“Do you miss it?”, Goddess Lakshmi whispered in her husband’s ear.

“I do, somewhat. He was here on my chest since the dawn of time; content, feeling my presence, as I did his.”, Vishnu replied. “But I was only his custodian, my love. It is now time for him to have a life of his own, and safely”, he sighed.

“An analogy crosses my mind, and I think it’s quite appropriate, since he is the necessary component of a new life. He is to you what her eggs are to a human woman. She guards them, limits unworthy access to them, but in the end, their ultimate fate is not to remain with her, but to become her future children”, he smiled.

“It is an apt analogy”, he smiled back.

…

A being of brilliant white light shimmered in, and solidified in form of a man; his spiritual structure obviously Divine, the white light glowing in golden hues at the edges, with a brilliant ruby light in the heart.

Unlike the other souls, who appeared in the reception room, he appeared directly in front of Lord Vishnu, as that is what he felt as his true home.

“Hello son”, Vishnu smiled at him, and came to embrace him. “Welcome back”.

Lakshmi took in his spiritual identity. Son of God, Saviour, Redeemer, Christ; Lord Yeshua; Person of God, Male. “Wow”, she bowed.

“Father; my Lady”, he bowed back. He took in the sight of his father and sighed with contentment of finally coming home, where he belonged. Then he looked at Lakshmi. “My Lady, you feel incredibly familiar, but I’m not sure how or why”.

She giggled. “You’ll see soon enough, Lord Yeshua. I don’t want to spoil your surprise for the time being”.

…

A silhouette of a woman shimmered in, of white light. She took in her surroundings, and saw Lord Yeshua, ran to him and embraced him, and he embraced her in return, for it was his mother, Maryam. Her light glowed stronger, solidified, grew deeper, incredibly deeper, and Christ felt the hair on his head rise from the intensity of raw power of destiny, fulfilment, glory and fortune that emanated from her holy presence, and he couldn’t believe what he was feeling. He looked at her, and froze in shock.

Lady Lakshmi was smiling back from his embrace, completely blissed out, as her holy tear returned to her heart and brought back memories.

“Hello, my son”.

“Mother??”

…

“My disciples would have a fit if they saw all of you. Belief in one and only God is sort of a cornerstone of our religion”, Jesus mused.

“Well, they are sort of right”, the Mind of God smiled at her brother, completely blissed out because she finally got to meet him. “If they are talking about the unmanifested Absolute, on the other side of the Relative. I am indeed One”, she switched into First Person. “If they are talking about instances where God became a person, they already had a problem with you and Father being one, or when you talked about the two of you being distinct persons, with separate areas of knowledge and jurisdiction. We are all persons of God in exactly the same way as you and your Holy Father, and your Holy Mother, while we’re at that”

“I’m still trying to digest that. So, Father didn’t just select any good woman at random. You are saying that my actual, Heavenly Mother, Lady Lakshmi, the actual wife of my Heavenly Father, Lord Vishnu, shed tears of compassion over the suffering of souls on Earth, and one of those tears became Mary my earthly mother, and my Heavenly Father impregnated her with myself, because it was perfectly within his right since she was in all reality his wife, so it is right and proper that she bears his son, and I am in fact one of the primordial entities, born out of the Primordial Chaos at the beginnings of Creation, at the very beginning of Time, and I was a Jewel of enormous attractiveness that was so dangerous to normal souls that Father took me and bore me around his neck ever since, and then let me be born on Earth to be the saviour of mankind?”, he scratched the back of his head. “The Jewel part I actually remember now, but the part with my mother is still a shock. I regret treating her as if she were an ordinary human woman, now that I know this. I’m sorry, Mom”, he smiled remorsefully at the blissful Lady.

“Son, don’t worry about it. You called it as you saw it. But now that I have the memories of giving birth to you, it’s completely blissing me out. Even if it were in a barn”, she laughed.

“Aren’t we having a bit of a precedent here”, sounded Lord Azazel? “As far as I can tell, you are the only male Person of God since forever who doesn’t have a female counterpart and wife?”

“Ah, that”, Jesus grinned mischievously. “Let me just say that I have a surprise of my own, to repay my Mother for shocking the living daylights out of me”, he laughed. “And you, dear Sir, are called Azazel, and you are not a demon, but a person of God, and you are married to this lovely girl who is apparently my sister, on the Mother’s side, and she is the Mind of God, which I have no problem believing?”, he laughed again.

The girl came to hug him and cuddle. “Mysterious are the ways of the Lord, as your people would say”, she laughed. “And what’s the surprise about…?”.

…

At this point Azrael thought he saw everything; however, as an incredibly pure, deep indigo-violet angel shimmered in from Earth, he understood that this belief might be unfounded.

“Hello, Azrael; it is a pleasure to meet you again”, she smiled at him with such depth of wisdom and kindness that he stood there like a statue. “I am Miryam ha-Migdalit”, she said in a voice that both felt as if it could melt the coldest heart, and cut through hardest steel.

“Mary of Magdala”, translated Zina. “We were from the same region on Earth”.

“Hello Zina, nice to meet you. I know the Angel of Death since before, and interestingly, they know of his new role and his name on Earth now. I don’t know you, my Lady, but I would be immensely glad if I did, for I can feel the deepest Love of God from your heart, and I love you as if you were my own sister already”, she bowed.

