Cardinal Sin (1) : Rebirth of the Fullmetal Alchemist

23 - Truth

Everything was white, bleak, without anything but a neverending distance without colour. In this place that existed where no human could attain through travel, there were but two things that stood out from the dull white surroundings.

"I thought I couldn't come back here because I gave up my alchemy," Edward Elric said.

His body was in perfect condition though it had a troublesome amount of blood on it and his clothes were in tatters. He guessed that his head had gotten crushed in the real world (it was unaffected in this place) for his face completely covered his crimson. As for the dagger in his chest, he had pulled it easily from his flesh some time ago and he had not died from blood loss, seeing as the wound had closed up within a second's end. The philosopher's stone had suddenly glowed with a red light and vanished. Supposedly its power was now inside of him.

Now, he was sitting across from a being he truly abhorred.

"Why shouldn't you be able to come here?" Truth asked, a creepy, permanent smile etched on its blank face.

Truth, a being that called itself God, was no more than a pure white human figure that had a thin, mist-like black outline. The only distinguishable feature on its face was the wide smile that never left. As usual, it sat with one knee up, its elbow propped up on it, staring at Ed without an evident presence of eyes.

"Usually I have to perform a human transmutation to come to see your ugly face."

"You killed yourself with a philosopher's stone, and a particularly bad kind at that. It's perfectly normal that you should come here."

"What's the difference between a normal philosopher's stone and the one I committed suicide with?"

"Can't tell."

Ed made a face, quite displeased. "What happens to me now? Where do I go now that I'm dead?"

"You're not going to stay this way, you know? Sure are eager to die."

Ed lurched forwards, eager. "I can go back? I can go back to Winry and Al? Alive?"

"That's part of the deal."

"The deal?"

"Yeah... The homunculus who was known as Dwarf in the Flask at the time Van Hohenheim wrote that message, didn't know everything. If you take your life with that philosopher's stone there, you'll die and inherit its power, but you'll come back to life soon thereafter."

Ed fell back and burst into laughter. It came to him as a complete shock for when he had taken his life, he'd truly believed it was the end and that he would rid the world completely of his existence. Finally, it seemed he wasn't done just yet and for that, he rejoiced.

"When are you sending me back?"

"In a minute now... Your body is fixing itself at the moment. When it's back to normal, you'll be right back to life and you'll have your alchemy again, too. Exiting?"

"Wait—if you die just to come back with all the power of the philosopher's stone, shouldn't there be a catch?" Ed questioned. "A price to pay?"

Truth's grin widened.

Ed was about to demand he be told about this when, all around him, Truth's domain vanished.