seat, but strained his eyes to see the shape of a mountain’s flanks before he tried to climb it. Before then, it had seemed to him that such base premeditation would mar his quest and defeat its point; if he had come here to perfect his spirit, should he not exercise it and let it grow rather than lean on the crutch of bodily senses? But then, he reasoned one day, as he sat cross-legged on a rock by a mountain stream, eating a hard and sour gourd-like fruit, perhaps he had been wrong to think so. If his spirit needed to be refined in the rarefied air of these mountains, then clearly it still had room to grow, and was uncertain in its abilities. The wise thing to do, then, was not to depend on it wholly, but let his experienced eyes and ears lead it about the world for a little time yet.

So it was that when he approached the third mountain, he knew that a path would lead him up as far as he could see from below. The footslopes were high and lenient, reaching beyond where, for most others, the sheer rock began, and the ledges spiralling upward from them were numerous and even, almost like so many paths climbing a less upright peak. The caverns in its side were plentiful, so that, as he made his way heavenward, he never had to sleep under the bare sky; and most were dry and spacious as well, like huts prepared for a traveller. In several places along the way, the ledges broadened considerably, and it seemed to him that entire villages could be built there, if their people could but find springs of water and grazing-grounds at hand. In three mere days he was at the top, though this summit was little shorter than the previous one he had attempted. It was a fine place, low enough that tufts of grass sprouted about it for comfortable seating, with a cavern close below if he had need of shelter. 

Yet this mountain did not please him, for the very reason that it had been so easily mastered. The thoughts he would reach upon it would be smooth and pleasant enough, but pedestrian and certainly not wise, for no wisdom was gained without effort.

Thus Nawal looked down from his elevation, which, though it was not spiritual, served him well enough, because he plied his bodily senses alone. His eye found a new goal which appeared both approachable and worthy, though of course it was hard to judge of the latter before having tried of it. The way down was easier than the ascent, and in but eight days he had reached the fourth mountain.

Great was his surprise when he saw that it was not uninhabited like the others! About the foothills and on the forested slopes, huge shaggy forms moved among the trees, walking on the knuckles of their fists and sometimes even standing upright on their two legs. These were reclusive, solitary beings, as he soon discovered; though they towered greatly over him, the shaggy brown apes lumbered away into the woods when they heard him approach, and would not come near him even as he rested. Only after some days of walking did he begin to see curious snouts, long and ursine, following him from the brush as he went by, and by the time he had reached the mountain they were accustomed enough to his presence to stroll freely about or keep chewing their fruits even upon his passage.

The peaceful mountain-apes amused him, but he was troubled by their presence all the same. His fears were confirmed when he reached the mountain’s rocky wall, and saw large brown figures lumbering about its crags and climbing its slopes. A path that was trodden by too many, of course, could not lead to wisdom, for that would have been a common thing; and a seat as peopled as this could only be home to common revelations.

Nawal almost despaired then, for he could see no other suitable mountains around him, and he was feeling weary from the search. But then he sat on a flat stone to think, and another thought did come to him. The senses were not the body’s only faculty; there was also speech, which could perhaps avail him now that he was no longer quite alone in the woods and the foothills.

He went into the thick of the forest, where most of the apes dwelt, and looked and prodded about until he found a large and grizzled beast crouching alone under a tree, where it was plucking the nuts from a tree-cone.

“Hail to you,” he said, in a raspy voice for he had spoken little in his long journey, “You who look more travelled than I around these parts; is there a place, neither too smooth nor too steep, where one can sit and contemplate in peace?” But even if it was old and experienced, the ape was not learned in the ways of speech, and it continued to fiddle with its trove.

Then Nawal saw that he would have to show what he meant, which was a difficult proposition, for what he sought was not as simple as something to eat or to drink! Yet he sat down cross-legged, closed his eyes and began to sway his head. One could not meditate for an audience, but he tried to summon a mood of clarity, so he hummed and whistled a tune like the high mountain wind. When he opened his eyes, the ape was looking at him attentively with its small round eyes over its tapering nose; then it let drop the cone and rose up, slowly making away on its four limbs, and Nawal followed.

They walked through the trees for a time, the ape not stopping to wait for its short-legged companion, but not hurrying away from him either, and at length they came to the edge of the woods. It was already growing dark, the sun slinking away between the great towering pillars. The hairy guide stood up on its feet and looked intently into the distance, fixing its myopic eyes on one of the column-shaped peaks. Even without words, Nawal understood its meaning.

“Thank you,” he said to the old ape, and it appeared to nod in the dusk before shuffling back into the treeline. The traveller slept on a pile of dry evergreen needles, and on the next day he set off for the place he had been shown.

