Natasha opened her eyes.
For a moment, she was sure she'd died. Everything felt too soft, too warm, too clean. There was no faint stench of smoke, no distant groans of undead, no cold cling of fear at the edges of her mind.
Instead—
A white ceiling rose above her, carved with swirling runes and black inlaid sigils. The air tasted crisp, faintly metallic, humming with an overwhelming density of mana that made her chest tighten.
Mana. Not ability energy. Pure magic.
She pushed herself up on the bed.
And froze.
A man sat at a large desk across the room, pen moving with impossible speed across stacks of parchment. High shelves of grimoires lined the walls like a forest of knowledge. A half-finished magic circle hovered in the air, rotating slowly, filled with abyssal glyphs she had never seen on Earth.
And the man—
She recognized him instantly.
