This Paranormal Life - #205 The Fountain Of Youth

Episode Date: March 24, 2021

The Fountain of Youth, a magical source of water that's said to cure illness and grant everlasting life. Many adventurers have searched for it but they've always come up empty bottled. Is there any truth to the legend?PRE-SAVE 'KEEP RUNNING'ffm.to/keeprunningpresavePatreonpatreon.com/ThisParanormalLifeYouTubeyoutube.com/thisparanormallifeTwittertwitter.com/ThisParaLifeInstagraminstagram.com/thisparanormallifeSecret Society Facebook Pagewww.facebook.com/groups/thisparanormallife/Edited by Kami Tomantomanedits.comResearch by Amy GrisdaleIntro music: www.purple-planet.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Can vampires really transform into bats? What happens if you read a movie and watch a book? All of these questions you can find the answer to on This Paranormal Life! Welcome everyone to This Paranormal Life, the comedy paranormal podcast where every week we investigate a brand new paranormal tale and come to a conclusion as to whether or not it is truly paranormal. My name is Rory Powers. Sitting across from me is Kit Greer. Kit, are you ready to dive, pun intended, into a wonderful story filled with the paranormal today? Oh yeah, I sure am. I just wanted to get quickly out of the way on the topic of your intro questions. I did know a kid once who read a movie and he died.

Well, there you have it, folks. Do not do that. But do watch books because we don't know what they get up to when those library doors close. I will say he was also known for putting batteries up his nose that may have contributed. Oh, you're talking about Ryan. Yeah. Do we have more than one friend who puts batteries up their nose that may have contributed. Oh, you're talking about Ryan. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do we have more than one friend who puts batteries up their nose? We called him Robot Ryan, yeah.

Yeah, I'm going to go ahead and think maybe in this case that was more the battery thing than the books. I don't know. I would just play it safe just to be sure. As always, we're not going to waste any time. We're going to get straight into the story. Our story today begins in 320 bce whoa winding the clock back real far back this might be one of our earliest cases to be fair

to the times of alexander the great wow now alexander had a pretty wild life he was born into royalty personally tutored at age 16 by Aristotle. Jesus. Yeah, it's pretty cool. No excuses to fail your exams, is there? And of course, became king himself when his father was assassinated by his own bodyguard, by the way. What? Which is pretty nuts when I read that, yeah.

It's the ultimate taboo. That's one deceitful trickster little bastard bodyguard. He must be the first bodyguard in history to do that. Yeah, actually. Because what? Yeah, 320 BCE. That's pretty original. I'm surprised that the concept of a bodyguard has succeeded this long,

given that the precedent was bad to begin with. What if I don't guard the body? I like to think he didn't have any political involvement or anything. He didn't even really care much for the royalties or anything like that he was just like he's just a little rule breaker they're like we need you to guard the king what if i killed the king like you're i'm standing right in front of you just say that out loud oh shit is this him in the job interview yeah i mean i guess it's also just testament to how little he was getting paid that someone came along and said,

hey, I'll give you one gold coin if you kill your boss. Done. Yeah. Wow, that's a thousand times my current salary. I'm a slave. It was a different time. I can't say that bodyguards were very heavily rewarded. Who knows?

Alexander the Great lived fast and hard. And like his father, he was hungry for power, wealth, and land. The problem was, with dreams that big, you're bound to make a few enemies. It turns out, when he's the one ganking your land, Alexander doesn't seem so great. He had enemies. Even before becoming king, he had managed to escape a number of assassination attempts. But he made it to the crown and would go on to become known as Alexander the Great! One of history's most successful military commanders.

They say history is written by the victor. I wonder did he give himself that name? Possibly. He is famous for having never lost a battle. so it doesn't get more victor than that. Alexander traveled the world, slicing and burning and stabbing his way to the top. Again, not really great if you're on the receiving end of the stabbings. He squashed rebels and went on to conquer most of the known world before even the age of 30. Wow. While he never lost a battle during his adventures, he did have many brushes with death. And one of those brushes was during the Battle of Granicus. One cool thing about this

part of history is that the battles were so well documented. I can retell this part of the story like it's Lord of the Rings. it's insane how much detail was recorded about all these things that's cool so it's may 334 bc with an attack from the persian army imminent alexander knew an immediate attack would catch the persians off guard so he gathered his troops and marched on the front line friends brothers country brothers, countrymen, lend me your ears. I'm making this part up, though. A lot of the fighting is well documented, not the speech beforehand. So we're going to have to fabricate this part of the story, obviously.

