ANOTHER eon.
So far away it seemed a distant star, the lone traveler through the infinite Void discerned a dull red glow. Larger and larger it grew as he soared toward it with lightning velocity.
And now it seemed a great mass of flameless fire, shedding its cold rays for millions of miles. With every second it grew in size until it was come to inconceivable proportion. And then it seemed to shrivel up, and turn ashen and wrinkled, and become as a dead and crumbling sun.
But suddenly the husk burst open, and the wayfarer described, dimly at first, what seemed the outermost rim of some gorgeous, primeval world.
Awhile it was as though he were watching it from afar off; but he traversed thousands of leagues in as many seconds, and swiftly it took definite shape as he flew nearer and yet nearer.
And then his journey through illimitable space was at an end, and he had alighted upon this unknown world, and was wandering through a dense jungle of some marvelous fungus that attained a wondrous height.
Seemingly without his own volition, he at length found himself lying on a verdant mound overlooking a vast tropical morass that reached off on all sides into endless vista.
And while he lay there he witnessed in that untracked wilderness a diabolical spectacle appalling as hell itself!
Grisly, indescribable Things—satyrs and ogres and demons and fiends—appeared in countless numbers, and held orgies that were Madness intensified. Now they were reveling and cavorting in wanton abandon; anon battling among themselves in murderous ferocity.
After a time he viewed a sight still more horrible. Off to the right, he saw a monstrous snake’s head, as huge as the body of a hippopotamus, rise up from the swamp and gaze on ravenously at the riotous revel.