Chapter Text
The Creation Era.
Before space and time, there was an inconceivable mass of pure and utter nothing. The “void”. This emptiness preceded all, and you could not even imagine it no matter how hard you tried, it is simply incomprehensible. Countless aeons ago, a single circling glow emanated from the centre of the nothingness. It was a glorious energy that seemed to form from the void itself, as if the 'essence' coalesced to form The Creator.
It is said that before the vast void of space was inherited, there was but an emanating glow at the centre of the universe. Not just a glow, but in fact, a living, sentient entity. “The Creator”. The Creator is a being of absolute power. Her size is inconceivable and her power beyond that of any comprehension. Truly limitless. It is this power of The Creator which kickstarted the creation of the universe and world as we know it. Her energy coalesced and condensed to form the Twin Primordials : Kosmos , the Guardian of Light ; and Khaos , the Dark Lord . Light and Dark; Good and Evil; Order and Chaos. They were the first to roam the universe and create the many worlds and planets in this universe. Before their creations, there was only the Neutral Void in which travelled far and wide. They used this void to separate and create their own realms. Kosmos created the Empyrean Plains which would eventually become the resting place of the Deities and Angels , while Khaos proceeded to create the Infernal Domain which would contain all Seven Hells and their subsequent Daemons , and souls of The Damned . Together, and the two united to create the Material Realm and from this inadvertently birthed a third and new Primordial: Gaia, the Seed of Life.
What some may refer to as “Mother Nature” or the “Seed of Life”. The living entity that is the disembodied spirit of the currently vacant planet, which has a ways to go before it could ever contain life. At this point in time, Gaia was only lit by the pure radiance of the Guardian of Light and then darkened by the Dark Lord. There was no heat or warmth, only light from the surrounding stars in the proverbial day, to then be bathed in a pitch-black darkness in the proverbial night. It would take much more than that to be able to begin nurturing and bringing about life on such a planet. So, Gaia proceeded to plead with her siblings for warmth so that eventually she may sustain life.
Expecting this request to be met with little to no challenge from her superior, senior siblings. Her request for warmth and heat, however, only resulted in causing the Twin Primordials to begin fighting with one another over their differing opinions on where and what this new world should become. Kosmos, believed that they should heed Gaia’s request, believing her to know best. However, Khaos believed that the world would fare better without heat, as it would only dwindle his power. This sparked the first conflict.
It is said that the conflict between the Twin Primordials could've been the end of this blossoming universe, and perhaps, in another reality, it was. Doomed to fall before it had even began. This original conflict subsequently created The Divine Trinity. Which are said to be the very deities that would bring about The Apocalypse. However, unlike the Primordials, who are flawless in design, their offspring are flawed in unique ways, as they lack the power that The Creator possessed when she created her children. From the same conflict birthed the burning sphere of Lito, the Sun God as well as his twin deity and subsequent lover Luna, the Moon Goddess. Their flaw, presenting itself as a tale of two cursed lovers only destined to reunite every solar eclipse. And as Gaia was warmed by the heat of Lito, she curled and formed the foundations of the planet we would come to know as planet Earth. Her essence, simply referred to as the "lifeseed".
The Testament of Mar'Zakel
(Discovered beneath the Ruins of Ur,
untranslated until the Final Year)
And it shall come to pass, in the waning of days when stars forget to rise before falling like ash, the rivers forget their names, and the ground itself groans beneath the weight of man's sin. Three shall enter the world.
The First shall arrive with the laughter of the innocent upon her lips, her breath the dawn of gardens long dead. Her joy shall stir roots in barren soil, life will bloom where none dared hope, and mothers will dream of her long before she is born.
The Second shall enter weeping, but not from sorrow. Born of smoke: his tears shall scorch the stone, his breath shall unmake cities, and his hands shall seek fire before they find touch. His coming a turning of the last wheel. Where he passes, air will tremble, and beasts will cower.
The Third shall not cry at all. No bell will toll for him, no beast shall sense him, no breath to mark his coming, nor shall the sky mark his arrival. He will be known only by the hush that falls in his wake. And when the silence is complete, it will already be too late.
For these are no kings, no gods, nor angels.
They are the Reckoning.
They shall not know each other. Yet they are bound.
They shall not seek each other. Yet they will meet.
And when they stand as one, the final hour shall begin.
