A Beginning of His End {Dai, Reila, Ayden or Xan)

[Murazar Dauthi]

Alchemy's most forbidden taboo. Sewing life together and with good reason. As the saying goes whats dead should stay dead.

Murazar had locked the door to his and Daigoro's room. Why you may ask? He was constructing something extremely complicated and serious. He had even moved the beds and furniture against the door to barricade it as he worked. He had just finished the transmutation circle perfectly. He used chalk and it was perfectly centered in the room with his ingredients on one side and his sword sheathed on the other.

Tragedy, misery, loosing ones innocence thats what awaits one and all who attempt human transmutation.

This time he swore to himself, it would be as perfect as could possibly be. He had searched high and low. All throughout the lands to find out what he could about this forbidden and apparently prone to failure type of alchemy. Finally he had decided he knew what the problems were and decided he would do it right. He would bring his mother back, the one person he loved that he had ended up killing.

He slowly and accurately tip toed over to the other side and one by one poured out perfectly the ingridients at each different proper symbol that was the equivalent to a translation of the meaning. He spoke to himself softly as the souls screamed in the background. Other than them and a laughing Gurthang it was perfectly silent, other than his soft voice. Barely above a whisper." 35 liters of water, 20 kilograms of carbon, 4 liters of ammonia, 1.5 kilograms of caustic lime, 800 grams of phosphorus, 250 grams of salt, 100 grams of saltpeter, 80 grams of sulfur, 7.5 grams of fluorine, 5 grams of iron, 3 grams of silicon."

This was not all he had done, he also picked up a body. A body devoid of life and had only recently died with all blood drained from it. He placed the body in the center of the room. She resembled his mother, almost perfectly in detail when she died. He had found her only days ago on one of his normal journeys. He knew that the complexity of the human body people had outdid him completely. Since he couldn't find a proper alternate, he would just use a real persons body. After all, it was the proper way he thought.

"I am the Wind of Death, the Soul Stealer, the Lord Captain-Commander and the Shadow of Death. Wherever I go Death is in my wake, wherever I go I am lost and dead already."

He put aside all the empty bottles, spare chalk, and clothing that the deceased body had. Her soul had already passed on to whatever afterlife they passed to. He stacked them in an empty corner before tiptoeing back over to the body with his sword in hand. He cut his hand open, making a grunting sound as he did so and speaking."Blood from one related to her." He cleaned the swords sharp blade with his clothing and tossed it back to the sheath. He then marked a blood rune up the womans inner thigh. The least likely place for the blood rune to be broken. After all this was a form of soul binding. At least souls he was familiar with.

"Happiness is a illusion for me, unattainable, impossible. Safe in my Madness is better than trying"

He tiptoed over to put his back against the wall. He crouched down and eyed ever chalk mark and position everything was in. He nodded to himself. It was as perfect as possible. He clapped and rubbed his hands together before slamming them down to activate the alchemy. The chalk glowed a bright blue color and lightning seemed to slam from nowhere or another dimension as it took effect.

Black ink-like liquid seemed to float up from all around the outer ring of the transmutation circle. The hair he had on his arms and neck seemed to stand straight up. A great deal of fear ran through him, he pressed onward. Deciding that fear would not stand in his way. Then a great eye opened up in the circle. The center of the eye was centered on the womans corpse.

Then small hands made of pure darkness struck forward and what seemed to him as dematerialize his hands. Just his hands. He stared in at first horror, then in painful bemusement as he spoke to himself.

"Mankind cannot obtain anything without first sacrificing something in return. That is Alchemy's law of equivalent exchange"

Then he was standing in front of a great large door, upon which he spoke softly to himself. As if his very madness produced the words alone.

"
Through me the way into the suffering city,
Through me the way to the eternal pain,
Through me the way that runs among the lost.
The highest wisdom,
Before me nothing but eternal things were made,
And I endure eternally.
Abandon every hope, ye who enter here."

Then he blinked as he had forgotten just at the moment what he was doing in the first place. Where was he? Why was he here? What was going on? Instead of asking those aloud or being answered he saw a being in front of him against the plain pure whiteness of the place.

It was a pure white, nearly formless being almost indistinguishable from the rest of the endless white expanse which surrounds the Gate but for a shadowy outline. Whatever it was, it appeared to resemble an outline of Murazar as he was now. Murazar spoke cold as frost, calm as a dead ocean sea without a breeze, and as calculated as machine. "Your what we call the Truth then. Very well, I want my mothers soul back and put into that deceased body I have prepared. I dont care about anything but that. So get on with whatever you have to do."

The creature called the Truth seemed to grin wildly and exclaim joyously," That would be correct, you already seem aware of all the prices and what happens. Well most of it anyway, you still chose to come here. With nothing that you care to not give me and nothing matters but this woman. Your mother. Such a pity for your case that there is always something to take." Murazar raised an eyebrow which barely hinted at surprise as the gate opened up behind him and the same little ink colored hands seemed to grab and drag him into the gate. He merely sighed in annoyance as he was dragged without resisting in the slightest.

Panic wanted to overwhelm him, but he crushed those feelings ruthlessly. It seemed like he was falling at first into nothingness. Then he seemed to be visualizing enormous amounts of information that was being pressed into his skull and permanently memorized. He gritted his teeth at the insane quanity and quality of the information he was being forced to permanently memorize.

Then almost as suddenly as he was memorizing the information he saw his mother and then saw her vanish dust to dust as if she was being forced from her curren location to somewhere else. He smiled to himself, this might be it. Then almost as suddenly as that he appeared outside the gate once more. He glanced around before his eyes settled on the Truth. The Truth poised a question in a familiar calmness,"So how was it?" Murazar answered back almost instantly,"Did I complete my objective here?" The Truth grinned and replied in return as if mocking him,"You'll find out once your away from here. No surprise is no fun, after all."

Murazar gritted his teeth as his anger flared up, then it died down almost instantly. What did it matter if he waited a bit longer. Murazar asked calm as ever,"Whats the Tax then?" The only answer he got was a devilish grin that irked him more than ever. Then almost as suddenly he returned to his collapsed body. The lightning and bright blue glowing of the chalk circle held one for a few seconds longer. Smoke hazed the small and tiny room and he couldn't see clearly.

He glanced at horror as he was bleeding horrifically because his hands were missing. They were completely gone, but it wouldn't matter if he could find his mother. He looked over at the center of the circle as he heard his door being bashed open. They didn't bash it open on the first try or the second, but it would be less than a minute before they knocked it down.

He looked over and saw the woman he had placed there before twitch once, then twice and get up. The screaming in his head stop, Gurthang held its breath metaphorically. Murazar glanced up at her and spoke softly, but apparently unheard of to her as tears filled his eyes. She looked once over at him, to his horror her eyes didn't recognize him, her body language was afraid, and she spoke in horror at him."Who are you?"

He cried as he throat closed up and he couldn't articulate a sound, he had failed. He had completely and utterly failed. She sounded, looked like, everything like his mother. But she couldn't remember him. He failed. He gave up the effort to holding himself up and just laid there. He hoped he could die before they brok-... Whoever it was broke into the room. He seemed to see her fall to the ground and go into a seizure of sorts. He closed his eyes as his head felt fuzzy, he didn't want to live anymore. He went unconscience as he felt the life drain from him, his last few thoughts were ones of regret before he started to dream. He dreamed of all the people he had killed, all the people he had seen die and the destruction from his own powers and work.

[Shula Brighton]

{BUMP}