author: Yeah, I know, this is a fanfiction sequel to the "horrid" reboot. Look, let's just enjoy what we want. You don't want this, click away, no need to abuse yourselves...
Prologue: Waking Their Destinies
Deep into the old library reveals an otherworld, and in it, a prisoner...
He plays a song of lamentation as a way for the dead to move on.
A few hours ago…
They are inside a tall, labyrinthine chasm, comparable to old medieval castles; the sun down's light (is it even sunlight?) that passes through its tall, glassless windows barely illuminate the old brick, wood and iron architecture of the chasm. The chasm is full of books, stacked neatly and untouched inside tall bookshelves that reaches almost the ceiling. In fact, the chasm's dark brick walls are covered by these shelves, making these shelves its walls, it seems. And yet, the scent of paper and books that should have been damaged by time should fill the air, but there is none, nothing to smell but the old metallic staircase they are descending. But there is something to hear; and in the deathly silence of each floor level of bookshelves upon bookshelves and ladders leading to more bookshelves, hallways leading to a different section of the chasm, the sound of murmuring emanates from these places, muttering a language only someone who knew it would know and understand their urgent messages—if someone listens close enough.
The chasm's staircase may lead anyone to this old library, but the largest and its most intricately-designed staircase leads down to a special room, hidden from oblivious, uneducated eyes for centuries, millenniums even. This room is the end goal and it will open—it should open, after all the years of searching and learning all about it.
Mary could only walk behind her father as she tried to calm herself, tried to look composed and fearless, but the truth is, her father, and his companion walking right behind her and this very place is going to be the very death of her, she just knew it. Who would've thought, she mused, that this strange place is underneath the university she's enrolled in?
Landing at the very bottom of this chasm—this old library or whatever this whole place should be and has kept—the three are beholden by a pair of large double doors, its height a good thirteen feet above their heads. It is made of wood and the intricate, Renaissance-like design that shows the craftsman's work to be enticing. At closer scrutiny, Mary could see that it holds a story of sorts; some words are also carved into the wood, above the other carved images at the center part of the door.
Her father steps closer to the doors and brandishes his left hand from left to right, as if touching an invisible incantation on its wooden surface.
"I can feel it," he mutters in his monotone, grave voice. "The tome you found was very precise! And all is left is to give it a small amount of payment to gain entrance…"
Mary could feel the chill grow at the back of her head and it spreads down to her very fingertips, down to her legs and feet, as if she is frozen to the very spot she stands on. Her head is slightly bowed now, not anymore interested at looking at the door or anything her father and his companion is doing.
She just couldn't bear it…
She feels her father's companion brush past her, the shoulder of her sheer green blouse almost touching the muscled arm of the man walking beside her father and to study the door.
"We are prepared, Jonathan," the man states and languidly gives her father a thick tome, its engravings on its cover similar to the doors. "The vial of blood samples you have with you would be good enough before I use mine."
The sound of a blade unsheathing is loud in this place that, when its sharp edge whips through the air, Mary could've sworn the murmurs above them have grown much louder. Her palms become colder and sweatier. Are they going to cut through her skin again?
The man turns to her and smiles, but it is a very cold and arrogant one. Her despise to him seemed to heighten and she clenches her hands into a fist.
"Don't worry," he says to her in that cool voice full of subtle malice. "Your blood in your father's vials is good enough. You had been very generous and we are grateful."
If she could only punch him—and that is a big if—she would enjoy the pain her fist would deliver at his pretty boy face. She remains silent, opting to be safe; but she cannot help but glare at him for a second and then roll them away in disgust, her lips set in a hard line.
He merely chuckles in amusement and turns to her father again, who opens the tome and flips the page to a certain chapter. When he finds it, he begins to speak an incantation; his voice chants the foreign words on the pages while he slowly procures one vial from his coat pockets, carefully opens it and spills the ounce of blood unto the surface of the door. As he continues to chant, the murmurs above them become stronger, its volume heightening. Her father repeats the process of chanting and spraying the contents of the vials in his coat until he brandishes one last vial and spills the blood on the door, as if blessing it the way holy water is on the ones who pray.
