The Ballad of Marble and Ash
War has never ceased—only shifted its garments. No longer did men march in iron ranks, nor clash in meadows dyed red. The toilers of factories and shipyards, their backs bent but their wills unbroken, found new arenas where their fates could be sculpted by sweat rather than by blood. Thus rose the Fields of Football, vast theatres where tribes gathered, not for conquest of land, but for the conquest of spirit.
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In such an age, there was a host unmatched, a phalanx so fluid, so untouchable, they were named The Invisibles.
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They bore no scars of defeat, their banners unblemished, their march unbroken from dusk till spring’s bloom. And over them ruled a peculiar sorcerer, known to men as The Professor, but whispered by foes as The Mad Alchemist, for he brewed armies from dust and molded swords from overlooked ore.
But men are foolish, as are their masters. The Invisibles, prideful and mighty, sought to climb the very slopes of Olympus. They laid down their ancient home, Highbury—their fortress of crimson walls—and sought to build a new palace of gleaming glass and steel, in hopes of touching the stars. Yet, the gods, ever jealous of mortal glory, cast down their ire. They shattered the host, cursed the strong into brittle shells, and chained the fearless into ornaments of silver and gold, sold and scattered to distant realms.
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And so the Professor found himself imprisoned in a great dungeon, a vast coliseum where shadows lingered and echoes mocked. At the heart of his prison stood a board—black and white, carved from volcanic wrath and icy marble—where every game was a battle against unseen fates. Here, the Professor sat, his cloak faded, his beard silvered, but his gaze ever defiant. Around him gathered the remnants: children with legs swift as deer but hearts untempered by war. He cooked them stone soup, wove them stories of Invincibility, called them sons where he once commanded warriors.
Some, seduced by the whisperings of silver coins, turned their cloaks and sailed to distant kingdoms. Others, broken by the weight of expectation, vanished into obscurity. The Professor, seeing their departure, held his tongue but aged a thousand winters.
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Yet, in the coldest of nights, amidst the jeers and the taunts, one son returned. Not as a boy, but as a matador, draped in the elegance of battle, whistling an ancient tune as if to summon the old spirits of Highbury. The Professor, now weary, turned his face to the stone. His heart, still ablaze with dreams, grew heavy. And so, before the assembled crowd, before the eternal game, he let himself be carved into myth—stone among men, memory among mortals.
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Thus ends the Age of the Invisibles.
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But whispers remain… that one day, under the shadow of the North Bank, the song will rise again. And the children of the worker class shall remember: for one season, there walked gods among men.