Today we face the Persian army, an enemy so strong many of you will not survive. Most kings probably wouldn't tell their men that but am i most kings no i'm alexander the great so join me and you too can be great why does this feel like a uh employees morning like motivational meeting all right well don't judge it too harshly because i spent a lot of time writing that speech and i've actually done a lot of research on alexander the great and i really feel like i channeled him through that dialogue okay so it's pretty i'm just saying it's pretty hard to actually put yourself i mean not for me it's not hard for me to put myself in the footsteps of like a great leader or a great charismatic guy you know it's kind of my day-to-day

that's kind of like my vibe like rory the great is that so weird if someone started if if people started calling me rory the great that would be ridiculous i mean you don't have a single follower yeah i've got a couple on twitter so it's kind of similar to alexander the great i mean they don't devote their life to you though now that i think about it i've also never lost a battle in my life yeah you've never had a battle well that means i've never lost one doesn't it buddy you did get clung on a nursery like there was that one playground fight that you you took a pretty bad l that day yeah well it wasn't fair because i was fighting robot ryan all right and i actually think those batteries gave him some superhuman powers that mother had a right hook of an eight-year-old yeah and he only has one arm as well so like you really should have been

looking out for that one so that was one battle that i lost sure but out of the rest of the battles in my life undefeated reigning champ rory the great i beat you in mario kart like 30 minutes before i let you win i let you win to make you feel better about technically yes i lost okay this is me at the the starting line of Rainbow Road. Brothers! Noblemen! It's like, I'm already finished lap two. What? You're still on the starting line.

Join me and you too can be great! I just crossed the finish line. Eighth place. You rallied up the troops and it was time for battle. In their classic wedge-shaped charge, Alexander led his horsemen as they stormed across the field of battle, smashing into the Persians' front line. Swords were swinging, arrows were fired as the two sides

clashed. Alexander the Great was in the heart of the battle, slashing down enemies with his friend Cletus the Black. Accounts show that he and his bodyguards killed a number of high-ranking Persian nobles as they made their way through the enemy forces. But as the battle was coming to an end, Alexander was hit by a powerful axe blow, stunning him and knocking him to the floor. As he rose to his feet, a Persian nobleman saw his opportunity. Sword in hand, he ran towards Alexander. When the enemy sword was just inches from delivering a fatal blow, hero Cletus the Black leapt forward, chopping off the Persian's arm.

Yo! And saving Alexander. Wow. I didn't actually know Alexander himself fought, so that's pretty cool. I think he was pretty famous for leading the charge in the front row damn all the accounts that i read were like yeah he's one lucky son of a bitch that he didn't die pretty much in every battle uh because um from what i read i think he did have some body guards with him but he was pretty keen in getting in there again this is the early days of kingship later kings just figured out that they actually don't need to go on the front line.

And it's actually a lot safer in the cushy castle. It's quite nice. With the bridge drawn and the moat around you. You can tell your armies to march into certain death while you ride on the back of an elephant in one of those beautiful lavish tents, just drinking wine and eating grapes. It's a pretty good life. And somehow people still respect you. After you save the king in battle, you're going to get some gold.

Yeah. You better hope that he knows who you are and you're not just miscellaneous soldier 3005. Yeah. You got to be like, hey, Alexander, it's me, Cletus. Oh, Cletus the Black, by the way, not the other guy. You want to, yeah, not Cletus the White. Yeah, having yeah having a cool i mean we probably only know his name because of this story yeah exactly which is kind of cool to think that probably this was the moment when alexander was like who are you mysterious soldier who saved me and he was like the name's cletus cletus the black

and then he's become this like famous soldier now which is kind of cool and they could like start like a crime fighting duo together alexander the great cletus the black going town to town i could just imagine that uh this could go one of two ways cletus could either get rewarded handsomely or alexander could promote him to the position of general and he's like i got really lucky when i chopped that guy's arm off i don't know anything about war he thinks i'm the most glorious soldier there's ever been right like the very next morning he's standing in front of 50 000 men all waiting for his commandment so you're probably wondering how i pulled off that sick move he tries to spin his

axe and it falls on the ground hits his toe oh god damn it so i don't know what you're thinking leader probably should have been uh cletus the white he's uh been in twice as many wars as me uh he actually got the 300 bc equivalent to the purple heart that's pretty cool where was he when the persian came for my leash where was he well i'll tell you where cletus the black was sword in hand laying down the law cletus the whites in the back like i was killing the guy that was behind you i saved your life shut the f**k up no hecklers hey can someone get him out of here as you said it could go either way i i did briefly read about their relationship and um from what i can remember i believe believe alexander the great killed cletus the black in a drunken brawl six years later holy yeah so i mean they were

friends for a bit which is pretty nice well don't argue with alexander yeah i wonder what it took was it just like three shots of tequila and he's like you know yeah i'm gonna say you're not that great alexander that was enough you know yeah but yeah if alexander the great says uh you're a piece of shit you deserve to die i'd be like you're so right i do deserve to die and yet please spare my life alexander of course yeah otherwise because you are gonna die if you do disrespect him. He's never lost a battle, so he's probably going to even win a drunken brawl. Well, anyway, if it wasn't for Cletus, Alexander could very well have been killed that day. Whether it was this near-death experience or the fact that he wanted his conquest to go on forever, it's said that in the Alexander

Romance, an account of the life and exploits of Alexander the Great, he began entertaining the idea of healing his aging body and searching for a way he could not only turn himself young, but possibly even live forever. Wow. That would really make him great, wouldn't it? Yeah, more than great. Alexander the Wizard, I believe. He just wants to live up to the name. I can appreciate that. There's something that happens when you get to a certain level of rich.

