He almost asked who had told her that, then stopped. The answer would likely be no one, or everyone, in the same blank way the others knew what not to touch. “That’s exactly why I have to go.”

Lina stepped closer to the vine-hidden slit and said, “You always say that before you stop listening.”

There was no edge in it. That made it worse. He slipped one leg into the opening and tested the first rung. It gave a dry creak but held. “If I bring back proof, I can understand what this place is. Then I can decide what to do.”

Lina’s hands closed on the wrap at her throat. “You think seeing is the same as understanding.”

He looked up at her. For a second he had the sharp, unhelpful urge to explain systems, evidence, causation, the whole old habit of meeting fear with a theory. What came out was smaller. “It’s better than pretending not to see.”

She did not answer. She only moved aside enough to let him descend, which was not permission and not surrender either. It was the kind of space people made around stubborn men walking straight into mistakes.