– Book of Revelation, apocryphal fragment, 13:13
3:11pm: Tuesday, December 25th, 2007.
The first child was born beneath pale winter light, as the church bells sang their final note for midday mass. No screams accompanied her entrance, only the quiet rhythm of breath, soft and sure, as if the world had been waiting to exhale. There was no blood on the walls, no tearing of sky, no omen in the clouds. The nurses called it a miracle birth: twelve minutes from first push to final cry, though she didn't cry at all — she laughed.
A single, bright chime of a sound that filled the room like sunlight slipping through a crack.
They said her eyes were open too early.
They said the room felt warmer when she arrived.
They said the doctor, just for a moment, forgot where he was.
Her mother would later say she saw nothing unusual. No visions, no signs. Just a peace that wrapped around her like a soft quilt. She felt... light. As though someone had placed something sacred in her arms and dared her to understand it. No thunder cracked. No angels sang. But somewhere, something very old stirred. And smiled.
They say the nurses felt a gentle warmth radiating from the newborn's skin.
They say the sun seemed to grow more radiant through the room's windows.
They say the mother fell asleep peacefully after birth.
The doctor and nurses both remained after the birth to ensure nothing went unchecked. The baby was said to have been remarkably healthy. It was a miracle birthing.
Unascertainable: Thursday, January 31st, 2008.
The second child did not arrive gently.
His mother screamed long before the contractions began: deep, guttural cries that had nurses scrambling through locked doors and whispering into radios. The labor came on sudden, like a storm rolling in beneath a blood moon. She clawed at the sheets, begging for release, for flame, for ice, for anything to quench the heat rising inside her.
The monitors shorted out three times.
One nurse passed out in the hallway.
And outside, birds fled the rooftop before the child took his first breath.
One nurse claimed the time of birth was 6:06am, another swore the impossible before it flickered and went dark. The logbook now reads 7:06am. But the original entry? Gone. No one questioned it out loud. Not after what happened in the room.He came into the world fists clenched, eyes shut tight, mouth wide open, but not crying: Roaring. His wail sent a tremor through the floor, and for a brief, impossible second, the overhead lights dimmed red.
They say the doctor swore he saw smoke curl from the newborn's skin.
They say the temperature in the room reached 108 degrees.
They say the mother's eyes turned black just before she lost consciousness.
No one stayed long after the birth. The baby didn't stop screaming until nightfall.
And even then, silence didn't return — it hid.
4:44am: Sunday, November 2nd, 2008.
The morning was heavy and still, dark clouds swirling ominously over the Catskill Mountains, their jagged peaks half-veiled in the persistent fog that clung to the land. In the heart of the wilderness stood Castello della Notte, an ancient stone estate carved into the side of a steep hill, its towers and spires reaching upward like dark fingers grasping for the overcast sky. Its silhouette a dark mass against the dim, starless sky. Surrounded by ancient trees whose twisted limbs clawed at the air, the mansion had always felt more like a fortress than a home.
It was a place that clung to the past, where memories of those long gone lingered in the shadows of grand halls. The castle, draped in centuries of history, whispered of long-forgotten times, its very stones holding secrets. In the high-ceilinged halls, tapestries of faded silver and crimson lined the walls, depicting scenes of lost kings and battles long past. The scent of old wood and incense lingered in the air, a persistent reminder of the estate's age.
It was here, behind the heavy iron gates and moonlit windows, that the bloodline of Nocturne endured. To the world, they were patrons of art, old money, a ghostlike nobility that rarely stepped into the public eye. But within these walls, where the air itself held still as though afraid to breathe, something far older stirred. Stories surrounded the house like the mist, stories of prophetic dreams, of children born under impossible stars, of silence that crept like ivy through the bones of the bloodline Here, amidst the towering trees and the brooding hills, the family of Nocturne had lived for generations, their legacy as old as the land itself.
It was in this sprawling estate, far from the nearest town, the heir was about to be born.
No one had known that night would come so quietly. The family had been asleep, tucked away behind thick, velvet curtains, the shadows of the great house swallowing their every movement.
The mother lay in her bed, breathing shallow, the weight of something unseen pressing down on her chest. Her contractions had come too swiftly, too violently, and the midwife who had attended the other births in the family was nowhere to be found. The room, adorned with antique furniture and faded tapestries, grew colder with each passing second. No warmth, no comfort. Just a thick, unnatural silence.
