Lolory
RWBY Tuesdays
Hello, this is a short story about my character Winrey in the universe of Isekai Hell. In this short, Winrey will be trying to learn how to heal himself, but it backfires and he ends up learning a different skill all together. The skill Winrey will be learning in this short is "Regeneration". I hope you like the short story!
Content tags: Death, blood, child abuse, nightmares, angst
It was night in the orphanage. Winrey was downstairs, in the basement, surrounded by the various lab equipment and large chemically submerged bodies of the “failures” that Oakwell hadn’t managed to bring to life. The noise of angry shouting and crashing could be heard up above as the familiar sound of Oakwell’s heels stomped on the ground. Winrey sighed, he knew she’d just make him clean everything after her tantrum was finished. He had no clue what had set her off this time, and normally when she got this way, leaving a path of broken vases and expensive paintings in her wake, there was nothing anyone could really do to calm her down.
Then those heels got closer, and soon Oakwell stood before him in the basement. She glared at him wildly, her breathing hard and Winrey could swear her heart beat was loud enough to fill the room. “What are you looking at?” She asked him with a sneer. “You think this is funny, don’t you? You like seeing me upset, that’s why you’re always causing problems! Why you can never do anything right!” She angrily threw one of the glass beakers at him, but it missed. Winrey had not flinched or moved then, but once she moved toward him it was as if time had slowed to an impossible pace then. The grip on his arm that she had was like a steel handcuff, and she dragged him through the lab until she reached the end of the room. There, in the back of the lab, was built a large pool of the chemical she’d used to store all of the other “failures'' in the test tubes. The scent was strong, it burned Winrey’s nose as he stood closely by the large tank, the acrid smell sent shivers down his spine.
“You think everything’s a joke? Well, you can think about what you’ve done at the bottom of the tank!” She practically threw his small body in, and Winrey had hoped for some reason that he would be able to swim to the top. His legs would not work then, and Oakwell’s heartbeat became louder and louder. As the chemical acid surrounded him, his senses were overwhelmed with a burn that pricked at his eyes, his nose, his throat. The murky chemical was hard to see through, and Winrey’s body would not cooperate as he sank to the bottom of the tank. He could make out Oakwell’s blurry figure as she walked away from him, though what confused Winrey was how he could still hear that drumming heartbeat. It wasn’t until he was on the brink of passing out and truly drowning, that he realized it was not Oakwell’s heart he was hearing, but his own.
Winrey’s eyes opened immediately and he sucked in a large gasp of air. The feeling of acid around him, burning his eyes and nose were still so vivid in his memory, that he raised a tentative hand to his face. Relief washed through him as he realized that it was not real, but a very vivid memory of something that had happened once in his previous life.
Strange…the dream wasn’t the same as what actually happened. He remembered that day clearly. He hadn’t sunk to the bottom of the tank, but rather swam to the top once Oakwell had left to rampage elsewhere. He didn’t remember why she was mad that day, but Oakwell got mad all the time for whatever random reason she could think of. If someone ruined her breakfast, it was enough to put her in a foul mood the whole day. Winrey laid a hand on his chest and felt his heart still hammering away, but it calmed as he took in the dark interior of his bedroom. Shame raced through him, how childish…having nightmares about a life that’s not yours anymore? Pathetic.
Winrey sat up in bed, and went over to his desk. His books on alchemy and funerary rites were still open, however the candle he had lit had long since blown out. He could hear the soft snores of his two normal, and doting parents in their shared bedroom down the hall. The moon was high in the sky, and it would be dawn in a few hours at most. He was not at that awful orphanage anymore, he wasn’t even living that life now. These thoughts didn’t soothe his mind any more than he hoped they would.
He sat down behind the desk, determined to study more despite his tired eyes. He re-lit the candle, shaking the match out with a few flicks of his wrist, before he turned his attention back to the page. Winrey had a vague sense of remembrance as he looked at the page that mentioned “Feverfew”, a simple healing potion in the Novice’s Guide to Alchemy. For some reason, he felt as if he had read over this page before, though he knew for certain that he couldn’t heal at all.
To heal was something that was beyond him, at least that's what it seemed like. All of his past attempts had failed, and he’d never quite picked it up. As he stared at the page again, reading over the words describing the simple ingredients needed to make it, he decided to try once more.
Over on a shelf in his room were spare vials of Holy Water that he carried with him whenever he left to go out on an adventure of sorts, and a few vials were still full. His room wasn’t exactly stockpiled with half of the fantastical ingredients listed in the guide book, but he at least had what he needed for Feverfew.