Mary gasps; the carvings on the door begin to move and its 'wooden' surface glistens with the blood her father has offered it—the doors looks like they are made of flesh!
The characters on the door move aggressively and violently; each character is doing some form of violence to one another or to itself—some appear to fight with swords while others mutilate and tear each other apart! The sound of their 'flesh' is very prominent and Mary feels sick!
The man who had unsheathed his blade pressed it against his right palm and, with one quick swipe, slashes a clean gash on his skin!
Walking closer to the door, he wipes his bloodied hand on its surface, feeding the violent creatures that are engraved on its doors.
"Let him out," the man murmurs vehemently. "For I am Nephilim!"
When those words escaped his lips, the chasm began to rumble and the murmuring voices around them and on the door suddenly screamed! It is very deafening, as if the inhuman voices themselves are right beside Mary, screaming at her! She covers her ears, but it's no use; the screaming pierces through her head, creating the sound of ear-splitting deafness! She fears the screams have shattered her eardrums, its high-pitched wavelengths threatening to pass her out!
She stumbles down to her knees as the screams continue and the earthquake crumbles the walls, the books falling from their places. She looks up and sees the double doors pulsate, crumble and darken, resembling an infected internal organ; dark veins appear where the man touches its surface and then it bursts upwards, cracking the walls, and an opening is revealed! The earthquake immediately stops and the voices cease or perhaps, she could not hear properly anymore…
Inside this room—this dark, fleshy room, full of pumping veins, arteries, dripping blood (perhaps the blood her father and his companion offered) and cords that resemble umbilical cords—is a…being of sorts. This being is connected with the fleshy cords that surround the room, looking like it is being sustained; even so, the being appears half-dead and pale, its bald head hanging by his shoulders back and forth, ready to fall off if it would. Mary suspects it could've been dead prior to there arrival.
Then, its croaky voice, long been asleep and imprisoned for centuries, it speaks: "Nephilim?"
"I am," the man says rather proudly. "I release you from this life-long sentence but for a useful reason. You will help us in our endeavors."
To her horror, the being lifts its head to them but seems to only see the man—this Nephilim. It looked like a corpse when it is still in its early decomposing stages, its skin slightly torn to reveal unnourished innards. It speaks again, "I suppose it is fair, as I have only been fed with all the things the prophets and other intellectuals have written in this humble abode, over and over and over again… I do want to share what I am forced to know here to keep me from escaping. I accept it."
The man is pleased and he smiles curtly. "Thank you. I and my associate have a lot of questions for you."
Mary's father bows at the being in respect after being mentioned.
"But to begin," the man says and his curt tone changes back into that cooler, more serious tone of his, "and most importantly, I would want to know where I would find my father's sword."
The prisoner's face lifts up much more, looking intrigued; and then it smiles (or at least, as it tries to). "So you are their Nephilim?"
Mary could not breathe anymore; she knows their plans are now coming to fruition and she has let them.
Present time…
Dante's hand trembled, but it wasn't from his wounds he still sustains. What they had just went through and what he's gazing at right now…
He sighs, a puff of visible cold air coming through his mouth, as he lets the horrible reality seep through his soul.
Dante's hand trembled. He held the very neck of the guitar steady as his blood-caked fingers managed to strum the chords to test it. It wasn't right. He adjusts the tightness of it, decides to loosen a few strings, opting for a richer, deeper bass of a melody.
He thought he saw something move, but figures it was time, anyway.
He strums the guitar again and nods at how near-perfect it is.
He begins to play the music and this time, this time, they move.
His lips open to let the lyrics float along with the dead.
