Rubbing his two arms and the string also of gandiva, that fierce bowman, Arjuna, then sped showers of cloth-yard shafts, and nalikas and arrows equipped with heads like boar’s ears and razors, and anjalikas, and crescent-shaped arrows.  Those arrows of Partha, O king, spread over the welkin, penetrated into Karna’s car like flights of birds, with heads bent down, penetrating in the evening into a tree for roosting there in the night.  All those arrows, however, O king, that Arjuna, that victor over all foes, with furrowed brow and angry glances, sped at Karna, all those successive showers of shafts shot by the son of Pandu, were cut off by the suta’s son with his own arrows.

The son of Indra then sped at Karna a fiery weapon capable of slaying all foes.  Covering the earth and the welkin and the ten points of the compass and the very course of the sun with its effulgence, it caused his own body also to blaze up with light.  The robes of all the warriors took fire, at which they fled away.  Loud sounds also arose there, like what is heard when a forest of bamboos in a wilderness is on fire.  Beholding that fiery weapon acting on all sides, the suta’s son Karna of great valour shot in that encounter the varunastra for quenching it.  That conflagration then, in consequence of Karna’s weapon, became quenched.

A large mass of clouds quickly caused all the points of the compass to be enveloped with darkness.  Those clouds whose extremities presented the aspect of mountains, surrounding every side, flooded the earth with water.  That fierce conflagration, though it was such, was still quenched by those clouds in a trice.  The entire welkin and all the directions, cardinal and subsidiary, were shrouded by clouds.  Thus shrouded by clouds, all the points of the compass became dark and nothing could be seen.

Then Arjuna dispelled those clouds caused by Karna, by means of the vayavyastra.  After this, Dhananjaya, incapable of being over-mastered by foes inspired gandiva, its string, and his shafts, with mantras, and invoked into existence another weapon that was the favourite of the chief of the celestials and that resembled the thunder in energy and prowess.  Then razor-headed arrows, and anjalikas, and crescent-shaped shafts, and nalikas, and cloth-yard shafts and those equipped with heads like the boar’s ear, all keen and sharp, issued from gandiva in thousands, endued with the force and impetuosity of the thunder.  Possessed of great might and great energy, those impetuous and keen shafts equipped with vulturine feathers piercing all the limbs, the steeds, the bow, the yoke, the wheels, and the standard of Karna, quickly penetrated into them like snakes frightened by Garuda penetrating into the earth.  Pierced all over with arrows and bathed in blood, (the high-souled) Karna then, with eyes rolling in wrath, bending his bow of enduring string and producing a twang as loud as the roar of the sea, invoked into existence the Bhargava weapon.