Killed Hillock, gate to Lioneye's Watch didn't open

Like the thread title says, I killed Hillock but the gate to Lioneye's Watch didn't open to let me in afterward.

I killed hillock in the small pathway that leads up to the gate, so that may have something to do with it, though I'm certain I've done that before without issue. Walking away and then back again did not trigger letting me in. Logging out and then back in restarted me in the same instance, and thus still left me unable to get in also. Since there is no way to manually reset the zone that I am aware of (since there is no exit or waypoint) I just deleted my character and made a new one.

Yeah, you need to actually spend that skill point you get off killing Hillock. I know it's a bit forced but I guess the game devs want to give you clues as to how the mechanics work.

Well, that's certainly not the case, because right after I deleted and remade a new character I got into Lioneye's Watch without allocating that point. In fact, I didn't spend any of my passive points before Lower Prison (where a giant reminder window pops up) and still didn't do it then, just closed the window.