The world had been reduced to a marsh-like state, large areas becoming muddy and waterlogged due to constantly being walked over by soldiers and the near-constant rain, heavy enough to greatly shorten how far someone could see. The human race was slowly dying off due to the poor conditions. While the angels and demons could come and go at will, the humans were forced to live in this landscape constantly: many dying of cold and disease. All they cared about now was surviving - while they were very involved in the start of the war, they now spent most of their time hiding, fighting only when they needed to and avoiding the other species the rest of the time. It was the only way they had a chance of survival. To put it simply, humans were becoming extinct.

Marsh - named after his home, named after all his parents had ever known - was nothing special: just another human, eighteen, likely to die soon. Humans were short-lived now, they were lucky to reach their twentieth birthday. His parents had told him stories, passed down through generations, about a time when the world was greener and flowers were more plentiful. He grew up thinking about flowers and was considered a flower among humans: bright, cheery and optimistic. While others thought the human race was soon to disappear, he believed times would become better and that angels and demons would decide suddenly to stop fighting and to return earth to what it used to be. Until then, however, he had decided to make the most of what they had. While everyone he knew hid and trained for the day they might have to join in the fighting and to lay down their lives for the little they had left, he went out hunting for flowers and always wore one proudly in his hair. Flowers were very rare now but he seemed to have a natural gift for finding them, always able to find at least one still alive and blooming. It gave the others hope.

While out collecting flowers one day, Marsh had to hide as he heard shouting nearby, getting louder as the source of the noise moved closer. Crouching in a ditch, he watched rows of angels march past - all in Roman style armour and all with swords. He frowned, the near endless line of creatures all perfectly in time with each other. It looked unnatural. Robotic, in fact. When they had eventually passed, he stood up and headed home, forgetting the flowers he had collected in favour of getting back to civilisation as fast as possible. He hadn't believed it before: that angels could be fighting. Marsh had just assumed that demons were destroying angels and humans alike as opposed to it being an actual war. He was one of the older of the humans left and neither he nor his friends had living parents remaining. Given his age, Marsh was expected to have found a wife and have had at least one child already but he was alone, which meant that the other humans tended to ignore him and leave him to his own devices. They likely wouldn't believe him when he told them that the angels were near, meaning that the war was getting even closer.

"I swear," he scowled, looking to the crowd in front of him, "The angels are near and we're going to die if we don't move. Now!" The group that had gathered were silent for a while as they thought about what he said before laughing, not believing a word. "Oh I give up!" he snapped, heading off. He'd leave and, when everyone else was dead, he wouldn't be. That's all that mattered to Marsh.

Packing the few items that Marsh could truly call his own, along with some long-life food, he set off, grumbling about how much he hated other humans. He trudged through the mud, determined to find somewhere to sleep for the night, but was severely slowed down by his search for flowers. For some reason, it felt wrong leaving the flowers in what he knew was going to be a battleground soon: he needed to preserve as many of them as he could while he still had a chance. Bending down to pick up a flower he spotted in the middle of the muddy field, he paused as he heard what he assumed could only be a war cry. He stood up instantly and went to run off but was too late; trapped in the middle of a battle of angels and a mix of fallen angels and demons. It wasn't long before he was just another body trampled into the ground, the only thing telling him apart from the others being the flowers surrounding him. Everyone else from his town, however, lived on peacefully: oblivious to the fight occurring right next to them.