Chronicle I - The First Hunger
Chronicle I — The First Hunger
The Forbidden Fruit, the Fallen Seraph, and the Birth of the Eternal Source
"And from the blood of Heaven's fallen, the first eternal hunger was born."
I. The Garden Before the Fall
The World Before Sin
Before mankind knew suffering, before the first grave was dug into the earth, and before death became the inevitable inheritance of Adam's descendants, there existed a sacred place untouched by the corruption of the mortal world.
Eden.
In those distant ages, the world had not yet witnessed the fall of mankind. The earth was young, the rivers flowed with waters untouched by corruption, and the creatures of creation lived beneath the protection of their Creator.
The Garden was not merely a paradise of trees and rivers. It was the earthly sanctuary where the divine and mortal worlds existed in harmony.
At its heart stood the Tree of Life, whose existence symbolized the eternity granted by the Creator. Elsewhere stood the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, whose fruit had been forbidden to mankind.
Yet ancient manuscripts preserved by the Eternal Throne speak of another tree, one whose existence was never recorded in the sacred histories of men.
A tree that did not belong to the original perfection of Eden.
A tree born not from creation, but from celestial blood.
The Creator Who Walked Among Men
In those days, the Creator, known among the earliest generations as Yahweh, Yavé, or YHWH, had not yet withdrawn His presence from the Garden.
According to the oldest traditions, He descended into Eden and walked among the beings He had created.
His presence was neither distant nor unknown.
Adam, the first man, recognized the voice of his Creator. Eve, the mother of mankind, lived beneath His divine protection. The creatures of the Garden knew no fear of His presence, for the harmony between Heaven and Earth had not yet been broken.
Ancient accounts describe the Creator walking through the Garden in the cool of the day, when the warmth of the sun softened and the shadows of the trees stretched across the sacred earth.
It was during these hours that Adam and Eve would encounter Him.
They spoke of creation, of the mysteries of life, and of the responsibilities entrusted to mankind.
For Adam had been given the task of tending the Garden, preserving its beauty, and naming the creatures that inhabited the world.
But the ancient chronicles of the First Blood preserve a detail absent from the surviving scriptures of humanity.
Adam and Eve were not alone.
Among their children was a daughter whose destiny would become inseparable from the history of immortality.
Her name was Lavínia.
Lavínia, the Forgotten Daughter of Eden
Lavínia was born beneath the protection of Eden, before Adam and Eve were expelled from Paradise.
She had never witnessed the suffering of the world beyond its sacred boundaries.
She knew nothing of war, famine, disease, or the cruelty that would one day define the history of mankind.
Her earliest memories were of the rivers of Eden, the voices of her family, and the golden light that passed through the branches of the ancient trees.
Yet Lavínia possessed a curiosity that distinguished her from the other children of Adam.
While her brothers and sisters delighted in the wonders of creation, Lavínia questioned the mysteries that surrounded them.
She wondered what existed beyond the boundaries of the Garden.
She questioned why certain places were forbidden.
She asked why the Tree of Life granted eternity, while another tree carried the warning of death.
And above all, she wondered why a world created in perfection contained things that mankind was forbidden to understand.
According to the oldest fragments of the Chronicle of Eden, Lavínia once questioned her father about the meaning of death.
Adam could offer no answer born from experience.
For death had not yet become the inheritance of mankind.
He knew only the warning given by the Creator.
That disobedience would bring consequences beyond human understanding.
But Lavínia was not satisfied.
"How can we fear what we have never known?"
The question would later become one of the most frequently quoted passages in the forbidden histories of the First Blood.
For it revealed the nature of the girl who would one day become the first vampire.
Where others saw perfection, Lavínia saw unanswered questions.
The Forbidden Corners of Paradise
Eden was vast, and not every corner of the Garden was familiar to the children of Adam.
Beyond the rivers and flowering valleys lay ancient groves where the trees grew unusually close together.
There were places where the light of the sun barely reached the earth, and where even the creatures of the Garden rarely wandered.
Adam had warned his children not to venture beyond the paths entrusted to their care.
Some boundaries existed to protect the sacred order of creation.
Others concealed mysteries that mankind was not yet prepared to understand.
But Lavínia was drawn to these forgotten places.
She began wandering farther from her family, following narrow streams through forests where the silence seemed different from the peaceful stillness of Eden.
It was during one of these journeys that she discovered something extraordinary.
A patch of earth where no flowers grew.
No birds sang.
No animals rested.
The ground was dark, almost black, and beneath its surface ran thin crimson veins resembling the roots of a living creature.
At the center of this strange place stood an ancient tree.
Its bark was black as obsidian.
Its roots twisted through the soil like veins.
Its leaves were crimson, and its fruit glistened as though filled with living blood.
The tree was unlike anything Lavínia had ever seen.
It seemed both alive and wounded.
And although the Garden was filled with the presence of divine creation, this tree carried something entirely different.
Something ancient.
Something celestial.
Something fallen.
