The black crystal wall didn’t reflect light. It drank it.
Standing eighty feet tall and fifty paces wide, the monolith blocked the entrance to the inner root registry.
Across its pitch-black surface, three thousand ancient high-tier laws pulsed in blood-red script: Spatial Folding, Temporal Deceleration, True Sun-Fire Transmutation, Void-Walking.
Beside each law hovered a tiny lock icon, pulsing with a cold, unchanging living hash.
“The Bloodline Gate,” Elder Wu whispered. He shook as he pointed a withered finger at the wall. “In the ancient scriptures, it’s written that only those born of the Nine Divine Lineages may understand the Great Daos. Mortal blood is too coarse, too muddy. A commoner who attempts to fold space suffers spontaneous spatial collapse.”
“Mortal blood isn’t too coarse,” Lin Ke said, his voice flat.
He struggled up from the canvas blanket, his forearms wrapped tightly in Apothecary He’s thick, herbal-soaked bandages. The pain was a constant, throbbing heat, but his fingers still responded.
“It’s an ancient licensing seal,” Lin Ke said, stepping toward the black wall. “A closed proprietary license wrapped in bloodline rhetoric.”