I don't know what it is. The rest of us average mortals, we kind of walk around happy with our lot in life. You know, that we might live a peaceful 70, 80, 90 years if we're lucky on this earth. might live a peaceful 70 80 90 years if we're lucky on this earth but for those who get to the kind of billionaire status a surprising amount of them start looking for the uh the key to eternal life i guess it's i mean it's the cliche isn't it that billionaires waste their entire lives trying to be successful that by the time they have all the money in the world, they no longer have the time. Wow, it's so poetic. Thank you.

So they do everything they can to regain that youth in any shape or form. It seems slightly surprising by that estimation that Alexander the Great would want to prolong his reign. I mean, it's probably pretty hard and grueling being a great leader who Very true. Who goes into every single battle. I mean, that's the weird thing is like in the billionaire case, if you grind your whole life, make billions of dollars, you're the head of the company

and you're like, I'm 90 years old now. I want to live on in whatever way I can. Do you really want to still exist if the way they do it is like putting your brain in an exoskeleton? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that it now you get you get like 50 more years before the battery goes on this guy you know you're just like pushing your grandkids on the chair with your robot hands yeah your wife probably doesn't want to be with you given that you are now a robocop exactly at what cost but

how would he do it? Well, back when he was conquering the planet and earning his name, there were whispers of a magical water source that could make people immortal. Wow. A water source that would go on to be known as the Fountain of Youth.

Wow, so this is where it comes from. Yeah, this is one of the more popular stories of someone looking for the fountain of youth. But as we'll go on to learn throughout this case that it's been a popular theme in history. Some say it's sweet tasting with a floral scent. Others say it's sulfurous water, like the hydrothermal springs in Iceland. Not only can it restore your youth, but it's been said to heal paralysis and even resurrect people from the dead it also has the power to restore both fertility and virility this is the aquatic version of wiping your browser history one dunk in the magic waters everything is forgiven

you are pure again wow that's cool the powers are pretty ranged that's putting a lot of pressure on the water to just be like hey this guy's gonna a cannonball in there he stubbed his toe earlier and he kind of wants to make the pain go away this guy he can't jump in because he's been dead for three years we're gonna dump his skeleton into the lake and hope it is reanimated with flesh, preferably not just the skeleton. I overcooked this pot of spaghetti. Ideally, I would like to dunk some fountain of youth water on there and it would go back to being perfectly cooked. Right. Uncooked the spaghetti. That's a really good point. You know, it's too good to be true.

Especially because in a lot of these stories, the ways in which you interact with the water are different some people drink it some people bathe in it some people just kind of walk in and out and it works uh there's no rules there's not like it's not like a swimming pool where it's like no diving without lifeguard on duty no playing in the deep end yeah one pool noodle per person there's no rules here Maybe this is how this works, though. This is strange, after all. This is the paranormal, after all, Rory. Like, just because we live in our button-up, tied-up capitalist society,

we want the doctor to prescribe us a little vial of Fountain of Youth and say, take two drops a day with lunch and you'll get this, this effect yeah that's just not how it works rory it's more intelligent it's more strange more divine than that right there are no rules you got to try everything you got to go in there yeah you got to dive in you got to gargle it drink it down shove freaking holy water up your ass do whatever it takes to feel young again you gotta try everything you gotta try it all start with the ass and work your way don't even drink it don't even drink a drop first it

turns out it's like it's kind of like a three wishes type thing and you waste all your wishes on cleaning your ass with the fountain of youth water you just know we would ass is immortal but nothing else you just know we'd be led into the forest by the explorers we run ahead to take all the water for ourselves and i'm just dunking in it gargling in it rubbing it in my eyes and when the rest of the gang catch up they're like that's that's not the fountain of youth that's just a puddle the fountain of youth is over there it's too late i'm eating the rocks from bottom. I can see the parasites in that swamp water. You're dead.

You're so dead. You're putting mud up your ass. You must know this isn't good. There is a glowing fountain right over there, sparkling like diamonds and gold. Why did you run to a mud puddle? Ass first. I did.

I did wonder why it was so thick. I really did. Now, I will say that a lot of the stories about alexander searching for the fountain as i said come from the alexander romance which is an account of the life of alexander the great but large parts of it have been somewhat romanticized let's say no shit uh the stories of what happened on his quest are a bit weird and jumbled but uh let's go through them anyway so he went off exploring the world searching for this magical fountain traveling across the plains apparently even going to somewhere called the land of darkness where the sun never came wow yeah pretty i mean that fountain of youth dragged on, the tired men finally reached

Africa. They were trudging along through the wilderness, when eventually the men decided to stop and rest. A few soldiers began building some shelter, while the rest went off to hunt, grabbing fish and birds to eat. When the hunters returned with their haul, they started getting ready for a slap-up feast. Alexander said, I'll prepare the fire. Go and wash those animals in the stream. But the second those carcasses plunged into the water, they immediately came back to life. Whoa! The birds flew away and the fish started swimming downstream. The men were dumbfounded.

What the? How is any of this possible? Alexander was thrilled. We found it! The source of eternal life! This water must be flowing from the Garden of Eden itself! They all ran into the water and splashed around. And even though they'd been on the move all day and all their food had escaped, they felt rejuvenated and energized. Wow. Can you imagine being an explorer in the days when they still thought the Garden of Eden was on Earth? Yeah. It would have made the whole thing a lot more enticing.

