The beggar had been traveling none stop since he had left the sanctuary, through the lush forests of North Cliff and now through the hot black sands of Hassan, it was truly a odd land change, from sun and lush plants do a land that appeared to have been scorched by the fire of hell itself and the sky had the life sucked from it leaving nothing but utter darkness though during the day it appeared this place was stuck in a eternal dusk, or sunrise depending on your point of view. The beggar liked it here, though he could of done without all the heat, but it was a desert so he didn't expect any less. But all that didn't matter now, what mattered now was what was before him, the oddly colored ruins of Hassan, the once wonderful city of jade, he had stepped foot in it once when it was at its peak and it was truly a sight to behold, but now he liked it abit more, though it could do without the ruins, that was why he was here now.


When he got closer to the ruins he noticed that there were fresh tracks of a cart, or something leading to the ruins, he beat it was their way of bringing food and water in since the tracks headed north towards more populated regions and a water supply. When he actually got into the ruins he saw things that would probably pry at the heart strings of some softy, little children huddling in shadows hoping to reduce the heat, their clothing soaked through with sweat, mothers crying as they hold the corpses of their newborns, the babies unable to survive in the harsh temperatures, greedy bastard wasting water throwing it all over themselves after they beat other people senseless for it. Though it did show the worst of humans, the best shine through in the soldiers, they kept the woman safe offering them water, trying to save all they could out of a false sense of loyalty towards the General that was dead for all they knew, but they knew little about that creature.


The time is now, he stepped behind a pillar and when he came back into a view he had the appearance of a much younger man, a man with medium length wild black hair and the black eyes that seemed to pierce the souls of whomever they fell upon, his clothing was dark, the shirt tight showing off his finely tuned body though his pants are slightly looser, lastly his military like boots and the long back scarf he kept up, covering his mouth. The only proof remaining that he was indeed the old man was his staff. The onlookers at the time simply blinked before shaking their heads, most of them writing it off as a hallucination created by the heat.

The beggar then made his way directly towards a barrel of water the the large people in line to with buckets and cups hoping to get a little relief, it was a perfect spot to begin. Stepping up onto a fallen pillar he stood looking down at the pitiful people with a grin on his face," People is this how you wish to continue living? drying up in the middle of this hell hole waiting for salvation, slowly tearing away at these soldiers kindness, expecting them to save your sorry hides, it is truly sickening in my eyes. Don't you all have your own legs? Don't you all have your own arms? Don't you have your lives? Why waste them sitting around here, you got buildings, you got materials just a couple miles out of town, you have the man power to make this bloody place livable? You soldiers, Atrox left these people in your hands, you know you can do more for them, you are Zaleran soldiers, so what if your Lord is MIA, so what if your General is dead, you have these people here looking up to you men, now show them what you can do, if any guidance I will aid you with ideas," Yelled The beggar drawing the attention of everyone, mainly the soldiers present at the time, they knew this man and so did some of the refugees, it was Sieg the blue winged angel that helped them when the leviathan crashed. This was the beginning, as the soldiers stepped forward and bowed their heads, they wanted his ideas to survive, if that golem did one thing right this was it, he became human enough to gain the faith of the people and now the Beggar would take over, guiding this people during his recovery, "What is it you all beg for? what ever it be you can grasp it with your own hands if you are willing to struggle, now get your water and return to your shadows and crevasses, tell your friends and family, that tomorrow we meet in the center of this place and I will tell you what you must do to survive." With that he grinned at the soldiers and refugees before stepping down from his pillar and walking off towards the center of the ruins.

" though they can achieve what they beg for, I can not.. nothing but a hypocrite."

After leaving the relative comfort of North Cliff the old man had led them south, true to his word, towards the cursed black desert. Somewhere between then and the present Shiro had found time to speak with a merchant on the trail and traded in his wooden staff for a lighter and more managable bronze of similar length.

