Śivasaṃhitā 5.80

Rudra—“he who roars,” “he who makes weep,” or “the brilliant red”—as regent of maṇipūra is fitting: Rudra is the form of Śiva as lord of transforming fire, the energy that purifies by destroying the obsolete. His ambivalent nature—he can cause pain or confer gifts depending on the practitioner’s state—reflects the fire chakra’s quality: it burns both food and illusions, but can also burn what is valuable if there is no discernment (viveka).

Lākinī—maṇipūra’s goddess—is described in texts as fierce and beneficent in appearance: four arms, sharp teeth, disheveled hair. She is fire’s śakti in its aspect as universal consumer. Her name may derive from lakṣ (to mark, to indicate): she marks the practitioner who has traversed her domain with the seal of purifying fire. Pātal-siddhi—the power of the subterranean world—is the capacity to penetrate normally inaccessible layers of reality, including possession of another’s body (parakāyapraveśa).

The capacity to enter another’s body (parakāyapraveśa) is one of classical haṭhayoga’s most mystical powers. Tradition narrates that Śaṅkarācārya used it to experience a king’s life before answering Maṇḍana Miśra’s questions about conjugal love. From the subtle anatomy perspective, this capacity is explained as the result of having purified the subtle body to the point where it can temporarily separate from the physical body and inhabit another. Maṇipūra’s fire, when completely purified, dissolves rigid identification with a single body.