Once it was all mixed up in the small vial, he realized he’d need to be able to test it in some way, to really see if it was healing him. Otherwise, it’d be like drinking strange tasting water. He glanced at the candle for a moment, and decided then to hold his hand above the open flame. Once the pain went past what was manageable, he turned his hand over and inspected the red, hot burn that was now on his palm. It was an ugly welt that had an unnatural sheen to it, and he winced when he touched it. Winrey poured some of the Feverfew over the wound, and waited. The water soothed away the burning sensation for a few seconds, before it returned in full force.
It didn’t work…I guess I’ll try again. He went over to find more of those vials, and studied the guide book with one less hand to turn the pages. Hours passed as the moon crested downward below the horizon. Winrey’s hand still stung, and he was nowhere close to being able to heal. His brow creased and an exhausted groan left his lips. He put his head on the desk, careful not to curl his burned hand or touch it. The exhaustion from the night was catching up to him now. All he wanted was to sleep, but he knew that would just throw him back into another horrid memory induced nightmare.
As he closed his eyes, a different kind of memory from his past life surfaced. This moment was all so familiar to him, despite the bizarre circumstances he’s in now living as an alchemist in a fantastical world. Winrey didn’t keep his word, and slumbered away on the desk.
He stood in an office, one that was decorated like it belonged to a doctor and practitioner of Medicine. Diplomas, pills bottles, filing cabinets, various college grade books on science and health, and a sterile smell lingered faintly in the air. A woman sat behind the desk that Winrey found himself standing in front of. Aunt Elvyra sipped from a glass of a red liquid, something he knew was not simply wine.
Winrey’s eyes wandered down to the floor, a few feet away from the desk a man's body lay motionless and bleeding an open gash on his neck. Elvyra’s hand, which were normally covered in gloves to help her patients, were free now and clearly covered in the strange corpses blood. Her face held an annoyed air about it as she languidly sipped from the glass. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she spoke. “God, I hate lawyers…His kind never pay on time, and they’re always trying to weasel their way out of deals….And now look, I’ve made such a mess of this place.” She gestured vaguely at the office, and Winrey had to admit that the bloody scene before him would be hard to clean.
With that thought, he realized that he was holding the usual equipment he had with him whenever it was time for him to “clean” for Aunt Elvyra. She looked at him then, “Look, I’m really pissed kid. Just get this guy out of my office, will you?” She said to him, “Don’t let the rot set in. I don’t want to have to smell something so…awful this week. We don’t want a repeat of last time's blunder.” Though she was angry, Winrey did not fear for his own life or well being at all in her presence. When he lingered still by the body, Elvyra simply smiled at him and waved him away. “Hurry, before the blood gets all in the carpet. It’s a bitch to clean up, you know. When you’re done, we’ll go get dinner, I’m starving.” She threw back the rest of the glass, wiped her mouth and left the office, though not before giving Winrey a small bloody pat on the head.
Winrey decided to get to work then, as he normally did.
This time, when he awoke from his dream, it was with a peaceful mind and not an urge to survive. Don’t let the rot set in…Those words from his Aunt Elvyra echoed in his mind, he remembered that night when she had killed a lowly lawyer in a fit of rage. He’d seen her rip that mans throat apart like a pastry in seconds. However, he was not afraid of Elvyra. He’d never been scared, even when she would act out in such a manner. I hope…she exists in this world too. He looked to the window and squinted as he saw the light peeking through the trees in the yard. It was dawn now, he had slept for far longer than he thought.
He yawned, and covered his mouth with his hand before he quickly recalled burning it intentionally over the candle fire. Though when he looked at his palm, there was no burn. There wasn’t even a scar.
He glanced at the Holy Water vial and wondered if maybe it had worked, but far slower than he anticipated. But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that couldn’t be the case. He blinked once, and strange words appeared before him. He recognized them as belonging to this worlds strange magic system, a way to tell him what “skills” and “stats” he had, or what abilities other people had. It confused him at first, and so he rarely paid it any attention, or was open about it with others.
The words “New Skill Unlocked: Regeneration” hovered before his eyes before he blinked again and it was gone. He looked at his palm, and touched where the burn used to be. The skin was perfectly mended now, as if he had never done that at all to his body. It wasn’t “healing” perse, but he’d take it. It seemed fitting for him, anyways. He’d always been bad at trying to fix things, including himself. So just reverting what had happened over time, piecing those smashed parts back together, was what was most familiar to him.
