Quand je me suis présentée ici, Oiseau m'a donné la permission de traduire son roman "Xhoromag: L'homme qui Marchait" vers l'anglais. Donc j'ai traduit l'introduction, que j'ai trouvé ici:
http://www.seriesfantastiques.com/t747-xhoromag-jeu-sur-forum-tome-1Bonne lecture!
He first appeared hundreds of years ago. No one remembers the exact date. In fact, that is the least of their worries.
He was not from there. Where he was from, no one knew, but definitely another world. He looked like a glowing ghost: a haloed man with an unnaturally white paleness, who walked endlessly without regard to his surroundings. On this unforgettable night, he went through the village, then disappeared. Dozens had seen him, but in those days of superstition, it was preferred not to discuss such matters. As a result, he passed out of all memory.
A few years later, the enigmatic phantom was no more than a legend, a tale that joined hundreds of others that echoed throughout the land.
Until the day the man came back.
Once again, while the village wound down for the night, the ghost walked down the main street. Those that saw him double-locked their doors. Quietly, with an unnatural silence, the ghost crossed the village and disappeared into a neighboring forest.
At daybreak, no trace of him was found.
Over time, they discovered that his path remained unchanged. Step for step, he repeated the same routine as his previous appearances. He came every five years, on exactly September 4th, at exactly 11:17 PM, exactly 43 minutes before midnight. No one knew who he was. No one knew where he came from. No one knew where he was going. But they had given him a name.
He was the Walking Man.
Valleyburg had hardly changed throughout the years. Isolated in the heart of a deep, green valley that it earned its namesake from, the village had about 500 inhabitants, give or take a few travelers in search of solitude. In fact, they had everything they needed to be happy in Valleyburg. The only blemish was the mysterious, frightening, walking man.
Throughout the centuries, the glowing ghost never missed a visit. Every five years, on September 4th, at 11:17 PM, he came. Several theories had been formulated, the most common one being that a practical joker was taking pleasure in spreading terror in Valleyburg. Obviously, since the Walking Man's appearances have been going on for several centuries, that couldn't be the case, taking into account how long humans generally live.
One day, someone suggested to just kill the damn ghost the next time he appeared. After many discussions, the idea was abandoned. Indeed, nobody knew what he was capable of. Plus, several people suspected he was of infernal origin, and you can't kill a demon.
The sinister creature then appeared again that night, before fading into oblivion for the next five years. In the year 1769, the day of September 4th was spent building a barricade in the middle of the main street. For good measure, they hung crucifixes, garlic and other talismans all over the village. Never has the Walking Man deviated off his path, which gave him an even more supernatural appearance. This time, they would finally know if he would.
The entity passed through the village, and the barricade didn't seem to inconvenience him. The next day, they discovered that the barrier was perfectly intact, but because nobody had dared watch for him—whose supernatural character was no longer doubted—nobody knew if the specter had gone through or around the barricade.
Things remained the same for five more years.
What was the Walking Man's secret? What did his appearances mean? Would they ever know? In Valleyburg, they were entitled to wonder these things. In more than 500 years, nobody has ever found a single clue.
Then strange phenomena started happening.
Five years later, when the Walking Man reappeared yet again, mysterious events took place, events that no one had ever noticed before. All night, they could hear distant yet recognizable screams: it was wolves howling. Five years after that, the first victim was discovered: a man, a traveler passing through, had been killed by a terrifying creature whose claws left wounds at least an inch deep in his flesh.
From then on, no one ever left their home the evening of September 4th.
Time passed. And terror took hold.
Jamie was four years old when he first saw the Walking Man. It was 1819. Despite his young age, he was hardly intimidated by the creature, nor by the terrible rumors that swirled around him. He undoubtedly didn't understand that the creature posed a great threat. However, when the Walking man returned when the child was nine, part of the mystery was revealed to him, completely by chance.
Leaning his head out of his upstairs bedroom window, he had seen the phosphorescent man go into Valleyburg's neighboring forest, then disappear into the trees. Jamie's eyes followed what would be the ghost's path. Then, he could see a faint light coming from a mountain located just beyond the two peaks that framed Valleyburg. More specifically, the phosphorescence came from the mountain's peak.
Little Jamie immediately got it.
That's where the Walking Man was going!
He ran to tell his parents about his discovery, but all he got in return was scolded. At this late hour, he should be sleeping, not making up frivolous stories to get attention. If there were a phosphorescent peak, someone would have noticed it well before a little boy did.
After revoking his dessert privileges, Jamie's parents ordered him back to bed. So right then, ironically, is when the only clue that had ever turned up about the Walking Man's appearances disappeared.
