Farther back, Draven watched the press unfold with a detached precision that felt almost inhuman. His gray eyes ticked from gap to gap—measuring stress points in the shield curve, counting how many brine-automata had adapted to the lightning residue, noting the subtle hitch in Vaelira's sword arm each time she redirected weight to protect Marrin's exposed side. Every movement, every falter, became data to store for later.
The basin's center yawned half a mile away, but he sensed the Gate's breath even here in every rising plume of memory-fog. Timed surges rattled under his boots, pushing warmth up through fissures like the exhalations of a buried furnace. They had minutes—less if the automata's next evolution ignored the cage's conductivity and attacked with sheer mass.
He signaled the infiltration team.
