After conversing with Ariel at the Pillars and beginning his quest for Nupraptor in the eponymous chapter, Kain left the clearing via a teleporter in the west which led him to a trail leading south west away from the Pillars, here he found the Light Dungeon.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The external appearance of the Light Dungeon is reminiscent of the mausoleums of the Cemetery and the nearby Energy Bolt Dungeon, consisting of a plain grey stone building with a sloped roof and plain pillared walls. In comparison to these buildings, the Light Dungeon could be distinguished by a slightly grander design and a double-arched roof.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The internal area of the dungeon also bears a marked similarity to the mausoleums of the Cemetery and Kain's Mausoleum, with the same dark green walls adorned with skull, pillar and box motifs, occasional sarcophagi, black gated doorways marked with red skulls and support pillars bearing torches with similar skull designs. One notable difference between the areas was the lighting, with the Light Dungeon, largely shrouded in shadow or lit only by low-level torchlight - necessitating the use of the Light spell to clearly make out the surroundings.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The dungeon in shadow...
...and after using the Light spell
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Kain entered the Light Dungeon into a small empty rectangular room with a mural of the light spell on the floor in front of a locked door with two open doors to either side. The left door led to a save altar room while the right continued into the building opening into a square room with a sarcophagus at the center surrounded by four torch-pillars. A narrow corridor led off to the right turning upwards and passing through an area where several Skeletons patrolled. Three 'crossroads' marked where the corridor 'branched' into small alcoves where other skeletons patrolled along with a blood vial in the mid left alcove. Chained humans could be found in the top alcoves along with a wandering spiked ball. At the top of the corridor, an open doorway led onto the next area.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The next area featured a widening room patrolled by three spiked balls. At the center along with two purple Magic spheres was the Light spell, surrounded by four pillars. Two sarcophagi blocked the path ahead, forcing Kain to move around them, to where two more vertically positioned sarcophagi split the path again. At the outer edges, two prisoners were positioned, while the inner paths joined and headed further into the structure. A short narrow corridor again widened into a room with a sarcophagus at the center with two skeletons and two spiked ball patrolling - with two chained prisoners next to pillars flanking the exit. A longer narrow corridor then led upto a 'crossroads' junction, where two sarcophagi flanked the top passage leading to the locked exit. Both left and right paths led through a slalom of pillars patrolled by skeletons and spiked balls with chained prisoners at the end - however the right path also contained the wall button necessary to open the exit door.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The next chamber was a square room containing three sarcophagi and two torch pillars, with a chained prisoner and a purple sphere in the top corner which were patrolled by a skeleton and a spiked ball. Next to the bottom-right pillar, the passage out led down a narrow corridor to a section with two alcoves patrolled by skeletons - with left containing a prisoner and the right containing the switch to open the exit door beneath. After a small narrow corridor, this led to a rectangular room with three Spike pits and three torch-pillars that was patrolled by three skeletons and a spiked ball. Between the first two pits was positioned a Flay artifact, while the path between the last pits led up to an alcove containing the exit switch, which activated the door beyond the last pit on the left wall.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
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The next chamber in the sequence was a singular square room with three tombs radiating from its center, with five pillars (four of them torch-pillars) and a pot dotted around the room. Patrolled by three skeletons, the room also contained a purple sphere in the top center next to the pot and a wall button in the top left which opened the exit door positioned on the bottom left of the room. The next map area was a larger stepped-square chamber with alcoves at the left and right containing a prisoner and a rune triangle respectively. The center of the room was patrolled by four skeletons and contained four spike pits around the center, with two obelisks at top and bottom preventing direct uninterrupted passage through. A wide passage joined the bottom of the chamber to another square room with a tomb and an obelisk in the middle which acted as a switch to open locked doors in the left and right walls - both led to square rooms, with the left containing a prisoner and a flay artifact and the right containing two prisoners, two spike balls and a Heart of Darkness artifact. The exit door was positioned at the bottom of the main room.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The final stretch of the dungeon consisted of a long slowly widening corridor, which could broadly be split into three sections. The first at the top was a usual square room with two torch pillars in the middle providing light, a captive on the left wall and a spiked ball to avoid. At the bottom another torch-pillar marked the transition into a wider section patrolled by two skeletons, with two captives in the top corners of the chamber. Kain's immediate path south was blocked by a spike pit and so it was necessary to negotiate around it. At the bottom of the spike pit a narrow platform extended up into the middle of the pit to where a flay artifact and two purple spheres could be found. Further down Kain could negotiate a passage patrolled by two spike balls and narrowed by the presence of three tombs and several pillars to reach the bottom-most section. The last section consisted of a wider area with a solid walled off area in the middle and several pillars dotted around the outside with two spike balls floating around. The final door at the bottom led back to the locked door in the initial area of the dungeon.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
In the spells section of Silicon KnightsBlood Omen FAQThe Complete Guide To Legacy of Kain, the building is called "a mausoleum to the west which contains the light spell" - with such a description ultimately implying that the building was originally intended as a burial ground much like Kain's Mausoleum and the other buildings of the Cemetery. The description is also notably similar to that given for the Energy Bolt Dungeon, with all three locations ultimately sharing very similar building designs.[2]
The internal areas of the Light Dungeon are counted in files under "Map 0011", with "Map 0011 Sect 02" referring to the first set of chambers with the save altar and mural, "Map 0011 Sect 06" referring to the branching T-shape corridor, "Map0011 Sect 08" referring to the chambers from the square room with three sarcophagi to the chamber with the Spike pits, "Map 0011 Sect 14" referring to the single square room square room with three sarcophagi and several pillars, "Map 0011 Sect 16" referring to the chamber with 4 L-shaped spike pits above three square rooms and "Map 0011 Sect 17" referring to the long corridor leading back to the initial room. The external map area is grouped with other 'overland' locations under the "Map 0001" designation as "Map 0001 Sect 61". The Developers' level select labels the area as "LGHT" under the "OL1" designation, grouping it with the first areas of the game.[Blood Omen]
The Light Dungeon notably shares its map area with the Energy Bolt Dungeon. The clearing of the Pillars of Nosgoth (and the chapter break) is also between the two structures, although the clearing is not visible on the map view and is only represented by the two Teleporters leading to and from the clearing. The pillars themselves are featured in a different map area - which has several variants depending upon the progression through the game. [Blood Omen][Blood Omen/3]
The Light Dungeon map area is visited three times in quick succession. Kain first enters the area as he travels to the Pillars of Nosgoth and reaches a teleporter in the south of the area. The Pillars themselves are represented on a different map area, with Kain returning to the Light Dungeon map area via a teleporter in the west and following the trail southwest past the Light Dungeon itself. This trail leads off screen and continues onto the Lake of Tears map area - which contains the Wolf Form Dungeon in a cave - before looping back and returning to the far north of the map, where the Energy Bolt Dungeon resides.[Blood Omen][Blood Omen/2][Blood Omen/3]
The Light Dungeon is one of the first interior areas to demonstrate the warped and physically impossible geography found in Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, with the rooms from "Sect 08" onward actually clashing with the previous rooms if laid out together.[Blood Omen]
The Light Dungeon does not appear in further titles and it is unclear if the structure survived beyond the events of Blood Omen. Its position within Nosgoth suggests that Kain and Raziel should both have passed close by in Legacy of Kain: Defiance when traversing between the Pillars and the Lake of Tears vista. Although the building itself was not specifically seen, some ruins and structures appear in a similar position.[Defiance][Defiance/5][Defiance/6]