Conspiracy at Meru Book review
Shatrujeet Nath started writing Vikramaditya Veergatha 4 years ago, and his first book The guardians of Halahala came out in 2014 which became very popular in youngsters because of the thrilling mythology fiction content it had. People were eagerly waiting for his next book in the series - Conspiracy at Meru. Well, it came out in august 2016 last year but I only ordered it just a few days ago. The book came from amazon on 3 June 2017. I wanted to read it slowly so that I can enjoy it better but couldn't. I was so much excited about the happenings after the first book that before I knew the 381 pages were finished in two days. The second book is much better than the first one more exciting, suspense building in every chapter. The author weaves a tale that extensively draws storylines and characters from history, folklore as well as the Puranas. Those who are particular about compliance to historicity might have a lot of reservations about the contents of the novel. But beyond the debates of historicity, the story has enough and more to offer to a reader who loves the craft of story-telling.
Shuckracharya just like before, was very determined to possess Veeshadha's dagger, which was given to Vikramaditya by the Omniscient One (Lord Shiva). After the first part, we came to know that during the attack on Ujjayaini by Ashwini and Maruts Vikramaditya gave the dagger to the ghost to protect it for some time. No one knew about it. Shuckracharya tried hard to know about its whereabouts in the second book, but the only thing that the bones tell is " it is in the banyan tree that holds endless pyres." This was true because the ghost resides there invisible to him. On the other side, Vishakha starts recovering quickly because of the regeneration spell that Shuckracharya casts in the last book. But he also tried to slow its effect.
Indra was furious because of his defeat by the human king, so he persuades yaksha Kuber to kill the wife of Vikramaditya- Vishakha. But again, Shuckracharya comes in the way of yakshas sent by Kuber to save the queen. But an unfortunate accident sends the queen in the same state that she was before. Vikramaditya sense there is something different about the Healer and ultimately Shuckracharya reveals his identity and made a proposal for which he came Ujjayini- The dagger. King refuses to give dagger even after Shuckracharya offered to treat Vishakha. Shukracharya failed and leaves for Patalloka. Meanwhile, there was an attack on Ujjayini by Ahi- a serpent who was controlled by Jayanta(son of Indra). But he failed too. Because of the powers that the counsellors of Vikramaditya possessed which they themselves were unaware of. All of the nine counsellors had different kind of powers because of nine pearls that were not known in existence.
On the other hand, Asuras attack Amaravati(Devloka) as suggested by Hiranyaksha from the message given to him by Shukracharya, to divert the attention of devas from the dagger. The attack proved costly for Devloka and killed many of the Garud and Devlok armies. Indra at the time was not there and had gone to Kubera to ask for his assistance. When he got back he was very furious and immediately decided to attack Patallok. But Narad understood the purpose of Shukracharya behind the attack and told Indra the same. It was finally decided that if they were to defeat the human king the devas and asuras have to find a strategy together because Vikramaditya was the main hindrance between dagger and them. It was then that by the agreement of both asuras and devas a meeting was held at Meru consisting of Indra, Brihaspati, Narad, Hiranyaksha and Shukracharya as it's primary members. Both worked out on a plan to defeat the king and Indra calls Gandharvasena who is supposed to attack Ujjayini. He is shown to be more powerful than Ashwins, Maruts and the undestroyable Ahi himself. This is where the book ends giving us a detailed account of CONSPIRACY AT MERU.