King Atimardan reigned in the city of Ratnapur. His son’s name was Lalitang. Lalitang was not only a worthy son but was highly accomplished.
It was spring and people had flocked to a public park. The prince was there too, and so was the minister’s young and charming wife. It was an accident that their four eyes met.
The prince sent one of his peers to inquire of the woman when he could meet her alone. The lady sent back the following message:
“Such a thing is by no means easy. My husband is so suspicious that he rarely lets me go out alone, nor does he allow anybody to come to our home. But there is one way. There is a dry well adjacent to our house. Let the prince dig a tunnel linking that well to his palace chamber. Once this is done, I shall take opportunity to quarrel with my husband and jump into the well. I shall then enter the tunnel and be with the prince. That will not be a short meeting, but rather a permanent union.”
The prince did accordingly. When the tunnel was ready, on an agreed day, the woman quarreled with her husband and jumped into the well. From there, she took the tunnel and soon she was at the prince’s chamber.
Now, as the woman jumped into the well, no one had seen her. So they started a complete search of the city and its suburbia. Even the well was not spared, but the woman was found nowhere, dead or alive.
When the matter reached the ears of the king, he held the minister guilty of murdering his wife and ordered for him imprisonment for life and forfeiture of his entire property. When the prince heard of the king’s order, he was afraid and mortified. He knew more than anyone else that he had been the cause of the poor minister’s fall. But more than that he was apprehensive on his own score. His entire reputation would go to mud the moment it were known that the minister’s wife was the prince’s concubine.
Thus thoroughly shaken, the prince fled the palace at once and entered into a forest, where he saw a Muni, to whom he said, “Holy Sir ! I am a culprit. Can I be absolved of my guilt ?”
The Muni saw a qualified soul in the prince and encouraged him to join the holy order. The prince agreed, and thus started a new chapter in his life.
Once Muni Lalitang reached a park outside the city of Khsempur. There, on the bank of the river, he started Kayotsarga (meditation). In the same city, there lived an atheist named Asangmata who had neither respect for parents, elders and superiors, nor faith in the religion. By nature, he was very arrogant.
It so happened that the river at that time was in spate, and the whole area was merged under deep water except the ground where the Muni stood. The news took no time to reach the city, and people flocked to see this wonder. Many touched his feet and many derived inspiration from his conduct.
This aroused a tremendous jealousy in the atheist. Men like him are no better than flies who do not appreciate real beauty but relish sitting on sores. He at once reached the bank of the river, tied the Muni with a chain, piled logs around him and set fire to them. The Muni took at ease the fire-bath, and the flames could do him no harm.
The next morning, when the atheist saw it with his own eyes, he was shaken to the core. He realized the great power of penance and bent his head low in reverence before the Muni. There he stood, calm and fixed, reviewing within himself the whole situation. He was a wholly changed man now, changed in thought and in conduct, and the process was so quick that almost in a moment the shackles of Karmas were destroyed and he still stood, facing the Muni, in possession of Kevalgnan.
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