Nephalim - The Whisperers

"mrmph...razzarazzafiz _they're using you_ thraz bischt mrmph...

The Nephalim are the twisted offspring that are often created from the union of a human and a Grigori or other Celestial. Most of them were hunted down shortly after the Judgment of the Grigori, but rumors persist of monsters that can be found in some of the darkest recesses of the Earth. Some say these obscenities can even be found in the badlands of Hell, but if so, no one has seen them in recent memory.

Appearance -

A Nephalite's appearance remains the same regardless of the plane of existence, though no two Nephalim are exactly alike. Some Nephalim appear to be normal to a cursory examination, although their eyes often display a greenish luminescence, or are completely black. A more detailed examination shows their skin to have an almost rubbery texture to it, with no bone structure at all. Tentacle-like growths have been seen on some of them, as well as an ability to stretch, twist and elongate their bodies in a decidedly unnatural fashion. In the more typical of the breed, the skin turns a glistening black color, while the arms seem to atrophy and lose cohesiveness, becoming ropelike tentacles.

Resonance and Dissonance -

The Nephalim are not strictly Celestials, and so do not have a Resonance or Dissonance Condition per se, however there are certain curious effects that have been noted.

Quantifying the average Nephalite is a difficult task due to the way that the Nephalim that have been captured seem to have a very different type of mind than most Corporeals or Celestials. They do not appear to speak any languages, even though it's often clear that they understand what is being said. Their behavior patterns swing from being completely unresponsive to outside stimuli to watching and observing their captors for hours on end. The public consensus is that they are dangerous animals that should be put down.

The reason that both the Archangels and Princes continue to lead people to believe this is that listening to a Nephalite's jabbering and mumbling has an effect on the minds of the listeners. Placed in a room with several different celestials, all of them heard the Nephalite speaking to them individually about different subjects, all of them extremely personal and deeply upsetting to the listeners.

It appears that the whispering of the Nephalim causes the listener to hear the Nephalite speaking about his deepest fears or concerns. It's not believed that the Nephalite actually knows what that fear is, but once a subject starts speaking to them, they will start carrying on an intelligent conversation, complete with philosophical details, secrets, etc. In truth, the Nephalite is still simply whispering its nonsense, but the listener will find it almost impossible to believe that.

A Seraph applying its Resonance to a Nephalite will find some disturbing information - their Resonance will read the entire conversation as a lie, even though the Seraph knows that certain parts of what the Nephalite said were True. In actuality, since the Nephalite is not actually saying anything cohesive, the fact that the conversation is taking place is a lie, and all the supposed 'Truths' are coming from the Seraph's own mind. In addition, a Seraph who acquires the 'higher truth' from his Resonance will find that the Nephalite is trying to drive him insane - any further inquiries are inconclusive.

Prolonged exposure to a Nephalite's whispering will slowly start to cause mind hits to the listener. Although the damage is slight, it builds over time until the person loses all their mind hits, takes a point of Ethereal Discord, and starts to lose his mind. The truly dangerous thing about this is that while the loss of Mind Hits may be quite evident to a casual bystander, it will not be noticable to the listener until pointed out by an outside source. The damage can be healed by standard methods, but if it is not pointed out, it will go untreated until insanity occurs. Even should someone gain Discord from listening to a Nephalite, there is a good chance that the person will fail to realize that the Nephalite is the cause, unless he knows about this ability.

Current Status -

Orders have quietly gone out to operatives in both Judgment and The Game to destroy any Nephalite that they encounter. No one knows precisely how many Nephalim are left on the Corporeal plane, but strangely the number seems to be going up slowly, The few Grigori that have been found and asked about the matter seem as mystified at this latest turn of events as everyone else. Rumors abound that Eli has been spotted in areas where there are believed to be higher concentrations of the beasts, but according to the few of his Servitors that have asked him about the subject, he becomes very quiet on the subject except to say that he has nothing to do with them, and would not have anything to do with them.

One curious note - to date, the souls of slain Nephalim have yet to be found. Both Asmodeus and Dominic have spoken on this subject at great length and volume, only to leave irritated and more confused. Both Yves and Kronos would very much like to know what is going on - both of them claim that the souls are not simply disbanding, but neither one has been able to track them down...

Finally, all rumors of Nephalim in notable numbers overseeing construction of a temple complex somewhere in the deserts of the Middle East are nothing more than rumors...