Chapter 2:
Gate and Open Sesame
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“WELL THEN, I came back and all, but…”
Once I left the cave entrance, I was back in the field with the magic circle. The profoundly sinister magic circle, carved upon blood-red stone, that currently sat at my feet.
It seemed the mysterious invisible wall from before had completely disappeared. Even though I stretched my hands out to the edge of the circle, I didn’t feel any resistance; my hands sliced easily through the air.
However, upon further inspection, this magic circle stood out from its surroundings like a sore thumb. The meadow was calm and shaded by the tender green of the trees. It was peaceful. Notably, the flora didn’t look like it had grown unattended. There were signs of wild growth—it hadn’t been maintained for quite some
time—but I could tell human hands had been involved. My initial impression of a garden didn’t seem that far off.
I glanced once more at the grass under my feet and noticed something new: a strange line extended out from the magic circle. The line was a shallow groove carved a few centimeters into the ground and painted with the same rusty paint as the magic circle. One end of the line was directly connected to the circle, which suggested that they were created together.
My eyes traced the line. It appeared to cut through the field and continue into the forest, going in the opposite direction from the tunnel.
Somehow, I was certain there was something waiting for me at the end.
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My hunch hit a bullseye.
The rust-colored line extended from the magic circle and straight through the trees. After it exited the mini-forest, it continued until it collided with the surrounding cliff. In other words, the line was longer than I expected. At the end of that long, long line was a massive stone gate molded into the cliffside. The gate towered at over five meters tall, and its doors were tightly shut.
This extreme gate had an equally extreme magic circle-esque pattern carved into it. However, this magic circle didn’t give off that sinister feeling. I only took a quick glance at it, but from what I could tell, it was made from a simple pattern of complex—but recognizable—geometric shapes. I didn’t sense anything else. In fact, I thought it was a rather beautiful design.
Wait… Was it possible that the first magic circle was so visually horrid that my sense of beauty had been permanently altered?
In any case, the rust-red line appeared to pass underneath the sealed gate and continue inside. That meant if there was something at the end of the line, it was beyond the door.
“Well, this is a bit troublesome… It doesn’t look like it was closed in the normal way…”
The gate had no keyhole or knob, only a magic circle. The grandiose majesty of its whole closed-ness kind of made it the Platonic ideal of a “sealed gate.” But lacking gorilla-like strength that could surpass human limits, there was no way I could just bust through. I searched the area for a contraption meant to operate it, but not only did I not find one, I couldn’t even find any clues. However, I figured that since it was a gate, it had to be possible to open.
To the point: Human means had to be sufficient to open and close this door. I didn’t know the stone’s weight, but judging by its size, it was definitely in the realm of tons.
Ah. Come to think of it, I heard that a set of gravestones can weigh around a ton. In that case, the weight of this absolutely massive stone gate would be… I dropped my shoulders, heartbroken.
Mentally exhausted, I peered at the magic circle carved into the stone door. Inevitably my mind turned back to that sinister magic circle in the field. “I wonder, could this gate be operated by some miraculous mystery power like magic…?”
Like, perhaps, the strange barrier I felt when I tried to leave that creepy circle.
There was a reason why I, who possessed a largely pragmatic and sensible mind, had in that moment allowed myself to hypothesize something as eccentric as magic. Whatever I had run into in the field was something totally outside the bounds of my experience, and resembled none of the phenomena I knew of, like static electricity, for instance.
Whatever the case might be, I currently had no means to deal with this gate. Utterly dejected, I announced to the empty air, “This is a completely hopeless situation. Should I go check out another area?” I gazed up at the mysterious magic circle. “If a magic chant could open this, I wouldn’t be having so much trouble. Open Sesame…! Ha ha. Just kidding.”
An odd creak split the air.
The first thing I felt was, if I had to put it into words, a strange discomfort. The moment I joked around and uttered “Open Sesame,” it felt like the air—no, the entire surrounding atmosphere—faintly, and I mean really faintly, shuddered.
Next, there was a curious sensation of losing something very minuscule. Like a very small piece of a vast something left me. To put it in simple terms, it was like when you let out a fart.
Wait. I accidentally used a crude example. That was unlike me. I apologize.
More creaking sounds brought me back from my foolish thoughts. The source of the sounds was the center of the gate: the magic circle.
Huh. Could it be that the power from those words had actually somehow opened the gate for me? I looked up at the door, not expecting much. Since it was made of stone, I had to assume the creaking sounds were actually due to age.
My eyes widened at what unfolded next. The magic circle carved into the door glowed red…no, it burned red. Hot air spewed from the area around the circle, creating a heat haze. More precisely, by mere proximity, I was getting hot.
That wasn’t all. The stone that comprised the gate began to twist and creak. The terrible sounds were born of a frightful pressure crushing the stone, continually twisting it inwards. Each time the strange pressure was about to warp the gate, the magic circle appeared to resist. It repeatedly flashed, each time accompanied by incandescent light and heat.
What was this? What exactly was happening? The sounds reaching my ears were no longer simple creaks. They resembled a spine being broken, and those broken bones were being chewed and devoured by something… It was almost like I was witnessing the gate’s death throes. The entire stone gate was being devoured, and it was screaming.
A conspicuous crack split down the majestic magic circle. Torn, no longer able to resist, the circle gave in and the gate finally began to distort.
This scene felt straight out of hell.
Eh…? Wait a sec. Could all of this be happening because I said “Open Sesame”?
No, that couldn’t be. Surely that wasn’t the case. I was a sensible man of sensible conclusions. But timing-wise… No, no way. Yeah. That definitely wasn’t it! It had to be some coincidence, some terrible simultaneous accident. That was final. I was decided.
Immediately after I settled on that assessment, the thing that was once a gate suddenly became midnight black and began to swell like a balloon. Then, the center where the magic circle had been located split into five pieces and peeled outwards. These pieces parted like the petals of a lily, black and crinkled after being burned.
Speaking of, why did it have to change color? It was really gross…
And thus, the stone gate guarding the cave was opened.