d e l v e
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a basic guide
upon occasion, neck will slip peculiar and individual vocabulary into his dialogue; nicknames and slang. this is a rough translation of his usual quirks from neck to common english. this is a work in progress.
UPSTAIRS / HOME
DOWNSTAIRS / THE PIT
MIDDLE GROUND
LIMBO
DESCENT / FALLING
ASCENT / RISING
PLANES
DAD / DADDY / FATHER
GATE
CIRCLES & SPHERES
SERAPHIM
ORPHANIM
CHERUBIM
SNOW / MISTRESS
WARD
heaven
hell
earth
purgatory
the act of an angel falling from heaven
a fallen angel returning to heaven or a demon exiled from hell
physical levels; heavenly, hellish and mortal
god
an entrance to heaven & eden: there are four in total
heaven's hierarchial divisions: three spheres dividing seven circles
six-winged, fire angels
angels that guard, construct and man the chariots of heaven
angels that guard the gates of eden; neck is an example
heroin
abeline
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a tl;dr history
adnachiel began his life as a cherub, one of the guardians of the northern-most gate of eden, named the angel of the sun, though without any direct association to it besides an affinity for daylight and the sky, and of the star-sign sagittarius. he was not the brawn of the guards; instead, a messenger. it was his duty to carry any emergency signals or negotiation between the guards and the higher-ups, which put him in direct association with the metatron. up until his one-thousand-five-hundreth orbit around the sun, adnachiel was loyal, if a little clumsy. he was learned in the ways of god, his father, and close to his brothers and sisters.
that was when, on a mission to the middle ground, adnachiel's left wing was damaged. he remained in the mortal plane, amongst humans, for around a month, nursing himself back to health in order to return home with his gathered intelligence. during this time, he came into contact with humans using dice to bet money, and very quickly became enthralled by the idea, and enjoyed playing it. during his fourth day playing the game, he began to show greedy tendencies, deliberately hoarding any money he won. by the end of the month, he had resorted to such sins as cheating with loaded dice, becoming violent with humans who accused him of such theft and, generally, causing a ruckus. he was pulled back to heaven by the archangel gabriel, who declared him corrupt by human influence, and allowed him a week to recover from the effects that the mortal plane had had on his consciousness.
it was unremarkable for an angel to have been tempted by the sins of earth, and although he was given a formal warning, adnachiel was forgiven.
that was, until, he was caught at the northern gate, whilst on duty, three lunar cycles later, smoking a joint with a recently deceased human soul of whom he was socialising. infuriated, the metatron and gabriel apprehended adnachiel, who quickly fell out of grace with them; tempers flared, swords were drawn, but eventually, adnachiel willingly admitted his guilt of the deadly sins, greed and gluttony, and was thus condemned to an eternity-until-thus-redeemed on earth as a mortal; in other words, he was to live on earth in a mortal, but not human, body, until he ascended into god's mercy once more through redemption; displaying acts of holiness and virtue amongst humans.
adnachiel's descent was not gentle. he was forced to fall approximately two thousand kilometres towards the mortal plane, burning through the earth's atmosphere. to a human witness, he was a shooting star. a space rock, lighting up the sky. immortal as he fell, the moment he hit the surface of the planet - and creating quite the impact crater as he did so - he became mortal, and his name, adnachiel, became taboo. unable to speak it, unable to unlock his true immortality or powers any further, he was cursed. his wings were torn up by the fall, and would never regrow to their former size or strength, forcing him eternally to live with his feet on the ground. within half a day, the horns, tail and hooves had formed onto his body, causing him to look more the part of a demon than an angel. a joke, on metatron's part, in an attempt to have the fallen angel see himself as his father apparently now saw him: corrupt.
nameless and without a goal, he struggled into a human lifestyle in pre-victorian england, using what was left of his magic to disguise his deformities and do what he could to remain unseen. he quickly became depressed and angry, shaving off half of his hair and trimming the rest of it to just below his shoulders. the look stayed with him, and whatever was left of the former angel was severed.
he took on the name 'neck' after watching the hanging of a human in the streets, a death sentence under the trial of murder. inquisitive and curious as to why humans would ever choose to execute their own kind, from both the angles of the murderer and the executor, he examined the remains of the body after sneaking into the morgue and was shocked to find the man in question still alive and breathing, having forced a metal straw down his throat to keep him, barely, alive. the man explained to the fallen angel that the neck was a remarkable part of the human body; so intrinsically perfect and that it did not matter whether or not it had been designed by a god, or by scientific evolution. with that, the former adnachiel decided that it did not matter to him, either, what his origins were. he was an individual. he was to the earth what the neck was to the human body.
neck found his way to the golden tether after wandering the earth a while longer, becoming familiar with its customs and quickly falling into a rather appalling alcohol addiction, followed feverishly by tobacco. he was offered heroin as relief from the pain of his fall, and quickly fell under its addictive influence as well. he is now staying in a rented room on the island of guilderem, enjoying a mortal life, and trying not to focus too much on the bitterness of his past.