Chapter 10: The Legend of Sejahtera Pura

“Now we come to the part that we've all been waiting for," Uda spoke, "the Legend of Sejahtera Pura.”

Uda then proceeded to tell the second story.

Once upon a time, a long long time ago, there was this kingdom, located it was in this land of Langkasuka, Sejahtera Pura (City of Well Being) its name was. So called because it was constantly peaceful and prosperous, its earth abound with many kinds of precious stones and metals, its woods yielding numerous varieties of coveted timber, and all its citizens living happily under the reign of a glorious king who ruled with all fairness and justice.

Its soil was good, regularly showered by blessed rain, which also gave rise to numerous rivers springing from the tall mountains. The rivers flowed through the hills and valleys, then across the plains, until they emptied themselves into the sea, making acres upon acres of earth surrounding their paths rich and fertile. Enabling the farmers to till the land and plant what crops they liked, and to rear what animals they chose.

Thus was how, due to its wealth and prosperity, Sejahtera Pura drew traders, merchants, travellers and adventurers from all corners of Suvarna Bhumi and Suvarna Dvipa. As time went by, the kingdom became even more prosperous, such that tales of its wealth and the prosperity of its people spread far and wide.

Nibung and Pinang were all agog now, listening with increasing earnestness, their eyes wide open and their mouths agape.

As a measure to protect his people and kingdom from external threat, the king desired to build a credible and well equipped army. But there were not enough men keen enough to serve in the army, because many of them thought they could earn a better living with less risk to themselves.

Thus the king was forced to offer the opportunity to anyone, regardless of their place of birth. That opened the door to many travellers and adventurers, who came in droves to offer their service, in pursuit of the lucrative pay that the king offered.

As the elders among the natives would say, misfortune carried no smell. Among the many who came there were ungrateful ones who were not at all averse to biting the hand that fed them. Indeed, some of them turned out to be spies or agents for their home kingdom. Eventually, Sejahtera Pura was invaded and defeated, its land conquered by a friend turned enemy from across the sea.

"How shameful those men were," commented Nibung. "One should never befriend people like them."

§

After a long period of living under occupation and oppression, their king and his most loyal followers having retreated into exile in the mountain regions, their land pillaged and plundered before their eyes, the people of Sejahtera Pura could take it no more. They had become poor destitutes in what had always been their own land, constantly hounded, taunted and humiliated by their arrogant conquerors, treated not much different to stray dogs scrounging for crumbs.

"There's going to be a war soon," Pinang commented.

Eventually, the people rose in rebellion against their foreign overlords, whose forces outnumbered the ragtag  rebel army by more than seventeen times to one. The king and his army came back from out of the mountains to join his people in battle. Even though they were much fewer in number, the defenders had proud hearts, immense fighting spirit and steel discipline on their side, with not a little measure of swagger and daring that they had inherited from their valiant ancestors. They fought their foes without fear or anxiety.

For six days the two sides fought on the battlefield, still neither side could gain ground over the other. In order to cancel out the numerical advantage of the massively larger enemy army, the rebel fighters dug in to face them in a narrow pass between two hills.

Unable to move about as freely as they would have liked, their overwhelming size now becoming more of a liability, the conqueror army could not press home their numbers, strangled indeed they were by their own complicated tactics. While the density of their own forces in a crowded space made them sitting ducks for the unstoppable arrow volleys of the rebel army, whose sharpshooting archers mounted on their well trained battle ponies, oxen and buffaloes kept moving around the enemy forces and slaying them at will.

Then there were also the poison darts from the bamboo blowpipes of fighters from Sejahtera Pura's mountain tribe, close allies of the rebel forces and whose men now formed an integral unit of the rebel army, for the conquerors' army to reckon with.

The enemy's high concentration of men in a small area impeded their movement, making them descend into chaos and disarray every time the rebel forces fell upon them. And every time a desperate group of conqueror fighters attempted to bolt away and escape from the battlefield, they were confronted and struck down by an elite squad of mounted rebel soldiers, armed with swords, pikes and spears and clad in composite bamboo, hardwood, turtle shell and rhinocerous hide armour.

From morn till dusk the two sides would fight, come darkness they would lay down their arms to feed and rest. The injured would be treated by healers. Those with light wounds would fight again the following morning. Those maimed or otherwise severely injured were allowed to leave, each now free to contemplate on whatever was left of his future or to reflect on his past. The dead were carried out of the battlefield and left lying in rows on the ground, to be devoured by carrion beasts and birds until nothing was left of them.

