Chapter 1: The Escape

He endlessly walked down the circling path with constant shifting in the blank environment. One moment in time it was a choir of children singing God's gospel, in another it was a town engulfed by flames. "Were they illusions or reality?" the trapped pondered. At this point in time, wherever time was, he had cleared all there was to start, experienced everything there was to feel, broke what was fixed and witnessed what the blind could only dream off. This was deserved, he tried to leave the world and explore past the containing horizons, into worlds that have disorder and are filled with chaotic creatures that hunger for death.

The devil sat on the boy's shoulder, laughing with an irritating screech that sounded exactly like a dying bug. Time had long abandoned trying to keep up and left him to traverse further and further from the flow of reason. Ironic isn't it. He technically achieved what he wanted, but lost everything and his very purpose became the chain that imprisoned him here. He's tried to escape the Ourabourous line but all results lead to further descent into maddening walking. However, one attempt did work, but even he didn't know what requirements were fulfilled for him to stop walking. And that's what shifted his roundtable punishment to one of stillness. Encompassed in stone, with his hand reaching out for the gentle grace of Mother Nature while being drowned in the glistening of gleaming gems, all different sizes and shapes that coated the hard rock exterior to make a mosaic that alluded to a past time.

He knew his name, but shunned it, disowned it and adopted the name Barbados, after one of his favourite humans he saw while walking. The human Barbados was a warrior of ancient times that was forced to go to war and kill the traitorous heretics of his time, shedding tears for the fallen enemies and comrades. The amount of bloodshed caused the land to rot and corrode. Years later Barbados returned to the ground and collected every material that had soaked in the red fluid, be it dirt that caught the coagulated substance or flowers that had used the iron as sustenance. He collected everything for months, and with all that Taboo Material he started a project that would most certainly end up killing him, but he was a stubborn fool who endured the process. Until it finally killed him.

Even now, the boy was in awe at the creation of a simple human who didn't specialise in blacksmithing or glassmaking. The young boy wondered, however, "What do you call the art of using blood from so many to form a weapon dedicated to them?" For that is what Barbados had created. A sword that was shapeless and lived in the veins of an ancient golem. All that untrained malpractice with putrid iron poisoned him, and in his final moments, he offered his own blood to the masterpiece to forever be with the people he fought. The sword was lost to time though, resting in radiance and relinquished but honourable memories.

Now, the only wish the boy had was to create something as gorgeous as that sword or even find the weapon and hide it away from the clawing hands of society, wishing for the past to be respected. One problem with that is that he needed to free himself from his prison shell. He had a few ideas, but the most prominent one was that he needed to have someone insert some type of crystal inside 7 crevices. However, he tried to consider what the bigger problem was; that he couldn't talk in this form or that his resting place was located behind a school for students of all ages but only younglings were allowed back there. Would they understand him? Would the young children understand the language he speaks? He was a Sinborn that spoke the Holy tongue and the Wretched tongue, both different from the simple English language that the mortals spoke, but he decided it was worth learning.

Before getting ahead of himself, he had to figure out a way to speak. What if he kept moving the muscles in his lips to slowly cause the stone to erode away via friction? "It could work," he exclaimed in a hopeless manner, "but inefficient." He tried it and as expected, nothing. Again and again he did it, but nothing changed. Repeating this exercise would have killed him of boredom had it not been for the young children keeping him entertained with their rebellious antics. He watched them play and laugh and cry, enjoying their youth. "I envy you" he thought, but didn't want to curse out the kids who were innocent and had wronged nobody. No, he was only wronged by his family on his mother's side. A Sinborn is a monster race, as seen by Angels, that only exists when a Holy Angel passionately envelope with a Cursed Demon.

"Enough wallowing in self-pity, I got lips to move." And he did so. For a hundred years. He watched his little entertainers grow old, become famous and happy, or turn to crime and create terror. He saw their lineage pass on through the generations. It was pleasing for him to know that not all would end up forgotten. Started remembering the names of those bloodlines to pay respect to those who unknowingly helped him. As time passed, the environment changed. Different clothing trends, different weather and advancements in magic and technology. From his understanding humans tended to have been split into two groups: The mages that worshipped what they called "Mana" and engineers who believed that artificial means of improving society were more important. But at a certain point they merged and created their own form of power.

"Quite fascinating," he thought as he saw people flying on long metal boards and flying metal birds above the heavens. But technology soon proved to be inferior to mana and became mostly obsolete, only being used to improve quality of life. Lost in thought, the boy failed to realise the cracks forming and soon a tiny hole had formed near his top lip. He was shocked but had no time to ponder, not knowing if it could regenerate. Crack after crack, the hole became bigger and he could feel the air brush and gently caress his lips. What shocked him was that no child had seen the falling pebbles, or even stranger, the gap forming. Was he encased in two prisons? One that sealed his consciousness and one that sealed his body. Barbados was lost in a trance of confusion, but at the sight of a child walking close to his solitary confinement, he whispered a joke to the child, "Why was six afraid of seven?". To his surprise, the child replied back in a shocked tone.

