"Men whether rich or poor, women or men deserve a real and fair chance to succeed. The learning of the People and the Nobility is a solid foundation for the future success of Kingdoms. Beginning with the Mighty, they act on the World and allow the free transmission of existing (or future) culture, languages and disciplines. Under the influence of these wise Sovereigns, these teachings will lead to the wisdom of their people. There will be a tactical and comprehensive harmony in the creation of a middle ground, which will lay the foundation for all Nations. This learning will shape the mentality and culture in the measure of the virtuosity and perpetual evolution of Man. Every man is born equal in rights, education and justice without distinction of race or sex. It is only by respecting and helping their fellow men that Man will be able to perfect himself."
Collection of Treatise on the Virtues and Equalities of the Men, Volume I, III - month of Ides, XVIII - year of the Imperator Gisele
***
A black shadow unloaded its hatred on the body of a four or five year old boy without stopping. The child on the ground wanted to get up, to scream, to pour his hatred on this figure whose face he could not see but whose name he knew. He begged, pleaded for mercy but it did not stop his violence.
- Why?" he asked in pain, his voice broken. It hurts so much" he whispered in a breath.
Pulling on the hair of his victim, the shadow cried out:
- You're a monster! A fucking monster! Your existence is aberrant! Why don't you want to die? I must have been crazy to have given you...
The man sleeping in the bed began to stir. Slowly, then more and more abruptly, as if in an epileptic fit. His forehead wrinkled imperceptibly, probably a sign of a bad dream. He woke up with a start, his eyes filled with a nameless terror, his breath short and his body trembling. Perhaps it was due to the violence of the nightmare. It was only half an hour later that he finally managed to calm down. Relegating his suicidal thoughts to the bottom of his heart, Caleb got out of bed with difficulty and walked mechanically to the bathroom. In front of the mirror, he took off the scarf with which he had slept and scanned his reflection with a gloomy look. This one reflected a man with the terribly tired glance in spite of his thirty years. His gaze stopped for a few seconds on his neck before it resumed its course until it stopped at his left shoulder.
Terrible scars still red and blistered sign of an incomplete cure offered themselves to his sight. As if guided by an instinct of protection, her hand moved faster than her brain and smashed against the mirror which broke, leaving her bleeding, splinters stuck in her flesh.
Alew's calm, worried voice, if it was only an auditory hallucination, echoed in his head but Caleb only sighed, leaving the question unanswered. Apathetically he slowly removed his clothes and entered the shower as if the scene of only a few seconds ago had never happened. The warm water flowing over his body took away the annoyed and amorphous state he was in. Sitting down on one of the chairs in his room, having finished his shower, Caleb took off one by one the sharp pieces of mirror he had forgotten to remove. Taking the anti-scarring ointment he applied it to his hand. Then like an automaton pausing, he stopped moving and waited.
On the other side, Eheil, who was calmly walking towards Caleb's room, stopped in front of the closed door. He knocked a few times before opening it, not having heard the agreement of his protégé. Because yes he had engraved Caleb like that in his obligations. He had to be defended at all costs...
What was not his astonishment, that he hid quickly under gestures of concern, in front of a Caleb taking care of his wound of a distracted air. The angel rushed towards the man and grabbed his wounded hand a little bit hard, commanding him with an urgent voice:
- Your hand, what happened?
- I'm okay.
- Caleb!
- Eheil... Forget it, you're not my father and if you were you wouldn't give a damn.
- All right. Let's go.
Eheil could see that something was wrong and it was not by forcing Caleb to talk about it that he would tell him. And then it was perhaps normal after all, he had not known him for very long. He was thus not in the obligation to trust him blindly. Eheil knew very well what he had seen in Caleb's eyes during these last days, a soul so young but yet terribly old. Broken by a story he didn't know about. And he had no desire to speculate on the precious life of a man with good intentions. Even if he didn't seem to see them, hidden under a layer of disillusionment.
As for Caleb, he promised himself that he would tell Eheil everything one day, if Eheil had not rejected him before. In this world so strange, Eheil was the first person to have given him an appeasement certainly mute but well and truly present. Contrary to Alew whom he still distrusted and all the others with whom he had not spent much time.
Both in their thoughts they did not say a word during the whole trip. Caleb followed his guide through the maze of corridors to an elevator that took them to the second floor. When they both arrived at a huge carved door, Eheil pushed it open and stopped on a high landing leading to a huge room filled with shelves.
- Welcome to the Great Library!
Leaning over the railing of the staircase of the floor he was on, Caleb let his eyes wander, observing his surroundings. A central aisle with varnished wood floors, monumental bookcases filled with colorful books. A glass ceiling with frames made of gray mithril outlined small stars to the walls covered with oriental carpets displaying large scenes where fantasy creatures and crowned angels were mixed. The calm atmosphere of the room had made all of Caleb's dark thoughts disappear.
