The first counterattack split the extraction bundle across five marked positions, and Rumi moved before the demons could reconnect their bodies.
She opened a temporary bypass along the three roads she had already touched around the empty square beneath the extraction chain.
The bypass did not cross the Underworld court, though it carried the trapped civilians away from the retrieval chain's pulling center.
Workers stumbled through the bright rifts with blank faces, carrying only the people they could reach before the route folded.
Nari followed the last group across the stone, placing a narrow mark beside every exit the committed demons had created.
"Keep moving," Nari said. "The road behind you is not safe until I close it."
A retrieval demon pulled its chain toward the nearest civilian cluster, trying to replace the empty route with living bodies.
