In the early hours of the morning on the first Monday of the first week of the year 2020, Damian woke up panic-stricken at the sound of air horns blaring through his city. Awakening from the stupor of deep-seated rest, he recounted and pondered the significance of these sounds. Half-somnolent, caught between sleep and wakefulness, his subconscious had reinterpreted the air horns as angelic trumpets. This eerie misperception contributed to his distress and profuse sweating, despite the fact that it was quite cold and frosty outside. Damian wondered for a moment what could be the cause—perhaps an emergency drill or a sudden onset of severe weather. However, he soon remembered the far graver reality and its peculiar weight: the global COVID-19 pandemic had entered its exponential phase. A communal feeling of fear, insecurity, instability, and pervasive worry now dominated everyday life.
Being quarantined was not easy, but dealing with loss on such a massive scale was even more jarring. Damian had lost his job, friends, school, and the simple joy of the outdoors. Even the once-mundane act of going out to get groceries now seemed like an unprecedented act of bravery. Nature itself felt treacherous and dangerous. He briefly mused about the 16th- and 17th-century explorers and their encounters with untamed and uncharted territories—though this thought quickly gave way to much more serious concerns. A flicker of guilt crossed his mind at what he deemed childish musings in such dire times. Mystified, Damian pondered:
“How can this be part of eternal providence? Is this a divine joke, a test, or just plain cruelty—retribution for humanity’s transgressions against nature or God?”
More immediate, however, was the pressure on him and his parents: the looming threat of eviction due to unpaid rent and the unrelenting burden of working frontline service jobs in the midst of a deadly pandemic. So-called “essential workers,” once relegated to the fringes of society and treated as third-class citizens, were now suddenly hailed as heroes. Yet, the praise did little to alleviate the hardship. This decision—whether to risk homelessness or exposure to a deadly virus—weighed on Damian like a ton of bricks pressing down on his chest. In the span of a single week, he had suffered two panic attacks—a first for him. Known for his resilience and tolerance for pain and the pressures of survival, Damian was startled by these episodes. Yet, with the options reduced to either suffering panic attacks at home or risking exposure in a hospital, he resigned himself to enduring in silence.
He also did not want to expose the source of his weakness. The mere thought of losing his parents was beyond his comprehension, an unacceptable prospect. He was truly worried—for the first time in his life. He swore to do everything in his power to protect them. At that moment, his inseparable Anatolian Shepherd dog, Braisis, came to greet him. Damian fed him, and for a fleeting moment, he felt a small joy at being able to care for his companion. This moment sparked an epiphany. He needed to act, to take control of his fate. Though he typically preferred to go with the flow and let things fall into place, something within him shifted. A transformation was taking root. At that instant, a line from one of his favorite poets, John Milton, surfaced in his mind:
“What in me is dark
Illumine, what is low, raise and support,
That, to the height of this great argument,
I may assert Eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men.”
-Paradise Lost, Book I, lines 22-26
Now, more than ever, these words resonated with him. They ignited a resolve. Without hesitation, Damian told his parents that he would go out for groceries and reassured them not to worry. He grabbed his mask, wallet, and hoodie and stepped out the door. However, as soon as he turned the corner of his apartment complex, a wave of dizziness overcame him. He felt lightheaded and short of breath. Sitting down to steady himself, he was suddenly overtaken by another intense surge of panic. He lay against the wall, struggling to catch his breath, when, at a distance, he noticed a strange and unsettling sight. He did not know if he was hallucinating, if it was merely a trick of oxygen deprivation, or if it was something far more mystical. He had experienced overwhelming emotions before, but on the opposite end of the spectrum. This, however, was so intensely negative, so utterly overwhelming, that he did not recognize it at first for what it was. Overwhelmed by the sheer intensity of the experience, he did not recognize it for what it was at first.
A black, undulating mass loomed on the horizon, drawing nearer. At first, it seemed like storm clouds and thunder, but as it advanced, it became something far more sinister. An all-consuming, yet eerily cold, black fire with soft white edges spread across the landscape. Damian felt terror unlike any he had ever known. He had experienced overwhelming emotional episodes before—but always on the opposite end of the spectrum. This darkness was something entirely different, something foreign. Soon, the faraway sight of a black, undulating mass on the horizon became clearer and nearer. What first seemed like dark clouds and thunder soon transformed into an all-consuming, yet eerily cold, black fire with soft white edges. It was terrifying for Damian to have such a dark mystical experience, one that stood in sharp contrast to his previous, more pleasant ones.
The black fire appeared to be consuming people from the inside out. It entered their lungs, suffocating them, draining the air from their chests, and burning them from within. One by one, people fell ill, collapsing like dominoes. That was when he noticed something even more unsettling. From within the fire, spirits appeared, as if swimming up and down between the shifting boundaries of the black mass and the physical world—the street, the walls, the doors of buildings. They thrashed desperately, as if trying to escape in vain. Their spectral arms, legs, torsos, and faces twisted in torment, struggling to free themselves, yet bound by some invisible force. The most disturbing part was that although the spirits seemed to be screaming, crying, and voicing their pain and desperation, at most they sounded like a quiet storm of murmurs, muffled by the earth-shattering pulses emanating from the center of the black fire.
These pulses came in intervals of three seconds, and they were so powerful that they corrupted and cracked every structure they touched. They felt like miniature earthquakes, devastating everything in their path. Damian was transfixed by the sheer force and pressure of the pulses, even at a distance. They made him feel ill and wounded in a strange, inexplicable way, as if a wall of sound had crashed into him, bruising him internally. He thought he could taste blood in his mouth. Yet, he did not move. He remained seated, overwhelmed by the immensity of the force and power, as well as the vividness of the vision. However, this soon changed when he noticed three monstrous figures emerging from the center of the black fire. They resembled Wendigos, yet they had no feet. These creatures attacked people on the streets with their long, black fingernails, leaving gaping wounds that they then used to carve out their victims’ entrails. It seemed as though they were feeding on the entrails to satiate their hunger while also performing some strange ritual. Behind them, they dragged a retinue of corpses, all strung together by their own innards.