Come the seventh day, the fatigue of battle began catching up with soldiers of the rebel army, while their much stronger enemy, shored up by much larger numbers, began to sense them weakening.

"Oh no," Nibung muttered. "The defenders aren't going to lose now, are they?"

§

The elders among the defenders' army, who would still recall the legends of old told to them by their own fathers and grandfathers, began calling for the invocation of the Sakti Muna Dragon and the Lady of the River, the ancient protectors of the lands of Langkasuka, who they believed would be able to come to their aid and change their fate.

"That name Muna, what did it mean, Uda?" enquired Kembang Seri Wangi.

"Some folks believe that Muna was a name by which the people of the lands of Langkasuka once called the Mon, the tribes now still inhabiting the lands of Dvara Vati, Hamsa Vati and Sudharma Vati, lands far yonder in the north," Uda explained. "It was said that they were the ones who first brought the legend of the Sakti Muna Dragon to our lands."

"So Sakti Muna Dragon meant ... wait ... Sacred Dragon of the Mon?" Kembang Seri Wangi ventured.

"You got it," Uda nodded.

"Whereas the name Mon itself could possibly have elluded from Mal, or Mala, which was the original name of the entire cluster of tribes who first settled the lands of Langkasuka, as well as Dvara Vati, Hamsa Vati and Sudharma Vati," Utih chipped in. "They and we were branches originally sprung of the same one tribe who spoke the same one language, them Mon and us Mala. Only our accents and dialects later gradually diverged. The Mon called themselves Mon, because that was the way they pronounced Mal, or Mala, by the way they spoke."

"If that is truly so, then why are we speaking the Malayu language now?" Kenanga Sari looked indignant. "It's so much different from the language of the Mon, it just makes me wonder."

"And why do we call ourselves Malayu?" added Kembang Seri Wangi.

"Because the lands of our Mala ancestors in Langkasuka were invaded and conquered by the Sumatrans, those Srivijayans from Palembang," Uda answered. "They brought with them the language they spoke, and the customs and traditions they practised. Our ancestors gradually adopted all of those, although with much adaptation of course, mostly not of their own choice, but more because things were imposed on them. For Malayu became the language and culture of the ruling elite. Gradually our people lost track of their own original Mon-Mala identity. This is what has happened often to a conquered people."

"If and when they remain conquered for long enough," Utih slipped in. "Have you ever wondered why the dialect of Malayu that we here in Amdan Negara speak sounds so vastly different in accent to that spoken by the Sumatrans? While there is also good reason to suspect that the Sumatrans themselves were descended from ancient Mon-Mala tribes of the mainland who sailed out to the islands. Only the language they spoke later developed in a different way to ours, as a result of their contact and exchanges with native island peoples. Right. Now let's get back to our story."

At first the others were worried and reluctant, having heard that the Sakti Muna Dragon and the Lady of the River, once invoked, would exact a heavy toll of death, injury and property damage, not only to the enemy army but also to innocent bystanders among the local populace, because of their awesome power, even if the defenders' army could end up victorious.

Desperate times, however, drove men to desperate things, and even the most sceptical of the doubters finally relented, eventually throwing their weight behind the dangerous last resort strategy. The king then instructed his high priest to initiate the rites to invoke the Sakti Muna Dragon and the Lady of the River.

"What rites?" Kenanga Sari looked unhappy. "Not human sacrifice I hope."

In very ancient times, it was said that the Sakti Muna Dragon demanded the blood of a virgin princess, whenever its presence was required. Like when a new king was to ascend the throne and the Sakti Muna Dragon would enhance the occasion and endorse the ascension, or when a kingdom was invaded and the king required the help of the Sakti Muna Dragon to fend off his enemies. But as time went on, the royal priest managed to persuade the Sakti Muna Dragon to accept a lesser sacrifice, and a virgin female duyong was substituted for the human princess. The Sakti Muna Dragon acceded to the request, because it understood that a royal princess was too precious to be sacrificed, since quite often she's the only one available for perpetuating the royal bloodline.

"This Sakti Muna Dragon, was it like some kind of magical beast?" Nibung asked.

The Sakti Muna Dragon was actually an avatar of the Lord of the Mountain, chief deity of all the divine deities of the ancient native tribes of the lands of Langkasuka. Thus it could be considered a mystical beast, and it was reputed to be endowed with great powers.

