Whether it happened or not, King Nesmeyan lived. No one had ever seen him laugh, that’s why they called him Nesme-yan.
The king had three sons, they were all called the sons of King Nesmeyan. The brothers said: “Let’s go ask our father why he is Nesmeyan, and we are the sons of Nesmeyan.” Went.
The eldest son entered first. His father gave him a glass of wine and said: “Drink this wine, then I’ll hit you.” If you can withstand my blow, I’ll say...
The eldest son drank. The father swung and struck. So the son spun around in place. “Go, I’ll tell you later,” said the king. The middle son entered. - Who are you? - asks the king. - I am your son! -What do you want? - We are all called the sons of Tsar Nesmeyan, why are you Nesmeyan? - Drink some wine, then I’ll tell you. The middle son drank. His father also hit him, and he spun around in place. - Go, I’ll tell you later! - says the king. The youngest son went. - Who are you? - asks the king. “I am the youngest son of King Nesmeyan,” he answers. - Why did you come? “They all call us the sons of Tsar Nesmeyan.” Why are you Nesmeyan?
The king gave him some wine and said: “Well, drink it, I’ll hit you, then you’ll know.” The youngest son took it and drank it. The king swung and hit him, but did not move him from his place. - Hit me again, but say it! - says the son. King Nesmeyan struck a second time and did not budge him the second time. “Strike a third time, but tell me,” says the son. The father hit him a third time, but the third time he didn’t move his son.
Then he said: “Go and get grenades the size of my head.” Then I taught him how to find them and said: “If you bring them, you will find out everything about me.” The youngest son went to his brothers and they asked: “What did he tell you?” “He said: bring me grenades the size of my head - you’ll find out everything about me.”
All three brothers went together. We walked, we walked a lot, you never know, we came to an open field. There is a crossroads in a field, at the crossroads there is a stone, on the stone there is an inscription: if you go there, you will return, if you go there, you will return, but if you go there, you will not return.
The elder brother went to where you will return from. The middle one went - from where you will return, the youngest went - from where you will not return.
He walked a lot, walked a little, and saw a black army in the distance, all on horses. “Well, I’m dead,” thought the younger brother, “I’ll die, apparently!” - and yet he went straight to this black army.
He came up and looked, and the army was all petrified. I moved on.
He looked and saw the red army in the distance, got scared, thought: “Now he’s probably dead,” and went. He came up and saw: and the red army was all petrified. I moved on.
He walks and sees a white army standing there, also all petrified. I moved on.
He walked a lot, he walked a little, he sees a tower, its top resting on the sky. There is a pomegranate tree right at the entrance; there are five pomegranates hanging on the tree, all with a human head.
The son of Tsar Nesmeyan came up and picked the grenades: he ate one, took three with him, and left one on a tree. A woman looked out of the tower and shouted:
- Oh son, how similar you are to my son. What brings you here? Look, the Vile Dev will eat you! “No matter what happens to me, I’ll go upstairs,” said the son of Tsar Nesmeyan. The woman braided her hair and pulled the braids down.
He jumped, grabbed his braids and stood up. A woman hid him: a deva would come and kill him. The son of King Nesmeyan asked her to find out where the deva’s soul was located. The dev came. “Something smells like the son of Adam,” he says. “No,” the woman answers, “where should the son of Adam be here?” That's right, you brought the smell with you.
She hugged the Vile Dev, began to caress him, and she asked: “I love you very much, I can’t live without you, tell me, where is your soul?” “My soul is in the broom,” says the Vile Dev.
The Vile Dev went hunting, and she took a broom, decorated it, wrapped it in colored brocade and all sorts of scarves, carried it and laid it on the bed. * The Vile Dev returned, saw the broom, laughed:
“I deceived you; my soul is not in the broom at all, but in this pillar.”
When the dev went hunting, she got up, washed, cleaned the post, decorated it as best she could, then hugged and began to caress it.
The dev came. - What are you doing? - asks. - I caress your soul. “You’ve gone crazy,” the deva laughs, “who will give you my soul?”
Do you know where my soul is? In such and such a place a boar lives, that boar has a box in its head, and in that box there are three birds: the red one is my strength, the white one is my mind, and the black one is my soul.
-Who can kill that boar? Is there anyone like this in the world? “No one can kill that boar with anything, unless they wound it with my arrow.”
As soon as the Vile Dev went hunting, the woman gave his arrow to the son of King Nesmeyan. He took two loaves of bread with him and went to the blacksmith. The blacksmith made him a bow from twenty pounds of iron, the young man pulled this bow and bent it. He made it out of forty pounds, the young man pulled it on, and bent this one too. Then the blacksmith made a bow out of sixty poods, and the young man pulled this bow - it held the bow without bending.
The young man hung it over his shoulder and went to look for the boar.
He walked and walked and reached the water where that wild boar goes to drink. A young man looks, a girl sits by the water, shedding tears. - Why are you crying, shedding tears, ruining your beautiful eyes? - asks the young man. - Go away, leave me. The boar is about to come and eat me... The young man found out that this boar eats a girl every day. “Don’t be afraid,” he says, “I’ll lie down, put my head on your lap, sleep a little, rest, and you, when the boar comes, wake me up.”