In a long time, or a short one, he reached its foot and climbed the lower slope; and then he saw that its upward crags were hard and steep. But as he looked closely, he began to spot little edges in the stone where a foot could stand safely, and then another further up if he searched hard enough, and so on further. It was not an easy way to climb, but soon his mind was lost in the task of blazing the trail for the body to follow, and so preoccupied was he with its efforts that it surprised him when, come the evening, he almost toppled over with sudden fatigue. The higher he went, the sparser the berries he had been subsisting on became, and his waterskin grew lighter. The pangs and dizziness of hunger went to join the fatigue, his waking hours becoming themselves something like a dream. But he kept his eyes fixed on the path, not allowing any of it to distract him.

So passed one day, and another, and more; but when at last he came to the summit, it seemed to him that they had gone by at a peculiar pace of their own.

Up on top, the ground was flat and rocky, made hot by the sun by day and cold by the wind by night, with but some scant and pale berry-bushes and a few depressions where pooled rainwater and melting snow. Even so, it was a quiet place, untroubled save for the whistle of altitude now and then. That sound disturbed the ear, but as he sat and listened, Nawal understood its purpose. Just as the mountain had been a laborious task to overcome, demanding all his focus, so would the meditation upon it be a struggle. And that was well, for a meaningful truth was not easily won, but neither was it beyond the grasp of one who put himself all into its quest. Only on a seat such as this one could it at last be found.

Thereafter, every day Nawal gave thanks to the old mountain-ape that had led him to the last step of his journey.

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Now it had been a long time since Rakshasaraja had dreamt that strange Stambh into being, long enough for that guru to have wandered far and away. The rakshasa-children would have similarly wandered, for it had likewise been a long time since that ravenous sun had swallowed his slumbering form while it served as the seasoning atop his primordial lilypad, and a long time since the sun, with its scorching tongue, had finally released him in its death-burst, sending him down onto the land that would become the Indias.

Much happened while the Rakshasaraja was asleep, you see. Perhaps more happened to that noble Ear while he was asleep than happened to him while he was awake! But the Rakshasaraja might tell you that the current state of the cosmos was all some jape of a tragedy–at best!--so perhaps that state of affairs is for the better.

Anyway, there came a time when a curious primate crawled up the hairy, sweating hill that was the Rakshasaraja’s head. This was not one of those white-furred and solemn macaques within whom Stambh had seen so much potential: this was a filthy, black-coated baboon with a raucous sense of humor, a foul tongue, and a particular penchant for throwing excrement at other creatures.

Once it had at last completed the journey it had set out to do that morn, leaping from a jungle tree to grasp hold of the Rakshasaraja’s crown and slowly climb up its great arches and ridges where possible. Where climbing the crown’s contours was not so easily done, the cunning baboon seized the great dark vines that were in reality the hairs, erupting from the side of the great hillock which was in reality a head. And he would climb up the vine-hairs, up and up, until he could disembark upon some higher ridge of the arching crown to regain his strength, and once rested, continue ever upward. By that afternoon it had grown quite hot, but he had reached the forehead which was the summit of this hillock, and a most pleasant breeze was there to cool him. The various birds that had roosted up here all fled from his might and majesty–or so the baboon thought! Truly they probably fled more from his stink!--so the primate was there alone to enjoy his throne, standing atop the highest hill all around, looking down upon the tops of the many jungle-trees that carpeted the verdant distance. You see, of the Three Indias, this particular region was the hottest, and so it was largely a jungle.

But back to the baboon! He laughed at the little birds as they flew away. He laughed harder still at those other birds below him, looking down onto their nests in the highest boughs of those trees so far below. On many an occasion, the baboon had reached upward to grasp at the ripe and succulent fruits of a tree, only to be met with the disdainful refuse of some bird nestled higher still. Time to return the favor! The baboon climbed to the summit, a small hill atop the hill which was in reality the tip of a nose atop the face, and he began to conjure the ammunition that he would rain down upon those wretched birds–

But then the air around was all fire, for the Rakshasaraja had smelled something most foul and snorted, and his steamy hot breath had scorched the baboon’s rear! With a howl the baboon clutched its red bottom, whose cheeks would forevermore be scalded that bloody color.

“Flea? Is that you again?” the Rakshasaraja mumbled, his three bleary eyes coming into focus upon the strange creature jumping up and down upon his nose. And what a vile stench! The baboon was in a panic, having had its posterior burnt even as it was met with the revelation that this hillock had come alive as some great monster. As it danced wildly and tried to clamber down from the Rakshasaraja’s nose, the giant lifted its great arm from where it had been blanketed by all the jungle undergrowth that had grown up around his slumbering mass.

Two giant fingers seized up the fleeing baboon, nearly but not quite crushing him, as the First Rakshasaraja squinted at the strange creature that had disturbed his rest, itched his nose with its scurrying, and offended his stomach with its stink. “No, you are not that same bothersome flea, so I might spare you for this is the first time I have been made to suffer the offense of your presence.”

