‘But I am sure your uncle did not give you the medicine merely because of your active third eye. He would have judged your character and found you worthy. He must have trained you for this.’

‘I was trained by him, no doubt. He taught me ethics, warfare, psychology, arts. But he did not say anything to me about my purported task.’

‘You must concede he did an excellent job, though. For you have done well as the Neelkanth.’

‘Just luck,’ said Shiva wryly.

‘Great Neelkanth, a non-believer will credit luck for one’s achievements. But a believer in the Parmatma, like me, will know that the Neelkanth has achieved all that he has because the Parmatma willed it. And that means that the Neelkanth will complete his journey and eventually succeed in taking Evil out of the equation.’

Shiva smiled. ‘Sometimes, faith can lean towards over-simplicity.’

Gopal smiled in return. ‘Maybe simplicity is what this world needs right now.’

Shiva laughed softly and looked at the audience of Vasudev pandits, listening to the two of them with rapt attention. ‘Well, many of my doubts have been cleared. The Somras is the greatest Good and will therefore, one day, certainly emerge as the greatest Evil. But how do we know that the moment has arrived? How can we be sure?’

One of the Vasudev pandits answered. ‘We can never be completely sure, great Neelkanth. But if you allow me to express an opinion, we have had a Good which has had a glorious journey for thousands of years and humanity has grown tremendously with its munificence. However, we also know that it is close to becoming Evil now. It is possible that the Somras is taken out of the equation a trifle early, and the world will lose out on a few hundred years of additional good that it could do. But that pales in comparison to the enormous contribution it has already made for thousands of years. On the other hand, there is the risk that the Somras is getting closer to Evil and is likely to lead to chaos and destruction. It is already causing it in substantial measure; I’m not merely referring to the plague of Branga or the deformities of the Nagas. It is believed that the Somras is also responsible for the drastic fall in the birth rate of the Meluhans.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes,’ answered Gopal. ‘Perhaps in refusing to embrace death, they pay the price of not seeing their own genes propagate.’