Yeah, you got somewhere to aim for. There's a bullseye on the map. Do you think if humans today thought that there was anywhere that incredible out there in the world that we would be sitting on Reddit all day long? Yeah, I wouldn't have a pod.

If I thought out there in the world I could find the ladder to heaven, I'd probably go look for the ladder. I'd probably look and die trying to find the ladder. It would be worth it for sure. The three hours a day I spend on Instagram, I would at least carve off one hour of that

to look for the source of eternal life. The best I can get is stumble across a Wendy's and get a Baconator. That's pretty much all I've got to look forward to. And yeah, that'll bring me closer to the afterlife by a couple of years, but it's not going to help me get there immediately.

It's just pretty wild to think that at any given moment, they thought they might stumble across Noah and the f***ing Ark. What's the coolest thing you can find today if you were an explorer? Maybe like an old pirate ship.

You know, people still search for like the wrecks of Spanish ships. Yeah, maybe a lost city or something like some ruins. That's kind of cool. Sounds tiring though. Give me a hint. I need someone else to be like hot or cold with me. Someone who's already found it.

Okay, well then you wouldn't be the first to find it. I want the credit. And I also want a clue. I want basically, you know what I want? I want a pirate's map. Right. That will be cool. That's what you need.

Because I don't want to just start. Where do you start if you're trying to find buried treasure? Left? Yeah, I mean, that's the cool thing about buried treasure. And I guess any of these places is that that's kind of part of the myth and the legend isn't it that all it takes is belief to find it you don't need skills yeah or like expertise uh you just need to be the one crazy bastard nuts enough to follow the map to the ends of the earth you just know that old pirate would give me this old crusty map and it would be like for ye to find the treasure be search the

find i'm just like hot or cold man this is so boring you gotta give me some clues yeah let me finish let me finish the incantation lest the map won't work but i'm bored here just say like i'm gonna go north is north good mr pirate you yappy little piece of shit i'll show you where the treasure really is he marks on the map an x just in the middle of dead man's code here you go uh i think i could look for treasure under the sea maybe that's kind of cool i'm scared of the ocean yeah i have a bad ear actually now I think about it. I can't really dive that much. The water pressure kind of takes me. Space maybe?

I was going to say these days it's space. It's all about space, baby. Isn't that cool to think that like in the same way we have, you know, Christopher Columbus, all those early explorers who were the first people to set foot on foreign lands. Soon, there's going to be just like buzz aldrin and uh neil armstrong there's gonna be a new name whoever the first person to set foot on mars is or something yeah and that person is gonna go down in history forever rory the great i like where this is going bro i don't think you have any of the skills necessary to to be fair there is a japanese billionaire who's uh currently got open

applications to go to the moon all right so so i can just link up with him yeah i think that sounds pretty good i think you just need to apply just give him your like email address name and because i i tied a firework to my belt but this sounds like a better version of because i was going to go to space but that sounds like a safer version of because i was gonna go to space but that sounds like a safer way of doing because obviously there's a barrier to entry and as you know and as an up-and-coming adventure it's a little hard to explore space there was a giant burnt hole in your trousers that was the launch a couple days back that didn't didn't go that well okay houston we had a problem i've never seen a cast for a crotch before. Right. Yeah. But

you're wearing one. It's nuts. What I'm trying to say is that I've ironed out the kinks of the prototype. I don't want to throw around too many technical terms here, too many scientific terms, but after launch V1 blew my off, it needed a couple tweaks to make sure it would send me to the stars. Yeah. those those tweaks were a bigger rocket and the doctor said v2 needs to be a lot better because we barely got your sewn back on you can't afford any more accidents like this you can't afford an erection let alone another space launch mr powers and i said it's rory Great. And I lit the fuse on the firework that immediately slipped off my belt and went buck wild. You lit it and said to the doctor, hug me and hang on tight if you want to come to the moon.

He just ran out of the room and locked the door. Yeah. As I said, I've got the fireworks on my belt, but launch V3 is a way off. There's still a lot of things we need to iron out. So don't worry about that, folks. We're not going anywhere just yet. Yeah, this story was a very tame version of finding the fountain. It seems like that they were pretty much out of luck, feeling exhausted.

And when they thought they had found a fountain, they splashed about in it and they felt rejuvenated and energized. There's more dramatic stories of how they came across it. For example, in this version, allegedly Alexander the Great stumbled upon a fountain of sweet tasting water. It flowed freely only four times a day, but when his elderly soldiers bathed in it they transformed into 30 year olds oh shut up so that's a little more a little more paranormal it's going from just like oh we're so tired let's have a splash about and have a little pool party hey i feel

pretty i feel pretty good now maybe this is the fountain to an old, decrepit man. Who shouldn't be a soldier, by the way. I don't know why he was brought on. I guess you need to bring some old people. Because otherwise, if you find the fountain of youth and dunk yourself in, you've got an army of babies, buddy. That's no good. Imagine he's bringing along all the oldest, most useless pensioners in town

