The air in the shop felt frozen, as if time itself had stopped. Dua stood paralyzed, the Golden Key pulsating in her hand like a trapped bird's heart.
The hooded man stepped closer, his heavy leather boots making on sound on the wooden floor.
"You don't understand, Dua, " He said, his voice dropped to a low, intense hum. "That key is not a treasure, it is a bridge.
It connects the Shanghai you see today with the Shanghai that was hidden away a thousand years ago. "
Suddenly, the symbols on the key began to glow a fierce, blinding white. Dua felt a sharp, magnetic tug at her navel, as if an invisible thread was pulling her toward the certer of the shop.
The floor beneath her didn't just glow; it turned liquid, swirling like a whirlpool of light and shadow.
"Help! " She tried to scream, but the world was swallowed by a sudden, deafening roar of wind.
Stone floor. She gasped for air. Looking around in total shock. She was no longer in her shop. She was in a vast, underground chamber filled with thousands of ancient stone statues, all facing a single, massive iron door.
The Golden Key in her hand was now burning with a steady, warm heat she looked down and saw a keyhole in the center of the chamber's floor.
It was a perfect match for the key she held.
"I have to go back, " She whispered, her voice echoing in the Hollow, haunting silence. But as she turned to find an exit, she was a mural on the wall.
It depicted a woman who locked exactly like her, holding the same Golden Key, standing before a great dragon. Below the mural, a date was carved one that was still three days in the future.
Dua realized then that she wasn't just a shopkeeper anymore. She was the Key's chosen guardian, and the door behind her was starting to creak open.