The Most Heavily Guarded Forbidden Zone!

At the end of the ventilation shaft, beyond a cold metal grille.

Link hovered silently in the dark, an observer who had melted into the shadows. His gaze pierced the grille and locked on the far end of the empty corridor below.

There stood a door.

A door that no known language on Earth could describe.

It was cast entirely from a deep black alloy that seemed to absorb all light. Its surface had no handle, keyhole, or seams. It was one solid piece, like a tombstone cut from the depths of the universe.

The only things moving were the energy circuits across its surface, shifting like living creatures.

Those luminous paths were no mere LED strips. At times they formed ancient pictographs; at others, intricate geometric patterns. Every shift seemed to perform some profound calculation involving space and time.

An intangible yet immensely powerful energy field seeped from behind the door and enveloped the entire area.

The field stirred an instinctive aversion in Link's Kryptonian cells.

"Interesting."

The corner of Link's mouth lifted.

He did not act rashly. First, he tested it.

He pushed the frequency of his body to its limit and tried to pass the tip of one finger through the metal wall of the ventilation shaft.

Anywhere else, it would have been effortless.

But here, just as his finger was about to merge with the metal, the energy field behind the door seemed to sense something. A barely perceptible ripple swept past.

Link's finger struck an invisible wall made of pure rules. His Molecular Vibration was forcibly interrupted, and his finger was wrenched from a quantum state back into solid matter.

"I can't pass through... This isn't a physical defense. It's a 'conceptual' defense."

"It's declaring that, within this area, 'passing through' is not permitted."

Excitement