Ygfldm

Once upon a time, in the times of olden, back in the times where trolls, dragons, witches, and orcs roamed about. The days when humanity assumed superiority over life, death, and creation. In a land far away, where trees toppled over everyone and everything, mountains were topped with snow, castles were as prevalent as frog feet in a magic potion. There lived the wisest man to ever live, the Grand Wizard Ygfldm, master of magic, conjures, spells, potions, summoning, etcetera. He was above all humans in terms of knowledge, for he predicts all actions that are bound to happen, deciphers any riddle that tangles the mind, and unravels every mystery humanity was yet to understand.

It all started with his self-separation from civilization, at a young age, which gave the grand wizard ample time to meddle with nature and concoct anything he so desires. Nothing could impede his most joyful plan, to create every possible potion, spell, and enchantment idealized by anyone. He was free to roam through the woods and explore every creature in site, taking shaves from unicorn horns, an eye from a blind cyclops, feathers from the queen harpy, and many more through his journey.

Over the next few decades, the wise one amounted to the biggest arsenal of potion bottles, books with hundreds of pages filled with spells and enchantments. Certainly, amused with what he accomplished, he also knew that this knowledge should be passed down to a worthy pupil, someone with the same tenacity as he did in his youth, someone with an unquenchable thirst for learning, someone that is willing to carry on his dream. He decided he needed a disciple.

With his sight straight, the masterful old man ventured into civilization once again, after being familiarized with any other creature that was not human. Setting a tent with a sign prompting for a new helper and apprentice. There was a second sign, though this one stated, with big bold red letters, WARNING: THIS IS A DANGEROUS TASK WITH INTENSE MENTAL HARDSHIPS. IT IS NOT MEANT FOR THE WEAK. Evidently, no one came to visit or ask questions about the tent. Not until a young woman waltzed right in front of him demanding that she should be the new apprentice.

Caught off guard, the grandmaster did not know how to react to this type of jovial desire. Nevertheless, he still questioned her reasons to join his teachings. Her answer was simple, “I want to explore nature and become a worldly known female wizard.” Abundantly astonished, the grandmaster insisted on not letting her come along, for the dangers of this country may attack. But as an empowered youthful woman, she persisted until she accomplishes.

Understandably, the wizard would be constantly worried for her safety, but, once again, she insisted that she can and will defend herself from any malicious intent. Taking this determination into account, Ygfldm decided to take her as his pupil, for one because no one else was willing to sacrifice heart and soul for a dangerous lifetime task, and second, she had the spirit and determination to do this ordeal.

Not long after this decision, the wise one rode his magic cloud and with his staff, he propelled to the tallest mountain in all the land where his living and experimental settings were poised. Almost like a house in the sky, covered in clouds to hide its presence, and to make it more difficult for any stalker in search of his knowledge. As a bonus, it had a great view of each direction, North, South, East, and West, he could admire the rise and fall of the sun, as well as bask in the full glory of a brightly lit night sky filled with tiny white dots on a black blanket.

Always amazed by his work, the grand wizard commenced the training for the youth. Many years of triumphant and disastrous moments lead to the worst possible course of events to ever cross Ygfldm’s life. A horrifying scenario occurred while he, the great wise one, was on a separate mission from his prodigious student. This notice came to ears by the words of an elf nearby the incident.

As the words were uttered, a fast-moving cloud came and went taking the wise wizard to where his pupil was. No one was surprised by the amount of speed the cloud the wizard was on was going, he could have been near light speed by how baffled he was with the news. Arriving at the site, there were no words to describe how distraught the old man was, his eyes were wide, his chin almost hits the floor, he stopped breathing for a second, and his heart skipped a few beats.

Observing and not believing. All he did was watch the mangled body of his former disciple torn and obliterated. Back a few seconds, the elf told him that an accident occurred and that he wanted to choose wisely his wording to not make matters worse. The elf said: “Your esteemed pupil was killed by a gang of orcs, they pulled each finger from their sockets one by one, broke her spine in half, crushed her head, and shattered her shoulders. I advise not to look for her body.”