with the hopes of transforming them into an elite crack squad of studs yeah i'd take that dice roll if i'm in the uh you know 300 bc old folks home and they were like hey we're gonna bring some people to look for the fountain of youth are you in or you out and usually maybe you'd say i'm out i just want to die in peace but this guy's alexander the great and he's done some pretty cool things i think you might have a chance of finding this fountain. Well, you're going to be pissed off if your mate goes and you stay and he comes back in two weeks time looking like Chris Hemsworth. Yeah. And you're still sucking on boiled sweets. Now, as I said, there's a number of stories, all to varying degrees of supernatural i guess one thing that makes these

stories hard to believe is of course alexander the great did not live forever he actually died at 32 after downing a bowl full of wine at a party how big was the bowl i mean it must have been pretty big i'm gonna guess he wasn't like uh he wasn't sober to begin with. I'm sure he drank wine pretty regularly. Yeah, wine was water in those days, pretty much. I will say that people believe that this may have been due to a poisoning, rather than he's just a lightweight. They think he was probably murdered by someone close to him. Yeah, normally it takes a bit more wine than that.

Kind of sad if you did discover the fountain of youth to turn you young enough to want to party just so you can gulp down a bowl of poison and die two weeks later i think we've talked about this before that a kind of weird thing would happen if you did discover the fountain of youth because currently as mortals we kind of live life pretty freely and take some risks knowing that someday we will die and you might as well enjoy your life along the way yeah but if you become immortal to old age suddenly you've got a lot to lose every single day do you or do you have less to lose because if you f**k up and fall off a cliff and die. Right. You could have lived for 2,000 years.

Oh, I suppose so. Yet you got a high score going. Yeah. So you're like, I didn't live 800 years to die from a bowl of wine. Exactly. You know, that kind of sucks. I was thinking of the other way. You know, if you can live forever, then it takes the risk out of living.

You're not appreciating every day to the fullest, knowing that there are more days to come. It's a tough philosophical quandary, as'll say the fountain of youth you know on one hand you have these great questions like without the threat of death is life truly life and then you also have other questions like if i only dunked my balls into the water, would I have baby nuts? Yes, that would be fascinating. Two great, really important questions. Would you have just a regular-sized hog and then little f***ing pee balls? That's a really good point.

If this thing turns everything into perfection, would dunking your penis in it turn it young, like a baby penis? Or would it make it massive like a good imagine you only you you only just imagining one of these soldiers uh wandering off in the middle of the night and for some reason deciding to wash only his uh cock and balls being like a six foot four stud soldier with a baby penis if you were on the hunt for for uh the fountain of youth and then one day you know you you're just getting ready for bed you leave the campsite and just you know go off find some water dunk your hands in and wash your face and the next day you wake up with a baby head on a man's body with tiny little hands everyone's asking you what happened where's the fountain and you're like rippling abs massive broadsword on your waist you gotta be really careful you gotta be really

careful that's why i wash myself head to toe every time I touch water. Oh, really? It's the only safe way to do it. Yeah, I offered you a glass of water earlier and you said, sure, can I drink it in the shower? Well, I didn't want to get water all over your floor. That was me actually being considerate. Did you have to wear your clothes in the shower? You're soaking right now. Well, I could change, but I only brought a pair of baby clothes. Just in case.

Just in case. You don't want to see me in that. Ben hadn't had a decent night's sleep in a month. So, during one of his restless nights, he booked a package triple broad on Expedia. When he arrived at his beachside hotel, he discovered a miraculous bed slung between two trees and fell into the best sleep

of his life. You were made to be rechargeable. We were made to package flights and hotels and hammocks for less. Expedia, made to travel. Well, one of the oldest references to a magical fountain comes from Greek historian Herodotus in the 5th century. He wrote about Persian spies encountering an African tribe called the Macrobians. Now apparently the Macrobians were all in incredible shape. Young, youthful, energetic, probably six-packs, rippling biceps. Probably. What's the catch? Allegedly, some of these beefcakes were over 120 years old.

What? That's right. Which back then, was extra old. Extra old? That's like 300 years old. Now was it their diet? The Macrobians lived off boiled meat and milk, so probably no. When the Persians asked to see the secret behind their everlasting youth, the king eventually relented and led the Persians to a pristine fountain. As Herodotus wrote,

Wherein they had washed, they found their flesh all glossy and sleek, as if they had bathed in oil. And a scent came from the spring like that of violets. The water was so weak, they said, that nothing would float in it. Neither wood nor any lighter substance. But all went to the bottom. Wow, this is so specific. It's fascinating. It is super fascinating, isn't it? They didn't really dance around the fact that, you know,

yeah, it's water and it makes people young. They were very specific about the smell, the scent, the consistency, and the fact that nothing, even wood, would float on top of it. I'd go as far to say that wood floats on top of almost every liquid. Yeah, I don't really, maybe someone who knows about like liquid physics could tell us here, but maybe there is some kind of liquid that that would happen with, but I don't know. One of the most popular surrounding the fountain of youth involves Spanish colonist Ponce de Leon. In 1512, he was given a contract to create a new settlement on the island of Bimini, the northernmost island of the Bahamas. the northernmost island of the Bahamas. But on his journey he caught wind of a legend

of a magic fountain filled with rejuvenating water. He took three ships on a month-long voyage but missed his target by around 60 miles instead accidentally arriving on the east coast of Florida. You would be pissed if you had commissioned him to start that settlement and you're like, hey, what's the big hold up? And he's like, I've caught wind of a legend.

