In the archangel Iwa's library, there is a cuneiform tablet, documenting the ravings of an ancient human prophet. As is usual for prophecies, the text rambles vaguely and with great melodrama. Roughly translated, it begins, "And at the coming of the one who will be the third avatar, a great house will be divided," goes on with a list of events (in prophet-ese) and ends with, "And the third avatar shall choose."
Most humans, these days, would look upon the prophecy as unmitigated drivel, and clichéd, too. However, when Repha'el stumbled across it in the Library, prophecy was still something interesting. She read it, decided that several of the predictions had already been fulfilled (the Fall, various other events), and happened to mention it to her servitor Y'hohanan, the angel of Lightning.
The pair of elohim -- the archangel of Knowledge and the angel whose Word encompassed inspiration -- spent a pleasant lazy summer dissecting the prophecy. They arrived at the conclusion that the Symphony might indeed spawn off self-aware aspects. These aspects, they decided, would have to have been created directly from the Symphony. They would probably be indestructible, with Forces interwoven with the Symphony such that to destroy the avatar would necessitate destroying that part of the Symphony itself. After a lengthy debate (as to whether Eru YHVH Iluvatar was an avatar Itself, a part of the Symphony that was self-aware without being separate, or an entity whose Word was, effectively, "the Symphony"), Y'hohanan wondered aloud if Iwa might be the first avatar.
Repha'el said, "Very interesting question. I'll ask him."
And when she did, Iwa said, "Yes."
Repha'el quickly came to the conclusion that the logical second avatar might be Sker, Iwa's opposite number. To that, Iwa replied, "Almost," and would say no more. Repha'el then went off and wrote a treatise on the nature of the Symphony, avatars, and free will entitled "Avatars, the Symphony, and God", with two little discourses thrown in, one on the nature of Leukibher (whom she had determined must have been the second avatar) and one on prophecy.
"Those who know the future are doomed to repeat it," is the title of Repha'el's chapter on prophecy. Most of her musings with Y'hohanan are included, either as support for the theory or as speculations on the logical conclusions of the avatar premise. One of these is speculations on whether the third avatar should be used as a Symphonic tie-breaker between Fate and Destiny, or whether that avatar should form the nucleus of a third side in the War. (Elohim like tough questions like that.) In this discussion, she hints that, if you play with that "the Third Avatar shall choose" line, you may come to the conclusion that this doesn't necessarily mean "choose between the first and second avatars'" but simply "
CHOOSE." Which might well imply that while Iwa is a manifestation of the Symphony's Bright Destiny, and Leukibher of its Dark Fate (though see below), the hypothetical Third Avatar would be Free Will manifest.
Concerning Leukibher, she wrote in a section entitled "On Sub-Creation": "Imagine Leukibher before the Fall as a prism, with the shining white light of Truth taken into him and refracted so as to wring greater beauty from it. This was how Leukibher was intended to be. As a seraph and an archangel, Leukibher explored the possibilities of the Symphony and showed his brethren, sistren, bothren, othren,, and neithren new ways of looking at God's creation. This ability to reveal to his brethren, sistren, bothren, othren, and neithren all of the colors and refractions of the Truth, unique to Leukibher, was at first a source of pride.
"Leukibher's pride was not Truth, and the dissonance of that pride drove him to madness and rebellion. When Mikha-el cast Leukibher down, I am asserting that the prism that was Leukibher shattered, and Forces which had been part of Leukibher flew free from the metaphysical impact, creating a number of distinct 'shards'. Leukibher, maddened and glutted with new power, would have maintained his new nature by compartmentalizing those parts of his psyche that did not mesh with the being that he became in the moment of his Fall. These fragments, perhaps, then broke free as shards, each with a number of Forces attached -- sort of a spontaneous creation of new celestials. As ages passed, some of those frgaments of his personality would have gained more and more Forces -- the children of his thought, the (often distorted) pieces of his Truth. Each shard would thus hold a fragment of the Truth that was Leukibher, or a fragment of his nascent madness. The Leukibher that God created (henceforth referred to as "Leukibher Prime") is likely no more. The largest shard, a balseraph, would have convinced himself that he was Leukibher, and with the amount of power that had flowed into Leukibher Prime during the rebellion, none of the new demons had the will or temerity to challenge. Besides, the rest of the rebels arrived in Hell somewhat later than Leukibher, who could create any story he wished and, as a balseraph, would believe it.
