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The scene went dead quiet after that, to the point that Hector wondered if that was the end. Everything in sight was silent and still, including Rathmore, who merely stood there, staring at the Gate through which Nykeir had just vanished.

Wait a minute. Had this guy just yelled “Yigorosk?” Hector hadn’t forgotten that name. He still, unfortunately, remembered researching it. A yigorosk was supposed to be mythical creature, infamous for its ooze and tentacles, among other things.

But then... this memory would mean...

Ugh. Hector did not appreciate this kind of confirmation.

At length, Rathmore moved again. He tossed something up into the air and caught it again, then let out a small laugh.

Hector froze the memory there, wanting to get a better look at the object in his hand. Had he had it on him the whole time? Or had he pulled it out of the rubble earlier? Nykeir had seemed quite confident nothing could have survived the forge’s destruction, so what could possibly have--

Ah. Hector recognized the object instantly. A small black pyramid with protrusions on some of its sides.

A Kag. A type of ancient key. He’d seen one just like it back in Himmekel.

Come to think of it, that Kag had been what brought them to the treasure they’d been seeking--and to Malast.

Huh.

Wow. Suddenly, this seemed like the most obvious thing in the world. Like he should have been looking for a Kag all along.

But hold on here. It wasn’t that simple, was it? The Kag in Himmekel had actually been used like a proper key. Diego Redwater had slotted it into a monument--one not unlike the Gate here. But Rathmore, from what Hector had just seen, had not slotted this Kag into anything. Instead, the guy seemed to have just magically activated it in his hand.

That was quite a difference. Hmm.

He rewound the memory in order to check more closely on what Rathmore had been up to when he’d been digging. The man’s blurry hands didn’t make it easy, but eventually, Hector spotted it. A moment where Rathmore did indeed appear to pull something out of the debris.

Yes.

While the forge and everything else in the area had been annihilated, the Gate was not actually the lone survivor. The Kag had endured, too.

Damn. Did that mean these things were made out of the same stuff as the rest of Rathmore’s Materials? Hell, they kinda looked like nightrock, now that Hector was thinking about it, which made him wonder if that was a coincidence.