14 The First Homunculus - Envy
Chapter 13: The First Homunculus - Envy
- BLUARRGGHH!! COUGH, COUGH, shit. That's horrible. How the fuck did that kid do it? 3 minutes and 33 seconds. I think that's enough
Simon came out of the bathroom completely weak and pale after throwing up all his lunch and trying to open his left eye. Since his awakening, God's eye has been kept closed to avoid further discomfort for Simon, because once he leaves it open for even a single second, the amount of information he receives is enough to destabilize his brain, causing nausea and forcing him to vomit.
But as he would soon be at Hogwarts, he wanted to get used to it quickly, and God only knows how his last week went.
- Leonardo sure is a persistent guy. I can barely resist the amount of information without wanting to go crazy.
Thinking about the character who owned these eyes, Simon was a little moved. The God's Eyes were extremely versatile, but they weren't very powerful, at least not compared to the magic of Harry Potter's world or his alchemy.
Although they are allowed to share the vision with someone, inducing hallucinations alters the perception of the vision. They had no way of inflicting significant physical harm.
Furthermore, the physical and mental discomfort caused by its momentary use was enormous and could drive people with weak wills to madness. When he first started training, Simon could barely process the information he received for a measly 20 seconds before starting to vomit. Hence, his admiration for the eyes' original user.
But Simon isn't too worried, he knows it's very likely he can find a way to mitigate the effects of using his eyes, or at least keep them under control, without having to keep them closed. Which is already a lot better than walking around with one eye covered, although he would look really cool with it
- Huh... Should I keep it like this? It gives an air of mystery, and characters who wear eye patches are usually pretty badass.
While he was thinking about how to better deal with his left eye, Simon went to his room and got some rest before going back to training his God's eye.
The next day, Simon went to the room where the bodies of the homunculus prototypes were kept. Passing through the deformed bodies, he stopped in front of one where Stephanos's body was floating.
Eyes closed peacefully and without marks on the body. Stephanos seemed to be asleep. Draining all the liquid from the tube, Simon carried Stephanos' corpse to a small room with a transmutation circle.
He has spent the last few days trying to think of an efficient way to create a homunculus different from the ones present in the FMA universe. After all, in the two versions of the anime, the homunculi are presented with different origins.
In the first version, homunculi are the result of a failed attempt to resurrect someone via human transmutation. Because they exist outside the natural order, they die shortly after their creation and thus return to the truth and become part of the cycle.
However, if they are fed a red stone, a byproduct generated from an attempt to create the philosopher's stone, shortly after being created, they become incomplete humans because, although they have a body, they do not have a soul, and for this reason they cannot use alchemy. Furthermore, they can also strengthen themselves by eating from the red stone and still retain a few memories of the people who were supposed to be brought back.
In the second version, after the father transmuted Xerxes' entire kingdom into a philosopher's stone to create a body, he noticed that the souls present in it were not pure energy as he imagined. They still carried their emotions, thoughts, memories and, of course, sins.
In his vision, Truth represents a perfect being that is neither good nor evil, a perfect form of balance, completely pure. The Father wanted to replace the truth, and for that, he needed a body close to hers. Then, in an attempt to create a pristine body, he divided these souls based on their respective sins and condensed them into a single consciousness, which created the homunculi.
Bradley was the sole exception to this. The souls that represented wrath could not be condensed into a single consciousness because all they felt was hatred, including hatred towards each other.
For this reason, the father decided to fuse the philosopher's stone directly into a living human and let them fight for ownership of the body. Which ended up leaving just a single soul at the end. This was the reason why Bradley was the only homunculus who could age and get injured in battle.
As for why they cannot use alchemy even though they have souls, in the work it is clarified that they do use alchemy, but they use it on themselves through their abilities and regeneration.
As for why they don't utilize the same alchemy as humans, Perhaps it is due to the fact that they feel superior to humans or are quite faithful to their instincts derived from their sins and never thought about seeking the necessary knowledge for this.
Of course, there was also the possibility that, although they possessed consciousness, The fact that their souls belonged to other people indicated that they did not have a soul of their own and were therefore unable to use alchemy or even alkahestry.
After several days of research in his mental library and in his memories of both versions of the work, Simon ultimately decided to create a new type of homunculus.
He would condense the few more than 200 souls in the philosopher's stone into just one, just like his father did, but he would use one soul as a base for it before injecting it into Stephanos' body. As for that soul, it was obviously Stephanos's own. In addition, he would use part of his own blood to fuse with the homunculus' body, making it part of him.