Looking all around him it was easy to see the so many reasons he had avoided this place for his entire life up to this point; however, in the end he hoped to learn enough for this to have been worth the sweat - and sweat there was certainly plenty. Long before the alchemist had bared down to the lightest clothing he owned and packed everything else in his satchel.

'At least now there be some dang tracks,' the thought passed as what appeared to be cart tracks against the sands. Shortly thereafter they were entering what appeared to be little more than ruins with numerous reminders of just how far humanity could fall. Compared to his own upbringing you never saw this, even in the slums it had never been this bad.

Thinking back the difference was obvious, at least back in Galem people actually had the will to fight for a better living - looking around at these wretches they had little will to survive let alone flourish. These thoughts were put on hold, however, when Shiro noticed that the old man somehow had changed his entire appearance. He couldn't mistake that staff in a place like this.

Steps just a few more and the Beggar had made his presence known to all that sorrounded the drinking well. If he didn't know better he wouldn't believe what he was seeing, that same man that staggered the whole way here was preaching to these people with the appearance of a much younger man.

Wanting to stay nearby the alchemist had made sure that he was at the base of the spire and made the act of being just as inspired by his words as those in rags around him were. After stepping down Shiro walked to his side, "Can grasp it with ye' own hands eh, wise words Beggar... What brings us all the ways down here, spreadin' hope?"

"... Simple, you live as long as I have you look upon this pitiful people and wonder, why is their people such as them alive when i have struggled my entire life to survive and lived to the best of my abilities, you simply wish for the next generation to share your ideals and move forward... in the end it is upto them.. especially once i tell them they have to they all have to make the trek across this wasteland to a fortress that fell not too long ago... going to offer my thanks to some old warriors there and then move onto the forest where we can ask for the elves for aid and hopefully get some of these people care... from there who knows, I am no savior.. the boy I am masquerading as is.. but I have no clue where he went after here.. my connection with him was broken when he remembered everything and sent me back to my "body".. don't ask what happened after that it isn't very pretty..." said the beggar as he waved his hand at his companion dismissingly as he ducked under fallen pillars and stepped over other random bits of debri the desert had yet to absorb. Once it was out of the sight of the chattering masses he reverted back to his normal raggedy appearance. If one could see his mouth you would notice he wasn't very pleased with what he saw here.

".. Either way we rest here tonight... will find out the verdict tomorrow, if you have any questions I am all ears for now, if you wanna make guesses at my question you can also give me those," said the beggar as he finally came to a stop inside a partially destroyed building, it was probably a little stone hobble once though now it was lacking part of its roof and its northern wall had collapsed. He moved to one of its walls and took a seat his back against it and his green eyes staring blankly up into the dark sky, he need to relax for a little bit, he hadn't fought in a long time and holding that form did take some energy though he knew he would be fine by the time morning came, ".. But before you do, What do you beg for boy? what is it you quest in this life?"

Looking down at his own hands the thought came swiftly, 'Move forward...' For most of his younger years no matter how hard he'd pushed himself or been pushed by those who'd taught him Shiro had always needed to continue moving further in his studies. As the Beggar went on down his list the alchemist was snapped back to reality.

'Just as I thought, some kind a' mind reader. What with jumping bodies it proves it.' All the while e'd been following shortly behind the old man; after the passing of fallen pillars he had once again taken on the form Shiro had been more accustomed to. Taking his own position opposite the beggar he stood raising hands to the sky. 'No matter how far I go it's always the same sky.'

Turning back downwards the response came in a hushed voice - "I beg for naught but a future where we who're diff'rnt get tha' respect we be deservin," a slight chuckle escaped, "and that I be havin' a smithy of me own one day for someone important." In essence that was the truth. The bigger aspect of where he wanted to end up in the future...

(OOC: sorry it took so long, I tried posting with my room mates internet but it didn't go through and then went down for some reason...)

