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‘I mean, the guy was brilliant. I’m not contesting that. Even if he didn’t actually create these things, he’s still the only person in history who’s ever been able to affect them in any way. And my interest in his Materials definitely stems from that fact, at least in part. I just feel it in my non-existent bones that these things must harbor some kind of incredible power or secret.’

“Well, this one was secretly a teleporter, so I guess your bones were right.”

‘Indeed.’

Hector circled around the base of the Gate, inspecting it. The formation was simple enough at a glance. Two big rocks, one almost twice the size of the other, similar in overall scale to a small office building. There hadn’t been much opportunity to examine the Gate before, so Hector wanted to take his time now.

He recalled Garovel mentioning that Rathmore had marked all of his works with a certain type of etching. Hector had seen it firsthand back in Himmekel, during the treasure hunt that ultimately led them to Malast. The etching had been quite hard to spot, though, nearly invisible to the naked eye.

He looked for it now on the Gate, getting up close to the rock and squinting. He was a little afraid of touching it with his bare hands, even though it was almost certainly fine to do so. There was just a slight fear in the back of his mind that it might suddenly teleport him back down to the Undercrust--or to some totally random place, maybe.

He was fairly sure it didn’t work like that, but still. A bit of caution wouldn’t hurt, he figured.

If there were any etchings on these rocks, then he wasn’t seeing them yet. It was quite hard to tell, though. He tried looking even closer.

‘Hector,’ came Garovel’s voice. ‘Over here.’

Hector ventured to where the reaper was pointing and found something entirely unexpected.

There was a flat object jutting out of the larger rock formation, about two-thirds of the way up to its peak. It had a golden sheen to it.

“What is that?”

Garovel was already up there, investigating. ‘Um... hmm. Wait a second. This is... a mirror.’

Hector raised an iron platform for himself to join the reaper. Indeed, it was a moderately large mirror with a golden, jewel-encrusted panel. “What the heck? Why would Rathmore stick a random mirror into his Gate?”

‘He didn’t,’ said Garovel. ‘This wasn’t here before.’