“The feeling is mutual, Lady Mary”, the Goddess curtsied and smiled to the super-angel, her own heart glowing in response.

“I had a different name before, which no longer matters, for I wish to be known only as Mary now”, the super-angel smiled. “And now, may I implore you to lead me to my Lord and Saviour, who was known on Earth as Yeshua, or Christ?”, she curtsied pleadingly to the Lady and the angel.

“By all means, Holy Lady of God”, Azrael bowed, and showed her the way.

…

The three holy persons shimmered into the room. As the woman noticed Jesus, she ran towards him, fell to her knees before him and embraced his feet, starting to cry. “It was cruel of you to leave me there alone for so long, my Lord”, she wept, and he slowly and gently lifted her up and embraced her, as the rest of the family took in the sight.

The crying woman started changing structure, as she drank in the presence of her Lord; finally, after all those decades had passed. Enormous power, as if dark lightning or gravitational shear from a black hole, shook the place, as she transformed into a brilliant light, for the Absolute became the woman.

“Mother, Father, I would like you to meet Mary of Magdala”, Jesus announced. “My most beloved disciple”.

“My holy wife”.

“I get how you got permissions to enter the Earth system and access the Jewel. I get how you could impregnate a woman, especially since it’s an incarnation of your wife’s compassion, essentially a part or an aspect of your wife, so you had permission to give her a child. I can see how you created a synthetic karmic body for that being. But what is the soul? That wouldn’t have bothered me earlier, but now I know about the sparks of the Absolute that emerge in particularly holy circumstances and then the karmic body develops around them, and that manifested spark seeks to return to its origin, and it finds it only when it becomes a God, or becomes a part of one. So, honestly, I can’t figure out what you did, and I am begging you to explain it because my curiosity about it is torturing me”, Lord Buddha smiled at Krishna.

“He’s right, Father”, Kay was deep in thought. “One can easily create a karmic structure, and that structure will be a soul for all intents and purposes, but what you did here was essentially make a new God, and since it’s not an incarnation of any of us, and you can’t just make a God out of nothing, because that would defeat the purpose of Creation, I agree with Lord Buddha and I can’t understand what you did, either”, she voiced her confusion.

“Also, there was talk about an attack on Sanat Kumar, and since that sounds very interesting, I’m dying to hear about it”, smiled her husband and looked curiously at Lord Vishnu.

“I’m glad you guys are paying attention”, Krishna grinned. “With all the brain power in the room, there’s no hiding anything from you, and I wouldn’t even want to”, he bowed to them. “You are right, I couldn’t conceive a son, and hope some random soul latches on or fulfils that role. I couldn’t just take a random soul with its own karmic structure and force it into the role, for it would be a violation. I also couldn’t just create a new soul because I would be using my own spiritual substance, and it would reintegrate into myself after death, and I didn’t want that. I wanted to make a true new person of God, one that is also legitimately ancient in its own right, has origins deep in the roots of Creation itself and is a manifestation of the nature of the Absolute through the Relative, and also, one that is mine”, he smiled.

His wife froze in shock, and then smiled like the sun itself. “The Kaustubha jewel is gone, it’s no longer on your chest”, she pointed out. “You used the all-attractive manifestation of the inner bliss of the unmanifested God, wrapped it inside a synthetic karmic path and gave it a life on its own”.

“You are indeed as wise as you are beautiful, my beloved”, Krishna bowed to his wife. “Yes, that is exactly what I did. The Kaustubha jewel, the Light of the World, is now growing to be our son”, he confirmed.

“Mara is going to go absolutely crazy with desire, trying to corrupt it or make it his own”, Buddha nodded knowingly. “That thing is at least equal in power to the Jewel made by Shiva and Shakti, and that one is an independent Power of Creation. This one is Fulfilment and Light itself, that feels like looking at the very meaning of Life and the blissful nature of the Absolute as an external thing. You were wise to take it onto yourself and wear it, because your nature is so blissful in its own right, that the jewel is completely lost on it, looking like any other part of your own body. Since the only ones ever seeing the Kaustubha jewel are the ones who see your glorious person, it poses no danger to anyone, because that structure on its own would act like such a powerful attractor, it would distract souls from their own personal path, like some very powerful addictive drug they couldn’t pull themselves away from. And now, you took that drug and made it into an attractor that will draw souls toward it and cut a path towards transcendence, where they will continue looking for it when it is gone from the world. But Sanat Kumar will try to make it a part of his world, or integrate it with the Jewel he controls in some way”, Buddha was thinking out loud.

“Or absorb it into himself, and make himself a God, as he always wanted to be”, Lord Azazel continued this line of thought. “In any cases, it will be a bait he wouldn’t be able to resist, and it will drive him even more mad than he already is, which is quite something. And if you want to get him in a condition where he will make a mistake, that’s exactly how you would approach it”, he nodded appreciatively.

“How do you know Mara so well?”, Buddha was impressed. “This sounds exactly right, like you know his soul inside-out”.

