• upasṛṣṭaḥ — being pursued
  Past participle of upa-√sṛj. The hunter has become the hunted. Compare verses 4, 15, 17 where the worshipers run toward Śiva (upadhāvati); now Śiva runs from a worshiper.
• santrastaḥ — terrified
  Sam- (intensive) + trasta (frightened). Not slight fear but enclosing fear. The Bhāgavatam refuses to deify Śiva past his actual position; in this hour, he is a frightened lord, and the truth is told.
• sa-vepathuḥ — with trembling
  Sa (with) + vepathu (tremor). Physical trembling — body honest to the inner state. The Bhāgavatam writes embodied fear, not abstract anxiety.
• antam divaḥ bhūmeḥ — to the ends of sky and earth
  Contiguous-join. The cosmography of flight: across all three coordinates. The reader is being prepared to learn that no created direction holds the refuge — only Vaikuṇṭha (next verse) is outside the geometry.
• udagāt udak — he went swiftly from the north
  Contiguous (udagāt + udak). Kailāsa is in the north; the fleeing trajectory begins there. Geographic precision: even in mythic prose the Bhāgavatam locates the journey.

A mountain itself rolls down its own mountain — there is no image of refuge stranger than this. The Lord of Kailāsa, master of the himalayas, sprints to the corners of the directions. The chapter forces the reader to ask: if even Mahādeva must run somewhere, where exactly is he running to? Verse 25-26 answers.