Consciousness did not return to him with the ordinary rustle of morning linen or the distant chime of municipal cathedral bells.
Instead, his awareness drifted weightlessly through an endless, boundless sanctum of warm amber radiance that completely defied mortal geometry.
The suffocating gloom of the abyssal corruption vanished entirely, replaced by the subtle, comforting scent of sun-drenched cedar and crushed lilies.
He hovered in the center of an immense metaphysical chamber whose crystalline vaulted arches dissolved into a serene, infinite celestial expanse.
No physical walls bounded the space, yet the profound sense of ancient sanctuary was stronger than any stone fortress in the mortal kingdom.
In the absolute center of this sacred void floated a radiant, translucent sphere of condensed starlight that pulsed with the steady heartbeat of a slumbering cosmos.