"Sing me to sleep, sing me to sleep…"
Dante sat at the edge of a cliff, overlooking the largest graveyard he's ever seen. Only, he questions how it could be, what with all the fresh corpses and pale bones littering the landscape, and not even a sight of an unmarked grave to make a Potter's field. Many of the skeletons lay half-buried, but many new cadavers lie at the mercy of the elements, their stench a feast for a stampede of feral demons about to come to devour them like vultures.
It's a massacre yard, then.
"I'm tired and I…I want to go to bed…"
He can feel Kat from the old Paradise mansion, staring at him and at the bleak landscape outside, near a cliff side that overlooked the lush nature and a beautiful sun setting right now.
She looks at the floating figures that accompany his lament, their souls ascending, for the final time. In many ways, Kat knew that feeling very well, but she understands its difference and how this is helping them find the Other Side. A tear rolls down her cheek as Dante sings…
"Sing me to sleep, sing me to sleep…
And then leave me alone.
Don't try to wake me in the morning,
'cause I will be gone…"
He strums the chords accordingly, letting his softened timbre weave gently, wanting the words to flow and reverberate. He sees a few souls: small, dancing in a circle, laughing like children—were children! His heart aches as he watches a few souls accompany them in their ascension. He almost misses a beat as his teeth grit when his own tears flow.
"Don't feel bad for me. I want you to know…
Deep in the cell of my heart, I will feel so glad to go…"
As the last few from a thousand souls finally disappear in peace, like twinkling stars fading in the twilight, Dante feels a stronger presence, rising like dawn. His skin bristles as he knows exactly what they are…
"Sing me to sleep, sing me to sleep…"
Angelic voices accompany his lonesome crooning, echoing those words as they slowly materialize from their bones down below the cliff. His heart hammers as he remembers who they are, all those years ago…
"I don't want to wake up on my own anymore."
"SING TO US…SING TO US…SING TO US…"
Their forms, clear as light, are ethereal and translucent; their enchanting voices together do not overpower his, as theirs meld with his melancholic one. Their wings spread, their calm, stoic, unblinking eyes upon him.
"I don't want to wake up on my own anymore.
Don't feel bad for me. I want you to know…
Deep in the cell of my heart, I will feel so glad to go…"
Slowly, Dante stood up as he continues, his eyes never leaving his sight from the awesome creatures before him.
"Sing me to sleep, oh sing me to…sleep…"
"SING TO US,O BLESSED ONE, O CURSED ONE, WHOSE VOICE CARRIES PEACE…"
"There is another world…"
"TO A WORLD PROMISED, TO A WORLD BEYOND…"
Already standing at the doorway, Kat remains hesitant to approach them. Frozen in fear and wonder, her indecisiveness is erased when a strange hand coalesces with hers. Looking up to see a man who looks a few years younger than Dante, he stands beside her with the same expression, yet more embolden to take a few steps closer. She huffs a breath and, together, they stepped beyond the doorway.
"There is a better world…"
"A WORLD DESTINED, A WORLD COMING…"
She can feel her own uneasiness melting away from her heart and, through this thin connection laced through their fingers, Kat can feel how their friend feels the same way. His expression is mellower, his brows and lips relaxed.
"Well, there must be…there must be…"
The floating voices of these angels rise into a crescendo, piercing the bleakness of the landscape with their compassion and power, and blessing the ascension of the other spirits further.
"A WORLD FROM YOU!"
Kat's eyes mists at the beauty of it all—!
Until Dante drops his guitar and literally bolts to the air, his sword Rebellion drawn and raised against a blazing and glimmering angel, her spear pointed at him!
"It's her again…"
Their new friend, his strange hand on hers, lets her go and goes over the forgotten guitar to pick it up.
When their weapons clashed, the thundering force rolls throughout the landscape, bending trees, darkening clouds and shaking the very Earth itself! The graceful, violent arcs of their weapons appear like a bright-orange blur in Kat's eyes, yet she watches for any sign of the fight stopping.
He goes back to Kat's side as they watch the savage spectacle eighty feet above ground, helpless and waiting.