Don’t let the rot set in…He supposed it’d make a nice enough name for the skill.
Content tags: Death, blood, child abuse, nightmares, angst
It was night in the orphanage. Winrey was downstairs, in the basement, surrounded by the various lab equipment and large chemically submerged bodies of the “failures” that Oakwell hadn’t managed to bring to life. The noise of angry shouting and crashing could be heard up above as the familiar sound of Oakwell’s heels stomped on the ground. Winrey sighed, he knew she’d just make him clean everything after her tantrum was finished. He had no clue what had set her off this time, and normally when she got this way, leaving a path of broken vases and expensive paintings in her wake, there was nothing anyone could really do to calm her down.
Then those heels got closer, and soon Oakwell stood before him in the basement. She glared at him wildly, her breathing hard and Winrey could swear her heart beat was loud enough to fill the room. “What are you looking at?” She asked him with a sneer. “You think this is funny, don’t you? You like seeing me upset, that’s why you’re always causing problems! Why you can never do anything right!” She angrily threw one of the glass beakers at him, but it missed. Winrey had not flinched or moved then, but once she moved toward him it was as if time had slowed to an impossible pace then. The grip on his arm that she had was like a steel handcuff, and she dragged him through the lab until she reached the end of the room. There, in the back of the lab, was built a large pool of the chemical she’d used to store all of the other “failures'' in the test tubes. The scent was strong, it burned Winrey’s nose as he stood closely by the large tank, the acrid smell sent shivers down his spine.
“You think everything’s a joke? Well, you can think about what you’ve done at the bottom of the tank!” She practically threw his small body in, and Winrey had hoped for some reason that he would be able to swim to the top. His legs would not work then, and Oakwell’s heartbeat became louder and louder. As the chemical acid surrounded him, his senses were overwhelmed with a burn that pricked at his eyes, his nose, his throat. The murky chemical was hard to see through, and Winrey’s body would not cooperate as he sank to the bottom of the tank. He could make out Oakwell’s blurry figure as she walked away from him, though what confused Winrey was how he could still hear that drumming heartbeat. It wasn’t until he was on the brink of passing out and truly drowning, that he realized it was not Oakwell’s heart he was hearing, but his own.
Winrey’s eyes opened immediately and he sucked in a large gasp of air. The feeling of acid around him, burning his eyes and nose were still so vivid in his memory, that he raised a tentative hand to his face. Relief washed through him as he realized that it was not real, but a very vivid memory of something that had happened once in his previous life.
Strange…the dream wasn’t the same as what actually happened. He remembered that day clearly. He hadn’t sunk to the bottom of the tank, but rather swam to the top once Oakwell had left to rampage elsewhere. He didn’t remember why she was mad that day, but Oakwell got mad all the time for whatever random reason she could think of. If someone ruined her breakfast, it was enough to put her in a foul mood the whole day. Winrey laid a hand on his chest and felt his heart still hammering away, but it calmed as he took in the dark interior of his bedroom. Shame raced through him, how childish…having nightmares about a life that’s not yours anymore? Pathetic.
Winrey sat up in bed, and went over to his desk. His books on alchemy and funerary rites were still open, however the candle he had lit had long since blown out. He could hear the soft snores of his two normal, and doting parents in their shared bedroom down the hall. The moon was high in the sky, and it would be dawn in a few hours at most. He was not at that awful orphanage anymore, he wasn’t even living that life now. These thoughts didn’t soothe his mind any more than he hoped they would.
He sat down behind the desk, determined to study more despite his tired eyes. He re-lit the candle, shaking the match out with a few flicks of his wrist, before he turned his attention back to the page. Winrey had a vague sense of remembrance as he looked at the page that mentioned “Feverfew”, a simple healing potion in the Novice’s Guide to Alchemy. For some reason, he felt as if he had read over this page before, though he knew for certain that he couldn’t heal at all.
To heal was something that was beyond him, at least that's what it seemed like. All of his past attempts had failed, and he’d never quite picked it up. As he stared at the page again, reading over the words describing the simple ingredients needed to make it, he decided to try once more.
Over on a shelf in his room were spare vials of Holy Water that he carried with him whenever he left to go out on an adventure of sorts, and a few vials were still full. His room wasn’t exactly stockpiled with half of the fantastical ingredients listed in the guide book, but he at least had what he needed for Feverfew.
