Aśvasena

Aśvasena was a great nāga (serpent being). He was the son of Takshaka and lived in the Khāṇḍava forest. When Bhagavān Agni burned the forest, Arjuna and Bhagavān Kṛshṇa guarded it so that nothing could escape. Aśvasena’s mother tried to save him, and Arjuna killed her. Aśvasena himself got away through the sky.

He kept his hatred of Arjuna. On the seventeenth day of the Kurukshetra war, he entered one of Karṇa’s arrows to take revenge for his mother.

Son of Takshaka

Aśvasena was the son of Takshaka, the great nāga king of the Khāṇḍava forest. Takshaka was not in the forest when it burned, because he was at Kurukshetra at that time. Aśvasena was in the forest.

Escape from the burning forest

Bhagavān Agni began to burn the Khāṇḍava forest, and Arjuna’s arrows closed every way out. Aśvasena’s mother tried to save him. She swallowed her son whole and tried to fly out of the forest, hoping to carry him up through the net of arrows.

Arjuna saw something flying upward, too large and too purposeful to be ordinary. He shot a single arrow and cut off the head of the flying nāga. She fell dead. Aśvasena came out of her body and flew free through the sky, before Arjuna could aim another arrow at him.

The Nāgāstra in the Karṇa Parva

Aśvasena carried his hatred of Arjuna through the years to the battlefield of Kurukshetra. On the seventeenth day of the war, during the great duel between Karṇa and Arjuna, he saw his chance.

He entered the shaft of one of Karṇa’s arrows, so that his whole being became the substance of the weapon, and he guided it by his will towards Arjuna’s head. The arrow blazed with great power and flew straight at Arjuna’s neck. Everyone watching could see its path and its aim.

Bhagavān Kṛshṇa was standing as Arjuna’s sārathi (charioteer). He pressed his divine foot on the frame of the chariot. The great war chariot, drawn by the horses Śaibya, Sugrīva, Meghapushpa and Balāhaka, sank into the earth by the depth of one hasta (a cubit). The chariot was now lower, so the arrow, which was aimed at the place where Arjuna’s head had been, struck his kirīṭa instead. This was the divine crown given by Indra. The arrow knocked it from Arjuna’s head into the dust of the battlefield. Arjuna lived.

Karṇa kept to the warrior’s code. He would not shoot the same arrow a second time, even when Aśvasena came back and urged him to. Refused, Aśvasena took his serpent form again and tried to attack Arjuna by himself. Arjuna shot six arrows and cut Aśvasena to pieces, and he died. The nāga who had lived through the Khāṇḍava fire, and had waited years for this moment, was destroyed in seconds by the man he had wanted to kill.

Sources

• Mahābhārata, Ādi Parva, Chapter 225
• Mahābhārata, Karṇa Parva, Chapter 90