The cold that radiated from the archway was not the cold of ice, but the cold of total empty pocket.
Lin Ke halted fifty paces from the black glass threshold.
Standing beneath the emerald-lit top door beam was a figure that made even the battle-hardened veterans of the vanguard draw their breath in sudden dread.
It was The Precursor BIOS Guard.
Standing thirty feet tall, the iron-puppet was forged from matte-black empty pocket-matter. A material so dense that it seemed to drink the surrounding light around it. In its right hand, it held a massive greatsword woven of pure, humming compile-time logic. That pale violet blade shook with the sound of a supercomputer crunching infinite counts.
It had no face, only a single level sight sensor that swept the crystal-clear floor with cold, unblinking red light.
An outer elder from a rescued sectarian clan stepped forward, eager to claim precedence. “I’m Elder Bai of the Southern Cloud Sect! In the name of the High Heavens—”
The Guard didn’t raise its voice.
