The gate stayed open by a single inch, and that single inch was enough to change the world.
Aether waited for the crushing wave of pressure he had braced for. He waited for the aura of a monster that had slept for ten thousand years, the kind that flattened mountains and made grown hunters weep. It never came. What seeped through the crack in the black stone was something thinner and stranger, a quiet, steady weight that pressed against his mind rather than his body, like a hand resting gently on the back of his neck.
He frowned. The voice had sounded patient, not powerful. Whatever waited on the other side was vast, but it was not awake in the way a predator is awake. It felt like a sleeper who has heard their name called and has not yet opened their eyes.
"It's weak," he said slowly.
Kael stared at him. "You call that weak?"
"Not weak. Incomplete. Whatever is behind that door isn't at full strength." Aether's gaze stayed on the crack. "If it were, we would already be dead."