Her husband, tall and thin with deep-set eyes that mirrored the secrets of his lineage, stood at the foot of the bed, watching in stillness. He hadn't moved since the moment the labor pains began. He hadn't said a word since the first quiet groan of her agony — the one that reverberated through the stone walls of the château like a bell tolling at midnight.
There were no sounds of shuffling feet. No hurried whispering or frantic movement. Just the echo of the mother's strained breath and the oppressive stillness of the room.
And then, just as the clock struck 4:44 AM, it began.
The air inside Castello della Notte changed, subtly at first, like the shift in wind before a storm, or the moment you realise a dream is no longer your own. The ancient estate, hidden high within the black-veined woods of the Catskills, held its breath. The world outside remained still, cloaked in winter frost, its silence heavy and unnatural.
Inside the birthing chamber, nothing moved.
Candlelight flickered against stone walls, throwing shadows like reaching hands across the high ceiling. The old tapestries lining the room, depictions of battles and angels, saints and beasts, looked down without expression. No prayers were spoken. No water was boiled. No scream of labor tore the air. Only the sound of breathing, shallow, strained, from the woman on the bed.
Lady Aurelia Nocturne, matriarch of the house, lay drenched in sweat. Her skin was too pale. Her lips too blue. But she did not cry out. There was no panic, no struggle, only the slow unraveling of something ancient — something heavy, older than memory.
She wasn't giving birth. She was being undone.
The midwife stood over her, face ashen, his hands trembling despite a lifetime of practiced steadiness. She whispered a psalm, but her voice died halfway through it, swallowed by the thick stillness in the room. Lord Sebastian Nocturne stood at the foot of the bed, unmoving. A man of iron, undone by silence. His eyes, sunken, rimmed red, were not fixed on his wife. They were on the space between her legs. Waiting. And then, it happened.
It wasn't a cry. It wasn't a scream.
The world seemed to pause, held in a breath. The air thickened. The flickering candlelight bent, flicked, then steadied as though something unseen had passed. The child stirred within her, moving with a quiet force, a presence that felt wrong in the best of ways. It wasn't a struggle. It wasn't pain. There was only the faintest whisper of something ancient, something that shouldn't be, pressing against her. In the distance, an owl called once. The wind howled through the cracks in the mansion's thick walls. But there was no sound in the room. No cry. No scream. Not even a breath. Only the silent descent of a shadow from the darkness.
Aurelia's hands, trembling now, gripped the edge of the bed with an iron will that had never before faltered. She felt the child shift, slip, the weight of it stirring something inside her that should not have been touched. She had no strength left to fight it. All she could do was let go.
And then, with one final, silent motion, the child was born.
A perfect, still figure in the pale light.
For a moment, just a moment, there was complete silence. The type of silence that presses on your eardrums, that fills your chest with something hollow. Her breath caught in her throat. She looked down at the child, and it looked back at her with eyes that were not yet open, but she could feel them. The world held its breath.
The child, no, this thing, was death. But even in that moment, it wasn't clear what that meant. It wasn't a presence that could be understood, only known.
And it did not move.
It did not breathe.
It did not cry.
It simply... was.
Aurelia's eyes softened. She did not scream. She did not mourn. She smiled, faintly, like someone seeing an old friend from across a river, and that smile was her last act. Her heart faltered. Her pulse slowed. And in the stillness of the room, the death that had been waiting to claim her for all these years finally claimed its due. She exhaled once. And the world went still.
She was gone.
Lord Sebastian, a ghost now, as pale as the marble floors beneath him, stood frozen at the foot of the bed. His gaze was locked on the small, unmoving figure in her arms. The child who had come without sound, without sorrow, without mercy.
His breath shuddered. His hands reached out, but he knew. He knew that he was too late. There would be no more time for anything.
The child remained still. No twitch. No whimper. No gasp for air.
Only a perfect, dead silence.
The shadows in the corners of the room leaned closer. The air grew colder still. And for a moment, just a fleeting moment, something passed between the father and the child. A knowing, perhaps. The faintest flicker of understanding. And then the silence deepened, stretching out to fill the spaces where Aurelia's warmth had once lived.
No cry.
No life.
Only the end of it all.
And the beginning.