Nala and Rama

Sugriva summons the foremost monkeys from every direction, and they arrive with armies numbering in the crores — Sushena, Gaja, Gavaya, Gavaksha, Gandhamadana, Panasa, Dadhimukha, and Jambavan with his bears. On an auspicious day, Rama marches out with this vast force, armed with trees and rocks, and they camp along the shore of the salty ocean — where the real problem begins.

Rama asks Sugriva how to cross the ocean. The monkeys propose leaping or building boats, but Rama rejects both — the army is too vast, and trade should not suffer. He decides to force the ocean god himself to yield a path, threatening to dry up the sea with celestial weapons. The ocean god appears in a dream and offers a solution: Nala, son of Vishvakarma, will build a bridge that the ocean will bear.

Enraged by the slaughter of his invisible ambushers, Ravana leads his full army against the monkeys, arranging them in the fearsome ushanas battle formation. Rama counters with a formation recommended by Brihaspati, and the two armies collide in a battle that shakes the three worlds.

Ravana's son Indrajit binds Rama and Lakshmana with boon-granted arrows, trapping them like birds in a cage. Sugriva and the monkeys stand guard helplessly until Vibhishana arrives with the prajna weapon to revive them, and Kubera sends consecrated water to grant them the power to see invisible beings.

Enraged by the death of his son, Ravana marches out with his rakshasa army and attacks Rama with terrifying maya — creating illusory soldiers and even false forms of Rama and Lakshmana. But when Indra sends his own chariot, driven by Matali, Rama mounts it and invokes the brahmastra, an arrow that envelops the lord of rakshasas in a mass of blazing flames from which nothing remains — not even ash.