The baboon had rather involuntarily finished that bowel movement that he’d began not a whole minute earlier, and the dropping fell between the giant fingers that grasped his body, right down onto the nose of that giant face below him. The Rakshasaraja was predictably enraged. The baboon howled and tried to profess its sorrow and its innocence and its respect and good-meaning, for that had been an [i]accident[/i]--a product of ignorance and fear–but there were no words that the mere beast could command that would be understood by that leviathan!

“Begone now, [b]you filthy, spiteful, beast of low-cunning![/b] You think to answer my mercy with this? Bah! Woe unto any who disturb my slumber and disrespect my majesty!” But his rage had been such that his fingers had trembled even as they had squeezed, and so he had simultaneously lost hold of the baboon even as he had meant to crush it. The sheer force and fury of his words had been as a mighty gale, and so his burning hot breath had blasted the bothersome primate away, sending it flying far over the emerald landscape and into the distance, safe from the irate giant’s clutches if not from the Galbar’s inevitable embrace!

Through the sky the yowling baboon hurtled, past startled birds that stared incredulously at this unwonted intruder. It was not the way of nature that simians should fly so, but the ground below did not hasten to reassert its claim upon the beast any more than the wind did in carrying it onward. The canopy below raced his flight, but just as its arc was descending, the trees lost ground, cutting off the animal’s desperate hope of snatching a branch at the last moment. The green gave way to yellow scrubland, split from it by a thin brown line of felled trunks. Near the edge of the jungle stood two wooden huts, with a fire-pit in the ground before them.

The baboon smashed into the ground in front of the huts, broke into pieces and died.

Corpse, who was lying in the sun nearby, for this was his habit, opened an eye.

“Come see this!” he called.

Then Song came out from one hut, humming, and Perfection and Preserver from the other. Rage, who lived in the first hut with Corpse and Song, did not answer, because he was away uprooting trees at the edge of the jungle.

“This one was whole, but has been broken up into many pieces,” observed Song, and then she broke up her chant into all its sounds and sang every one with a different mouth, to show how such a thing might be done, “Such things I have seen climbing on trees, though there was less red on them.”

“Show me how they were,” said Preserver, who had never gone far from the huts, because he was the one who closed the holes in them with wood from the trees that Rage uprooted.

Then Song showed him how a baboon was, humming louder and lower, and Preserver gathered up all the pieces and put them together, so that the baboon was whole again.

“It is not really whole, these pieces are still loose,” said Perfection, and picked up the spite, the filth and the low cunning that had flown into the baboon from the Rakshasaraja’s words. And since Preserver had already closed the baboon up, she put them into its mouth and nose.

As soon as she had done this, Baboon jumped up with a hoot and scurried off. The rakshasas did not run after him, because they were stunned by his foul smell and dirty fur now that Perfection had put filth into him. He loped towards the jungle, looking for a tree where he could pick some fruit. But when he came to the edge of the trees, he saw Rage gripping around a trunk with his arms, and stomping and pulling until he pulled it out of the earth.

Then Baboon cackled in his way, because he had had a thought, and he took a little stone that had a sharp point and threw it so that it landed next to Rage. When the rakshasa stomped his foot to push against the ground and tug at the tree, it came down on the stone and was prickled on its end. Rage glared and stamped and waved his fists, furious that someone would dare sting him so, and in so doing he let go of the tree, which teetered aside and fell down on his head. He sat down on his haunches and his eyes crossed; and by the time he got up to find the one who had played this trick, the mischievous Baboon had hidden himself in the canopy and cackled from above, and Rage did not catch him!

[hider=The Magnificent Indias]
As wise men know, there exist [i]three[/i] different Indias: one cold, one tepid, and one hot. And each is populated by a different sort of monkey! This post has one section for each. 

Starting in the tepid India, the sage named Stambh encounters the rhesus macaques, and, seeing some latent potential in them, enlightens the creatures. He teaches them to purify their bodies, then their minds, and finally their souls. Some tribes of men then come to find this fertile land, and to their astonishment, the local macaques–though they do not speak–prove to be very benevolent and helpful friends.

In the cold India, another sage named Nawal wanders. It becomes apparent that his purpose in coming to this strange land of spiral mountains is to find an auspicious summit to meditate atop, that he might receive revelations he can bestow unto others. For this end he tries several mountains, but none are satisfactory. Eventually he stumbles across one populated with giant timid primates; these are ursine yeti-like creatures. One of them shows Nawal the way to a good mountain. It is an arduous climb, but at the top, Nawal meditates.

In the hot India, where the Rakshasaraja and his children first landed, there is a jungle inhabited by baboons. One such creature climbs atop the great bulk of the slumbering Rakshasaraja (think King Kong) and wakes him with its stench, only to be cursed and blown away. He explodes upon landing in the distance, but the other Rakshasas find him and reassemble his pieces, and the Rakshasaraja’s curses and insults metastasize into a malevolence that makes this a very special and mean baboon–[i]the[/i] Baboon.

By the power and virtue of Cyclone, primates exist in India, rhesus macaques are enlightened, yeti-things are cool, and Baboon exists. All for 0MP![/hider]