The son of Tsar Nesmeyan fell asleep. A little time passed, and the boar appeared.
He walks, grinds his teeth, and drops foam from his mouth. The girl calls the young man, wakes him up, even hits him - no, he doesn’t wake up. She began to cry; cries, cries, is killed, the whole earth burns with pity for her. One girl’s tear fell on the young man’s cheek and burned his skin. He woke up and jumped up. He grabbed the bow, inserted the arrow, pulled the string and launched it. An arrow hit the boar in the side and pierced through it. The boar fell and gave up its spirit. A young man came up, cut off the boar's head, cut it in two, and took out the box. There are three birds in the box; Before, he tore off the head of the bird of power, then he left the bird of reason, the bird of soul, alive and took it with him.
And the Vile Dev is on the hunt; He sensed that a misfortune had befallen the boar and wanted to rush to his aid, but the young man managed to kill the boar and tear off the bird’s head. How the young man tore off the head of a white bird, lost his devas and his mind, and somehow dragged himself to his tower. He came and collapsed exhausted.
A woman saw him, went downstairs, sat down next to him and asked: “What, my life, what happened to you?” The son of King Nesmeyan came up here and shouted at the deva: “Why are you lying here, dog?” Tell me now, how can those troops that you petrified be revived? - Go, go upstairs, there you will find three whips: white, red and black: hit the black army with the black whip, hit the red one with the red one, and hit the white one with the white one. They will all come to life and become your faithful servants. - Tell me how to cast a spell? - the young man ordered. The dev said and how to cast a spell. -Where is all your wealth? - asks the young man. “Take this key, unlock the outer room, my whole life and all my wealth are there,” said the Vile Dev.
The son of King Nesmeyan went, unlocked the door to the outer room, looked, and there were three snakes. “Oh, this is not a bad thing for us,” the snakes spoke when they saw the young man.
The young man got scared and said: “Wait for me a little, I’ll come right away,” he went out and locked them.
He comes to the deva: “Did you send me to these damned snakes so that they could eat me?” “No,” says the deva, “go and open such and such a room, there are a lot of pearls and precious stones there, and those snakes won’t do anything to you, since they see the red whip in your hands.” Lay everything on them and chase.
The young man got up, opened those rooms, took away, apparently or invisibly, pearls and precious stones and went to look for his brothers, and took the grenades with him.
He reached the crossroads where the stone lay and sat down to rest. The older brothers also came. The younger brother took out grenades and distributed one to everyone.
I'm jealous of those: - We got such small grenades, but he has such large ones.
They decided to destroy him. Here come the brothers. They wanted to drink on the way. And there was one miracle well, they called it Bulakh. The brothers approached Bulakh and wanted to get water. First they lowered the elder brother into the well. As soon as he went down a little, he shouted: “Lift me up, lift me up, I’m burning!” They picked him up.
Now the middle brother is being omitted. And he screams the same way, and they lifted him up. They lower the younger brother, and he says: “No matter how much I shout: “I’m burning!”, you all lower me lower.”
He went down, drank water, served water to his brothers, and then tied a rope around himself so that he could get up himself. His brothers began to lift him, but halfway they cut the ropes, and the younger brother fell to the very bottom.
The brothers went and brought grenades to their father. -Where is the third brother? - asks the father. - We don’t know - and we haven’t seen him! - say the brothers. - What did you see? - asks the father. “We didn’t see anything,” say the brothers. - What did you see? - the father asks the older brother. “I didn’t see anything,” says the older brother. - What did you see? “And I didn’t see anything,” says the middle one.
King Nesmeyan became angry. He ordered his advisers to immediately send people to look for his younger brother.
They went, searched, searched for a long time and found him dead in this Bulakh. They took him out and took him home. King Nesmeyan took God's handkerchief, passed it over his son's face, and the son came to life.
King Nesmeyan laughed, he laughed so much that from his laughter the earth trembled, and the sky opened and gold and silver began to fall from there. King Nesmeyan asked his son: “Where are your grenades?” “I remember,” says the son, “that I took them with me.” - What did you see on the way, son? - asks the king. The son told everything that he saw: “On the way, the black army stood, everything was petrified, behind it was red, and behind it white, I passed by, there I saw a tower, such that the top rested on the sky and there were three windows in it, under that tower there was a pomegranate tree, from that tree I picked these pomegranates.” - Did you see a woman there? - asks the king. “I saw it,” says the king’s son. Then the king said: “My son, that’s why they call me Nesmeyan, because that woman is my wife, that Vile Dev kidnapped her from me.” And those troops: black, red, and white - all mine, the Vile Dev petrified them. How can someone who has lost so much laugh?
The young man immediately stood up, went to that tower, killed the Vile Dev, took his mother with him, took all three whips, swung one - he revived one army, with another - another, - with a third - a third, and so happily returned home.
Translated from Russian · original on wisdomlib.ru