Going down the stairs dressed in red velvet followed by Eheil, Caleb lost himself in the maze of the library's aisles. The angel guided him in a small belvedere filled of plants in any kind where he made sit his protected on a soft carpet letting him slouch on big multicoloured cushions. Finally installed, Caleb seized a fruit in the salad bowl that Eheil gave him. Taking a deeper voice than usual, Eheil began his story. Or rather the story of the Creation of the world.
"In the beginning lived a God. This deity was called Chaos: Father of all things, primordial and primitive state of the world. Chaos fecundated of him only: Nuit, goddess of the Protection, the Silence and the Darkness. Night married Chaos and together they had three daughters.
In the form of mist was born Ibŭn'ĭl: Chaos. In the form of flame Faí'yŏk, Desire was revealed. Käli'nĕù, Harmony, the little last one, point in the form of light. All three forming the perfect unity in the heart of every human being. There was also another deity hidden in the shadows that had existed for much longer than Chaos. It was blind and controlled the destiny. Fate for which every human and every god was touched.
But one day Father Chaos suddenly disappeared. Where? Impossible to know. Nuit, mad with grief, because yes the gods also feel emotions, went to hide far away in the darkness from which she was born.
The children of Chaos and Nuit together created the Earth and filled it with fauna, flora, stars and all other living beings. Käli'nĕù conceived the day, Ibŭn'ĭl begat the night and Faí'yŏk created life.
For the second time together, they generated an immensely powerful divine being known throughout the eras as Adonai, Eloah, Elyon or Boreh. Then the three deities left him in a marvelous garden filled with so many things, each as precious as the other.
By force of circumstance and probably with a little help from Fate herself, this being began to feel quite alone. From the dust of the ground he had walked on, Adonai fashioned a man in his own image, whom he called Adam, and with his breath gave him life. Unfortunately, something was cruelly missing in Adam, a heart. A soft one at that. So he put his creation to sleep and repeated the process of Adam's genesis, which once again proved to be a failure. From a piece of the man's ribs, Adonai created a woman whom he named Eve.
Ibŭn'ĭl goddess of Chaos, who had long been watching along with her sisters - the life of the being of light - became extremely jealous. Of her own creation! She sent her son, a blood-red monstrous beast with hooked, coal-black wings. Then by her command, this hideous creature moved to the wonderful garden in the form of a tiny newborn snake and punished Adonai, who had since become a god, in one of the most deceitful ways.
In this garden, there was a tree, with some juicy but rare fruits, planted in the middle of a bright clearing. God Adonai had allowed Adam to do whatever he wanted in that garden except eat the fruit of that tree. The Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. The transformed creature took advantage of a moment of inattention from God to sneak up on the woman taking a nap in the trunk of the plant.
- Eve," whispered the little creature, bringing the fruit to her. Look at its color, its consistency. Smell its perfume! Wouldn't you like to taste it and tell me about it?
Not wanting in any way to abrogate the orders of her Father, she refused the bewitching proposal. The little green snake, after many advances and many resistances, returned unsatisfied to his mother who immediately sent him back to Adam. The harmless snake immediately repeated the same words he had suggested to Eve.
Adam, who had been marveling at the magnificent tree for some time and was increasingly tempted by its tender, juicy fruit, tore the fruit from the branches and, blinded by his greed, swallowed it. Eve took what was left of her husband's larceny, prompted by him. This is how this man and woman gain a deep understanding of the universe, of joys and sorrows. When God learned of the sacrilege of his creations, he became very angry. He drove them out of the beautiful garden and abandoned them on a lonely land that he had created himself during his many troubles.
Forgetting his deceitful and gullible creations, God once again became bored. He then had in mind to elaborate this time, beings of lights from the stars and the sun that he called Angels. Adonai had given them all the unimaginable qualities and a beauty without equal. And once again jealous Ibŭn'ĭl, sent his hideous creature. Hidden in the shadows this one deposited in the hearts of some angels, a fierce hatred against their creator who wanted to be above all. With these dark thoughts in mind, Samael, the most beautiful, the most intelligent and the wisest of all, wanted to reign in the place of his Creator.
A fierce battle against the angels of light and shadow followed. Terrible it was.
Samael and his angels deceived by the vile reptile attacked Heaven. As Samael got closer and closer to God, he was quickly stopped by Michael, who after a merciless and exhausting fight burned his lost brother with his light. Samael was defeated and fell from his celestial condition and was lowered to the ground.
Over time, Sammael took the name of Mara, leaving behind decades of light to find himself in darkness. He built his kingdom underground where fire and iron meet and became a God like Adonai.
