Dawn had not yet broken,

but the Lingyuan Division’s grand hall burned with spirit light.

All arrays thrummed — awake and watching.

When Shen Jin stepped in, five elders were already seated in crescent formation.

Qi Ming Heng sat at the center, unchanged in expression.

The seat at his right was left empty — as if awaiting someone.

Luo Qinghan stood just behind it.

She wore the muted robes of a Water Mirror delegate; at her cuffs, two inked characters: Textual Observer.

She did not meet Shen Jin’s gaze.

Only tightened her grip on the scroll in her hands.

He walked to the dais.

Bowed.

“I, Shen Jin, request to re-enter the sealed domain beneath the monument.”

The hall trembled.

Elder He Yang scoffed.

“Do you think this is a library you may come and go as you please?”

Another added, calmly:

“The mark on his body may call the monument — but to let him enter at will is reckless.”

Shen Jin lifted his eyes.

He did not argue.

“The key was never mine to ask for.

So it is not mine to discard.”

“You understand the weight of this?” someone asked.

“I don’t,” he replied.

“That’s why I must go ask.”

The room grew still.

Qi Ming Heng finally asked:

“If not for yourself… then who do you question?”

Shen Jin answered:

“The one who chose me.”

Qi studied him for a long, long moment.

Then said, very softly:

“Granted.”

He rose.

And though his robe did not stir, the entire hall dimmed.

The pressure changed.

Something rose beneath the stones.

He descended from the dais, silent, but the air warped around his steps —

as though rewritten.

His right sleeve lifted.

Five fingers extended.

He made no sigils.

No chants.

He simply moved.

Seven lights bloomed above the floor.

Fixed points, like stars.

Each drew a spiral into the air.

Then, with his left palm, he drew out a thread of black-gold light, weaving it into orbit.

The mirrors appeared.

They were not made.

They simply were.

Seven bronze discs — rimmed in rings, at their centers a sleeping void.

Each bore a mark.

Each waited to open.

The hall fell silent.

Even the glyphs on the wall stilled.

“…The Seven-Spirit Mirror Path,” someone whispered.

Shen Jin stepped forward.

Each mirror he crossed lit with a trace of his Keymark.

Seven mirrors. Seven pulses.

And beneath the floor, something rumbled —

The sealed domain answered.

He did not look back.

“Open the gate,” he said.

Qi moved one sleeve.

The seal cracked.

And the gate began to open.

Only then did Luo Qinghan look up.

Her eyes held a depth of something unspoken.

A question:

Do you even know where you’re going?

But Shen Jin was already gone.

Swallowed by the light of the monument.

—

Beyond the monument’s gate lay a downward corridor — spiral and sunken, carved into black stone.

Shen Jin walked slowly.

With each step, symbols on the walls pulsed to life, casting a faint glow along the floor beneath him —

like a slumbering artery reawakened.

The air cooled.

And within the spirit flow,

a sound.

Not heard —

but felt.

A low resonance, like whale-song in a distant sea, yet intimate —

as though the monument itself leaned toward him,

inviting him deeper,

closer to its core.

There was no fear.

Only the uncanny certainty that this had already been written —

somewhere, long ago.

He stopped at the end of the descent.

Before him stood the wall of the inner stele.

Covered in patterns he had never seen.

Unrecorded.

Undeciphered.

At its heart, a spiral crevice —

shaped precisely like the bone fragment in his palm.

He raised his left hand.

The bone key glimmered —

dark gold light curling into a ring,

echoing the mark beneath his shoulder.

The air stirred.

Dust rose in gentle spirals.

He did not hesitate.

He pressed the key into the mark.

—

Silence.

The bone sank into the stone.

No resistance.

Perfect fit.

The sigils on the wall ignited, blazing white across black stone.

The chamber shook.

Far ahead, the earth cracked —

and from the void, a gate rose.

Not carved.

Formed.

Its frame bore no god’s name.

Only a single blurred symbol —

The same as the Keymark across his back.

And from the monument came a whisper —

“The key is in place.

The gate… must turn.”