Editing Demon: The Fallen (section)

== Paradise Lost ==
=== Genesis ===
In the beginning, there was God and despite being all powerful, he got lonely so he fashioned beings who were like him yet unique, the first beings known as Elohim, or Angels. Creating seven Houses, each with specific skills, objectives and powers they helped God in His works. This mirrors the whole "God created the world in seven days" thing from the [[Genesis Chapter]] from the Bible. Paradise was being created in preparation for the arrival of the epitome of God's work, His most glorious creation: Humanity.

When He was finished and created Adam and Eve (after some drama involving Lilith getting tossed out), leaving them content in the Garden of Eden, he made two decrees to his Firstborn. First, they would love Humanity as much as they loved God. The Elohim considered this to be a given, but agreed because they reached the consensus  that God did not want them to feel bad for loving Humanity as much as they did. The second was far more difficult: they would only observe Man and never interfere with or reveal themselves to Humanity. The Elohim were at first disappointed, for they all were in awe of Man and wanted to befriend and help them achieve their divine potential, nevertheless they heeded God and obeyed.

=== Discord and Temptation ===
For a while things were calm and peaceful, with the Elohim's observing of Humanity being like watching a pair of very inept Let's Players. An Angel named Ahrimal foresaw a terrible catastrophe that would befall the world and undo all the hard work the Angels had done to help Man and forever mar the race of Man. He reported this to his superiors but was ignored. God's response to this was pretty much "If you knew what I knew you'd understand." Some Elohim took up this offer but were seemingly destroyed and left unfindable. Those Elohim bothered by this began a great debate as to whether or not they should interfere and help save Mankind from this impending cataclysm and at the same defy God. It was the favored son and mightiest of the Archangels, Lucifer Morningstar, who rallied an third of the Elohim and left Heaven to finally interact with Humans. This of course angered God, so when the Archangel Michael arrived, told Lucifer and his kin to face punishment, and that the works of the rebels would be unmade he flatly refused and whupped Michael's ass. Michael retreated but called a curse on each of the Houses: 

* The House of the Second World would have to reap things before their time and above all, reap the beloved humans as well.
* The House of the Wild would see Humanity lose its place as nature's top dog and have beasts turn their claws and teeth upon Humanity.
* The House of the Deep would see the minds of humans be filled with lies and untruths, clouding the truth they sought to bring.
* The House of the Spheres sought to bring contentness to the minds of man, but would now see them only consider that which they had not done, filling them with greed and envy.
* The House of the Fundament had given Humanity power over matter, but would see its reach overexceed its grasp and despoil the land in search of more.
* The House of the Firmament would see Humanity grow sick and die without them being able to prevent it.
* The House of the Dawn was stripped of its purpose, leaving them empty and without meaning.

Humanity picked sides as well: most of them joined the Fallen but a few chose to stay faithful to God. With this began the thousand year lasting civil war of the [[War in Heaven]].

=== War in Heaven ===
The first blow came from God Himself. Shielding those faithful to Him God essentially place a divine bitchslap upon reality, filling it with entropy and ruining Paradise. Oh sure, it did not destroy the world outright but scarred it enough to break endless perfection. Initially the angels on both sides were naive and kind in a way. Fights were on many different levels, from physical battles to acts of physics meeting. Those who lost were captured and imprisoned: the Fallen to be processed later and the loyalists to deprive God of His soldiers and to try and seduce them. This meant that the war was a bloodless one, until a local man ruined everything. He had joined the Fallen while his brother had remained faithful to God. The man observed his brother make a sacrifice to God and was rewarded with His love. This drove the man into a rage from jealousy but also love. For he loved his brother as much as he hated him, and he loved God as much as he hated Him. So the man decided to make a sacrifice of his own, that which he cherished the most was given to God. It was an act of love, an act of jealousy; an act of kindness, an act of hatred. The man killed his brother, the man gave his brother to God. This first act of cruelty, of murder, of hate and desire, changed the angelic host and the rebel Fallen forever. As a punishment the Lord set a mark upon the man, lest any finding him should kill him.

Way to go, [[Caine]].

This turned the war for the bloody. Lucifer's lieutenants, the Fallen [[Belial]], [[Abaddon]], Dagon, [[Asmodeus]] and [[Azrael]], each took command of a host of Fallen and began to wage their wars. They were successful but ruthless: exterminating or enslaving those who would side with God against the Fallen. The successes kept mounting up so Lucifer decided to enact his Great Experiment: uplifting Humanity to their true potential. He appointed ten of the most learned of Fallen and gave them the task to teach something to Humanity:

* Giriel taught how to shape the land by combining elements and minerals.
* Sharaael taught medicine.
* Bephamael taught astronomy and how to use it to predict the future.
* Marael taught meteology.
* Gamael taught metallurgy.
* Ur-Shanbi taught how to predict the future.
* Samael taught of the Moon and its powers.
* Agriel taught farming and herbology.
* Shamshiel taught of the Sun.
* Penemue taught linguistics, writing and reading.

Unimaginatively called the Ten, these Fallen set out to be the teachers of Humanity. For a while they did quite well and Humanity grew to unimaginable heights. Some Fallen however were distressed by this: because if Humanity was to master all of Creation, what use would the Fallen be? A nameless traitor suggested that in order to remain the masters of Humanity, perhaps it would be possible to create something new to lord over the humans. Asmodeus, Abaddon and Azrael being to formulate a plot to create a new race of beings. These things would be born from Fallen and humans, making them subservient to their Fallen progenitors but lording over Humanity in their masters' name. This saw the creation of the [[Nephilim]]: possessing the gifts of Man and Fallen, but terrible to behold in visage or potential. They quickly began to dominate their cities, but they made a grave mistake when they turned on the Ten. This lead word of their existence to Lucifer's citadel, who purged them with fire and sword. This great battle left the world in tatters and created the Shattering.

=== Shattering and Imprisonment ===
Lucifer had made a miscalculation: the Fallen were teaching Humanity too much, too fast. They began to buckle under the weight of their divinity, eventually snapping. In an attempt to make Humanity like God its own divinity proved to be too much. The most critical failure however was that this caused Humanity to lose its mastery of the One Language, a primordial tongue used by all of mankind to speak with one another. They drifted apart and began to forget of the Fallen, starting to think of them as legends and myths. All that they had built was lost or abandoned, and the Fallen were left with nothing.

At this point the loyalist Host struck. One by one their citadels fell, their inhabitants imprisoned. After 40 days and 40 nights of battle Lucifer's own stronghold was breached and the Lightbringer was bound in chains of fire. Dragged off the Fallen were sentenced to banishment into the Abyss, a place utterly devoid of God's touch. Once the final Fallen were cast inside its gates were shut, never to be reopened. They quickly discovered that one of their kin was missing: Lucifer himself was not with them. The agony of being utterly devoid of everything but those around them began to drive the Fallen slowly insane, decrying Lucifer as a traitor who sold them out. And that was the last anyone heard from the Fallen, until...