“I do, in fact. He used to be a fellow demon, and I spent ages listening to him conspiring against the Gods, inventing his own weird philosophy that shifted between egalitarianism and self-aggrandisement, as in his madness he sought to rationalise a way out of his own insignificance and weakness, rather than making good choices that would change his condition”, Azazel nodded darkly. “I probably know more about him than he himself does, and at some point I looked at him, and looked at myself, and realised that he in his madness and evil is what I will become unless I do something radically different”, he smiled.

“Which, judging from your current state, you obviously did”, Buddha smiled back.

“Indeed”, Azazel nodded. “Sanat Kumar hated the Gods with incredible hatred, and wished to somehow either have their power and rise above them, or to make all power irrelevant so that he will not be inferior. He will resort to egalitarianism when victory doesn’t look possible; but put the Kaustubha jewel within his grasp, within his realm of power, and he will get absolutely insane from desire. And then, he is likely to make mistakes”, Zee nodded appreciatively. “Lord Vishnu is as wise as he is wonderful, which is why we all look up to him”, he bowed.

“What exactly is the vector of attack?”, wondered Lady Kay. “He will try to corrupt it by either seduction or threats. I assume that won’t work, because that Jewel will think about only two things – the source of his own light, and his beloved Lord Vishnu, in whose company he spent his entire exstence. At this point, I don’t even think he can tell the difference between the two, and I don’t blame him, for there indeed isn’t one, as Lord Vishnu is the Absolute, only manifested. There’s nothing Sanat Kumar can offer him that would entice him in any way. What can he offer him, to be the king in his world? That will sound as enticing as guarding some stable. So let’s go further; the Jewel rebuffs Satan’s advances. Satan grows angry in his frustration, and enters the ‘you will pay for this’ mode. He threatens with the stuff he threatened Athena with; he’ll throw all kinds of humiliation and suffering on him, but unlike Athena, this one isn’t arrogant and foolish. He doesn’t boast, threaten or invite Satan to do his worst. He simply shrugs and says it will be as his Lord commands, thinking of his actual Lord and Father. Sanat Kumar goes insane with frustration, and actually subjects him to worldly horrors uninvited”, she hypothesised.

“If he does that, it’s game over for him instantly”, Lord Shiva interjected. “The axe of karma falls, head goes plop. He has to know that, and that’s why he’s always being so careful not to get caught in any outright action. He makes their victims doom themselves, while he pretends to offer tests and trials of character and true spiritual choice, which is actually useful”, he nodded. “Which means his attack on your son will take form of some trial of faith – of the kind where he proves his faith and loyalty to God and dies, or he is saved from a terrible ordeal by choosing to belong to Sanat Kumar”, he looked at Vishnu as if asking for confirmation.

“That, indeed, was my plan”, Krishna bowed and smiled. “The best way to attack Sanat Kumar is to offer him something he desperately desires, and which will make him desperate enough to get himself into a situation where any realistic outcome is a loss”.

“You actually don’t expect him to get himself killed. You think he’ll see that and avoid the trap”, grinned Azazel. “But you think he will avoid the trap in such a way as to doom himself strategically in the long run, and he won’t see that one”, he looked at Vishnu appreciatively, as the Mind of God cuddled into him adoringly.

Lord Shiva grinned at him appreciatively and they fist-bumped. “I like the way you’re thinking”, he nodded. “But let me try to guess what the actual plan is. The option of the Kaustubha giving himself to Satan willingly is completely off the table. Only Satan is foolish enough to even try it. But then he will think that he can pressure him into it with terrible torture. That also won’t work since the Jewel will pray only to Lord Vishnu and surrender to his will. Sanat Kumar will either have to blink, or let him die. Will he blink and spare him in the last moment?”

“No. His vanity will be hurt and he will be the woman scorned, so to speak. He will gloat at Kaustubha’s suffering and will enjoy his death. However, then he’ll be in a pickle. He’ll have to present this as some kind of a trial of faith, but in this case it would be a very thin explanation. He was too obviously involved, and the ‘test’ excuse is too thin here”, Azazel scratched his chin. “I don’t get this part, there must be something more”.

“He will have to permanently cede some part of his authority”, Shiva guessed. “I don’t know how or what”.

“All who accept and follow my son will have a way to eternal life”, Vishnu smiled. “His suffering and death will buy this, because Sanat Kumar will have to allow it in order to evade punishment. It will be the only way to appear justified. He cooperated all along, and made the conditions so that the Son of God could prove his glory, so that all the faithful and true can follow him to heaven”, he grinned. “He’s truly such a good and misunderstood character”.

“He’ll allow it because he thinks he can bury it all under a pile of false teachings, alternative similar-sounding false teachers and all the other stuff he always did”, Buddha mused. “But there was talk about an undeniable proof, and of resurrection?”, he looked at Vishnu.

“Yes, both. My son will die, spend a few days dead, then come back to his resurrected body, interact with numerous witnesses and then finally ascend to Heaven. I had enough access to arrange it. Also, Sanat Kumar won’t be able to either prevent it or work on completely covering it up, because remember, he needs to present himself on actually enabling the full glory of God to be shown so that the righteous believers will be saved. He presents himself not as the enemy of God and righteousness, but as a righteous person who hates fakes and hypocrites and works to unmask them and ferret them out. If he shows that he’s actually the enemy of all that is good and works on its destruction and failure, the axe falls and he dies”, Vishnu nodded.

