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carlatsukinamistolemyhamsandwich · 6 months

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Alright last post before I disappear (save for some reblogs that I've scheduled). In case anyone missed the tags in the post I made a while ago, I've stopped writing for DL. Before I did, I had also taken a stab at writing out the Alchemist result for my fantasy AU quiz. Because of who the LI is for that one I got carried away with it and it ended up being a lot longer than it should have been even though I didn't actually finish it. Given that I'm releasing all of my fantasy AU content into the wild, I've decided to paste what I did write below.

Fair warning, the ending is a little abrupt so I've added a little summary I wrote while planning the AU under the drabble (i.e. what the plot would have been had I ever developed this into a proper fic).

"What were you trying to do to me, alchemist?" The man above you hissed, the blade of his dagger pressing into your neck, his knees digging into your hips as he kept you pinned. Even with one eye covered by an eyepatch, his glare was no less fierce for it, his single iris almost glowing gold in the dying daylight.

This, you swore, was the last time you tried to help someone.

"I told you, all I did was give you an antidote!" You strained away from the metal at your throat but the hard earth beneath you offered nowhere to go. Casting your eyes to the side, you could see your spear just out of arm's reach along with a couple of your more potent concoctions, any one of which would have been enough to blow the guy on top of you away.

In hindsight, it'd been a bit stupid not to keep your weapons next to you when treating some random stranger you'd found passed out next to the road. Admittedly he hadn't seemed like much of a threat at the time, his pretty features covered with a sheen of sweat and his breathing labored as the lord's-bane poison ran its course. There were a dozen or so lacerations over his body, several of which coated in a telltale dark blue sheen. You hadn’t heard of there being any bandits in the area, let alone any with the resources needed to acquire one of the deadliest brews known to man, so you couldn’t imagine how he’d ended up in such a state.

It was an extraordinary stroke of luck that you happened to have the ingredients for an antidote on hand, one which you’d wasted no time cooking up and coaxing down his throat. Of course, had you known he’d pounce on you the second he regained consciousness, you doubted you’d have gone to the trouble.

"Don't bullshit me, you're all just a bunch of lackeys for that no good King Karlheinz, so spill it before I start spilling something else." There was a sting as the dagger cut into the skin of your neck, blood welling up over the blade.

"I swear all I was trying to do was heal you, I'm not even a formally qualified alchemist, I'm just a trainee!" Albeit an overqualified trainee who'd been putting off their exams but you decided whoever this stranger was he didn't need to know that but.

"A trainee?" His eye remained narrowed in suspicion, but you could see him looking over your dark red robes, devoid of the gold embroidery worn by those formally recognised by the King. "Huh."

He made no move to climb off you but you felt the pressure against your throat lessen and nearly sobbed in relief.

"If you're a trainee that means you haven't sworn any binding oaths have you?"

And just like that the relief was gone. Upon gaining formal recognition, all alchemists were required to enter into a pact that forbade them from revealing any alchemical secrets to those outside the royal order. Trainees were a bit of a grey area, usually studying the basics under a master of their choice for a couple of years before joining the order themselvesーthe general consensus was that although more knowledgeable than the common man, they didn't know enough to merit the resources required for the magical pact, and instead would face a severe but mundane punishment if found to step out of line.

It was something you'd always been slightly in fear of, enough so that you'd spent a long time coming up with excuses to avoid the even harsher, magical threat of the pact.

"Well, technically, but一"

"Shut it, that's all I needed to know." The man finally clambered off you, but before you could dart for your weapons, he tossed a heavy tome into your lap.

"Can you read that? And don't even think about lying to me, because if I decide you're no use to me, there's no reason for me not to stick a blade in a you."

Swallowing nervously, you ran your fingers over the thick leather cover. The royal seal was emblazoned in bright gold over the cover, marking out whatever was in here as property of the King and those in his service. How the stranger had gotten a hold of it, you had no idea, but you were starting to understand how he might have ended up in the state you found him in.

