//------------------------------// // Ventral // Story: Balance // by BioQuillFiction //------------------------------// 1500 AD on Earth You’d think a doctor would be treated as an item in a noble house, but this is not the case in my home, well, the noble home I live in. They hired me when the plague was beginning to enter Spain, and with my herbal and medical knowledge, I’ve kept them all healthy and safe from the plague’s grasp. It’s been four years since then. The plague is almost gone, but sadly thousands perished in it’s path. “Dr. Ventral.” I turned from my notes, seeing Sofia Romero, the middle child of the Romero nobal home, and the girl who’s life I saved more than a few times. When I was first hired she caught the cold, though her family mistook it for the plague. Some herbs and hot soup later she was walking around fine again. “Why do you always look at those notes?” “A doctor should keep sharp Lady Sofia, and please, call me Nicolás, that is my name.” “I like Ventral better.” She said, walking into my office. “It’s so… unique.” “I don’t know where it comes from honestly.” I spoke while still reading my notes. “I tried looking it up but no records of any region have such a name, all I know is that my father said it was my mother’s favorite word, whatever it means.” I said, opening the next scroll. “You need to get out more, you know?” “So your father says also. If I was out when something happened I might not make it back in time.” “Well then… why not have one at home?” “How would that work?” She took my scroll away, and stared at me right in the eyes, mere centimeters from my face. “Uhh… Oh.” She smiled as she stepped back. “I’ll be in the backyard if you want me~” She spoke in a very unlady like tone as she left. I snapped out of my stupor and put my notes away before leaving. Sofia and I had been courting for three years, finally we told her father of our plans to marry and he was thrilled. He threw a grand party to celebrate, he often feared Sofia’s brash attitude would scare suitors away, so this was grand news for him. By year’s end she was with child and I was taking every caution in ensuring her, and our children, are healthy when born. Her four other sisters also married and two were with child by new year's early spring. I had my work cut out for me. The months passed and I noticed Sofia had grown… larger, than she should. After some research and words nor wisdom from the church, we realised she was pregnant with triplets, something more rare than twins in this region. When her father found out he threw another party, the old lord really liked parties. By next year's spring Sofia was in labor, and it was for sure a hard one. In the end, she and our three sons survived the birth. The first born we named Miguel, the second, Gabriel, and the third, Alphonso. The lord, now a proud grandfather, threw yet another party for his three grandsons birth. It was the first and only time I partook in alcohol and whatever I did, I woke up next to Sofia in a barn four miles from our home. Thankfully the lord had a better tolerance and looked after the children. Years had passed and the children were showing signs of… issues that worried Sofia and I greatly. Miguel never spoke, he didn’t even make noise when scared or hurt like most children do. Gabriel had beautiful blue eyes when he was born, but as he grew up they became grey like fog, and Alphonso never responded to calls, even when they were to warn him of something he never responded. It didn’t take long for us to realize, our children were missing crucial functions. Miguel his voice, Gabriel his sight, and Alphonso his hearing. When we informed the lord, he immediately ordered them kept inside at all times. I found out why soon after, the old stories about the three wise monkeys of Japan. The church finds all things relating to any other religion other than that of christianity unlawful, and anyone partaking in such acts, or affiliated, will be hanged for injustice against god and the church. For the next ten years our sons had lived inside at all times, the only times they saw a priest was the one the lord had sent in from outside the country, for baptisms and funerals. Sadly, a new gardener the lord had hired, and a blind follower to the church, found out about the boys, and regretfully, the church came bashing down our doors within days. * * * “That should do it Tomas, just some of these herbs boiled in tea and that sore throat should be gone.” “Thank you Gabriel.” Mr. Thomas said in his scratchy voice. From what I could make out during his physicals he was a generally healthy man, though, this last winter was rather harsh, lots of surgeries involving falls and broken legs. My family and everyone in the english town we now call home are amazed by me, blind all my life yet I can give the exact herb needed by smell, the smell of the herb and the person, and I can perform surgeries and amputations with minimal help, usually father or one of my brothers hands me the tools, I take care of the rest. The door shutting signaled me Mr. Thomas had left, and I felt the firm arm of my father pat my head. “You really are a miracle, you know that?” Father said. “So you keep saying.” I reply, removing his hand from my head. It has been fourteen years since the church in spain broke into our home and tried to kill my brothers and I, with grandfather’s help, we escaped… but mother made a wrong turn in the chaos, and while we rode away on horsebacks her lifeless body was hung from the tallest tree from that home. At least, that’s what father mumbles and curses in his sleep, he never told us the whole story, but his sleep talk betrayed him. “We’re running out of the herbs for pain, I’ll be heading out to gather some.” “You sure you can handle it alone?” “I’m almost thirty father, so are my brothers. We may be… broken, but we are not helpless.” I say, grabbing my basket and heading out. I knew the forest behind our home as good as the inside of our home. The herbs for pain largely grew near the waterfall, and thankfully, my hearing gave me a decent sense of direction. Luck was not on my side this day, few herbs had grown from what I could find. I was worried, lots of people are still recovering from their winter injuries and we’ll need more- ”Oph!” I didn’t realize someone was in front of me as we hit. From what I… felt… it was a woman, and from the sounds only I