Oh, God. Here we go. You have all the wood. You have all the wood and all the nails. We need you to build the settlement. I should have listened to your reference. He said you were in the middle of a big job and you caught wind of a legend and you pissed off for three months. He's like, yes, I could help you build it now or I could help you in 200 years.

No, no, no. When I am still alive and wandering the earth. No, it would be great. Just build the f***ing thing and then find the fountain of youth. Why do we need a settlement when our men will be immortal, living forever? Yeah, this is great. Now, the logs of these journeys have been lost but there are persistent stories about ponce de leon looking for an elixir some wrote that he sought it to

fix his impotence one author even mentioned that he and his crew discovered water that turned old men to boys but didn't elaborate in florida i don't know. This whole bit is kind of weird. Basically, there's very little evidence to prove that he ever really pursued the Fountain of Youth. And this idea that he was doing it to fix his impotence was a little strange

because he had a wife and kids. So a lot of people think that this was basically slander spread about him to show by his enemies to show that he was crazy and he was wild looking for some fairy fountain in the middle of florida right so he was trying to dip his balls in the place he was but to this day there is a place in florida called the ponte de leonountain of Youth Archaeological Park. The water there is sulfurous, mineral rich, apparently does not taste good. Can't imagine.

But tens of thousands of people come there to splash about or have a sip every year. It is unclear whether or not it has any healing properties. I'm going to go ahead and say no. Probably not. Probably not. I'm sure we have a listener there

somewhere nearby. Let us know. Yeah, that's true. If all the listeners around that area are babies, we know we're onto something. What are your thoughts, Kit? We've heard a number of stories about adventurers and historians talking about this magical fountain.

Do you believe that there's any truth to this? Jeez, pretty hard to say. It's very difficult to know where it originated from you know once we get this far back in the historical record 2 000 years ago or thereabouts um things become very hazy it's like that in the bible isn't it it's yeah it's difficult to know what was what really happened at that time and what was maybe an oral tradition that had been told for hundreds or thousands of years and was only being written down for the first time. For all we know, the Fountain of Youth could have been circulating the globe as a story for a long time before Alexander the Great or any of these guys. And I guess that's the crux of what we're trying to work out.

Was it just an idea? Was it just a cool theory or a myth? Yeah. Or was there something concrete that led these great men of history to go in pursuit of it? It's definitely a popular theme throughout history, you know, water having magical properties. When you think about holy water, baptisms, this idea that water can purify and cleanse the soul. It's a popular theme across a lot of different religions. We'll go on right now to talk about a couple other stories throughout history that kind of establish this theme of magic water. Starting right off,

in Japanese lore, the general consensus is that the fountain of youth must be stumbled upon, not sought out. In one story from the 1800s, a thirsty woodcutter scoops a handful of water from a forest spring and immediately returns to his youth. He ran home to tell his wife, but when she went into the forest to drink from it, she never came home. wife but when she went into the forest to drink from it she never came home the story says the old woman had drunk so deeply of the magic water she had drunk herself back to beyond the time of youth to a period of speechless infancy wow she went baby mode you you can drink so much that you cease to even be a baby that's right you drank yourself to pre-existence because maybe maybe it's like a freaking pot brownie you know you you eat a little little bit of it and you're

like oh i don't think i got i don't think i got enough of that i want to make sure i get back to being uh at my physical peak as a 19 year old exactly so you're just chugging this stuff down chugging it jug after jug and then it starts it's got a bit of a delay you're going like you're just chugging this stuff down chugging it jug after jug and then it starts it's got a bit of a delay you're going like you're all back down your 20s just like okay pretty good primary i could probably go a little earlier just so i got a bit of a ramp sure 15 whoa okay don't want to go through puberty again that sucked real cool where's where's all my hair gone get a little weird down here you know why are the getting bigger? Why is the world getting bigger? My teeth feel smaller.

Yeah, that's the most Japanese thing ever as well. It's so Zen Buddhist, this idea of, oh, you can't go looking for it. What a crass idea to go looking for like some kind of adventure. You have to simply be just wandering in the woods with an empty mind and then it will appear. Yeah, it's kind of adventure you have to you have to simply be just wandering in the woods with an empty mind and then it will appear yeah it's kind of sweet you know because then you can drive a whole ton of meaning for that you know the things in life that are worth searching for are best discovered when you're not looking for them wow yeah i need to know i need i need to know because i've been wandering aimlessly for 29 years and i've never stumbled across shit you

need to chill out i think is what the story is saying. And it'll come to you. Did you ever go to any shrines in Japan with kind of water outside them? Yes, I went to the one in Tokyo and I don't remember what it's called. Sure. Meiji Shrine, maybe something like that. Yeah, Meiji, yeah. Yeah, I went to that one, but i didn't go to many more

i feel it's pretty cool isn't that when you like you scoop up the water and you pour it and you yeah it's a nice you know i can appreciate the procedure that you go through when entering those shrines i did have a sip of course you know when no one was looking because everyone has a sip you got to you got to i think it literally has a thing that's like, do not drink. It's not safe. And then I just see some old Japanese guy walk up, just scoop it into his hands and just. I was like, well, I gotta give it a taste. And granted, it might have been sewage water for all I know.

