#i love love love mahabharat characters but you can tell the original text has been embellished by fans
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blackknight-100 · 1 month ago
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It'll never stop being funny to me how Indra's status and power level changes throughout the different texts because initially, you have this absolute badass God-King who defeats a giant monster and gets together with his wife and holds court in heaven. Next the Ramayana rolls up and he is set as a benchmark for battle-skill: Meghnad, as the warrior who defeated him, is an absolute powerhouse who nearly kills both Rama and Lakshmana (and one of those two is a god). In fact, depending on the version, Rama and Lakshmana only survive by semi-divine intervention (Garuda and Hanumana). It is a story about how Lakshmana, an exiled third prince, kills the man who defeated the King of Gods, thereby proving the victory of good over evil et cetera... et cetera... You know the drill.
And then, you have the Mahabharata. Where Krishna, then a young boy, protects an entire settlement from Indra's rage. Which... you know what, fine, he too is a god.
But then, Arjuna defeats Indra, who is his father. Arjuna, who presumably upset the audience a few moments ago after he just burned a whole forest with everyone (including children) in it to supposedly satisfy Agni.
Then, Indra shows up to Karna's doorstep begging for his armour, and Karna who had previously angered the audience by calling Draupadi a harlot gets to demand things from the king of the gods.
See the pattern?
Also they have that absolute disaster of a ceremony and their city is called Indraprashtha.
Like come on, at this point you're just using Indra as the bonus +500 point in games to get your favourites in the audience's good books after they messed up.
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