Soren E. Rasmussen's House

[Fenris Tsukai]

Tucked away in the far corner of the Alchemist's area of housing lies a small plot of land containing a stand of trees. These trees however appear unnatural given the surroundings, they are aligned perfectly in a double-layered single-file line, creating a box to conceal the inner sanctum of the plot. If one were to look into this stand of trees from without, the illusion they create is to make this pseudo-forest appear much deeper than it truly is. An optical illusion as designed.

Within this stand of trees is where Soren E. Rasmussen makes his home. The trees, he will tell you, block out most of the extraneous sounds from the outside world, sealing him off from the city in which he resides. On this plot of land there are only two structures. One, a simple small cottage, and the second a mysterious door leading into the earth.

The remainder of the land contained within the trees is populated by various rows of vegetal matter from herbs, vegetables, and various edible (or poisonous) plants. A separate section of bushes lie in front of the small cottage, these are numerous blends of tea. All plants contained on this land are cared for by hand, to the smallest detail, even pollination, as to keep the strains pure. Luckily, through selective breeding, they have been created as such that they CANNOT pollinate without assistance.

One would assume that the small cottage is perhaps the minimalist home of someone who wanted to maximize the space given to them. This, however, is not the case. This small cottage is merely a shed in which all things pertaining to the upkeep of these plants is conducted.

Then where does the man Soren E. Rasmussen reside you may ask, certainly not within the macabre door leading into the bowels of the earth. Certainly that is merely a mausoleum for some lost love. Again, this is not the case. Given constraints in space, one has two choices in which to build to maximize an area. The first, is to build up and further clutter the skyline of the city, and ruin the ambiance of the space. The second - and the choice in which Soren Rasmussen partook - to build within the earth itself. The eldritch door leads to his living quarters and laboratory. Not only does this style of building save space, retain the ambiance that was so lovingly crafted, but it as well keeps prying eyes from his life and work.

His living quarters are very simple. A main room in which to entertain guests - though he rarely receives them. A bedroom for sleeping and other such private activities, with attached bathing quarters. Finally, a cabinet, the room containing his library - his mass of books having after some time, spilled over from the shelves as he ran short of space - and a work table often strewn with various materials and encoded journals. This room is as private as they come, and when he is not home it is locked several times over. Those not privy to his inner most thoughts are not welcome within its confines. The soul exception is that of his feline companions.

Three cats live in this plot as well and are free to come and go as they please.

1. Mephisto : The eldest of his cats, a being as ethereal as he is regal. Curiously he has lived to be much older than the average age of felines, he is assumed around 43 years old in human years and is the guardian of the gates.
2. Kyrie : The second eldest of his cats, she is still within the normal confines of age for a feline. Though still up there in years, she is as spry as a kitten.
3. Socks : The youngest, a kitten, recent visitor turned resident. A youngling who wandered in off the street and was promptly adopted by the elders.  

[Fenris Tsukai]

Reserved

 

[Fenris Tsukai]

Soren E. Rasmussen

[bio cont. *note, I will be switching between the names Albel and Soren during this post as one represents the past and the other the present.*]

Albel's throat burned furiously, he stumbled around his workshop, still groggy from his ordeal, in search for something to quench his thirst. He managed to maneuver himself in his daze to his workbench, a pot of tea having gone cold. Placing the spout into his mouth he tilted it back in unison with his head and drank deep, the cold tea a welcome releaf. Draining the pot he cast it aside, rubbing his eyes until they accustomed to the light flooding in from his window. As his world returned to him, he began to stroke the area around his mouth - something he did when thinking - it was at this time he noticed the presence of hair. It was not an early morning's stubble, but the onset of a beard. It was quite the oddity as he kept himself clean shaven out of annoyance of the facial hair that usually itched unbearably. He hurried to a mirror, taking in his partially bearded chin. He had been out for more than a day it would seem.

As he began idly fumbling about for soap and a keen blade with which he would rid himself of the abomination. After soaping his face up and running the blade down his cheek with practiced precision he made short work of the hair. After quickly finishing the other side, then chin, upperlip, and finally more carefully his neck, he looked himself over in the mirror. Satisfied with the job he was about to set the mirror down before bringing it quickly back within his gaze, he stared deeply at his own image. His eyes in particular. Once they were a near lifeless gray, dull and almost morbid in their tone...now, now they were a most brilliant and striking orchid. A blazing violet. Flabbergasted at the change, he examined himself as closely as possible. Could this have been the only result of his near death by what he would assume turned out to be poison.

