The Turtle at the Bottom of the Ocean
The gods needed to churn the ocean. Someone had to hold the mountain steady. Vishnu became a turtle.
The devas have lost their strength. The only thing that can give it back is a magical drink hidden at the bottom of the great ocean of milk. To get it, the gods and the asuras must do the impossible. They must churn the ocean itself. They use a mountain as a churning rod and a giant snake as the rope. But halfway through, the mountain begins to sink. And then, very quietly, Lord Vishnu becomes a giant turtle and carries the whole mountain on his back, so the world's biggest cooking project can keep going.
A Time When the Gods Got Tired
Long, long ago, in a time before our time, the devas (the gods) and the asuras (the demons) were always fighting. The asuras were strong and clever. They had a teacher named Shukracharya who knew a secret mantra to bring dead asuras back to life. Every time the gods killed one, he came back the next morning, fresher than before. The devas had no such mantra. Once a god died, he was gone.
Slowly, very slowly, the gods began to lose. They got weaker. They got tireder. Their golden glow started to fade. Indra, the king of the devas, who used to throw thunderbolts that lit up the whole sky, was now sitting on his throne with droopy eyes, a slumped back, and a worried face.
Indra rode his white elephant Airavata to the home of Lord Brahma, the creator. He folded his hands.
"Grandfather," he said. "We are losing. The asuras are stronger than us. If something does not change, the world itself will tip over. What do we do?"
Brahma stroked his white beard.
"Go to Lord Vishnu," he said. "He is the only one who knows."
So Indra and the gods went to find Lord Vishnu. They found him resting on the great serpent Adishesha, floating on the ocean of milk that lies at the very edge of all worlds. They folded their hands and bowed their heads to the ground.
Vishnu opened one calm blue eye.
"You need amrita," he said softly.
The gods all blinked. Amrita is the magical drink of immortality. Anyone who drinks even one drop never dies, never gets weak, never loses their glow. Of course the gods needed amrita. But where in the worlds was it?
Vishnu sat up. He smiled a small, mischievous smile.
"Amrita," he said, "is hidden at the bottom of the Kshira-sagara, the great ocean of milk. To get it out, you will have to do something nobody has ever tried. You will have to churn the ocean itself."