"Hmm.. it is more sincere then most people's, most beg for money, women, love, wealth, power though all of them can be achieved by ones own power, except mine because of the mindset everyone is born with... all i do now is look upon this world and hang my head in shame," said the beggar as he shook his head his beard swaying back and forth it looked sort of like a crappy broom or something at the moment to tell ya the truth.

"I'll tell you a little bit about this world we live in. alchemists harmonize with the world around them and in return the elements allow themselves to be manipulated, though alchemists have to limit themselves to only a few select elements since obviously the world does not wish to give power over all of its elements to one person, the people that take harmonizing to the next level are druids and in my personal opinion they are the ones who do the planet the least amount of harm, next your dark magics such as mine, they sacrifice leaving energy in order to cast spells, so simply to more I use my magic the closer i get to death this art is also a clean one but that depends on the person using it since the dark magics can cause great damage to the planet if it is used to do so, last of the magic magics is your normal black magic oh looky i summon a fireball type of magic, now these mages are probably the ones to be feared, but they are also the ones who will eventually kill the very planet we live on in my opinion, obviously we don't have enough energy within our bodies to cast some of these spells, so where does the access come from? " the beggar then paused and eyed Shiro, he wanted to see if the boy knew this little bit of hidden knowledge, if he did he would definitely have to give the man some credit.

(( np sorry for the talker lol))

"Damned mages, if ye' be askin' for me thoughts I'll try and put it to words. As a lad I was brought up taught of another realm beyond what we be seein' 'ere in front of us. To me it's close to what you say; where those like me can speak with the earth, or what element have you, and Druids speak with the world and its creatures these self appointed mages draw from that other world..." even as the words escaped a piece of stone under palm shattered into pieces.

"To me every time they draw on this energy they tear at the seams dividing our realms. But then," silence. Shiro flashed back to the dream he'd had of his true father. 'At least that's what he had said,' looking to the ground he realized his palm had been clenched tight. "but then not all of us are as we seem as I am startin' to realize. Sincere, bah! No such thing. I just be finding contentment in learnin' what there be ta' learn and stayin' out of sight..."

The facts were simple and esecually obvious after Galem - he had alot to learn before he could ever truly settle down and live such a humble life. "S'pose the bright side be that so long as this fightin' stays at it my talents will be needed. Without war I'd 'ave nothing to smith but shoes for horses." just the thought brought a chuckle despite their uncomfortable travels. 'An' so long as there be fightin' there'll be more ta' learn about the elements.' Shofting weight to a more comfortable position he continued, "I hear the whispers at me forge, well I did when I still 'ad a place to call home. Me hopes that one day I'll learn how to speak to the metals rather than just listening. But 'ow about you? If it brings you closer to death why keep fighting?"

".. Hmm a interesting outlook on it, but there is another opinion on what energy the mages draw from, fifty percent of it is from their own energy and the other fifty is the very life energy this planet is based off of, there has been some proof of this to one of my old friends was a healer, a marvelous one she drew the very energy from her enemies bodies and used it to strength her own healing spells, one time she took this too far and attempt to heal a entire army at once, the results shook her to her core the plant life that was around them started to wither and die cause of how much energy the spell took, after that she spent a couple weeks trying to mend the planets and such hoping to make up for her mistake though using a magic that drains the very planet's life to heal it is kinda redundant... either way in the end she started to center on a way to use more of her own energys and her opponents energy to use her spells and stop using the planets though it was a difficult task, don't know what she is ding now though probably wandering around somewhere.." said the Beggar as he chuckled after his story, it had been awhile since he had thought about the past none the less that woman, he was truly thankful to her for a couple unknown reasons," well now I use my power because it does kill me instead of the planet, that is why i see dark mages in all thier gruesome glory to be one of the more purer mages, also i get scars for every life i take so its a fair exchange."