"Further research has shown the following to be reasonable possibilities for at least some of the more major shards. One shard, which embodied the insubordination of Leukibher, became Azal, the balseraph demon of Insubordination. Another shard, embodying the reverence of Leukibher for God over all, even in spite of God's favor for humanity, became Iblis the djinn, who by Islamic tradition was damned when he refused to bow before the first humans. Yet another shard, embodying the impulse which led Leukibher to test Hawwah with temptation during the Edinnu Experiment, became Samael of Hebrew tradition, a habbalah, still testing the worthiness of humanity for Heaven and firmly convinced that he works in God's service. The shard embodying the need of Leukibher to uncover and reveal the Truth eventually fledged into Litheroy, now the seraph archangel of Revelation. Seeing as no one knows his origins, it seems quite probable that Leukibher's status as the original chooser of Fate over Destiny might have grown into Sker, the prince of Fate. Perhaps one shard, holding fragments of outrage upswelling from Leukibher Prime's consciousness, nursed its rage through the eons until eventually fledging as a malak, and so on . . . . The wildest theories -- that some of Leukibher's shards might have left the Symphony entirely and taken root in Ein Soph Aur to form separate Symphonies, subject to wild variations on the Divine Will -- still find themselves without effective counterargument. Should they prove true, it is likely that the most reliable way to access these Sub-Creations would be to somehow travel through or by means of another Leukibher-shard.
"Only those shards that originally possessed (or later gained) Forces from all three realms (corporeal, ethereal, and celestial) could be considered viable celestials. Other proto-shards, possessing Forces in only one or two realms, might still exist somewhere but would most likely have dissolved into the Symphony. Still, there might be shadows in the Marches, each with a bit of disjointed wisdom, which never gained corporeal or celestial Forces, and Remnants of Leukibher Prime may lurk somewhere on Earth.
"Shards would be independent beings, with unique motivations and distinct personalities. Though they share a common origin, they almost certainly would not conveniently fit back together like some celestial jigsaw puzzle, and most would likely heartily resist any efforts to do so. They would not merge into celestial amalgam beings when they come into contact with one another. Some ancient celestials who were around before the Fall might see a faint resemblance between a shard and their memory of Leukibher Prime, but it's been a long time. I didn't."
In the last section of the manuscript, Repha'el mentions that she believes she can determine the identity of the Third Avatar.
Any search for the sequel to "Avatars, the Symphony, and God" turns up an extensive tactical summary of the battle with Leg -- troop movements, tactics, and a list of the dead. The "Third Avatar" paper died, unwritten, with Repha'el. Y'hohanan forgot all about such "youthful diversions" as he shouldered many of Repha'el's responsibilities. The tablet and her first treatise were buried in the Library, and have not come to light for centuries.
Questions to Answer, Plot Points for the Future, and Musings:
- Who is the ancient human prophet?
- What are the events he lists?
- Three different translations, in various languages, of "Avatars, the Symphony, and God"? What's each's story? How do they come to the PCs?
- There is one Symphony-created individual who seems to embody Free Will, if not entirely in a good way: the princess of Freedom, Lilitu.
- If you assume that the Grigori were created to sire children, and that their mortal descendants the Nefilim are known to naturally have 6 Forces, and add in the concept of Lilitu as an Avatar herself . . . maybe Eru YHVH Iluvatar wanted humanity to be the deciding factor in the War, and not just the prize.
- The Angel of Hip-Hop, influenced by postmodern realities and remix/sampler culture, sees the Sub-Creations as ways to forge a new kind of existence, a novel ontology
