I remember the first time I heard the voices; weird unhuman sibilant voices, issuing forth from the outer reaches of blackest space, where amorphous beings cavort and caper before a great black fetor-belching idol worn by the passing of uncountable centuries. With the commencement of these voices came visions of horrifying intensity, dread chimeras of dual black and green suns, shining on towering monoliths and citadels of evil, which rose, tier upon tier, as if seeking to escape their earthly attachments. But these dreams and illusions were as nothing compared to the dread colossus that was later to encroach upon my consciousness; even now I cannot recall the horror in its entirety, but when ! think on it I have an impression of vastness, of size beyond measure, and groping tentacles, pulsating, as if with an intelligence of their own, alive with malignant depravity.
Around this base enormity pranced cadaverous monstrosities, their voices rising in a cacophonous chant:
'Mwl'fgah pywfg fhtagn Gh'tyaf nglyf lghya.'
These horrors were with me always as was that shadow from beyond.
Still I would study the books and scrolls and pass blacker gateways into unknown dimensions, where dark beings would instruct me in arts so infernal that even the most prosaic of minds was likely to be blasted at the thought of them.
I remember how I discovered the title of the book; it was late at night as I sat poring over the vermiculated pages that I came across a passage which threw light on the mysterious volume:
'Nyarlathotep rules in Sharnoth, beyond space and time; in his gigantic ebony palace he awaits his second coming, served by his minions he broods and festers in blackest night.
'Let none meddle with spells and enchantments concerning him, for he is quick to trap the unwary. Let the ignorant beware, heed the Black Tome, for terrible indeed is the wrath of Nyarlathotep.'
In secret delvings I had found mention of this 'Black Tome': that legendary manuscript written centuries ago by the great necromancer Alsophocus, who lived in the land of Etongill before ever modern man had taken his first uncertain steps upon the earth.
The mystery was explained; this was indeed the blasphemous Black Tome. With this knowledge I eagerly began devouring all the evil lore in that book; runes of binding, naming, and shaping were all within my grasp, and I basked in my new power. New gateways and thresholds were made available, demons of the darkest reaches were at my command; but there were still barriers I dare not pass, those black unplumbed depths of space beyond Fomalhaut, where the ultimate terror lurked, crouching obscenely and gibbering blasphemies older than the stars. In Ludvig Prinn's De Vermis Mysteriis and the Cultes des Goules of the Comte d'Erlette I sought for elder secrets, but all those ancient mysteries were as nothing compared to the evil knowledge of the esoteric Black Tome. This book contained incantations of such awesome power that perhaps even Alhazred himself would have trembled at the contemplation of their use: the citing of Boromir, the foul secrets of the Shining Trapezohedron - that window on time and space - and the calling of great Cthulhu from his watery palace in the oceanwhelmed city of R'lyeh; they were all there, waiting for him who would be brave, or insane, enough to use them.
I was now at the height of my power; time expanded or contracted at my will, and the universe revolved around my evergrowing intellect. My hold on all earthly aspects of life was broken by my occult studies, and my strength became such that I attempted the inconceivable, the passing of that final dreadful threshold, the gateway to the black secrets of beyond, where the Old Ones hold their court and plot their return to the earth from which they were banished by the Elder Gods. In my obtuse vanity I imagined that I a tiny speck of dust in the vast cosmos of time - could pass through the black gulfs of space beyond the stars, where iniquity and chaos rule, and return with my mind intact and untouched by the aeons-old corruption that dwells there.
Again I made the five concentric circles of fire on the floor, and standing in the innermost one, invoked powers beyond all imagining with an incantation so inconceivably terrible that my hands trembled as I made the mystic passes and symbols. The walls dissolved and the great black wind swept me away through dark gulfs of space and grey regions of matter. I travelled faster than thought, past unlit planets and vistas of unknown realms which swirled and shifted across immensurable distances; the stars flashed by so rapidly that they appeared as gossamer-fine threads of brightness interlaced across the universe, minute shooting stars of brilliance shining against black aether that was darker than the fabled depths of Shung.
A minute may have passed - or perhaps a century and still I was rushed along. The stars had thinned considerably: they were clustered in groups, as if attempting to find solace in the company of others; nothing else changed. I suffered utter loneliness on that journey; hanging suspended in space and time I appeared stationary, although the speed of my flight must have been phenomenal, and my spirit cried out at the awesome solitude and the dreadful stillness and silence of space; I was as a man entombed in a grim black sepulchre while yet alive. Aeons passed, and then I saw far ahead the last star cluster, the last light for countless millennia; beyond there was nothing but impenetrable blackness, the end of the universe. As on that earlier terrifying occasion I screamed and struggled, but to no avail; I continued on my endless quest through corridors of silence and dread.
For endless eternities I travelled, with no change except the unsteady beating of my heart. And then it came, a green-tinged light, or perhaps only a suggestion of light; I had passed through an absence of time and matter; I had passed through Limbo. Now I was beyond the universe, unrelatable distances from the cosmos that is normally imagined; I had crossed the final threshold, that last gateway before oblivion. Ahead were the dual suns of my visions, towards which I drifted at what now seemed to be an infinitely slow speed; around these black and green prodigies rotated a single planet; ! knew it for the home world, Sharnoth.
Toward this dark cold globe I floated slowly, and as I approached I saw the green-litten plain far below me, upon which rested the gigantic twisted city of my earlier visions, looking misshapen and out of proportion in the unnatural glow. Over the roofs of this dread metropolis I drifted, noting the crumbling masonry and the cracked pillars that stood stark and frightening against the broken black skyline. In all the city not a thing moved, and yet there was a feeling of life there, of evil prurient life that sensed my presence.
As I descended towards that city I felt my physical senses returning; I felt cold, ice-cold, and my fingers were numb and paralysed. I alighted on the edge of an open space, in the centre of which was a gigantic square stone building with a tall arched doorway that yawned blackly like the maw of some terrible primeval creature. From this building radiated an aura of palpable malevolence; I was stunned by the intensity of dread and despair that assailed me, and as I stood outside that monstrous edifice I remembered a small passage from the Black Tome:
'In an open space in the centre of the city stands the palace of Nyarlathotep. Here all secrets may be learned, although the price of that learning is terrible indeed.'
I knew beyond doubt that this was the abode of grim Nyarlathotep. Although the thought of entering that dark structure appalled me beyond measure, I walked unsteadily towards the doorway, my legs guided by some intelligence other than my own. Through that mighty portal I passed and into utter blackness as dark as my unlit journey through the aether to this abominable place.
Gradually the impenetrable gloom gave way to the weird green glow that lit the outer planet's surface; and in that sickly gangrenous light I saw that which no man should ever be condemned to see.