"What?" As he was beginning to panic, Barbados had to consider a way to stop him from crying.

"Wait, don't cry, I was just going to tell you a little joke, that's all." He couldn't let his ticket to freedom flee because of a stupid joke.

"Where are you mister? I can't see you." Satisfied that the child could understand him, he told him he was a trapped hero from the dark ages and needed help in escaping from his statue to save the world, which was a lie.

"What do you need me to do?" Asked the child oblivious to the potential danger that talking to a stranger possessed. 'His parents must educate him on the dangers of strangers,' Barbados thought.

"All I require is for you to gather some of your friends to find clear rocks shaped like the gaps in the statue. Clear?"

The young child exclaimed "Yes sir" as he hurried along, making Barbados feel old and archaic.

Little soldiers showed up for duty and began collecting sparkling rocks to try and find any resemblance to the mysterious shapes, and one by one, rock by rock, they were all found in the span of 5 minutes. A hundred years preparation time for a 5 minute procedure. 'Fucking ironic,' he thought, feeling full of rage that he had to desperately hide from the children.

"All done mister. Should we put the funny looking rocks in now?"

"Yes, please do," he said in a calm manner while on the inside he was repeating 'Do it now please for the love of god.'

While the children did so, a student from an older grade looked at the noisy children and complained how she wished she was younger, getting to run around and not be told to act her age. Her friend joined her and they both looked outside and a question popped into their heads. What was that statue with ripped wings and a bloody halo meant to represent? It looked too good to be a Wretched, but too evil to be an Angel. They asked a passing teacher and even he exclaimed that it hadn't crossed his mind. He told the curious duo that it's been there since the creation of the school and was kept as a decoration.

"I don't know the maker but I can most definitely tell you about the creature. That monster depicted there was one that had long since perished and left for Paradise. If you wish to find more information you can go and visit the library since you have a breaktime."

They walked into the grand quiet library with a peaked interest in a race that no one seemed to talk about. The druid librarian welcomed them and asked if they needed help. Without making too much noise, they expressed their curiosity and the druid chuckled at the young girl's enthusiasm. She told them that the book they're looking for is located in the Fauna section and should be titled "Gods, Angels, Devils, Demons and Sinborn", but she did warn them that the things written can't be confirmed as the book is older than anything else in the library.

"Oh and some things depicted may be for adults, but I trust the two of you to not cause commotion. Ciao.'' And as the last world left her green leaf-patterned lips she mischievously winked.

"Ah, how it feels to be young and full of enthusiasm," she whispered to herself.

There was the book, in its true form of a wooden cracked book cover and thick leather pages. Its age could not even be estimated. They both began reading out the pages, making sure to not damage this miraculous artefact. They skim read the pages that didn't interest them and then they finally got to the part that interested them. The Sinborn.

"When the 2 separate factions fall in love and procreate, 9/10 the newborn would be either an Angel or Demon." The girls were shocked at the thought but continued reading on.

"However, that 1/10 chance is what we humans have referred to as Sinborn, born from the illogical breeding of good and evil. Their true race name is the Nephalem, Sinborn being the name given by Humans. From what I have observed, there have only been 7 Sinborns that survived the harsh treatment of their younger years. Angels are perfectionists and view the sub-race as an abomination that needs to be eradicated. We…I don't know how the Demons treat them but I am thankful because if a single Sinborn wished, they could wipe out every nation on Earth and possibly destroy half of what the God's made. May we find peace in our hopeful prayers. Their names were…"

"…". Barbados lay in shock at the incompetence of the children. It took an entire hour for them to place seven stones into holes. Who knew that children were bad at pattern recognition. But it was finally time to reward them for their efforts. Barbados tensed his whole body and with a will stronger than steel and sheer determination, prepared to smash through the ash-white marble stone.

"Get ready. 3, 2, 1, OUT OF THE WAY!" and as he heroically cried out the last word, he had gathered cheers from the children. But to his surprise, an audience had formed and they looked shocked as well, especially the two girls who were in the library. He stared at the deep purple gash etched into the sky, complemented by the rich blue and white clouds. Barbados decided to show his greatness to his gaping audience and yelled "I live again!" at the top of his lungs. The young children saluted the 'ancient hero', and to show his appreciation, he decided to bestow them each a special sealed weapon that would only awaken when the children were 16. Lastly, he saluted the young children, but from the background he heard a name that shook his core.

The girls began brainstorming if they had seen anything to do with weaponry in the book, and then it hit them. The book mentioned one thing about weapons, "The last confirmed Sinborn, beware him, beware his weapons and lastly, be wary of his creative prowess, his name being-

"Sansar the Creative" left the mouth of the girl who had first looked out of the window. "Oh my goodness, he's a Sinborn!"