“Constructs six through eight arrived in sequence. Mrityulata was everywhere — the crystal sword moving with a speed and precision that Ekansh's natural capability could not have produced but that the S.E.E.'s combat amplification channelled through his arms and wrists with the particular competence of power borrowed from geological deep time. The sixth construct fell to a horizontal cut. The seventh to a rising parry that converted the shadow blade's momentum into its own destruction. The eighth to a thrust that pierced the construct's centre mass and discharged the Mrityulata's geological frequency through the shadow structure's core, the crimson energy propagating through the darkness like lightning through a storm cloud.”