Chapter 50: In the Belly of the Beast

Stung by Envy branding him small, Edward hammers at the homunculus, who ignores the blows and tries to settle the frenzied Gluttony, telling it to spare the Elrics but granting it leave to eat Ling Yao. At that, Ed throws up a massive brick wall to split the fight, leaving Ling to face Envy while he and Alphonse take on Gluttony.

Ling's duel with Envy starts well; the homunculus leaves an opening that lets the prince cut its belly, but it proves a trap as Envy turns one arm into a blade and the other into a snake that coils around him. Ling loses his sword to the crushing grip yet kicks dirt into Envy's eyes, seizes the blade arm, and slices through the snake to reclaim his weapon and the advantage.

Beyond the wall, Edward opens a deep pit under Gluttony's feet, but the homunculus escapes by stretching his ribcage far enough to haul himself out. The two fights then merge, and with Envy still outmatched by Xingese martial arts, it transforms into Lan Fan, freezing Ling in place. Gluttony seizes the moment to swallow him; Edward and Envy both rush in, Ed to save Ling and Envy to protect the precious sacrifice from being eaten alongside the foreigner. Gluttony devours all three, then, realizing his blunder, reverts to his ordinary shape as a distraught Alphonse cries out for his brother.

Over at Dr. Knox's home, Lan Fan at last wakes to the grim truth that her arm is gone. At Central Command, Mustang and Hawkeye try to gauge which allies they still have. General Raven approaches Mustang about his transfer to Central, and Mustang describes his old Eastern habit of trading city gossip, however far-fetched. One rumor, that King Bradley is a homunculus, catches Raven's ear, and he ushers Mustang into a meeting with the military's top men, the President among them. Elsewhere, Edward wakes in near-total darkness, sprawled across a vast, seemingly bottomless lake of blood, and, confirming he can still move, recalls being swallowed alongside Ling and Envy, left to wonder where he is.

Ed walls off the battlefield to separate the two fights. Ling gains the upper hand until Envy takes Lan Fan's shape. Gluttony swallows Ed, Ling and Envy, then reverts in dismay. Mustang seeds the rumor of Bradley's true nature and is drawn into a meeting with the military elite.

Among the wreckage inside Gluttony lies a skeleton dressed in the priestly garb of Reole, implied to be Cray, Cornello's devoted follower. A mistake in the Viz release makes it appear that Dr. Knox has several children, when the original story gives him just a single son.