The black gate loomed ahead, its surface absorbing what little light the corridor dared to give. It stood like a sentinel from a forgotten age, towering over three meters tall, carved from shadow-dark ore that shimmered faintly when struck by the wavering glow of Li Wei's lantern. Within its colossal frame, dozens of silver gears turned with methodical grace—interlocking, disengaging, realigning—as though possessed of thought, or bound to a will not yet sated.
Each click of the gears echoed like distant thunder through the passage ~klak-klak~ klak~, unsettling the dust from the eaves above. The sound was not deafening, but deliberate—warning.