fell. “I am sorry… miss?” A hand reached out, taking mine, startling me, and helped me up. “Yes, who are you?” She asked, her voice was soft… like mothers was. “Oh, Gabriel Ventral. I work with my father and brothers as the town doctors. I was getting herbs and as you can see… heh… I couldn’t find much.” “Not easy for a blind man to gather herbs.” “Blind I may be, but I am not helpless.” I retort. She laughs. “Fair enough. Tell me… Doctor… do you carry any herbs to treat cuts? On my way into town some fool left a nail in the road and I wasn’t paying attention and it scratched the bottom of my foot.” “Huh, well we do have some herbs for infections and herbs that aim in the mending. You’ll still have to be charged as everyone else.” “How about a barter?” “Barter or what?” “Well you see, I’m a witch on the run from the spanish church. For helping me I can give you an… elixir of mine, it will restore your sight.” I laughed. “I’ll give you the herbs solely out of the fact I think you’re a tad mad miss.” I say, walking in the direction that would be home. As I made my way in and called out, no one answered, father and my brothers must have gone into town for the dinner items. I walked over to our herb drawers, quickly finding the one we kept the mending and anti infection herbs in, handing her two of each. “These will do?” “Grind with water into a paste, then apply to the cut. Just a few trimmings of the herb should be ground at a time, make it last longer.” “Thank you.” She said, the sound of something glass being placed on a table. “As promises, one elixir of sight.” I chuckled. “If you say so ma’am.” “You’ll see soon enough, everything has a price.” She said as the door slammed, signaling me she had left. Her parting words were odd to me, but she was clearly not in her right mind. I found the small glass jar with the ‘elixir’ she had placed onto our dining table and felt the bottle. It was very tiny, smaller than a shot glass at the pub, but the top was bottlenecked, a cork stuck in it. I popped it open, smelling it. “Smells like… strawberries and honey…” It did smell good. Well, Solo se vive una vez.” I said, drinking the ‘elixir’ fast. It did taste like honey and strawberries. After drinking it my stomach apparently didn’t agree… “Damn it…” I moan, making my way to, someone's bed, and collapsing on it. It has been a month since the witch gave me that elixir, and it was, I thought, a godsend. When father and my brothers came home and woke me up, I screamed at first, actually seeing my father and brothers faces. Seeing my own felt especially odd, but I could not believe it, I had sight! In my reflection, my hair was a dark black, my skin tone a light brown, and my eyes… a dark red. Father swears when I was born they were blue, but it has been years so who knows. I took a week to just… see things, things that I had to feel or describe I could now see and above all, the sunsets and sunrises were the best part of sight. So many think of it as a common thing, when they’re events or beauty. Unfortunately… somehow, my parents didn’t get as much joy. Now that I could see, they were getting more and more ill… and two weeks ago I… lost some one on an amputation, something that I had done dozens of times blind and now… someone died…That witch gave me sight, but she took away my gift to heal.... All my hands bring now is death. When word reached the church about my deal with a witch, my family tried to persuade them to not bother with it, but they were mercilus. They cut my father and brothers down before me, burned our home and sent me off to be hanged in public. I now sit in my cell, waiting for them to drag me to the nuce. “Hey doctor boy.” The guard at my cell said. “Times almost out, any last words?” “You and this church will pay for killing my family… just like you killed my mother years ago.” “Different church, same punishment. You will hang and join your sinful family in hell demon eyes.” “You all fear things that you do not understand, brand it as evil and just kill it… you church dogs disgrace god and his teachings.” “Why you!” The guard shouted, unlocking the cell and stomping in. “I think the church won’t mind hanging an already dead man.” I don’t know what happened next, I just reacted. I jumped up, kicking him into the wall and just started… choking him, I felt the pain of watching my mother’s body hang from a tree, my brothers and father killed in front of me. Crack I snapped out of it at that point. I squeezed him so hard I… I cracked his neck. I felt something wash over me, not guilt, nor sorry… I felt joy, pride and above all… vengence. I grabbed his sword and ran out. If I now have the hands of death, let’s see how much I can bring! * * * Josh placed his ancestor's diary down. Before some kinda magic kept Core from setting foot on earth, he managed to find this lost record of the Ventral family, kept locked away by the same english church that the first Ventral killer escaped from. He had been reading it over since Core had brought it, more often than not, wondering about the witch, and this elixir. “Core?” He asked sitting on a chair in one of Core’s many labs. “What is it?” Core responded, typing on a large computer of sorts. “What was this witch, and this elixir, no magic has even existed on earth, so what the fuck?” “I have an idea, but until Zeke activates his Killing Mood I won’t know for sure.” “Didn’t Eclipse trigger his already?” “Yes, but somehow he is repressing it, so any data from that will be unclear.” “Alright…? So why did you cut off Zeke’s legs?” “I’m stepping forward with all of them, pushing them forward to reach my goal. If we went all out now it won’t be a long fight at all, we need them all stronger in order to later stand a chance against that god and I’m not talking about my brother.” “Right. So basically, you’re at your limit for this realm, and you’ll need them at their limits to get stronger when you do the thing… Ugh, this multiverse, multiverse crap is weird.” “If you aren't going to be useful in the lab then go mess with the Foretellers, don’t hold back too much, and bring her with you.” “Well, at least I get to kill people, even if there are a shit tone of keyblade wielders there.” “Be sure if you kill any of them to gather their Keyblades, we’ll need more for Project Puppet.” “Got it boss.” Josh said as he was leaving, eager to see what the last original Foreteller, Ava, could do.