Setting the mirror down gently, he turned to his work. Frustrated, he wished to give in to his rage and sweep everything from the table, but he collected himself. "I..I know I am close. Ever so close to perfection. Yet-" He pounded his fist on the table's top, "yet it alludes me at every turn!" His voice echoing off the wall he had been facing and dancing out the window to join the raucous vibrance of the city below. He sighed heavily, his nails digging into the hard wood of his desk. "I will complete my work. I will complete my magnum opus. I can not turn back now. I have cast open pandora's box and looked deep within. Though the truth alludes me...I have looked into the eyes of God and grasped wanting at eternity. These hands-" He formed fists, "have clawed at the throat of Thanatos, and he merely sneered." He placed his hand over his heart, feeling its beat. "I am alive, and that is all that currently matters. I have failed at this venture, but I will not lie in repose and admit my defeat. No...I have gotten close, these eyes are proof. They must be." He brought his hands to his face and ran his fingers as claws down his forehead just to his eyes. Albel would not let this apparent failure stop him from continuing, he almost died this time, perhaps next time will truly end it all. If that were to be the case, then that is as far as his fate allowed him to travel. He would not be broken by failure, he would not give in to his waning sanity.

Months passed, and as they did Albel grew weaker. Each day moved at a snail's pace, and with it pain at every turn. His body felt as if it were breaking at the seams, he felt as if he would fall in clumps as would wet sand. When he reached the edge of his medical knowledge he seeked out a doctor, "Sir...I beseech you. I do not feel well. I have knowledge of medicine but...I am not omniscient. This is something I have never encountered." The doctor whom he approached was one who just recently came to the city. He traveled all over, learning something new at each port, he kept his knowledge from going stagnant by constantly adding to it. He spoke cheerfully to Albel, his voice sonorous but revealing his age, "My boy...none are omniscient but our Lord, we all must strive every day to even approach a modicum of his brilliance. Now then, let us see." He, though a rather small man, lifted Albel with ease - Albel having apparently lost a considerable amount of weight in his weakened state - he set him on his examination chair. Albel sat languid and breathing heavily, each breath a labor. First the doctor placed his ear to Albel's chest, he listened for the beat of a healthy heart and he got it. Albel's heart was strong and beat against the pain. Next the doctor examined Albel from head to toe, finding first a small patch of skin along his neck. It looked like reptilian scales, plates of thickened skin flaking from his body. Another on his hip, and quite a few more down his legs. "I have not seen this before my boy...even in all my travels this is quite the oddity. These I do not know how to cure, I am sorry. However, I can help with your weakened state." He pat Albel gently on the shoulder, "From the look of your body, you are rather anaemic. You need more blood in your body. I suggest you go eat meat. Lots of meat, promotes the body to make more blood." Albel offered to pay the nice doctor, but he flatly refused as he could not cure the younger man and merely offered advice to his health.

Albel took the doctor's advice and sat for a feast rich in meats. He finished every plate, and just as the doctor said, he began to feel better. However, for the amount he consumed, the feeling did not last. Quickly thinking over the doctor's words, he made a rather odd request of the kindly barmaid. He requested a large flaggon of ox's blood, and a second of wine. Though an odd request it was, he paid handsomely for the completion of it, and as such the barmaid had no reason to refuse. They did indeed have blood in the back for the use of thickening stews, but she couldn't believe what he had intended to do with it. When asked, he merely replied with a weak smile, "I am fulfilling my doctor's orders...with some added creativity." Once his supplies had been placed on his table he immediately began mixing the blood with the wine and pouring himself a large glass. He downed it in moments, feeling immediately better. It was just as the doctor said...he needed more blood. After a few large helpings more, he felt as right as rain. Enough so to leave unlabored and make it back to his cottage, with extra drink in tow. He deemed his odd mixture as 'serum'. The wine having made its way to his head, he was a bit tipsy and near collapsed into bed. The next morning, he checked his body thoroughly, he wanted to test the scales he had the previous day...but he could not find any. Not a single one. Thinking over the situation time and time again, he came to the conclusion that it was a second effect of the potion that nearly killed him.