Azhariel, the Crimson Seraph
The oldest forbidden manuscripts of the Eternal Throne identify the celestial being whose blood gave birth to the Crimson Tree.
His name was Azhariel.
Known in the lost language of the First Age as The Crimson Seraph, Azhariel was said to have belonged to the celestial hosts long before the fall of mankind.
He was not a mortal creature, nor a spirit born from the earth.
He was a being of celestial fire, fashioned to exist within the presence of the Creator.
According to the Fragments of the First Heaven, a forbidden manuscript whose origins are believed to predate the Great Flood, Azhariel once served among the Seraphim, the burning beings who stood closest to the divine throne.
His wings were described as radiant, his presence as a living flame, and his voice as one that carried the terrible beauty of Heaven.
But even among the celestial hosts, rebellion had taken root.
The surviving accounts disagree upon the nature of Azhariel's transgression.
Some claim he questioned the destiny prepared for mankind.
Others suggest he became fascinated by the fragile creatures of the earth, whose lives were brief yet whose souls possessed a freedom he could not comprehend.
A third tradition, preserved only in fragments, claims that Azhariel sought to grant mankind a form of eternity independent of the Tree of Life.
Whatever the truth, his actions brought him into conflict with the divine order.
He was cast from the celestial realm.
His wings were broken.
His radiance was corrupted.
And the fire that once burned with heavenly purity became stained by defiance.
The Blood That Fell Upon Eden
The forbidden chronicles claim that Azhariel's fall brought him to the boundaries of Eden.
There, wounded and stripped of his former glory, the fallen Seraphim wandered beneath the trees of Paradise.
His celestial blood fell upon the sacred earth.
But the blood of a Seraphim was not like the blood of mortal creatures.
It carried the essence of a being created beyond the limitations of flesh and time.
Even corrupted, it retained a fragment of the eternity from which it had come.
Where the blood touched the soil, the earth changed.
The grass withered.
The roots of nearby trees darkened.
And beneath the surface, something began to grow.
Over ages unknown to mankind, the celestial blood took root within the sacred soil.
From it emerged a tree unlike any created by the hand of YHWH.
The Crimson Tree.
Its existence was a contradiction.
It had grown within Paradise, yet it did not belong to the perfection of Eden.
It carried the essence of immortality, yet its fruit was filled with corruption.
It possessed the power to overcome mortal limitations, yet no human body had been created to endure its nature.
The oldest manuscripts refer to it as:
Arbor Sanguinis — The Tree of Blood.
Unlike the Tree of Life, which represented eternity through divine grace, the Crimson Tree carried an immortality born from celestial corruption.
Its fruit promised neither wisdom nor salvation.
It contained something far more dangerous.
The possibility of life beyond death, purchased through an eternal hunger.
The Whisper Beneath the Crimson Leaves
When Lavínia first approached the Crimson Tree, she felt an unfamiliar sensation.
The air grew cold.
The sounds of Eden faded.
And the peaceful harmony she had known throughout her life seemed to disappear.
She reached toward one of the crimson leaves.
Before her fingers touched it, a voice emerged from the silence.
It was neither the voice of her father nor that of the Creator.
It seemed to rise from the roots beneath her feet.
"Child of Adam..."
Lavínia froze.
"Why do you fear what you do not understand?"
She looked around, searching for the speaker.
But no figure stood among the trees.
Only the crimson fruit moved gently upon the branches.
The voice continued.
"You were born within eternity, yet you know nothing of its meaning."
"You walk beneath the light of creation, yet you have never questioned what lies beyond it."
Lavínia approached the tree.
For the first time in her existence, she felt something that had no place within the innocence of Eden.
Temptation.
But it was not the temptation of wealth, power, or dominion.
It was the temptation of knowledge.
She wanted to understand why the tree existed.
Why its fruit resembled blood.
Why the divine world contained something so profoundly different from the creation she had always known.
And why its presence seemed to awaken something within her soul.
The voice spoke once more.
"Would you surrender eternity merely because you were commanded to?"
Lavínia raised her eyes toward the crimson branches.
There, suspended among the dark leaves, hung a single fruit whose surface shimmered like liquid ruby.
She reached for it.
And in that moment, the fate of the First Blood began.
The Secret That Heaven Did Not Record
The chronicles of mankind would later remember the fall of Adam and Eve, their disobedience, and their expulsion from Eden.
But the histories preserved by the Eternal Throne speak of a forgotten tragedy that began before those events.
The tragedy of Lavínia.
The daughter of Adam who discovered a forbidden tree.
The mortal child who encountered the corruption of a fallen Seraphim.
And the first human whose curiosity would lead her beyond the boundaries of life itself.
For the fruit of the Crimson Tree did not contain the wisdom promised by the serpent.
It contained the blood of a celestial being whose existence had been torn between Heaven and rebellion.
And when Lavínia finally tasted it, the Garden would witness a transformation for which creation had no name.
Before the fall of mankind, before the exile from Eden, before the first kingdoms of men, the First Hunger was waiting to be born.
— End of Part I: The Garden Before the Fall —
Next: II. The First Death