You looked up, and upon seeing him watching you like a hawk, you carefully opened the book. Instantly you understand why he'd asked you to read it, the whole was written in complex alchemical script that was a struggle even for you. In fact had you not spent far longer as a trainee than most, you doubted you would have been able to read it at all. Bit by bit though, you managed to piece the contents together, and as you did, you felt your blood turn ice cold.

"Well?"

"It'sーIt's about the creation of an artificial disease, I think they named it Endzeit…"

"I know that," he scowled at you. "What does it say about a cure?"

You hurriedly flicked through the pages, scanning the complicated script.

"Um, there's a lot about the creation and testing, how they designed it to target a specific bloodline and… Ah it mentions a cure here, so maybeー" you turned to the next page only to freeze as you took in the torn off paper hanging from the edge of the spine. "The errーthe page is missing."

"What!" The man snatched the tome from before throwing it to the ground with a snarl. "Damnit! Those filthy no good alchemists, I'll gut the lot of them!"

You flinched back. A more sensible individual would have grabbed their things and run the moment he was distracted, but the sight of the book on the ground held you still, curiosity all but devouring your common sense.

"Who are you exactly?"

"Hm?" The man turned towards you, fingers still curled like he longed to wrap them around someone's throat. "The name's Shin Tsukinami. Ring any bells?"

Tsukinami. The fallen empire.

-end of drabble-

Summary of what the story would have been:

In this AU, rather than being demons, the Tsukinamis are human but one of their ancestors was a great demon and their bloodline became famous for having powerful magic users. Shin didn’t inherit much of the magic but Carla did and is a skilled wizard (Cordelia was a sorcerer).

Karl’s family also mingled with inhuman entities but has sorcerers of the undead bloodline, including Karl himself (or maybe he’s a wizard idk). As per canon Gies was jealous of Karl’s power and declared war but rather than fighting him, Karl tasked his head alchemist (Carnelian Brecht?) with developing a live agent that would target only those with the infernal bloodline (i.e. Endzeit). Endzeit got unleashed and upon hearing that the royals were dropping like flies the people fled and those that didn’t got captured by Karl’s armies. The Tsukinamis were driven to one of their country estates. Giesbach’s died and Carla is now showing symptoms of the disease.

To try to find a cure, Shin decides to hunt down Carnelian and the alchemists that worked with him (many of whom followed the disease to monitor their work). He manages to find some of them and kills a couple. One of them has some notes on how they made Endziet and partial information on a potential cure but it’s written in alchemical script and one of the alchemists taunts Shin that he’ll never be able to read it and even if he can, no alchemist with royal certification will help him because they know they’ll get banished by Karl.

Shin trudges onwards but realises too late that he was poisoned by one of the alchemists (too soon to be Endzeit) and collapses. Enter Reader.

On Reader's way to visit their family from where they’ve been apprenticing as an alchemist in one of the large cities, they run into Shin near death on the road and help him as they can make an antidote. They heal him up, Shin mistakes them for one of Karl’s alchemists and gets aggressive but they’re able to clear things up before Reader gets their head cut off. They reveal that they can read alchemical script and have been following the progress of artificial diseases because they found the idea interesting but they didn’t realise they’d actually made this much progress.

Shin works out that Reader might be able to make the antidote and thinks that they’ll be weak enough for him to bully into doing it even with the threat of Karl but jokes on him because they disagree with Karl’s way of governing things and am happy to go along with it (in other words Reader gets kidnapped but doesn’t quite realise).

At some point Shin and Reader encounter some sort of monsters. They get separated and Shin deals with his lot and then thinks that he’ll have to save Reader only to find them with a bunch of smouldering monster corpses (and along with that comes the reveal that they're not just a healer). Queue a slow burn romance featuring the Reader, i.e. the oblivious idiot, and Shin, there’s no way I can have feelings for some soft dumb alchemist Tsukinami.

#warning I haven't edited this at all so if there are errors then my bad #this may be the last thing I ever post featuring Shin #which is sad but I definitely picked the right time to move on #right back into the ether I go #take care all!

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