Throughout the years that passed, Jamie learned a few things that he still hadn't known concerning the mysterious night stroller. For example, during the night of September 4th-5th, besides the luminous being, diverse creatures also made an appearance. Moreover, in 1814, the year before Jamie was born, a traveler, who had refused to believe in the possible danger, had been found dead, shredded to bits by claws and fangs that must have been enormous. However, despite a big organized search the next day, they never found a trace of the responsible creatures.
They existed for only one night.
There were also people that claimed that, during the night of September 4th, another universe imposed on top of ours: an evil planet where creatures from Hell reigned and were attempting to invade the world of the living. Of course, these theories were treated with the ridicule they deserved, but the facts didn't become any less unexplainable. Throughout the centuries, the rumors surrounding the Walking Man had accumulated so much that they were now woven into a net of tangled superstition.
Undoubtedly, it would have been a while before getting to the bottom of the ghostly walker mystery if Jamie and his friends hadn't decided to take action.
Jamie was eleven at the time, and his three buddies Nicolas, Michael and Christian were ten, eleven and twelve, respectively. In secret, the four children had put in place an ideal plan to shed some light onto the Walking Man's dark mystery. In three years, on the date of his next visit to the world of the living, they would secretly follow him to the glowing peak that he was surely going to, and then they would learn his secret. They would do all of that regardless of the dangerous creatures that would be wandering about that night in search of human blood.
Since their parents, if they knew what they were planning, would probably lock them in their bedrooms for that entire night, the four children decided to keep their project under wraps. In three years, they would surely have the time to fine-tune their plans or, more likely, forget about them.
However, over time, their determination grew even stronger.
Three long years passed. Three years at the end of which the mysterious phantom should reappear and pass through the village again.
In the most secret way possible, on September 4th, the four young teenagers met to go over the final details of their big scheme. They seemed less confident than they were three years earlier, because in spite of all their good intentions, superstitious fear of the unknown overcame them. Jamie was the only one to outright refuse to abandon the plan. He had been the one to discover the glowing mountain. Tonight, he was determined to follow the Walking Man at all costs.
Then, night having fallen, at 11:16 PM, while their parents thought they were fast asleep in their cozy beds, the four boys lurked in the woods, on the lookout for the phosphorescent creature. Every now and then, sinister howling could be heard in the distance, undeniable proof of the existence of the creatures that they had heard so much about.
At that moment, a faint glowing grew brighter, and the Walking Man appeared in front of them.
Even though the boys were as well hidden as possible, an infernal creature would most certainly notice them. The Valleyburg ghost didn't even turn his head. But can we be so sure that the children went unnoticed?
"Let's go, Jamie!" whispered Nicolas, the youngest of his friends.
The boy was white from fear. Christian and Michael seemed just as nervous. As for the Valleyburg ghost, he continued walking unbothered.
Mustering up all of his courage, Jamie stood up and ventured onto the dirt road to follow the mysterious creature. To reassure himself, he thought about how he hadn't gone through all the preparation to carry out this scheme for three years just to give up now. If he succeeded, at daybreak he would have the best news ever announced to the residents of Valleyburg.
Nicolas, Michael and Christian hesitantly followed Jamie. Soon, all four of them found themselves in the middle of the forest, on the only road leading back to Valleyburg, surrounded by shadows and terror.
For Jamie, following the Walking Man wasn't just to satisfy his own curiosity. If he saw it through, if he discovered something, he would get a hero's welcome by the entire village. As an added bonus, there would also no longer be need to fear September 4th. A 14-year-old boy, achieving something that even an adult would never have dared to even attempt!
If he had been able to imagine the real danger of the Temporal Night, maybe he wouldn't have been so eager to follow the Walking Man. Maybe he would have gone home.
But he was only 14 years old. At that age, nothing bad can happen to you.
While the lights in the distant village diminished, other glows took their place. Red fireflies, eight of them, were moving in pairs in the woods. Far ahead, the phosphorescent aura given off by the Walking Man guided the kids in their investigation that would have, for one of the four companions, an unimaginable finale.
And there you have it. The rest of this adventure is in your hands. You will become Jamie in his quest for the truth.
In order to get through this mission assigned to you—following the "Walking Man"—you will have to learn the rules of the adventure, which are listed on the following pages. Once you have chosen a path, do not change your mind after reading the first paragraph. Only read the designated paragraphs corresponding to the choices you make.
Because now you are Jamie, age 14 ½--and you are the one that's going to bring the secret of the Valleyburg ghost to light!
Sujet: Traduction de Xhoromag-L'homme qui Marchait 
Lun 3 Jan - 19:14