Currently, his being was there and steady, but his mind was an abyss, it was completely blank, with no thought to emerge. Wise he was, as well as untouchable, but he was still human, with normal human feelings. After a few brief minutes of nothingness, the nigh-omnipotent wizard crashed down and cried for the poor girl.

Soon, rather than later, a formal burial commenced, for he knew not of any familiars of the woman, but not before taking memorabilia, that being a sample of her being. The old man contemplated his existence in this world and why he did such a thing to a poor youthful soul. Questioning his actions proceeded to question when his life will end since no human is inmor… That’s when the candle lit up in his head, "what if he created such an allusive potion, spell, enchantment, whatever it may be, but just achieve it in order to prolong this horrible existence and find a new disciple?"

At the same speed, he went to find his former pupil, the grandmaster flew to his hideout to begin his new and final investigation. Firstly, he reread every book he had, then continued to analyze the origin of the words to see any form of mix and match and possibly encounter a new enchantment or spell. To no avail, the trial and error method was not fruitful. The next step was trying to mix every potion that he had not already mixed, and in the process add some more ingredients.

This carried on for quite some time, it went on for 3 more years, and with some interesting new findings, he was yet to find what he longed for. Everything he tried was a failure in his eyes, for none performed as he wished. He tried everything, everything except for that one thing that still pricked his heart. The memorabilia, a droplet of blood from a dead virgin would be the only option to grand this desire. Of course, the only use would have been to experiment, but it was all in her name.

The desperate wizard started the fire on the cauldron and hoped for the best, for this is a one-time thing. There were at least 5 drops of blood on the test tube and was sure to use them properly. Ygfldm attained the rarest ingredients, the heart of a unicorn, tears from a crying crocodile, the eye of a blind cyclops, a four-leaf clover from an active volcano, and a few other more. He then mixed everything together in ethanol.

The wise old man was conservative with his tube of blood, so he only added one drop to finish the potion. Subsequently, he distillate the content of the cauldron, to muster 9 and ¾ minims of the solution, and he was the only one that could taste test it. Excited, since this could be the real thing, the one and only way to become ever living. It seemed ritualistic the way he prepared for the consumption of the liquid.

But before anything, everything turned darker than any shadow he had witnessed, nothing to see. Out of nowhere, an entity bearing only a white robe and a scythe appeared in front of him stretching out its hand composed of only bones. Without knowing, the hand already took the test tube with the immortality potion, coupled with the tube of four drops of virgin blood. The being, in a seemingly spiteful manner, threw the containers to the ground and left with no trace. Everything happened as fast as lightning and was a little bit frightening for the master wizard.

After a few seconds to comprehend what occurred, he did not want to acknowledge the event and proceeded to pinch his skin as if this was a dream. He tried everything, drinking energy potions, chanting various spells to see if he was asleep because he kept thinking it was all in his head and it never transpired. This, evidently, did not work, for he was wide awake.

Still not accepting the prior, the wizard turned from denial to anger in a split second. The grandmaster, capable of destroying entire countries, did with no remorse. He created a local ice age in the nearby forest, smitten the castle with an endless lightning storm, shook and trembled the earth, and the sky was blood red, almost like in the prophecies. The most powerful man in the country, maybe even the world, sought to obliterate everything he could see from his pedestal in the high mountains. There was no regard to any life.

Tired from destroying, the old man then looked for his dark arts books, with the plan to bargain with the skeletal entity. He assumed it must have been the embodiment of death itself. Mortified, he still searched for any solution to his desperate attempts at grasping this ordeal. Although he did find the one and only possible way of contact, the Necronomicon, nevertheless the immortal did not appear. He even begged to any god he could think of, but it was all pointless.

Knowing there was no other way of going back, rain fell, and fell, and fell, for forty days and forty nights. Sadness loomed throughout the land, everything was quiet and many of the creatures went into hibernation while the great wise wizard stood in silence thinking of all the horrible things he had done. Empty and devoid of meaning, the old man could not sleep, he felt hopeless.

Coming to terms with what occurred was not an easy task. But of course, all things must come to an end, and so does he. The white embodiment appeared before him once again, this time it just stood there, waiting. Ygfldm, understood, and with open arms, he approached Death and left existence with a solemn requiem.

THE END