FATHER
FA
The original Homunculus. Created centuries ago in Xerxes from the blood of Hohenheim, a being of pure knowledge and ambition contained in a flask. Engineered the destruction of an entire civilization to gain a physical form and a nation to work with. Has been using Amestris as a transmutation circle for centuries, orchestrating wars, accumulating souls, working toward a single goal: to contain God. Not conquest. Not revenge. Not ideology in any recognizable form. Father wants to become something that exists beyond human limitation entirely, and he has been building toward it with the patience of something that does not age. Brotherhood constructs him carefully across its entire run and the Promised Day arc delivers on everything that construction has been promising. The most ambitious villain the franchise produces.
FATHER THROUGH THE ARCHIVE //
STORY & ARC GUIDE //
Open page →Episodes 25–26
Edward and Alphonse finally reach the being the Homunculi call Father.
He can neutralize their alchemy without treating them as ordinary enemies because he needs certain alchemists alive as potential sacrifices.
He can neutralize their alchemy without treating them as ordinary enemies because he needs certain alchemists alive as potential sacrifices.
What changed
The brothers stop chasing disconnected clues. There is now a central intelligence behind the Homunculi, the military cover-up and the strange behavior of Amestrian alchemy.
Episodes 36–40
Hohenheim is revealed as the surviving human counterpart to Father's origin, carrying souls from Xerxes inside himself.
Unlike Father, he has spent centuries recognizing those souls as people and preparing a countermeasure for the day Father repeats Xerxes on a national scale.
Unlike Father, he has spent centuries recognizing those souls as people and preparing a countermeasure for the day Father repeats Xerxes on a national scale.
Why it matters
The absent father Ed resents turns out to have left his family because the catastrophe that created him was finally approaching them again.
THE PROMISED DAY //
Open page →The country itself is the apparatus
The national border, Sloth's tunnel and decades of bloodshed are built into Father's nationwide transmutation circle.
On the Promised Day, the people of Amestris are intended to become the human material for Father's next step.
On the Promised Day, the people of Amestris are intended to become the human material for Father's next step.
Why it matters
Father does not conquer the country at the end. The country was constructed around his alchemical purpose long before most of the cast was born.
Episode 60
Using the eclipse and the five sacrifices, Father opens the enormous gateway his plan was built to reach and takes the power he has pursued for centuries into himself.
For a brief period the scale of his alchemy becomes almost absurd.
For a brief period the scale of his alchemy becomes almost absurd.
Why it matters
This is Father's philosophy succeeding on its own terms. He has removed another boundary. The problem is that becoming powerful enough to take something is not the same as becoming capable of containing it.
Prepared across the country over centuries
Hohenheim has spent centuries communicating with the souls inside his Philosopher's Stone body and placing portions of that power around Amestris.
When Father activates the national transmutation, Hohenheim's countermeasure reverses the mass extraction and returns the population's souls to their bodies.
When Father activates the national transmutation, Hohenheim's countermeasure reverses the mass extraction and returns the population's souls to their bodies.
Why it matters
Hohenheim defeats Father's first victory using the thing that most separates them. Father treats souls as fuel. Hohenheim learned their names, spoke to them and acts with their cooperation.
Episodes 61–63
Hohenheim's countermeasure removes the Amestrian population from Father's reservoir, leaving him with far less human energy available to stabilize what he absorbed.
The entire surviving cast then attacks for the same reason: force Father to keep spending souls and power until the body can no longer contain what he took.
The entire surviving cast then attacks for the same reason: force Father to keep spending souls and power until the body can no longer contain what he took.
The Breakdown
The final battle is attrition on a metaphysical scale. Nobody needs to individually overpower "God." They need to make Father run out of the human lives he uses to keep that power under control.
BROTHERHOOD COMBAT LEDGER //
Open page →Central Command Ruins · Edward Decisive Victory
With Father's control over Amestrian alchemy broken after Scar activates his brother's reverse transmutation circle, Father unleashes desperate energy blasts. Alphonse then sacrifices the soul binding that keeps him in the armor, allowing Edward's original right arm to return.
The Breakdown
Edward is not suddenly stronger than Father in some clean power-scaling sense. Father is already destabilizing, burning through the souls and power keeping his stolen godlike state together while the surviving cast keeps forcing him to spend more. With his right arm restored, Edward finally gets close enough to turn that collapse into a physical beating, driving Father to the point where the power he stole can no longer be contained.
Central Command Subterranean Core · Strategic Draw / Counter-Trap Set
Van Hohenheim confronted his original "twin" Father beneath Central Command, attempting to destroy Father using his own Philosopher's Stone souls. Father attempted to drain Hohenheim's body and stone core completely.