“But he will of course invent lots of reasons to doubt, as if to test faith, and he will present all kinds of alternative narratives about your son later on”, Buddha added. “It’s just what he does”.

“Indeed”, nodded Azazel.

“But while we are at this, I have a question”, Kay interjected. “What are we actually trying to do here?”, asked the Mind of God.

“What do you mean?”, asked her husband.

“It’s simple. The Jewel was created to solve a problem. The problem is stagnation of the souls, and lack of proper motivation. The fact that Sanat Kumar got hold of it was the worst case scenario, apparently, but everything was seemingly designed to accommodate for that possibility. He’s doing what he’s supposed to be doing – his worst. The results are apparently following prediction; some souls are doomed by their arrogance, some have snapped from their stupor, some are moved towards enlightenment. It’s working. So, may someone please explain why we are fighting?”, the girl asked, truly puzzled.

Vishnu nodded and smiled. “The place he made has multiple functions. The first, most fundamental is that it is the alternative to the Kingdom of God. It is a place where beings like Anthea can go after they expressed their desire to belong to the Kingdom of Satan, rather than the Kingdom of God. They can have him as their god there, for whatever it’s worth. Were it the only role that place is playing, we would be unconcerned, and wouldn’t interfere; for a time, of course, because their choice is that of ultimate doom. However, there is another function that place is serving, and that is a playground of obligatory choice for the undecided. Most souls entering didn’t do so the way Anthea did – after having made a clear choice for the satanic and against the divine. Most go there either because they are stupid, ignorant, naive, arrogant, or undecided. And so, the reason we interfere is, essentially, Zina. She is the ultimate reason why Lord Shiva grew angry and cracked that place. She is the reason why I sent my son there to be born, to teach, to show, and to be tortured, to die and rise from the dead showing them perspective and hope. I knew why Zina almost died there, without hope, thinking that place was all there is, and that isn’t a fair thing to do to souls who went in foolish or undecided, but ended up being as wonderful and loving people as she did. So, I’m giving them hope and perspective, and if some want to reject it and choose the fate of Anthea, they are certainly free to do so. However, if they choose the life of love and kindness, they will now also be free to have hope, faith and perspective”, he concluded.

“Lady Zina, Lord Buddha, will you please assist me?”, Lord Vishnu called. They were all quite relaxed after being temporarily done with the hard issues, and were all smiling.

“Of course, my Lord”, they both nodded and joined him.

“Lady Kay, Lord Azrael, would you too please join us as well?”, he waved.

“How may we be of assistance?”, Azrael replied, and Karuna smiled.

“Lady Karuna is the Mind of God, and I will want her to listen to what we’ll say and give me her opinion, since she is the wisest and her thoughts are deepest”, he smiled at the blushing girl. “Lord Azrael, along with the two of you, has the greatest experience with humans, so I would appreciate his feedback as well. The thing I want to consult with you about is something I’m personally uncertain of, since it deals with matters of religion, or, more precisely, spirituality and spiritual ethics based on actual realities, but from a human perspective, when incarnated on Earth”, he nodded.

“Oh”, Buddha nodded with understanding.

“Indeed”, confirmed Vishnu. “The religious philosophy that you established seems to be a resounding success. I think we need to learn from this success and build upon it, which is why I will ask you first: when establishing another religion, what would you repeat, what would you do differently, and what are your general comments on the matter?”, Lord Krishna inquired.

“An interesting question. Well, first of all, I would want to establish the cornerstone elements of reality, because any religion that is to succeed must be based on reality. They are in a world that is in its essence a persistent, very convincing illusion, especially designed to inhibit insight into reality, and substitute its own false perspective. If we are to successfully fight Sanat Kumar’s plans, this is the primary vector of attack that I would implement. Do you agree?”, Buddha looked at his esteemed coleagues.

“Indeed”, Vishnu confirmed, and the Mind of God nodded in agreement. “Fighting illusion with reality is an excellent approach. However, may I ask about the specifics? How would you approach reality from a world that is specifically designed to make it nigh impossible?”, Kay asked.

“Without knowing what is technically possible, I would concentrate on things that actually matter the most, and cause the most problems to incarnated souls. I wouldn’t necessarily make it complicated. Things like, this place is not all there is. There is God, meaning transcendental supreme reality. This reality is not something distant, it’s within you and everywhere around you. Your actions and choices matter, as they determine your destiny in the afterlife, and yes, there is an afterlife, and it’s better than what you have now. Have faith in dharma and don’t retaliate, don’t react with evil and hatred to evil and hatred. Love, truth and compassion will free you, while anger, hatred, malice, envy, spite and cynicism will doom you”, he was deep in thought. “The part about this not being all there is, and the fact that there is eternal life beyond it, that is very important”, his wife interjected. “That’s what almost killed me, the belief that there’s nothing past Earth, no eternal life, just what we have there, and Mother had to save me by showing me transcendence and eternity in order for me to be able to process it emotionally”, she nodded.

“This was one of the errors of my former approach”, mused Buddha. “I didn’t want to talk about transcendental realities because if people can’t see them in person, they will fill their heads with all sorts of nonsense that will actually stand in the way of salvation. However, without clear ideas about salvation as a positive thing, it’s very hard to get a clear grasp of things and the philosophy becomes mostly about avoiding bad things, without a clear goal”, he shrugged.

