Page 3533 -- CCXCIV.

Chapter Two Hundred Ninety-Four: ‘O, Wonder! O, Threshold...!’
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The memory froze when Hector heard that. Had he frozen it himself? Yeah. He felt so. He wasn’t entirely sure how he’d done that, but it seemed true.

If this blurry figure in front of him was really Rathmore, then he wanted to take a minute and reexamine the scene.

Recontextualize it, actually.

This giant metal-and-rock formation all around the Gate...

Could it have been a Fusion Forge?

Hector knew that they could look like just about anything, so perhaps there was no telling for sure. But if it was, then that might explain, in part, why it no longer existed in the modern day. Forges were too highly sought after to be left alone. Someone would’ve either taken it or destroyed it.

Furthermore, it might also explain how Rathmore had been able to affect the supposedly un-affectable stone. If anything in the world could modify the unmodifiable, it would probably be a Fusion Forge, wouldn’t it?

Hmm.

The more he looked at the enormous formation, the more he wondered about how it might have functioned. All those spiked points focusing on the Gate. Were they for channeling ardor, perhaps? Or extracting it, maybe? Dammit. Maybe if the scene hadn’t gone white earlier, he would’ve gotten a clearer picture of things.

He found himself hovering higher, floating above the stony contraption in order to get a better idea of just how huge it really was. It extended out farther than he’d realized, seemingly embedded deep into the ground, making it difficult to tell where the natural rock ended and Forge-rock began.

Perhaps that was the point. The Candle had a similar design philosophy, didn’t it? Built right into a tree. Made inseparable from it. In which case, it might’ve been better to think of the “natural” rock as still part of the forge. Like a root system.

And that lever. That was distinct. Hector looked for any other mechanical parts, but he couldn’t find any. How could that be the only thing? Was there a vast network of cogwheels underground? Probably not. That sort of technology seemed a bit advanced for how long ago this must have taken place.

But then again...

Ancient integrators were no joke. Stasya Orlov, the creator of Warrenhold, had apparently invented locked door mechanisms long before the technology became commonplace. So maybe Rathmore had done something similar here.