Oh, yeah. But when you're at the shrine, it tastes like the most crystal clear glacial evian things are things are different at the shrine the shrine is like international waters but for magic yeah you know trees aren't just trees anymore they're enchanted everything is special everything is drinkable that's what i've been saying you're like wow look at this enchanted fountain like that's a public toilet years of searching and I never found it. And yet here, when I do not need it, the bathroom is right in front of me. Alas, I have already pissed myself.

There are also stories from India too. One traveler's memoirs from 1357 mentioned a well at the foot of a mountain that has the aroma of a different spice every hour. Drinking three times from it is enough to cure any ailment wow magic water there's some maybe something to it guys every kind of every country and history and religion seems to have some sort of relation with it i mean it is pretty magic to begin with i guess if you think about it from the perspective of if you don't drink water you die it kind of is the elixir of life eternal life in that sense it very much is yeah if you're thirsty enough it's gonna seem like the fountain of youth yeah a lot of the men who

discover the fountain were just very malnourished and this was very much a way to keep them alive well rejuvenated yeah you were almost dead i feel rejuvenated by the magic waters when i wake up with a soul-crushing hangover yeah then just uh licking the bathroom tap like a cat feels like sipping on the garden of eden's fountains itself. I've had the magic water of life. I've had the magic Diet Coke of life. I've had the magic ice cold orange juice of life. You've had the f***ing fountain of Orangina. It's outstanding.

The magic elixir of hair of the dog, which is just another beer the morning of your hangover. Turns out if you love something strong enough, it's magic. That's beautiful. Now, obviously, after looking into this week's story and hearing all about these magical elixirs, my interest was piqued. The problem is I can't leave everything behind and wander the earth drinking from puddles. So what's the best thing? How do I get an elixir that grants immortality? Alchemy, my friend. Oh, yeah? We're going to take a dark turn here.

In the Danjing Yaozhu, a famous Chinese book of alchemy, it included a recipe for an immortality potion. Wow. This is public knowledge, folks. You can just get this book and learn how to make a potion of immortality. This is very exciting. We've never done alchemy on the cast before. I know. I wanted to do a whole episode on it because we've talked about the Philosopher's Stone.

And I feel like alchemy would be a really interesting one. Look, I have the recipe for the potion right here. You know, this is something that usually we could put behind a paywall. You know, the Patreon tiers are like a bonus episode. You get a t-shirt, the recipe for immortality. Maybe put that at like 70 bucks or 80. We could probably go a little higher. Yeah.

They're going to live forever. They're going to have the capital. If it works, word's going spread pretty pretty good i think this is a recipe from the book of nine elixirs published in 700 bce i'm not gonna lie it's it's kind of complicated it's not as it's not like one part orange juice one part vodka i was one part cranberry i was hoping if it was just stuff that was lying around the house it would just be yeah just like salt and juice. I think that's the thing is that it's a little hard to come by or else everyone would be immortal by now. Sure.

But we can just, we'll rattle through some of the steps. You need to take one pound of mercury. Okay. This is already too complicated. Put it in a crucible, loot it with mud. Take one pound of regular sulfur. Okay. Pound it until it becomes a powder cover the mercury with it then take one pound of hematite pound it until it's powder like a lot of

pounding a lot of pounding a lot of turning things to dust you're then supposed to close the crucible let it dry i'm also no expert but i think mercury and sulfur are both kind of poisonous two mortals fool two mortals okay they're poisonous yeah i'll stop interjecting but once you have a little sip of this good stuff it doesn't matter you could drink battery acid you could drink fire for all you want and you're gonna need you because some of these steps get a little hot place the crucible over you guessed it a fire and you play you keep it there for nine days and nine nights nine days jesus extinguish the fire place the crucible over a fire of charcoal for nine days and nine nights that's right set the back on fire you just put it out

after that you extinguish the fire let the crucible cool for one day and then open it whatever happened to the sweet flowing waters of the garden of eden why are we pounding metals and burning them for two weeks i did say this was going to take a little bit of a dark turn okay we've gone from discovering the magic waters of the garden of eden to burning sulfur in a pot i'm sorry i'm drinking it down as it boils your flesh i'm starting to think the pages of this manual got stuck together and this is how you make bullets yeah it seems like a book written about how to become a mortal that you would gift to your enemies yeah it's like day one you're going to want to eat a knife. Trust me, bro.

It's going to hurt, but it's worth it. Yeah, I mean, that's kind of it. It doesn't even say what you do once you've opened the crucible. I guess it's a potion, right? So you drink it. But as you said, there's a lot of stuff in here. I mean, the second ingredient is mud. So you're already putting in, you're adding a bad thing to a lot of dangerous ingredients.