Terrified and driven by instinctual fear, Damian stood up and ran back home to his parents. He ran and ran, yet it felt as if he were running in place, trapped in some twisted dream—like Zeno’s paradox, where the distance between him and his destination seemed both near and infinitely far at the same time. It was as if time itself were bending and stretching beneath his feet. A murder of crows perched in a nearby tree, watching him, their sinister calls echoing in mockery. When Damian finally reached the entrance of his building, he looked back and saw the black fire creeping closer—just a hundred meters away. At that moment, his fear transformed into desperation and resolve. He thought of his parents. He called upon Braisis for aid and armed only with his will to protect those he loved and his faithful companion, he faced what now seemed like his inevitable doom. With no second thought, he dove into the black fire in a final attempt to rip it apart. He did not know exactly what he was doing—he acted purely on instinct. Even now, he does not fully remember what happened next, or whether he did anything at all. But he recalls tearing through the black fire and everything within it, only to find three female figures standing side by side.
He stepped back in shock.
The three women moved forward, equidistant from one another, their bodies almost touching, gliding toward him with a peaceful, graceful air. Their movements were perfectly synchronized, mirroring one another as though they were bound by a single will. Each was dressed in a flowing, crocheted chiton, with closed, flat shoes resembling modern-day Ferragamos, a full-body underlayer that covered the skin beneath the chiton, and delicately sewn gloves. Their presence was striking, yet each had a distinct appearance. The figure on the left was completely white—an ultra-pure, glowing white. The one in the middle was royal purple, her entire form bathed in that deep, regal hue. The figure on the right had a white base adorned with nine horizontal bands of brownish-orange. The bands were most vibrant at the top, gradually fading into the white before another band interrupted the transition, creating a rhythmic pattern of color.
Damian, captivated, tried to peer beyond the veil of the figure in the center. The moment he did, a flood of visions overwhelmed him.
The visions played like a film in his mind. A panoramic view of a pristine, untouched landscape dominated his field of vision. Time accelerated, unfolding in a non-verbal, visual narrative. The sounds of nature filled his ears—the rumbling of the earth, the rushing of rivers, the whistling of the wind, the crackling of fire deep within volcanoes. He watched as vegetation of all kinds flourished. At the heart of it all, a magnificent oak tree took root and grew, its branches stretching wide. From beneath its canopy, a female figure emerged—her body sprouting from the roots, her head adorned with small, ram-like horns. The female figure grew, and the three other women were seen playing with her, as if they were her mothers. Soon after, two additional figures entered the field—a man and a woman. These two, however, remained near a towering sequoia-like tree that bore golden-hued fruit. The male and female figures, who appeared humanoid or human-like, eventually procreated and spread rapidly across the landscape, multiplying like wildfire.
As time passed, the world transitioned from a vibrant, Spring-like era of birth and renewal into a heated, Summer-like age—a time of peak vitality, abundance, and indulgence. Damian was reminded of the left and center panels of Bosch’s The Garden of Earthly Delights, where life was at its most lush and exuberant. Eventually, some descendants of these original human-like beings intermingled with the horned female figure and her kin, creating a hybrid lineage. However, conflict soon arose. In what appeared to be a territorial struggle, the human-like peoples turned against those who had interbred with the horned female’s lineage. Through deception, they lured them into a distant, isolated field and, in an act of betrayal, slaughtered the horned female figure along with her progeny.
In response, the three female figures were seen wailing in grief and rage, cursing the very elements—earth, wind, water, and fire—upon which humanity depended. The human-like people, despite their treachery, continued to evolve, procreate, and expand their dominion over the environment. This marked the onset of a more somber, Fall-like era—a time of slow decline and impending decay. Signs of humanity’s rapid evolution became evident. Yet, with each step forward, the three female figures remained ever-present, bringing calamity, war, famine, pestilence, and mass death. However, these destructive forces were intermittently counterbalanced by external interventions that sought to shield humanity from total annihilation.
This cycle persisted until the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. At this point, a much darker, Winter-like night settled upon the landscape, casting a shadow over all that had once flourished. Under the pale glow of a waning crescent moon, nocturnal creatures emerged, serpents slithered, owls perched in silent watch, crows cawed ominously, and the howls of wild dogs and hyenas echoed through the night. Then, from the marshy ground in front of the ancient oak tree, a monstrous figure arose—a golem, forged from decayed trees and the remnants of dead animals. Its limbs were twisted branches, yet its core pulsed with the internal organs of beasts.
The three female figures gathered around the grotesque being. With deliberate precision, they infused it with life, animating the lifeless mass using animal blood as a conduit for their dark magic. The vision accelerated. The landscape’s devastation unfolded at an ever-increasing pace. The human-like beings had changed—they had grown distant from nature, obsessed with technological augmentation and tools. At every turn, nature was sacrificed in pursuit of progress, until their very essence was transferred into inorganic vessels, severing their last ties to the living world.
At last, the final stage of devastation was reached.
Then, the vision shifted. The three female figures now stood at the center of the ruined expanse, the only source of light in a world swallowed by darkness. Even the moon’s reflection had vanished, leaving only their spectral glow.
They turned to Damian and, in unison, asked:
“What will you do, Damian, our White Snake?”