The gate did not open.

It inhaled.

The inverted sky-wound drew everything toward its threshold with the slow, irresistible pull of a mouth that had decided the entire war was edible. Origin-mud, black-vein script, topographical stone, completed density, living syllables, and the first curious probes of unlogged second chances all streamed upward and inward at once. The collapsed battlefield folded like wet paper. The southern grounds shuddered as pillars of living soil and glowing script climbed into the air and braided themselves into the forming doorframe. Reality itself thinned, became translucent, then began to taste of iron and old blood and the salt of open wounds.

Zelda felt the eight-syllable...