The Breakdown
Hohenheim revealed he had spent centuries conversing individually with all 536,329 souls inside his body, gaining their conscious cooperation. The souls infiltrated Father's physical shell from within, breaking Father's body-holding matrix and forcing Father to shed his human form.
FATHER & HOMUNCULI //
Open page →Xerxes · Hohenheim · a being trying to escape every limit
Father begins as the Dwarf in the Flask, a small artificial being created from the blood of the slave who will become Van Hohenheim.
He teaches the people around him enough to make himself useful, then exploits the king of Xerxes' desire for immortality. The nationwide transmutation in Xerxes destroys the population and leaves both Hohenheim and the Dwarf carrying vast numbers of human souls.
Father uses that power to create a body resembling Hohenheim and eventually builds Amestris around an even larger version of the same idea.
He teaches the people around him enough to make himself useful, then exploits the king of Xerxes' desire for immortality. The nationwide transmutation in Xerxes destroys the population and leaves both Hohenheim and the Dwarf carrying vast numbers of human souls.
Father uses that power to create a body resembling Hohenheim and eventually builds Amestris around an even larger version of the same idea.
Why it matters
Father's final plan is not a sudden supervillain upgrade. Brotherhood reveals that he has been repeating the same answer for centuries: when a boundary exists, spend other human lives to move himself beyond it.
THE PHILOSOPHER'S STONE //
Open page →Dublith → Ling
When Father reabsorbs the first Greed, the Homunculus is returned to the Philosopher's Stone system from which Father created him.
Later Father places Greed into Ling Yao, expecting the Stone and Homunculus to overwrite the human vessel. Ling remains.
Later Father places Greed into Ling Yao, expecting the Stone and Homunculus to overwrite the human vessel. Ling remains.
Why it matters
The series keeps refusing the idea that a soul is only interchangeable energy. Greed and Ling become two distinct people sharing one body despite Father's attempt to treat both as components.
Episode 40 · the original national transmutation
The Dwarf in the Flask manipulates the king of Xerxes into activating a nationwide transmutation that sacrifices the population.
Hohenheim and the Dwarf survive carrying enormous reservoirs of those souls.
Hohenheim and the Dwarf survive carrying enormous reservoirs of those souls.
Why it matters
The Promised Day is repetition. Father has already proven that a country can be converted into alchemical power once before.
Centuries of preparation
Father treats the souls inside a Philosopher's Stone as a power supply. Hohenheim spends centuries recognizing the individuals inside himself and speaking with them.
That relationship is what makes his national countermeasure possible: the souls cooperate rather than being spent anonymously.
That relationship is what makes his national countermeasure possible: the souls cooperate rather than being spent anonymously.
Why it matters
Brotherhood's argument about souls is not only that human life has value. It is that reducing many people into one resource does not actually make them stop being people.
XERXES, HOHENHEIM & FATHER //
Open page →The resemblance is not a family relationship. The being later called Father began as the Dwarf in the Flask, created from the blood of a nameless slave who would become Van Hohenheim.
When the Dwarf later constructs a human body for itself, it uses Hohenheim's appearance.
When the Dwarf later constructs a human body for itself, it uses Hohenheim's appearance.
Why it matters
Brotherhood turns the visual similarity into history. Father is not Hohenheim's brother or alternate self; he is a created being that used Hohenheim as both source material and model.
The Dwarf possesses knowledge but cannot survive outside its container. Its first problem is physical confinement; its larger problem becomes resentment of limits themselves.
The pattern continues throughout Brotherhood. A body is not enough, a nation is not enough and eventually even the boundary represented by the Gate is treated as something to overcome.
The pattern continues throughout Brotherhood. A body is not enough, a nation is not enough and eventually even the boundary represented by the Gate is treated as something to overcome.
Why it matters
Father's final plan is not a sudden escalation. It is the same desire growing in scale.
When the array activates, the population of Xerxes is sacrificed. The souls are divided between Hohenheim and the Dwarf, giving both human-shaped bodies that function as enormous Philosopher's Stones.
The Dwarf uses Hohenheim's blood and appearance to create the body that will later be known as Father.
The Dwarf uses Hohenheim's blood and appearance to create the body that will later be known as Father.
What changed
Hohenheim survives the catastrophe without choosing it. Immortality arrives as mass death he has to carry inside himself.
Hohenheim initially experiences the people inside him as an unbearable chorus. Over centuries he learns their names and speaks with them individually.
Father takes the opposite path. He treats the souls inside a Stone as power to be counted, spent and replenished.
Father takes the opposite path. He treats the souls inside a Stone as power to be counted, spent and replenished.
Why it matters
Their central difference is not that one possesses human souls and the other does not. It is whether those souls remain people.