Objectively speaking, no one is free from the sins or virtues that govern the human heart. And Stephanos couldn't be different
Stephanos was a good man, but his soul was "impregnated" with the sin of envy. Although he was greedy for magic and had anger against the wizards who despised him, he felt more jealous of them, as everything he ever wanted was denied to him due to the fact that he was born without this gift.
That was the purest reason why Stephanos helped Simon, even though he was weak when it came to the children, it was just an old man's moment of weakness, nothing more than that.
It wasn't as if Stephanos really cared about them—well, maybe a little. If he were given a choice between being a wizard and having everything he ever wanted and the lives of children, Simon was sure that Stephanos would choose the first option without even thinking twice.
Looking at Stephanos' body and the stone in his hand, Simon began to draw a circle of blood on Stephanos' chest to pull his soul, and then he drew a new circle and placed the stone on it.
Although he wanted the soul back, it was only to serve as a container. Simon wanted to ensure that Stephanos would not be resurrected. Thinking about the homunculus he was creating, Simon started thinking about its abilities.
Obviously he couldn't use alchemy, but Simon was hopeful that he could use magic, as it was genetic, and he had already activated Stephanos's magic gene shortly before his death.
Looking at the body in front of him, Simon finished drawing the last circle around the body and then drew a seal on Stephanos's body with his own blood. Finally, he cut his wrist and spilled his own blood on the body, and after a few seconds, he stopped the wound.
- I hope it works
Looking around, checking that everything was ready, Simon opened his left eye and looked at the circle. The information began to be superimposed on his mind at an overwhelming speed, but he remained firm and began to transmute
The room was suddenly illuminated by the beams of energy that immediately activated the 3 transmutation circles at the same time. Looking at this, and with the help of the God's eye, Simon sent the energy evenly to all of them.
Suddenly, the first circle of blood glowed a little more brightly, and a translucent soul appeared over Stephanos's body. It was his soul, he was looking around and then seeing his own body in the middle of a transmutation circle. He seemed a little stunned, but before he could even move, he was pulled into the philosopher's stone.
- First step complete, Harg Sh*t.
Simon's left eye began to burn. He knew that this indicated a heating in the god's eye. Unlike what many might think, the eye of God is actually more of an artifact than an eye itself.
- Come on.
After fusing Stephanos's soul within the philosopher's stone, Simon immediately began fusing it with the corpse and then fashioned a new soul for the homunculus.
The body on the ground suddenly went through some changes, with its skin becoming less pale and coming to life, and its wrinkled body also becoming younger and stronger. His white hair and beard gave way to short hair and a well-trimmed beard of a dark brown color.
The process seemed long, but in reality, it only took 3 minutes. Upon finishing the fusion, Simon channeled the rest of his strength to guide the magical power within himself to the blood mark on the homunculus' chest, thus creating an Ouroboros mark on his right chest.
- Huff, huff, huff. I did it.
Looking at the body in front of him, Simon smiled as he saw it get up and look at him.
Simon looked into the homunculus's eyes and saw confusion and doubt passing through his for a moment before they met Simon's with a pure and innocent gaze.
- Father.
- Don't call me that
- But… you created me. Gave me life. You are my father.
- Stop it, envy. This little act of yours will not fool me.
- Tch.
Envy's eyes changed suddenly, and innocence gave way to cunning as he stared at Simon, analyzing him with some curiosity and trying to see through him.
Envy's appearance was very similar to that of an actor who played Iago in Othello in Simon's past life. Unfortunately, he couldn't remember the name.
He spent a lot of time thinking about how to create a homunculus loyal to him. Sharing his soul was out of the question, so after searching through the books Stephanos left and his memory for anything that might have appeared in the films he watched, he finally found something useful. Blood pact.
Simon tried to study this magic for a long time, but unfortunately he had no idea how to use it, and without a good base, trying to perform such a spell was suicide.
Simon, however, used this magic, the proteus spell and the dark mark as inspiration to create a magical mark using his blood as a channeler and fusing it with the homunculus' essence, making him completely loyal to him, almost like a blood curse.
The Homunculus himself was created from his blood, so it was as if he were an extension of himself, and it seemed he was completely loyal to him, even if he had his own conscience.
Looking at the Homunculus in front of him, Simon felt a connection with him and could sense that although the Homunculus didn't really like being stared at, he couldn't really do anything without Simon's order.
- Any discomfort?
- None, it appears.
- Hmm. Let's get some clothes for you first
Leading Envy out of the room, Simon handed him a change of clothes and waited for him to dress. Afterward, they both went to the training room for Simon to check his homunculus abilities while he was slowly recovering.
