Week 11 Story: Exorcist Parashurama Part 3

The city of the dead (source)

Parashurama arrived back in the city of the dead, the festival was still going strongly. He approached another ghostly figure and asked him for directions.

"Do you know the closest portal that will let me return to the physical world?"

The ghost replied,
"Well as far as I know, the demons smashed all the portals they made. That's fine by me. Good riddance as far as I'm concerned. But I do believe there was one they were unable to touch. There is a temple with a shrine to Vishnu in the center of this city. I believe that should work as a portal. That's who we're celebrating today actually, Vishnu. Just follow the crowds and you should be able to find it just fine. Say, what's your name anyways?"

"Parashurama."

The ghost dropped to his knees in respect. The ghosts around him did the same. As word traveled, the entire city dropped to their knees and made a path for him leading to the temple.

Parashurama started laughing,

"I can't believe none of you recognized me. Who else would be here in the spirit world looking for demons?"

"Your hair is shorter than we expected"
The first ghost said.

Parashurama made his way through the path in the crowd to the temple in the center of the city. The ghost was right, the temple was very easy to find. It was the tallest structure in the city by far, and was easily visible from ground level.

Parashurama ascended the weathered steps of the ancient stone temple and entered the main room. set into the floor was a shallow reflecting pool. Holy water. That explained how it remained untouched.

Parashurama gazed down at his reflection in the still water. He closed his eyes and recited the mantra that would bring him back to the physical world. This time when he opened his eyes, he was in a small room, no, a closet, with a small Hindu shrine. He opened the door and stepped out of the closet into the living room where a couple was watching TV. The couple looked at him in disbelief. He expected them to scream, but instead they just stared at him, eyes bulging.

Parashurama broke the silence.
"Sorry for the intrusion. I'll be leaving now."

He stooped his head and power-walked to the door of the apartment. He called a taxi and paid him triple to drive as fast as he could back to the home of the Tavakolis. Hopefully it wouldn't be too late.


Author's Note: Part 3 of the Parashurama exorcist story. Very cheesy but I thought there would be some interesting concepts to play with. For example, Parashurama taking a taxi was really funny to me. Also him being transported to a corresponding shrine in the real world, which just happened to be someone's personal shrine. There aren't a whole lot of Hindu temples here in the states, at least relative to in India, so I thought it would make sense for it to be a personal shrine which I know some people have in special rooms of their house.

I apologize if my representations of Hindu beliefs are wrong/inaccurate. I realize I'm conflating a lot of different religious ideas here, like the reflecting pool in Vishnu's temple being made of holy water which is a Catholic invention I think, but I'm just trying to mix and match things that have supernatural significance. So I'm not trying to be an authoritative source on Hindu traditions, just trying to write a cliche ghost story with some Hindu gods and stuff mixed in.

Anyways, until next time, I'm NitroDubbz.