It's dark and damp in the old disused mine, the flickering light of a candle and the dull glow from away of a torch the only illumination in the small damp room. The walls are slimy and cold, a barely visible film of yellowish green algae, the source of the dripping water, patches the stone walls and trickles down in rivulets.
Small puddles have gathered in various places across the room and rusty, yellowish green stalactites of rust hang from the ceiling which gives off a low groaning sound.
I can tell you one thing, it's not looking too hot right now, if I where to make a comparison, this place is giving me some serious 'Alien' vibes, in fact I'm half expecting a face hugger to jump out at any time.
In this room there are four people. One is the leader, one is an optimist and the other two are silent figures, they are the cowards.
Old man Carl, the leader, is an old sea-faring man with a long gray beard and long gray hair, wearing an old overcoat and a pair of red trousers and blue shirt, is holding a strange looking sword-like object in his scrawny hands. He stands with his back to the wall, his eyes fixed firmly on the opposite wall, his full beard quivering in the flickering light.
He has a look of fear and almost reverence on his face, but the fear is from the sword which he is holding in his hands, not from me. I'm the one he's afraid of.
The other three are looking at the old man in confusion and shock, they have no idea why he is in this room, where we're in this room and what his intentions are. The old man is looking back at them with a blank expression on his face, his eyes wide and fixed, his teeth gritting and his lips clenched, his hands are fidgeting awkwardly at his sides, his shoulders shaking and his bright eyes almost bulging out of their sockets.
Then he begins; "A long time ago, long before the world was inhabited, there was a group of beings that made the oceans, mountains and plains their home. These beings, called 'The Anu' had lived peacefully together, the groups that made up the Anu lived in harmony, they had no enemies.
The Anu stayed out of the affairs of humans, they had no quarrel with them. In fact they had only known of their existence for a short while as they had lived in distant lands and were unaware of humans and their minor skirmishes with each other.
Their peace was not to last, however. They encountered a new race, a race that was composed entirely of an evil darkness; these dark beings, known as 'The Nephtis', travelled to the depths of the oceans and began to conquer the Anu that struggled against them.
The Anu used all of their powers against the Nephtis, their water based powers did nothing, their fires burned nothing, their lightning raced to the depths of the oceans and still hurt nothing, the sunlight and moonlight did not effect the Nephtis. The Nephtis had fled to the outer reaches of the sea, they escaped the Anu, who, unlike them were made entirely of flesh and blood, not a soul shard in their being.
a dark mist blanketed all of the oceans, the sun and the moon were both blotted out by the dark shadow and the Anu left, some went to the mountains, some went to the plains. Most never returned, now only a few remain in their desolate homes, deformed and mutated after so long in the cold black waters, their minds and souls all but gone.
