• vīryam — strength, prowess
  Vīrya — vital force, semen, heroic capacity. The Bhāgavatam uses vīrya broadly: physical strength, spiritual potency, generative power. Each king was ranked by his vīrya; none of these vīryas would prove sufficient.
• vayaḥ — age, life-stage
  Vayas — span of life, age. Vedic etiquette honors elders first. The doubled measure (vīryam + vayaḥ) names the two axes of kṣatriya rank — physical force and accumulated experience.
• ādaduḥ — they took up
  Aorist of ā + √dā — to take, accept. The bow is taken up: the moment of commitment. Gauḍīya parallel: bhakti also requires a moment of ādāna — taking up the practice — before any siddhi appears.
• veddhum — to pierce
  Infinitive of √vyadh — to pierce, to wound. The verb appears in many Upaniṣadic and tantric contexts as 'piercing the heart of the mantra'. Here it remains literal — pierce the fish — but the resonance carries.
• mat - dhiyaḥ — whose minds were on me
  Mat (me) + dhī (intelligence). The suitors took up the bow with their dhī fixed on Lakṣmaṇā. Gauḍīya reading: the dhī determines the act's destination. Their dhī was on a woman; only Kṛṣṇa's dhī was on Lakṣmī's iṣṭa-bhāva.

• Padaseva Pr SB 10-83-21 Oriya
  His Grace Padaseva Prabhu· Oriya

Bṛhatsena's protocol is precise: each king is honored according to his vīrya and his vayaḥ, then offered the bow. Only after worldly courtesy is satisfied does the trial begin. The same order governs spiritual life — honor the kṣatriya-protocols of dharma, then take up the bow whose only target is the Lord's own arrangement.