The beggar then stood up and pull at a portion of the chest on his robe revealing a rather large hole that had been covered by a portion of tattered cloth and then slowly guided the hole to his right side to reveal that the skin on the right side of his chest was black and decaying leaving some hints of muscle and bone mass mixed in with the darkness of the skin, " with each spell i sacrifice a portion of my skin after all my skin has decayed I'll start to sacrifice my muscles and then once that is gone i will die, these sacrifices can be healed but it takes alot of energy and would almost completely drain some of the highest level of mages, even after being healer it would still decay faster then normal, soon i would have to sacrifice a whole arm to cast single spell.. all i can do is delay the unavoidable and while i live watch the foolish mortals of this world run about leading their pointless lives into the ground... either way like all immortals I'll end up like a mortal over live a pointless life forever, but that isn't true immortality..." the beggar then sighed quietly and stared blankly at the ground before taking a seat once again falling silent as he pondered his thoughts.

Just as quickly as praise had been given the same as a reprimand was licked out in another theory as to how the mages drew their power. The more he listened the truth he saw in the words, however, and Shiro took it in fold with his own thoughts and how he'd grown up on thoughts behind this strength. Even more then these words the scars on the beggars body showed that at least when it came to the dark arts the beggar had far more knowledge.

"So if I be followin' ye then you was born immortal and yet ye choose to toss that away in order to live? I s'pose I could understand that if living for all time not really mean anything at all if ye don't do anythin' with it." Lowering his head in though, "But then it seems me an awful way to go, y'er own body givin' out on ye. That the case though it seems as if ye do alot more 'n what ye should to me."

Pulling spear from its holster the alchemist began to wipe it down, removing what sand he could from the small engravings in the metal. "I still say that it's a bit of both a' what we be sayin' about them mages. Mayhaps it kills the earth because it tears on what borders there are, but then we could both be wrong... Either way I'm with ye now and says that should there be need you'll have me staff, alls I ask is to learn from what ye have to be sayin' to me..."

".. No I first begged for immortality and I supposedly achieved it after abit of struggle and with alittle bit of help from that healer i told you of, but how i did it I will keep to myself since it isn't real immortality but more of a cheap mortal knock of that keeps you young forever," explained the beggar before he looked up at Shiro and grinned before nodding his hairy head, " Whether you learn from what i say is your on choice, you just know that to learn from me you must follow me and I will tell ya now the road won't be smooth... for the first lesson I suggest taking some time of meditation and work on bettering your connection with the earth and from there work on away to make it flow with you in combat, you probably know this but if you try to force control you just waste access energy, if yo want a real tutor you just might find one traveling with me especially if we run into a old commander i know, he was able create and control acres upon acres of his own element and decimate everything in his immediate radius while the flames that were but a centimeter from him never burnt him, he was one of the better alchemists that i know of.. next to a certain pirate i have heard of on my travels but considering the fact he is a pirate i doubt he will be taking on students... either way I am gonna take a nap now, you have better rest up as well we have a long day ahead."

"A long road eh, the days behind us make who we are an' the days ahead are a gift to change. I worry not 'bout the rocks on the road for they smooth beneath me feet," even as he words escaped a slight laugh escaped. "A'corse that be on account of me affinity fer the earth I s'pose. I'll try an' listen to yer words though"

Setting the spear down, satisfied with the cleaning he'd done, Shiro prepared to meditate like he had done since starting his training. Legs crossed the boy began to become one with the terrain. The fallen columns beneath, walls and ceiling above. Every grain of sand and pebble of stone became an extension of the alchemist' spirit.

For the first time since being with his uncle Shiro could finally just relax in peace with the world around him. Just sitting in this fallen down ramble of would be shelter the boy could feel so much more then just himself. As the night sky shone brightly slowly the boy lost all sense of time and even the beat of his heart as chest rose and fell. Slowly he slept into a sleep still retaining his connection with the soil around him..

The beggar was dreaming his normal dream, a dream of nothingness a dead sleep as some would say, he never dreamed and never tried to, dreams were created of fear and pleasures, he tried to avoid having either, they created connections with people he didn't want created in the first place, besides he didn't fear anything other then his own demise and didn't think pleasure was necessary for life. What happened next though annoyed him more then anything as for once in a long time a dream started to form.