The next months passed with little incident, he kept himself supplied with adequate serum...however, it soon began to lose its effectiveness. No matter how much he downed, his body did not improve. He came to the conclusion that the blood needed to be fresh, it could not be held for months at a time and used as needed. It had to be fresh and still full of life. It was not blood that his body needed...but life. As his body continued to weaken, he thought over ways in which he might satisfy this need. He could think of no other...than to take in a 'sacrificial lamb'. The most effective serum he could make came from blood of other humans, and needed less of it to be effective. However, just getting this blood was near impossible. He weakened more still, entering unconsciousness. His body in a fugue state moved with purpose, he could not see nor hear, but he knew he was moving...and under his own power. He awoke the next day full of energy, though he was stiff as he had awoke laying on the floor. He thought it strange, but still groggy made way for his mirror to look over his body. What came into sight in the mirror was frightful. He was covered, near head to toe, in blood. Fresh blood. The darkest of which was collected around his mouth. Panicked he quickly looked around the room for clues as to what may have happened, and he did find it. Collapsed in a pile on the floor was the body of a young woman, her side of her neck having two puncture wounds, an even spacing apart. The skin around the wound was flushed, almost purple. She was not moving, a marionette with cut strings. He had taken what he needed - life - and he had taken it from this unknowing young woman. Without a second though he grabbed the knife with which he shaved, as he knew its edge was keen. Staring down at the young woman's body, Albel's heart beating loudly enough he could hear it, his hands shaking. Placing the edge of the blade at his own throat just above his left clavicle he pressed it into his flesh, drawing the blade slowly and purposefully across his throat in a diagonal to just beneath his right ear. Blood spewed forth from his mouth, and the wounds themselves. He collapsed, awaiting death. Death did not come, shortly after the wounds began to fountain his life away they closed up. They left a scar, but did not let his life escape. Having just been freshly infused with life, his body regenerated rather quickly as he would come to find out later in his miserable life. He could regenerate from near all damage he could take, and the quickness of the healing depended souly on how much fresh blood he had taken in, and how recently it had been.

"Wild dreams torment me as I lie. And though a god lives in my heart, though all my power waken at his word, though he can move my every inmost part - yet nothing in the outer world is stirred. Thus by existence tortured and oppressed I crave for death, I long for rest."

By night Albel rid himsel of the young woman's body. He cast her into his hearth and cremated her delicate form. The next morning, before the sun had broken the bonds of the horizon, Albel had made his way to the countryside. Awaiting a favorable wind. As the sun peaked over the horizon, he was granted a view most spectacular and breaktaking, and a warm western wind accompanying. Sprinkling the woman's ashes into the wind, he gave her a burial of a loved one, keeping a small portion of ashes for himself. He kept them in a small phial to remind him every day that he was no longer truly human. No, he was not a monster, but he was no longer truly human. He required the lives of others for himself to survive, and he hated himself for it. He kept this young woman - his first monstrous taste of life - close to his heart. Though he would continue to live on, changing his home as the years passed as to not stay too long in one location and draw suspicion, and he would take the life from others if he let his 'hunger' go too long unsate. He would continue to live. He gave each person he robbed of life a kings burial, keeping the ashes of each with him as he lived. Once he completed his potion for an unending life, and no longer needed to feed on others, he would be sure to ask for forgiveness. The thought that haunted his dreams however was that; what if he HAD completed the task, and this was the price of continued life.
[/bio]

Soren nodded himself awake, he head dropping from the palm that supported it. He was previously perfectly balanced, but his elder statesman of a feline companion Mephisto, nudged him just enough to awaken him. The cat made not a sound, simply staring at him a long while - In other cultures, cats were regarded as the keepers of the underworld...and at times, Soren was sure it was the truth. The ever-living Mephisto, who he was sure had long run out of lives was his watcher. He was the guide and guard of the gates of Hell, but at the moment, he was a spoiled pet. Soren yawned as he stretched, "Yeah, yeah. I got it Master" he gibed at the cat. Making quick work of fresh ingredients, he set the bowl down for Mephisto, the remaining two felines quickly appeared to join the feast.

As they ate, Soren made sure to bathe, shave, and dress. He gathered up his various potions, powders, and instruments, placing them into his bag. He donned his coat and headed for the door, locking each he passed behind him. The cats had ways of maneuvering through the house Soren could not comprehend. They moved as ghosts, passing through seeming impenetrable barriers at will. "Watch the house."

The sun just began to rise into the morning sky as he made his way across his garden. With a cursory glance he checked the plants as he passed, he'd check again more thoroughly when returning.[Next part posted in the market]
{sorry for the exceedingly long post, it was a continuation of his bio into an intro post}

“A man sees in the world what he carries in his heart.”