“I think I would want to keep it simple. If at all possible, show them what we feel like. For all of us, the goal isn’t abstract. It’s us, to each other. We all have a person we adore and belong to, and we are saturated with what God feels like. I would want to show them what God feels like, and then give them intellectual framework to conceptualise this in whichever way they are comfortable with; but without actual spiritual connection with the goal, it’s all going to become just another worldly religion people kill each other over”, the Mind of God voiced her opinion.

“I would want to have some actual evidence and demonstration that physical death is not the end. I’m afraid that without that, it’s all going to be dismissed as a coping mechanism. This belief that death is the end is one of the most harmful consequences of Sanat Kumar’s evil. If they think death is the end, they will be open towards all evils – indulgence, despair, cruelty and so on. Also, I would be very careful to avoid mentioning the fact that most bodies are empty, in a sense that souls are actually rare. This is a super sensitive information that should be shared only by a God who can explain it as well as you could”, Angel of Death nodded at the Buddha. “They need to treat everybody as if they were a child of God and their best friend. That’s the only way they will act ethically and in ways that are conducive to positive soul formation”, he concluded.

“All of your ideas are excellent, and offer a much needed clarification to my general and vague concepts”, Lord Vishnu bowed to his friends. “I now need access rights to the Jewel and the Earth system”, he was deep in thought. “Ah, Anthea. She belongs to Sanat Kumar, and is outside the Throne of God. She is his property and acts in his name”, he smiled.

“And she insulted an angel and a God”, Lady Zina smiled widely as she understood what he was getting at. “This is a karmic offence which creates an opening for you”.

“Exactly”, he smiled at the wise Lady. “And also, the Sentinel, who was the person in charge of giving access to the Jewel. Lord Shiva, will you please join us?”, he waved at his buddy.

“Sure thing, Lord Krishna”, Shankar joined them. “May I understand that you have need of that frozen scream of terror that I preserved, thinking we might find a use for it at some point?”, he grinned at Vishnu.

“We would indeed be in a pickle without your foresight, brother”, Vishnu clapped Shiva’s shoulder. “Gentlemen, may I claim your grievances?”, he addressed Buddha and Azrael.

“You are welcome to them, Lord”, they nodded.

“And Mahadev, may I get access to the Sentinel, and through him, to Earth?”, he bowed to Shiva.

“By all means, my Lord”, Shiva bowed back.

“Then I have all I need”, Vishnu grinned, turned his eyes inward, and started making hand movements. The Gods and Goddesses all felt a stirring within Reality, as something changed, and they looked at each other and Lord Vishnu.

“Done”, he sighed and smiled.

“What did you do?”, they inquired.

“I implemented your wise and good ideas, my Lords and Ladies. There are going to be visions of us, and there are going to be religious scriptures describing our persons, actions, thinking and feelings, with enough mantric accuracy as to enable transcendence and salvation if proper discernment is present. They aren’t going to get everything right, but it’s going to be close enough. Also, there is going to be a surge of ethical philosophies that in essence amount to what Lord Buddha suggested, with more or less resonant accuracy. And finally, there is going to be an attack on Sanat Kumar, and a resurrection”, he concluded.

“What kind of an attack?”, the Mind of God asked.

“Resurrection?”, inquired Buddha.

“You just conceived a son with another woman”, Lady Lakshmi pretended to be distraught. “That’s not fair; what about me?”, she smiled at her husband and poked him in the ribs.

He smiled back and kissed her ear. “As far as I can recall, you recently had a beautiful Goddess daughter quite on your own, and without my assistance”, he said. “Besides, I conceived a child in a wonderful young woman that just happens to be conceived from one of your tears, artfully placed by our beloved and hundredfold-worshipped Lord Shiva, which means, if she keeps being a good girl, and comes back to you, it will have been you, truly”, he whispered seriously.

“Wow”, Lakshmi was astounded.

“I will get to actually have given birth to our son?”

“With your blessings, oh Fortune”, he smiled mischievously.

“By all means, my Lord”, the Lady curtsied, unable to hide a blessed smile.

“But now that we’re on the subject of…”, he turned inwards and an angel appeared.

“Hello Gabriel”, he smiled. “Will you please do something for me?”

“Of course, my Lord”, Gabriel bowed deeply.

“There’s a young girl on Earth that is in the process of conceiving a child due to my intervention. Would you please make sure there are no misunderstandings and that no harm comes to her?”, Vishnu asked. “Here are the permissions to access and intervene”.

“It would be my pleasure, Lord Krishna”, the angel bowed again and shimmered out.

“Now that’s taken care of, may I have another coffee?”, he sighed and smiled, and his glowing wife rushed to refill his cup.

“I’m going to actually be a mom”, she whispered.

“You already are”, her daughter winked.

“You know what I mean”.

“I do, but this is fun. Congratulations on your magical pregnancy”, the Goddess of Wisdom patted her Mother’s tummy and made her giggle. “I can’t wait to meet my baby brother”.

Lord Krishna focused inwards, and made a hand movement. “Done. She is now firmly in a womb, and we can proceed to the next point, which is analysis of what’s actually going on here, and figuring out steps we should take in order to stay ahead of it”, he smiled at his family.