Once it was all mixed up in the small vial, he realized he’d need to be able to test it in some way, to really see if it was healing him. Otherwise, it’d be like drinking strange tasting water. He glanced at the candle for a moment, and decided then to hold his hand above the open flame. Once the pain went past what was manageable, he turned his hand over and inspected the red, hot burn that was now on his palm. It was an ugly welt that had an unnatural sheen to it, and he winced when he touched it. Winrey poured some of the Feverfew over the wound, and waited. The water soothed away the burning sensation for a few seconds, before it returned in full force.
It didn’t work…I guess I’ll try again. He went over to find more of those vials, and studied the guide book with one less hand to turn the pages. Hours passed as the moon crested downward below the horizon. Winrey’s hand still stung, and he was nowhere close to being able to heal. His brow creased and an exhausted groan left his lips. He put his head on the desk, careful not to curl his burned hand or touch it. The exhaustion from the night was catching up to him now. All he wanted was to sleep, but he knew that would just throw him back into another horrid memory induced nightmare.
As he closed his eyes, a different kind of memory from his past life surfaced. This moment was all so familiar to him, despite the bizarre circumstances he’s in now living as an alchemist in a fantastical world. Winrey didn’t keep his word, and slumbered away on the desk.
He stood in an office, one that was decorated like it belonged to a doctor and practitioner of Medicine. Diplomas, pills bottles, filing cabinets, various college grade books on science and health, and a sterile smell lingered faintly in the air. A woman sat behind the desk that Winrey found himself standing in front of. Aunt Elvyra sipped from a glass of a red liquid, something he knew was not simply wine.
Winrey’s eyes wandered down to the floor, a few feet away from the desk a man's body lay motionless and bleeding an open gash on his neck. Elvyra’s hand, which were normally covered in gloves to help her patients, were free now and clearly covered in the strange corpses blood. Her face held an annoyed air about it as she languidly sipped from the glass. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she spoke. “God, I hate lawyers…His kind never pay on time, and they’re always trying to weasel their way out of deals….And now look, I’ve made such a mess of this place.” She gestured vaguely at the office, and Winrey had to admit that the bloody scene before him would be hard to clean.
With that thought, he realized that he was holding the usual equipment he had with him whenever it was time for him to “clean” for Aunt Elvyra. She looked at him then, “Look, I’m really pissed kid. Just get this guy out of my office, will you?” She said to him, “Don’t let the rot set in. I don’t want to have to smell something so…awful this week. We don’t want a repeat of last time's blunder.” Though she was angry, Winrey did not fear for his own life or well being at all in her presence. When he lingered still by the body, Elvyra simply smiled at him and waved him away. “Hurry, before the blood gets all in the carpet. It’s a bitch to clean up, you know. When you’re done, we’ll go get dinner, I’m starving.” She threw back the rest of the glass, wiped her mouth and left the office, though not before giving Winrey a small bloody pat on the head.
Winrey decided to get to work then, as he normally did.
This time, when he awoke from his dream, it was with a peaceful mind and not an urge to survive. Don’t let the rot set in…Those words from his Aunt Elvyra echoed in his mind, he remembered that night when she had killed a lowly lawyer in a fit of rage. He’d seen her rip that mans throat apart like a pastry in seconds. However, he was not afraid of Elvyra. He’d never been scared, even when she would act out in such a manner. I hope…she exists in this world too. He looked to the window and squinted as he saw the light peeking through the trees in the yard. It was dawn now, he had slept for far longer than he thought.
He yawned, and covered his mouth with his hand before he quickly recalled burning it intentionally over the candle fire. Though when he looked at his palm, there was no burn. There wasn’t even a scar.
He glanced at the Holy Water vial and wondered if maybe it had worked, but far slower than he anticipated. But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that couldn’t be the case. He blinked once, and strange words appeared before him. He recognized them as belonging to this worlds strange magic system, a way to tell him what “skills” and “stats” he had, or what abilities other people had. It confused him at first, and so he rarely paid it any attention, or was open about it with others.
The words “New Skill Unlocked: Regeneration” hovered before his eyes before he blinked again and it was gone. He looked at his palm, and touched where the burn used to be. The skin was perfectly mended now, as if he had never done that at all to his body. It wasn’t “healing” perse, but he’d take it. It seemed fitting for him, anyways. He’d always been bad at trying to fix things, including himself. So just reverting what had happened over time, piecing those smashed parts back together, was what was most familiar to him.
Don’t let the rot set in…He supposed it’d make a nice enough name for the skill.
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