Nodal Sanctuaries

What are the Five Nodal Sanctuaries?

According to the "On the Veil of Cognition", the Five Nodal Sancutaries are:

1. Sanctuary of the Rootless Form—where identity melts in the mirror of infinite selves.

2. Sanctuary of the Hollow Flame—where desire burns in the absence of object.

3. Sanctuary of the Unbound Eye—where perception peers beyond the knowable.

4. Sanctuary of the Broken Name—where language collapses and silence becomes speech.

5. Sanctuary of the Final Host—where all returns to the Source, and the Source forgets.

The sanctuaries are suspected of being physical locations that are accessible to Aliens and Humans, but their precise identify is uncertain. Scholars of The Church of Alienism seek these sanctuaries.

1. The Sanctuary the Rootless Form

Hidden deep beneath an ever-shifting desert, this sanctuary is said to reside within a labyrinth of obsidian halls, where gravity bends and reflection fails. Inside, mirrored surfaces reflect not the viewer, but versions of themselves they have never been—some ancient, some yet to be born. It is here that ego unravels, and form becomes optional. Echoes of alien architecture—non-Euclidean, fluid, unsettling—suggest this place may not have been built, but grown. Maps to its location are rumored to appear only in dreams experienced during dissociative fugue states. 

2. Sanctuary of the Hollow Flame

A volcanic island that appears and disappears off the coast of an unnamed polar region houses the Hollow Flame. Unlike earthly fire, the flame here emits no heat and casts no shadow, yet it burns endlessly. It consumes thought itself, drawing out suppressed desires and burning them into abstract ash. Locals speak of strange heatwaves in arctic waters, of red auroras dancing to no known solar rhythm. The alien sigils found in glacial caves nearby suggest this was a site of ritual exile for entities no longer allowed to dream. 

3. Sanctuary of the Unbound Eye 

Embedded in the upper stratosphere inside a floating black monolith—visible only to those undergoing near-death experiences—this sanctuary is inaccessible by conventional means. Within, walls pulse like neural tissue, and impossible geometries funnel perception into higher dimensions. It is said that the Sanctuary of the Unbound Eye does not show truth, but removes the limits that prevent one from seeing it. Declassified satellite photos occasionally show brief shadows cast by nothing, and aviation records include pilot accounts of “staring back at themselves from above.”

4. Sanctuary of the Broken Name 

Located in the heart of a ruined city that appears differently to every traveler, this sanctuary is a cathedral of shifting symbols. Spoken language fails here; all attempts at communication devolve into glossolalia or silence. Within the sanctuary, names fall off memory like leaves in winter—identity becomes fragmented, and meaning decays. Linguists have long puzzled over a “phantom dialect” present in unrelated ancient texts, whose origin may trace to this site. Local legends call it "The Place Where Even Gods Forget Themselves."

5. Sanctuary of the Final Host 

Buried beneath a still ocean trench deeper than any known to science, this sanctuary is less a structure than an event—a radiant implosion of light, time, and selfhood. The few who claim to have approached its edge report experiencing their death, birth, and dissolution simultaneously. Machines sent near the area fail; only organic memory retains partial impressions. It is said this is where the Alien Mind first touched Earth, or perhaps where Earth first remembered it. The ocean above is unnaturally still, a flat mirror hiding the final threshold.