| rdfs:comment | - Born the second son of Trisha Elric and Van Hohenheim of Resembool in the year 1900, Alphonse's first few years were relatively peaceful and happy despite the short-lived abuse of his older brother Edward; but after the sudden disappearance of his father during the toddler's formative years, Al was left with his mother and brother as his only family. The three Elrics lived in peace in the rural village and the boys began displaying a remarkable talent for alchemy at a young age, much to the joyful astonishment of their mother. However, early in the year 1904, Trisha contracted an illness that had been spreading in the area and died, leaving her two sons orphaned. Alphonse, devastated by the loss of his mother, began to fear that he and his brother would not be able to survive without her,
|
| abstract | - Born the second son of Trisha Elric and Van Hohenheim of Resembool in the year 1900, Alphonse's first few years were relatively peaceful and happy despite the short-lived abuse of his older brother Edward; but after the sudden disappearance of his father during the toddler's formative years, Al was left with his mother and brother as his only family. The three Elrics lived in peace in the rural village and the boys began displaying a remarkable talent for alchemy at a young age, much to the joyful astonishment of their mother. However, early in the year 1904, Trisha contracted an illness that had been spreading in the area and died, leaving her two sons orphaned. Alphonse, devastated by the loss of his mother, began to fear that he and his brother would not be able to survive without her, but twisted hope returned to the boy's heart when Edward vowed that the two of them would find a way to bring their dear mother back to life with the power of alchemy. Alphonse and Edward spent the next few years living on their own in the Elric family home, supported by their close childhood friend Winry Rockbell and her grandmother Pinako, while pursuing the alchemical knowledge necessary for their planned resurrection. Although they had gained a great deal of information and comprehension regarding the extended basics of the craft, before long it became apparent to the young prodigies that there was only so far they could go while being self-taught. In a stroke of good fortune, Resembool was visited by an exceptionally skilled alchemist named Izumi Curtis who, after some persuasion, agreed to take the Elric brothers on as her apprentices provided they pass a preliminary test. She brought the boys to Yock Island near the town of Dublith in the southern region, where she informed them that they were to survive for one full month without alchemy. If, at the end of their ordeal, they could correctly explain the concept "One is All and All is One", they would begin their training under her wing. While there, the brothers discovered self-reliance and gained new abilities and insights relevant to living in the world under their own power from having to forage and hunt for food as well as fend off periodic attacks from Mason, an employee at the Curtises' butcher shop who had disguised himself as a masked wild man at Izumi's behest. Coming to understand together that, as humans, they are but a small part of the world and universe as a whole, but that the world and universe cannot exist without a collective of small parts, the boys were able to fully comprehend Izumi's riddle by the time she returned and, as such, the Elric brothers were subjected to Izumi's intensive alchemy and martial arts training for the next five months, growing significantly in both mind and body and gaining a great deal of alchemical knowledge before returning to Resembool. Though instructed specifically by Izumi to understand that death is an irreversible part of the flow of the world and that acceptance of such is important to the "One is All, All is One" concept, the boys dove headlong into their plan to resurrect their mother upon their homecoming, having advanced their knowledge while abroad and discovered the basics to a forbidden practice called Human Transmutation. Devising a Human Transmutation Circle, amassing the elemental ingredients for an adult human body and offering their own blood as soul and biological data, the boys secretly initiated the Human Transmutation secretly in their home. Unfortunately, the Human Transmutation resulted in a Rebound; Alphonse and Edward were pulled into The Gate. Encountering the mysterious being called Truth, Alphonse was forced into the stream of the Gate's vast alchemical knowledge and forced to witness as the Truth stripped him of his physical body as toll for crossing into God's domain. Returned to the human dimension, Alphonse's errant soul attached itself to the soulless, inhuman creature that had resulted from the failed transmutation as it struggled futilely to survive. Incapable of sustaining life, the grotesque body died, allowing Alphonse's soul to once again wander toward the other side. When Alphonse next regained consciousness, he discovered that his soul had been bound alchemically to an antique suit of armor with a Blood Rune, and that his brother was sitting in a pool of blood - his right arm and left leg "taken". With the trauma of the tragedy, Alphonse's memories of the Gate, the Truth and his existence in the failed body became repressed. In a panic, Alphonse carried his brother to the Rockbells' house, begging Pinako to save Edward's life. During the night, after Edward's emergency surgery was completed successfully, Alphonse discovered the true tragedy of his new body. Incapable of physical sensation and sleep, he began to feel detached from others and lamented the long solitude of restless night. The two boys remained in a lamentable state of shame and grief over their tragedy for some time, until the visiting officer Roy Mustang confronted Edward and persuaded him to join the State Alchemist program. Promising to use the system to find a way to restore their bodies, Edward underwent an operation to attach custom-built automail and, a year later, he applied for a received his state certification. On October 3rd of 1911, the boys burnt down their family home and left Resembool on a journey to return to normal.
|