The years passed as the seasons died and decades later the hatred of the Fallen Angels dried up. But evil was only evil and all the negative emotions remained in the hearts of men as a perfect balance to their positive emotions. The three gods of the Beginning disappeared mysteriously as Chaos had done thousands of years earlier. Perhaps another trick of Fate..."
Finishing his tale, Eheil noticed his listener dozing, his hair disheveled. With a tender smile on his face, the angel covered Caleb with a colorful tartan. Leaving a note behind, Eheil left to make some noise, not wanting to wake up his Shä'ol. Shortly after the blonde angel left, small hairy paws rushed to the sleeping man and curled up around his neck. During Eheil's story, a single question had nagged at Caleb: What was the reason for Ibŭn'ĭl's jealousy?
Caleb awoke with difficulty, an unknown heavy weight nestled on his chest. The cause? A small silver fox named Eun. Pushing the fox off, Caleb got to his feet and not seeing Eheil in the room, he made his way to the bookcases before bending down, picking up his angel's message from a piece of the carpet.
"Take care of yourself.
Here's a book that might interest you: Babel,
History section, 2nd row
Eheil
Smiling, touched by the word, Caleb walked towards the location of the book given by the blonde angel. Taking a seat in one of the chairs in the second row, Caleb opened the recommended book and began to read.
This story takes place in another time period after God has cast out his ungrateful creations.
"After God abandoned Adam and Eve, the sinners began another life more arduous than they had in Eden, on a lonely land given to them by Adonai. After many trials and failures in this inhospitable land, they finally found a place that brought them the peace they had been seeking. They had two sons: Cain and Abel.
Growing up in the warmth of a loving home, the two brothers became strong and handsome young men. For better or worse, a great calamity shook the foundations of their family. For in exiling them, Adonai had cursed Adam, his wife and his descendants with a terrible misfortune. Out of jealousy Cain slaughtered his brother Abel who had sacrificed the first born of his flock. After being summoned to a mission by the God who had abandoned their parents. To replace the missing son, Eve gave birth to Seth.
Cain, marked by the imprint of God and plagued by remorse for several years, fled one day under the sign of a terrible prediction.
During his exile Cain met Awan and took her as his wife. Condemned for his crime, he had only one son whom he named Henoch. After his birth, a city of the same name was founded. Cain died about fifteen years later during a hunting trip when he was killed by an accidental arrow by one of his descendants at the age of two hundred and fifty-nine. His family, in spite of his past, ensured him an important descent which was destroyed at the foundation of the generations later.
Seth, the third and last son, stayed with his parents until their death. He stayed on this earth and married Azûrâ a woman whom he had saved from drowning and with whom he had fallen in love. His life was blessed by the birth of two children, Enosh and Noam, at the age of one hundred and five. For many years he begat sons and daughters and had a very long and distinguished lineage. Seth died at the age of nine hundred and twelve.
Caleb stopped to get some water, then sat down and resumed his reading.
"A century, two centuries, three centuries passed and it was at the end of the fourth that a terrible catastrophe occurred. The world was submerged by a flood of immeasurable magnitude, killing almost all life on earth. The survivors, trying to rebuild their lives, crossed paths, mixing until their languages became confused. No one could understand each other, no one could decipher each other. Each individual speaking the same dialect grouped themselves into clans. These same groups reached the fertile plain of Burj and settled there. One of the men named Lamesh, one of the descendants of the one who had accidentally, by the hand of God, killed Cain, had the idea, the project, to build a city and a tower higher and more majestic than any building to reach Heaven. On the occasion of this project a common language was created.
The first days, the first months, the first years passed without any incidents, under the goodwill of the builders and the iron hand of the creator.
But one day, while they were working as usual, several accidents occurred one after the other. It was not the warnings of a mysterious stranger or the deaths that stopped the madness of these humans. It was not until fifteen years later, when the Tower was almost complete, that God, who had heard of the Humans' plan and kept an eye on the offspring of his primordial creations, flew into a violent rage, blurred their common language, collapsed the building and scattered them over the entire surface of the Earth.
Babel. This was the name given to the city that had been built around the ruins of the personification of the arrogance of Man."
Rereading several times the passage he had read, he ticked on two words... In his thoughts Caleb was startled when he heard a deafening noise in the huge room.
Getting up, he rushed towards the noise and saw Eun in the middle of several books, a book on his head. When the little fox saw Caleb, he climbed onto his shoulders and buried his trembling muzzle against his human friend's neck. Seeing the animal's kindness, Caleb didn't have the courage to admonish him and stroked his fur in comfort. Putting away the books scattered on the floor, his eyes were drawn to a black-covered book with no title. Caleb hurriedly put away what was left in his hands and grabbed the strange book. He then moved towards the chair he had left a few minutes earlier and did not see, or preferred not to see, the circus of Eun, who had left a few seconds earlier, a proud look on his little fluffy face.
