The echo of the Banshee's wail had not only resonated in the subterranean depths but had also chilled the air in the corridors of Umbria. Several students and faculty, including Aria and her closest friends, had witnessed the ghostly apparition and heard its cryptic warning about the arrival of the Netlin, the Masters of Magic.
Unease gripped the school. If the Banshee, a being linked to the omens of catastrophic events, deemed this warning necessary, the threat must be of unprecedented magnitude. Merlin immediately summoned the Council and the Ancient Magi to the library, the place that had become the nerve center of their resistance.
"The Weeping Lady has spoken," Merlin said, his face graver than ever. "The Netlin, the 'Children of God' as she called them, are on their way. Their arrival is imminent."
"But who exactly are they?" Kaelen asked, expressing the confusion felt by many. "If they taught magic to humans, shouldn't they be allies?"
"History is rarely so simple, young Kaelen," chimed in Professor Alatar, the elderly Divination expert. His eyes, usually clouded by visions of the future, were now fixed on a heavy tome lying open on the table, a book bound in cracked leather and written in a language even older than the Latin of the Clavicles. "Merlin asked me to consult the oldest fragments in our archives, texts that date back before recorded human memory."
Alatar pointed to a specific passage in the book. The symbols were strange, angular, and seemed to twist at first glance. "This text," Alatar continued, "which we believe is a copy of fragments from the so-called 'Codex Angelorum Perditorum' (Codex of the Lost Angels), speaks of the 'Netilim,' a word very similar to 'Netlin.' It describes them not as benevolent teachers, but as… the Fallen."
A tense silence filled the library. Fallen Angels. The implication was terrifying.
"Fallen Angels?" Aria repeated, incredulous. "Like... demons?"
"Not exactly," Merlin clarified, speaking up. "According to these texts and other fragmentary legends I've collected over the centuries, the Netlin were beings of immense power, created at the dawn of time. They were architects of reality, weavers of fundamental magic. But they rebelled."
"Their fall wasn't necessarily to 'evil' as we understand it," Merlin continued. "It was a fall from pride, from forbidden knowledge, from defying the original cosmic order. They were banished, cast out of the higher spheres. And in their exile, they interacted with early humanity."
"Did they teach magic out of benevolence?" Lyra asked, horrified.
"Perhaps," said Merlin. "Or perhaps it was an act of defiance, a way to interfere with the creation they could no longer rule. Or perhaps they sought to create servants, or simply experiment. Their motives are as alien to us as their nature."
"So," said Finn, ever practical, "are they enemies?"
"We don't know," admitted Merlin. "They could see us all, Light and Dark, as aberrations, as corruptions of the order they represent or tried to create. They could come to judge us, to 'cleanse' the world. Or they could simply ignore us in their own ancient conflict."
"And what about the connection to 'Jehovah' and 'Poimandres' that the Keys mention?" asked Morgana, who, despite the tension surrounding her recent personal revelation, was still a member of the council and a powerful sorceress. Her voice was cold, distant, but her question was pertinent.
"It is possible," Merlin replied, "that the Netlin are entities related to that primordial division. Perhaps they were the first 'children' of that original entity, before the separation. Or perhaps their fall was a direct consequence of that cosmic war. The texts are fragmentary, the legends contradictory."
Dracula, who had been watching silently from the shadows, spoke for the first time. "Legends exist among my people," he said, his deep voice echoing. "Whispered stories of 'those who fell from the sky,' beings of terrifying power who demanded worship and punished disobedience with unrelenting fury. We never believed them to be more than myths to frighten neophytes."
The atmosphere in the library grew even more oppressive. Now they faced not only the dark alliance of Nyx, Morgana, and Poimandres, but also the imminent arrival of beings of quasi-divine power, whose nature and intentions were a terrifying enigma.
"This changes things," said Professor Thorne, the magical defense expert. "How do we prepare to fight... fallen angels?"
"Perhaps we shouldn't fight them," Aria suggested, thinking aloud. "Perhaps... perhaps we can reason with them. If they are beings of order, perhaps they will see the danger Poimandres represents."
"Or perhaps They may see us, with our use of the Keys and the Emerald Tablet, as the greatest threat," Kaelen countered.
"Be that as it may," Merlin concluded, "we must be prepared for any eventuality. We will continue our study of the Emerald Tablet and the Keys of Solomon. We will need all the power and wisdom we can muster. But we must proceed with extreme caution. We are walking on very dangerous ground, among forces that could destroy us all."
The certainty of an imminent battle against darkness was now overshadowed by the uncertainty of an even greater and more unknown threat. Umbria was caught between unleashed Chaos and an ancient and potentially hostile Order. Survival was no longer just a matter of winning a war, but of navigating a cosmic conflict whose rules they were only just beginning to understand.