Symphony of Nightmares

Prologue

Awake in the darkness, of a quiet, simple field I could always find comfort in the lacklight and solitude of the

witching hours. No one to bother me, nowhere to be, no one to answer to, or for. This... darkness was my haven.

The loneliness in a crowded sanctuary, the absolute quiet was quite the auditory spectacle to behold. And then,

that familiar knock of wood striking wood and the whoosh of bodies flying to the ground with each mistake they

made befell my ears as dawn broke once again. It was music among barked orders, the sound of pain when I fell

like all the others. It meant I was still alive. It meant that I was alive when I should have been as dead as the

dry, yellow tinder grass that crunched beneath my weight as the inner circle of Fighting Nephils taught us pain,

and then ruthlessness as they struck again and again and again until we felt only nothing through our shattered

bones and shredded skin. Flesh ripped from fragments that were once solid bone burned as our mentors lit our

still alive, yet broken bodies ablaze. But despite all this, we were still alive, we still felt! For, we were Nephillim,

the undying, the heroes of old, the abomination that was the result of the union of man and the fallen. We did

not dare utter a cry as the pain refused to cease, we all knew that this was an unfathomable crime in the eyes of

our mentors. A crime to which no punishment was severe enough.

We were the heroes of old, we did not succumb to old age, but some of us (like me) are still only in our teens or

younger. We all once had false parents, lying guardians, and most of us had felt the pain that came when the

fallen angels occupied our bodies during that accursed month. Cheshvan. the name burns my tongue and leaves

a bitter taste even after it's sound has gone into the past once more. Our prowess was, to a certain extent, our

bane and the source of our pain, our immortal qualities allowed the fallen ones to strike at our deepest fears and

control our bodies like rag-dolls and puppets for that eternal month. Soon all of this would come to an end, but

not in the way that any could have anticipated... or planned.