“I think we should count our blessings first”, his wife smiled back. “There are great things that came from this ordeal. The first was Zina, the loving and lovable, cute, gracious and dignified, whom we all love and adore”, she smiled at the woman, whose complexion was starting to turn towards crimson. “The second is her wise, good and immensely brilliant husband, Lord Buddha, whose wisdom, experience and virtue are great comfort and inspiration to all of us in these challenging times”, she nodded at the man, who looked deeply into her eyes, and bowed with deep respect and worship.

“Let us not forget Lord Azazel, my worshipped husband, who was so disgusted by Sanat Kumar and his plans even before they were put in motion, that he sought out Lord Shiva, attained enlightenment, and whose great discernment, wisdom and devotion pulled both of us towards godhood”, smiled her daughter, the Goddess of Wisdom.

“Hear, hear”, clapped Lord Vishnu. “We have two new blessedly Divine couples in our family, and all four of you are heartbreakingly wonderful, in four different and amazing ways for God to be a person”, he bowed, as everybody’s mood was already uplifted greatly.

“Obviously, we had losses. Angel Uriel was irretrievably lost and had to be destroyed, and if not for Lord Shiva’s sacrifice, that would have been a much greater disaster for all of us than it ended up being, for which I bow before him with great gratitude and even greater respect”, she nodded to Shankar, who smiled and nodded back. “Also, we lost Athena the angel, who now belongs to her new chosen Master, and has been removed from under the Throne of God”, she continued in a grim tone. “However, I feel there is more, and I would ask our honoured Judges of Karma for a report about the returning souls and their condition, so that we can have more of an informed opinion on the overall state of things”, she concluded, nodding towards Azrael, Buddha and Zina.

Buddha and his wife nodded to Azrael to take the first word. “We had multiple criminals that had to be put in the astral prison in order to await your further judgment, worshipped Ladies and Lords, and so that they would not interfere with the lives of normal souls. Interestingly, it turned out that very few demons did what one would expect – joined Sanat Kumar in his rebellion, conspired against the Gods or tortured other souls. In fact, it looks as if they relish in the opportunity to finally do something useful and get new ideas about the future course of their lives, and they usually throw themselves into family life, useful crafts, sciences and so on. For instance, there are a few very intelligent Greeks who developed philosophy and science, while being good husbands to their wives and fathers to their children. Their actions were virtuous and praiseworthy. Some, unfortunately, turned to mischief and committed terrible acts, but overall, it was a minority, while the majority conducted themselves with honour and virtue, and I have nothing but praise for them. The most notable example of this is of course Goddess Zina, who was so virtuous that she literally loved so much that she almost died, and had to be saved by her mother and Lady Fortune, but she is not as much of an outlier as one would have thought. Baal and Mephisto, for instance, were honourable family men who showered their wives and children with love and care, and beside minding their own affairs, one was an excellent blacksmith and very much respected in his community, while the other one excelled in construction work, building houses, roads and bridges”, he nodded approvingly.

“The sheep, if I may use this term for the stagnant, dormant souls that did nothing for eons, were a different story”, he continued. “For the most part, they were the easiest to corrupt into evil. Put one of them in a body that has any propensity for evil, as most human bodies do, and it all rolls downhill to a bad ending. If they are women, they tend to just indulge in promiscuous sex, following their shallow urges, becoming harlots and sluts. If they are mothers, they abuse their children because they are bored and lack the entertainment they think they deserve. If they are men in power, they usually abuse their positions and become terrible leaders. If they are subordinates, they slack off, steal, or perform their duties poorly. If they are husbands, they tend to be drunkards and no good, and their wives and children suffer the consequences. All in all, they are a terrible mess, but this actually tends to snap them out of being sheep and into being demons, which in their case is an upgrade, and since we’ve seen that demons tend to surprise us positively, I think there is hope for the future”, he nodded. “There is, of course, a rare example of Lord Buddha, who was born a prince, and seemed to be destined for a life of automatism and inertia, when he suddenly woke up, and surprised everybody by being the most energetic, decisive, strong willed and virtuous person one could possibly imagine, and I bow before his holiness again and again”, he bowed to Buddha, who smiled and bowed back.

“Some sheep, unfortunately, continue to do absolutely nothing of consequence. They live their lives as in a dream, make no important decisions, go with the flow, die and continue sleeping in the astral plane. That is unfortunate, but not unexpected”, Azrael shrugged, and nodded to Lady Zina to take over.

“The normal souls are actually a minority, because unlike the demons, who hurled themselves into the abyss without much consideration, and sheep, who got herded alongside them and just followed the crowd, the normal souls were actually thinking with awakened minds and for the most part decided to stay in the astral plane and continue with a normal evolutionary path, which in their case is actually both safest and the most rewarding option”, she smiled. “However, those of them who did choose the human path, usually got incredibly confused by the human experience, and lack of transcendental feeling they were used to. They would get lost and suffer terribly there, but when Lord Shiva broke the ceiling of spiritual darkness in that place, and cracks of transcendence started to appear, they started noticing the inner light and grew strongly towards it, becoming mystics, yogis, artists, mages or philosophers. Some of them in fact achieved great progress in their spiritual evolution, and their human experience gave them an additional depth and flavour, and I can hardly wait what will happen as they crystallise, since we haven’t seen this spiritual type before”, she smiled in appreciation. “As family people, they vary. Some are excellent – they tell their children inspiring tales with a spiritual message, they are loving, caring and wonderful. Some, unfortunately, are so concentrated on the otherworldly matters that they neglect their families and cause suffering”, she frowned. “It is what it is, unfortunately, and we’ll see how this develops. It would be helpful if they could be taught balance”, she nodded to her husband to take over.