The beggar stepped forward, standing tall as he stepped past the man and stared down that the planet before grinning wickedly as suddenly the planet itself seemed to burst into flames, Multiple pillars of smoke slowly rising from the scorched planet, ".. You don't enter a psychics dream and expect things to go your way... but I'll say this what you see now is what the planet will look like if what you say is true, but in order to achieve your goal this is what it will look like," the beggar said before snapping his fingers and then suddenly, the world blew up sending chucks of the planet sailing past them into the darkness of space along with trails of lava and pieces of cities, " As long as people exist there will be conflict, there will be the filthy and hideous along with the strong and righteous and even the most righteous can fall."

When he finished the world reverted back to the way it was, though it was slightly different, it looked newer as if it had never been touched, the dark world vanished and became just another forest though from the looks of it, it was stuck in endless winter, the desert of hassan had golden sands as a desert should and not a single human building could be seen within it no matter how hard you looked, " The only thing that could of saved this planet was if we had never arrived, but no we came and brought things with us that shouldn't of existed though those decayed and vanished as time went on, now we have magic.. a even worse scourge then the mortals you wish to remove, if it was up to me I would take magic from everyone and give it back to the creator before telling him to kiss my ass for letting something so horrid run into the hands of man.. but it isn't up to me so we continue to live as we do now... now get lost and leave me to the darkness of sleep."

~~~~~~~~

With that The beggar banished the man from his mind and awoke from the dream, finding himself staring at Shiro who apparently fell asleep meditating or just fell asleep as such, he couldn't tell since he couldn't sense the working of alchemy.
"... This planet is going to see more troubles in the future.. if it isn't magic it is the mortal stupidity," The beggar whispered to himself as he stood up and stretched before warping his image to the of the man he used yesterday and slowly exited the building, his eyes staring off towards the rising sun a small grin on his face as he did, " either way this is one of the multiple beginnings I have in my life.. hopefully it won't be the last."

Hours passed and the Beggar stood alone in the center of the ruins in the image of Sieg Vesica, the supposed hero of the Leviathan crash who got some of the people of the ship alive before the Aesir burned it. When the sun would normally be its highest people started to show, first it was just curious bystanders of yesterday's speech, then came the soldiers carrying with them the essentials, jugs of water, packs of dried goods, medical supplies whatever would be needed for the next stage of the Beggar's plan.

When the meeting ground was nearly full The beggar turned and faced the majority of the crowd and smiled gently, " I thank you for showing your trust in me today citizen's of Ascantha and soldiers of Zaleran, now i will show you it was not miss placed," The beggar yelled his voicing seeming to echo over the ruins, no one questioned his voice for a obvious reason, sieg barely spoke during their original encounters, " Today we leave this waste land and head to the east, to the ruins of a once great fortress, once there we will rest and recover, the temperatures and such should be milder and it will be a good relief for the people, after that we head northeast to the forest there we shall make camp and live there for the time being, it has abundant resources and enough area to keep ourselves hidden from enemies, but I won't cloud your judgment with ideas of hope, this journey will be long and strenuous, some of you may not make it, but ask yourselves this, would you rather stay here and die a slow death or get off your arses and move forward to a place that may provide you with Salvation?" With that the beggar turned and started to walk through to crowd and head towards the desert, a smile on his face as he heard the murmurs of the populace behind him grow louder, many of them overjoyed about the idea of getting out of the desert though there were a few very skeptical about the plan.

"I leave in a hour, all those who wish to come with me get your things and meet me to the east, all those who wish to stay may god be with you," with that The beggar exited the meeting and head to the eastern border of the ruins leaving the populace to their discussions, then a hour passed and the entire populace of the ruins left the ruins in silence once again with the Beggar leading the way.