The towering fifteen-meter-tall dark red giant door didn't open to the sides, nor did it lift upward; rather, it began to slowly and steadily rotate inward as if pushed by an invisible giant hand.
The sound of the door axis turning was as muffled as thunder, grinding past the dust of ages.
As the door continued to rotate, a scent a hundred times richer than before, mixed with rock dust, ancient spices, the stagnation of time, and an indescribable aura of majesty, surged forth like a vintage that has been accumulating for thousands of years from the deep darkness behind the door, flooding the entire vestibule. Even the metallic sand currents surrounding Duke trembled slightly, emitting a low hum.
Duke held his breath and focused, enhancing all his senses and detection methods to their extreme, tightly locking onto the gradually widening crack of the door.