“As for the angelic beings of crystallised vajra, they turned out to be a mixed bag. You’ve all seen Uriel and Athena, so I won’t waste words on them. However, there are some who turned out quite well, if in unexpected ways. One would expect them to regularly outperform others, since they are so spiritually powerful, but that is sometimes the reason for their very poor adjustment to the world of extreme limitations. They struggle with the basics, and keep trying to meditate when that doesn’t work or actually harms them, sometimes becoming autistic, which ends poorly as society discards them. Sometimes they follow paths of personal power, treating other people with complete contempt and disregard, and become reclusive hermits who practice religion, dark magic, austerity and similar activities. Some study sciences, some create art, and some get into religion, but very often in nasty ways, as they are often self-serving, arrogant and lack compassion. All in all, the surprising news is that they become almost exactly what one would expect demons to be – self-serving arrogant assholes who pursue power and treat others as if they were grass under their feet. Uriel is the most notable example of this, in his incarnation of Ashurnasirpal, who seems to be the worst person to have existed in the history of that world so far. Others in their arrogance challenged Sanat Kumar openly, of which Athena is the worst example, but there are others, who fortunately woke up and smelled the coffee in time, and changed enough of their attitude as to evade the worst outcomes”, he grinned.

“All in all, it’s a mixed bag, and the results were for the most part wildly unexpected. For the most part, we get souls with various degrees of traumatic injury, but once that has been handled, some of them tend to gravitate towards Earth and seek the next incarnation, spending time on astral Earth planning what they would want to be next. Some meditate and think about the lessons of their experience, advancing quickly. Some are dumb as rocks. Some, unfortunately, are evil and incredibly nasty, and we’ll probably have to shovel them back to Earth like we did with Athena/Anthea, because the only other alternatives would be either letting them ferment in prison with their own ilk, where they’ll likely grow even worse, or to outright kill them, but I think it’s too early for that since there are other options to be explored first. So, that would conclude our report”, he bowed to the Gods and Goddesses.

“What are the differences between male and female souls, and male and female incarnations?”, Lady Kay asked.

“There are of course significant differences between the sexes on Earth, but honestly, it all amounts to being the same”, shrugged Azrael. “Their lives are usually hard, and they suffer and die. Men usually die in wars and fields, and women die in childbirth or violent crimes. Women are raped more often, and men are castrated and otherwise maimed or brutally executed more often. Both frequently starve to death. Women work at home, men work outside, and they both have equal chances of being either good people or villains. If they are free, their lives are usually hard, and if they are slaves, their lives are usually terrible. All in all, you can argue that their lives are either as good or as bad as each other. When they love and help each other, their lives approximate heaven. Spiritually speaking, I think Lady Zina and Lord Budha are a good illustration of the best outcomes. She was loving, compassionate and nurturing, and he was wise, compassionate, intellectual and sharp, and they are now both exceedingly wonderful, and my life is so much better since they have been around, as they are so inspiring, fun and insightful. We had many long discussions, where I always felt greatly uplifted and enlightened. So, any talk about men or women having it better or being better is nonsense. Uriel and Athena show that both men and women can become terrible abominations, and Buddha and Zina show that they can both become beautiful, inspiring and worshipful persons of God”, he bowed to both of his friends, who smiled back widely, as other Gods giggled.

“I think we must consider the issue of intellectual content that is spiritually uplifting”, Lord Vishnu noticed. “That matters a lot there, since there is little ability to establish spiritual truths personally, and people have to rely on what they were taught, and if they are taught good moral and spiritual principles, this will help them a lot. Conversely, if they are taught wrong and bad things, this will be spiritually detrimental”, he mused. “Lord Buddha’s teachings were a brilliant positive example, and I salute him. However, they seem to be geographically limited, and there is room for introduction of similarly valuable teachings elsewhere. I do notice, however, that Sanat Kumar actively works on muddying the waters, so whenever someone like Lord Buddha introduces a truth, twenty stupid dumbasses who serve Satan start talking similar but harmful and deceptive things, thus greatly confusing people and making the teaching inaccessible”, his face darkened.

“Do you have any suggestions as to how we should improve this situation, my Lord and brother?”, asked Lady Shakti.

“Some. Our tears are there, as well as the cracks, thanks to your glorious husband, my Lady. Let me think about this some more, ok?”, he smiled at his sister, who grinned and nodded back.

“So, if we’re done here, how about coffee?”, Shiva rubbed his hands and smiled mischievously.

“That was really bad”, Zina was the last to sit at the war table. “I kept praying to my husband and my mother to save and guide me, and I am thankful to them for being my anchors through this”, she sighed heavily.

“Please, tell us everything there is, for I feel this is of great importance”, nodded Lord Azazel.

“Indeed”, confirmed Lady Shakti.

