The darkness clouding my vision split apart slowly into a fuzzy image of my own hand raised above me clenching a mangled piece of bloody flesh. The world gradually came into focus around me extending the area of my consciousness. The first thing that I became aware of was lying on some sort of table. Stretched out like a corpse on its bier. Loose straps running across my body falling away as I sat up and swung my legs over the edge. Pushing my unsteady body over onto the floor my feet slipping across something soft. Only then realizing that the bloody flesh still in my hand had come from some place. The frail old mans body on the floor that had tangled up my feet for just a moment the obvious source with his throat ripped out. I tossed away that bit of flesh in my hand and stumbled towards the wall catching myself on a set of shelves. Looking up I read the titles. “Nether planes and their denizens” realizing suddenly that I could read and understood what reading was. The title did not make much sense to me but so many things did not make sense I pushed it into the back of my thoughts. Looking around the lab the bubbling jars and glassware. Flames of candles each came into focus separately and registering in my mind differently. Each color in the world around me a strange symphony all its own. Each object taking a moment to register in my mind as to what it was and why it would be there. Candles, tables, chairs and so many other things that for a few seconds as I saw each new object made no sense but gradually came into focus in my mind. I moved around the room taking it all in. Finally finding a door and realizing what it was. I moved out of the room into the rest of solid stone rooms cut out of the living rock of a cave. Understanding after a moment that venturing out into the caves beyond the worked area might lead to me never being able to get back here. I examined the area more fully. I read each book though it took some rereading for them to make sense as I read them in no particular order. Each book opening my mind and my world further and further.

I found and took clothes from the wardrobe of the wizard. I could not understand what sort of thing that he had been doing to me but I did know that something had gone very wrong for him and very right for me. I gathered supplies and valuables from the rooms. Leaving the books and anything else too heavy to carry out of that place. I knew that something was missing from my mind and that I needed to find a way to get it back. The only thought that I had was to find another wizard or other wielder of Magic and get them to help me. I ventured out into the caves not knowing what to expect. The only weapon I had found in the wizards rooms a short but wickedly sharp black handled dagger.