Warm...
That was the very first sensation that managed to pierce through the icy, suffocating shroud of non-existence.
It did not arrive with the violent, flesh-searing agony of her Imperial Flame Transformation technique tearing through ruptured meridians, nor did it carry the bitter, freezing bite of the abyssal brine that had filled her lungs and dragged her down into the sunken graveyard of the reef.
It was a gentle, pervasive heat—soft, steady, and profound, like the first golden rays of an equatorial dawn creeping over frost-covered flagstones.
It wrapped around the bruised core of her soul, cradling the shattered remnants of her consciousness with an ancient, primordial gentleness she had not felt since the earliest days of her childhood.
Am I dead?
The thought drifted through the murky expanse of her mind like a solitary leaf caught upon the surface of a tranquil, bottomless pond.
If this was death, then the ancient scrolls had lied.