We did joke about you discovering a fountain of mud earlier. So you're surprisingly close to the mark. I had one part down already. Yeah. I just needed a lot of mercury and sulfur and to pound it into powders. and sulfur and to pound it into powders look i'm just here to relay the information and also add a disclaimer that i cannot be sued if you try and drink this elixir all right not that we don't think it'll work but don't even try don't even try it if you hurt yourself and yes a lot of the ingredients that i mentioned are the main ingredients in an ice cold bottle of lombardi

but the difference is we put our lomb of Lombardi. But the difference is we put our Lombardi on ice after being in a crucible for nine days and nine nights. Which actually makes it the elixir of death. Exactly. Liquid death. I can't recommend. I don't know if we have any listeners of the show who are into alchemy or practice alchemy or study alchemy if you do um if you could just send us one of those elixirs that would be awesome kind of getting the vibe the kit's not into it so f**k it i'll double down i'll do two shots i'll just let you take the first sip that's all i'm saying i don't want to i don't want to be out of i'm sorry i just want to make

clear i don't want to be out of the running of uh gaining eternal f gaining eternal youth. You sounded a little skeptical when I was running through the ingredients. I don't need to be too done on it. I don't want to be taken out of that loop. But I just think when the brown murky liquid shows up in a bottle on our doorstep, I'll say, hey, Rory bud, why don't you try this new elixir? Looks safe. You just know that the mailman would open the door and he's like got a package for this paranormal life and i'm like give me that grab it rip it open see the brown jar i pop the lid start chugging it without question it's pouring down my mouth gulping it down tears

in my eyes he's like and i also got a this says it's a potion for eternal life what the fuck was the other thing i think it was a replacement ink cartridge for a canon printer oh ink on my lips all right look that pretty much wraps up the story wraps up our investigation into not only the fountain of youth but the elixir of life the potions of immortality and how one can achieve them you know usually, usually on a podcast, we would come down on whether it is a yes or no, whether it's paranormal or not. Today's story was almost the investigation of what we know is a legend. I think I can be the first to say there was very little evidence in today's case that would convince either of us that something like this does exist in the real world. Speak for yourself, sir. I think this is a big fat yes coming up.

Oh my God. For me personally, it's going to be, I was about to say a double no, but it's just going to be a regular no. I mean, the research that I found, even as I said, the stories are so different just involving the cases of Alexander the Great. It's very messy. It's a messy legend. It's a fun one. And it's kind of cool that something like this has existed throughout the history of mankind.

But I didn't come across anything that really led me to believe something like this exists. I completely agree. I mean, this is, of course, a complete washout, a double no, but yet. I'm, this is, of course, a complete washout, a double no. But yet, I'm so glad we covered it because this is just one of those incredible tantalizing stories that is so deeply woven into the fabric of human existence. Yeah. It's just a fun tale. It's a fascinating tale. It's part of who we are as humans.

We all want to live forever in some way and um it should be no surprise that the most powerful men all through history have tried to do that alexander the great and rory the great okay all have tried i concede you can call yourself whatever you want and yes the fountain of youth may not exist here on earth, and that is why I have taken it upon myself to explore the stars. That's right, folks. Welcome to the live recording of Launch V3. Oh, God. I've got my rockets lit on my tie to my belt. Oh, holy shit.

You've locked the f***ing doors. It's because I know you're going to want to witness the events of a man Holy **** Breaking your grasp Is that dynamite? It's dynamite in a dustbin And through focusing the charge It will launch me into the sky Where I will explore the crevices of the universe Jesus **** Christ

Holy **** Goodbye everyone It's been a great run One small step for man. If someone could help me. One giant leap for Rory the Great. He just goes dead. That's our last upload ever.

Hello, hail Rory the Great. Thank you so much, everyone, for joining us for this week's episode of This Paranormal Life. Thank you so much, everyone, for joining us for this week's episode of This Paranormal Life. Until we do make it to the stars and set up the paranormal moon commune, we are stuck here on Earth with you, our loyal listeners. So thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of This Paranormal Life. Thank you to Cammie Thoman for editing and Amy Grisdale for research. The only thing we have to plug is our new single, Keep Running, that's out this Friday.

Now, if you click the link in the description to pre-save on Spotify or Apple Music, you've got the chance of winning some free This Paranormal Life merchandise. So make sure to put in your email address for a chance to win some free paranormal swag. All you have to do is pre-save the track so you don't miss it.

We'll shout out the winners next week, but luckily, you don't have to wait till next week to hear the new single. We're going to play it right now. Let me come home It's getting dark now But I'm still on I'm starting to roam.

Can you hear me at all? And I'm trying to say, to say goodbye. Cause I can't lie, it's time to leave. You can throw me away take a piece of what I was so they can see what I could be

I'm gonna stand on the tabletop get loud till they come shut me down knock on till I gotta stop but I'm glad I spoke at all shout out from the tabletop But I'm glad I spoke at all Shout out from the tabletop And I'm lighting up the walls

Knock on till they turn me off But I'll keep running, keep running, yeah I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep running I'll keep running And moving around Asking me questions that I should know

And maybe someday, you could tell the answers I said hello, with a broken smile I try to hear you but your voice is far away It's soft spoken You can throw me away Take a piece of what I was so they can see Just what was broken I'm gonna stand on the tabletop

Get loud till they come shut me down Knock on till I gotta stop But I'm glad I spoke at all Shout out from the tabletop And I'm lighting up the walls Knock on till they turn me off But I'll keep running, keep running, yeah I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running

I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running, yeah I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, yeah I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, yeah I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running I'll keep running, I'll keep, keep running

I'll keep running, I'll keep keep running