The Undoing Room

Part 1

The room smelled of death. As if there had been a deer carcass rotting in the sun for a week. It was the kind of place you wouldn't want to stay for very long.

The whole structure was badly in need of work. Shattered windows, chipping paint, and broken floorboards were just some of the blindingly obvious problems. It was just a small one-room shack in the woods. Junk everywhere. Cobwebs. The amount of dust indicated that no one had lived there for a long time.

Turns out I was wrong.

I stopped at the shack that I had found in the woods to see if I could pilfer any supplies for the rest of my journey. As I was rummaging through the junk and stirring up dust, I heard what sounded like a voice from the corner. I turned and noticed something that I hadn't noticed before. Peeking out from under a pile of blankets was a face.

He must not have moved in some time judging by the amount of dust and bat droppings that had accumulated on his face. Was he dead? Maybe that is where the stink was coming from.

I slowly moved over to him saying "Hello? Hello?" although I'm not sure why. I pulled back the blankets and found a withered, smelly, hairy, man. His eyes dry. He somehow wasn't dead. He was very very sick.

I came to Flower Grove to find an old man who I was told could help me on my journey. Was this the old man? Normally I would have just left him die. It's not my business anyway. I thought of just ending his misery, but what if he is the man I was to find? I had to find out.

Over the course of the day the old man slowly got energy. I had found a few cans of beans in his shack and had been feeding him. He was still very sick, but could talk.

I explained to him that I was looking for the fountain of youth.

Part 2

"Long ago I was once like you. Long ago I went looking for the fountain of youth. I found it. Now look at me..." said the old man in a shaky quiet voice.

"Many humans want to live forever. I do live forever, and I don't want to. Since I have drank from that fountain, I never die. I have been sick for over 200 years. I quit counting at 200. You have no idea what it is like to be in constant pain. Id ask you to kill me, but it won't work. I get deadly diseases, yet I don't die. I just suffer the pain."

"I have lived over 50 lives. The fountain of youth sounds like a good idea at first. But what happens when all those you loved are dead and gone? What happens when you are lonely, sick, and forgotten? Kind of makes living forever not sound like such a good idea."

"Id give anything to be like you. Id give anything to die. Oh how I miss her."

The desperation and sadness in his eyes was almost too much to bear.

I had set off on my journey to find a way to live forever. Now I'm somehow on a journey to die.

Before I left the mans shack, he asked a favor of me. He told me of a room called "The Undoing Room". You go there to correct the mistakes of the past. He told me that when I go there, it will take me to the point in time that I need to undo.