A great party awaited Krishna when he visited the Pandavas that the women, especially Draupadi and Subhadra, became extremely intoxicated. As the picnic was coming to a close, Krishna and Arjuna was visited by a brahmin. The brahmin was Agni, the god of fire, who asked of the two heroes for food. Agni did not want regular ordinary food but the food he so craved and desired was the Khandava forest. Agni attempted in the past to consume the forest, but Indra had always defeated him and put out his fire with rain. Agni begged Krishna and Arjuna to help him because he had gotten terribly weak and pale from only drinking ghee for the past 12 years. The heroes agreed to help Agni in exchange for celestial weapons. Agni got Krishna and Arjuna the celestial weapons they desired and soon after the battle began. The great Indra poured down torrents of rain but it was no match for Arjuna's arrows that eventually Indra was defeated and Agni got to consume the forest. During the battle, animals were dying left and right but six creatures did manage to escape, one being Maya, who was the son of a rishi.
Maya was utterly grateful to Arjuna for sparing his life that in return, he promised to build a beautiful and grand palace for the Pandavas. Maya was an architect and had an abundant source of gold and gems stored safely in the Himalaya mountains. Maya worked hard and diligently on the palace for the Pandavas that in just 14 months, a majestic palace stood tall, adorned with beautiful gems that people that it was on fire. There had not been a palace like this in all the land that Maya wanted to protect it so he brought eight thousand rakshasas to guard the impressive and gleaming palace.
Bibliography: "Public Domain Editions" Mahabharata by Laura Gibbs (
link)
Burning of the Khandava Forest. Source:
Wikipedia
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