It was said to have measured over sixty armspans in length and exceeded three hugfuls in girth. Thus it was certainly a sight to behold, its dazzling beauty and splendour symbolising, all at once, the strength and ferocity, pride and greatness, nobility and valour, as well as intelligence and mystical power, that the Lord of the Mountain himself possessed.

“This Lord of the Mountain, he was a bit like Father, right Sister?" Pinang speculated.

“That one is merely a nickname, Brother," Kembang Seri Wangi held Pinang by his shoulder. "Like an honorary title, bestowed on him by his loyal followers. Our father is a mere mortal. He's no divine lord like the Sakti Muna Dragon."

“Still he's no ordinary mortal," Utih interjected. "Prince Adhi Vira is indeed a warrior among warriors. That's why the people of Amdan Negara call him Lord of the Mountain. As they did all his ancestors before him."

“Uncle Uda,” Nibung spoke. “The Lady of the River ... was she a friend of the Sakti Muna Dragon?"

“And what did she look like, Uncle Uda?” Pinang followed up.

The Lady of the River ... was actually the daughter of the Sakti Muna Dragon. She was said to be someone of splendid good looks ... of the most exquisite elegance. Her beauty was without equal.  Mind you though, she was also a sage of paramount wisdom, as well as a warrioress of supreme valour. She was a brilliant archer, while also highly proficient with all kinds of weapons.

Her steed was a fierce giant goose with a body of gold, feet of silver and plumage of gold. Its wings, neck feathers and tail were of white gold inlaid with jade, opal and ruby. While its eyes were of glittering blue hued diamond. Thus the Lady of the River was sometimes also called Hamsa Vati, which in Sanskrit, the language of kings, meant Goose Maiden. 

Indeed a legend of the Mon people would have the country of Hamsa Vati, centred at the city of Pago, as first named Hamsa Vati Nagara, meaning City of the Goose Maiden, after the original Goose Maiden, by its first founders, Sa Mala and Vi Mala, believed to be two Mala princes who reputedly came from the south, the lands of Langkasuka. Hamsa Vati Nagara gradually came to be known as simply Hamsa Vati.

The Sakti Muna Dragon then came hurtling down from the mountain peaks, at the darkest of midnight it left, the crystal on its forehead beaming out brilliant light through the darkness, its almost deerlike but much more magnificent antlers looking gloriously daunting.

At times it would be sliding on the ground, at others it would be skimming a river's face, yet other times it would be gliding through the air, totally unaffected by the earth's pull, ripping through the swiftly blowing winds, traversing the vast forests which spread as far and wide as the eyes can see.

While the Lady of the River started from the river's uppermost source, mounted on her fearsome goose paddling away powerfully through the river's waters, occassionally leaping up into the air and soaring with the grace of a swan, then swooping back down with the power of an eagle, following the river's routes, piercing the air like an archer's arrow.

As soon as they reached the site of battle, the Sakti Muna Dragon and the Lady of the River both launched themselves into the thick of the fight with all their might, drawing on every available bit of their strength to aid the defenders' forces against their much more numerous foes. Nonetheless, the conquerors' soldiers were just too many, as also were their huge and fierce battle elephants.

Thus was how, the Sakti Muna Dragon eventually leaped onto an isolated hill and withdrew temporarily into a cave. Immediately he shifted into his human form as the Lord of the Mountain, and went into deep meditation to summon the assistance of a friend, the Lord of the Wind, whose earthly abode was located on a mountaintop in a distant land. Thus came the Lord of the Wind,  as he heard his friend's call for help, swifter than the wildest tempest he flew, assuming his animal form, the Celestial Horse.

From those mountains of his homeland he came, first galloping down the valleys, then launching himself up into the air, flying and soaring like a giant eagle, up and up he soared, driving himself forward with his immensely powerful wings, sweeping over the clouds gracing the heavens, skimming the occasional rainbow. Without respite he flew all the way, until he reached the land of Sejahtera Pura.

As soon as he touched down he threw himself into the centre of the enemy army, charging, kicking, trampling, biting and crushing every enemy man and beast around him for all he was worth. Destroying as many of the enemy soldiers with his formidable strength, which surpassed that of seven elephants combined.

"Attaboy!" Pinang shouted. "Whack them! Whack them good! Just what they deserve. They thought they were so strong."