“I kept trying to feel compassion for her, since she’s obviously a victim of terrible crimes. I kept thinking what my poor Tamara would look like had those bandits chained her into a cave so that they could keep raping her for years, rather than just killing her outright. I tried to justify her, see her condition as a mere consequence, tragic and inevitable, of someone else’s crimes”, Zina sighed.

“But I couldn’t. She is so incredibly disgusting, offensive, blasphemous and outright repulsive, so opposite to what is acceptable in the eyes of God, and I would know, since I grounded myself in the First Person state of the Absolute. Rather than helping, it made it worse”, she shrugged.

“There is a reason why we Gods exist in couples, and it’s always married couples, bound by intimate love. When I was in that deep state and I looked at her, I knew why God is a man, a woman, and man and woman together. It’s as if entering from the Absolute into the Relative just can’t produce one self-sufficient result; it’s always a man loving a woman, and a woman loving a man, and only together they form a unit that is harmonious and happy. We need to be ourselves and belong to our partner in order for God to find us acceptable. And that woman”, she couldn’t even force herself to say her name, “She is not acceptable to God. She is so far from being acceptable to God, that I would go so far as to say that she is a gender-flipped mirror image of the priests and guards in that prison where she was kept. I tried to see her as a victim, but I couldn’t, because whatever she was before, now she is just vile, disgusting, hateful and ungodly”, Zina shivered.

“I really tried being compassionate; I really did. But she keeps spewing vile hatred against male God-persons, and her hatred takes form of mantrically charged curses and dark magic. I have no useful recommendations. I calmed her down somewhat and put her to sleep, and I created a special section for her in the astral Earth, so that she can’t come in touch with other souls there and spread her vile convictions and ideas and thus harm them. I didn’t want to put her in the prison with the criminals, but I probably should have, because she’s as vile as any of them, if not worse”, she shivered. “I have nothing more to say, and I surrender this thing to you now”, Lady Zina finished.

“Let’s not forget how she is obviously a creature of Sanat Kumar, broken and shaped by fear”, Azrael added. “She calls him Baal, which means Lord or Master in her language, and is in terrible fear of crossing him in any way. I think it would suffice for him to raise an eyebrow at her, and she would lose bladder and bowel control. Also, she seems to have had mystical visions of him in that prison, so it’s not just quasi-religious nonsense; I’ve seen him in her mind, and she truly knows him, fears him and belongs to him”, he frowned in disgust.

“I looked into her history. Her name was Athena; a calm being of dignity and power. She stood near the very top of the range of heavenly angels, deep purple and indigo blue, large mass. So, how exactly is it possible that such a being be deformed into such a vile abomination?”, Lady Lakshmi asked. “It is as she was at the precipice of becoming a Goddess, and then this happened”.

“I think I can offer a possible explanation, and others may complement it”, voiced Lord Buddha. “I think she is what happens when you have power, dignity and glory, but no devotion to God, and no deep, spiritually profound love in your heart. She was powerful, she was proud, she didn’t know her limits, she challenged Mara in his world, at his turf, she expected to triumph and return to the Gods with his head on a pike, so that they would all see her glory and be humbled before her. In essence, she has the character of Mara the Satan, Satan the Mara or Sanat Kumara, whatever you may call him, only he’s an astral imp, and she was a deep violet super-angel. If I look at the Will of God within my heart, I would say that her outcome was only logical, because she wouldn’t go beyond herself and love; she saw Gods not as goals and ideals to worship and be glad for the opportunity, as we all worship each other, but as a challenge and competition to be rivalled and humbled. She was not what God wanted to be. In essence, we all became Gods and Goddesses because we worshipped and loved and become something Absolute wanted to be, as a person. She wanted to defeat a super-demon so that she could humble the Gods and rise above them. She got her comeuppance, I’d say. She had no love, no humility, no bhakti, went into something that was over her head, and she got destroyed. Honestly, she’s a good cautionary tale. During my human life, I kept warning against being proud, arrogant and everything else that she was in abundance, because that would end badly, and I wish I could have had her there, pickled in a jar, so that I could show her to my disciples in Rajagriha as evidence of why the noble eightfold path is good, and how the opposite would end”, finished the Buddha, as all other Gods nodded in approval and relief, because they feared he would advise endless compassion, which they felt was sorely misplaced in this case.

“Hear, hear”, clapped Lord Shiva. “I wholeheartedly support your opinion, my friend. Also, I would say that your incredibly deep experience with Earth and life as a human makes you an authority on this, so I would hardly feel qualified to override your opinion”, he grinned and bowed to Lord Shakyamuni. “I also bow to your blessed wife, Lady Zina, who did us a great service and suffered this nastiness so that she could provide us with her invaluable insight, as someone who herself was human, and is familiar with the kinds of terrible violence this woman endured, and I further bow to her great competence and patience”, he finished, bowing to Zina with a wide smile.

“I recommend that we throw her back down there to Sanat Kumar, because she is obviously his creature out of her own will, or out of her own fears, and due to her own arrogance, and she can either break further, or heal, or find some other option for herself, but there is no place for a creature such as herself: disgusting, blasphemous, cowardly and sinful; in this or any other world under the Throne of God”, concluded Lord Vishnu, as all the Gods bowed to his verdict.