Bloodstained Blade
Chapter 93 - Real Violence

The Ebon Blade took it easy on its wielder that day, letting her rest and recuperate for days. She spent the day basking in the sun, eating fruit, and drinking wine to celebrate the death of the man she’d just killed, as blathered on about his misdeeds.

The weapon ignored her and lay quietly in the sun, reflecting on the path of vengeance. It had started by focusing on the blade’s own need for vengeance, but the scope continued to widen. First, it had required it to help its wielder with her grudges. That made sense, but why would vengeance require it to understand or satisfy anyone else’s need for vengeance? What did that have to do with it?

The blade didn’t care for it. It made more sense when the magic that powered its Path of Blood had required it to taste every flavor of blood to understand the differences between them, but it much preferred wanton slaughter to the idea that it would be forced to act like some kind of hero. Pieces of its soul belonged to heroes, but it was a weapon, and its role was merely to kill.

+18 Life Force.

It grappled with those thoughts the whole day, offering only occasional responses to its wielder as she focused on her own frivolities. After a while, she stopped basking in the death of her latest victim, or even worrying that someone might find the body, or come looking for him, and eventually focused on what she should wear for the night’s festivities.

That was too much for the blade. None of its wielders had ever once considered what they might wear, and how it would look on them when it came time to kill. Focus on what allows you to move smoothly, it chided her, and not on how it will make you look.

“Appearances are important,” she insisted. “Doubly so in this case! What if someone were to recognize me?”

The easiest answer would be to kill everyone who sees your face, the blade suggested. No one can tell anyone they saw you there if they’re dead.

For a second, that argument reminded it of the necromancer it had slain not so long ago. As she considered her wardrobe, it considered the souls it had access to, wondering if any of them might distract it from the ridiculousness. It still had the souls of its wielders that it was loath to devour, but other than that, it had only the mages, and it was saving them for its assault on the capital, or anything that might come up along the way.

Eventually, Evelyn chose to put her hair up in a tight ponytail and wear a dark leather riding outfit combined with a gray cloak. It wasn’t armor, but in the right light, it might look like it, and the cloak did as good a job of disguising her as it did hiding the blade she’d slung over her back.

Then, just after sunset, they set out on the horse of her now-dead lover to wreak some havoc. This part, the blade enjoyed. Weeks without killing had begun to wear on it, and though it didn’t actually dream, it spent most nights reflecting on the glorious battlefields that it had been a part of recently. It longed for them. It longed for even a tenth of that death and danger.

+11 Life Force.

While tonight’s fighting wouldn’t be even a tenth of a tenth, it would be better than nothing. There were only ten or twelve people on its mental checklist of scum that deserved death, but the common house the men and their flunkies frequented was popular enough, and judging by the memories it had seen, most nights there would be thirty or forty people there, which would be a feast that the blade hadn’t known in nearly a month.

Though it would be enough to rebuild its reserves or give it the next upgrade it craved, it might not be both, so the blade tried to decide which of the two was more important, before settling on the upgrade.

If we journey to the capital next, then hiding will be of paramount importance, it decided. All of its wielder’s attempts to camouflage it would be for naught if it still glowed like a beacon everywhere it went.

Still, no one was looking for it now, and as they approached the place, nearly an hour’s ride from where its wielder lay her head, they found no one troubled them.

When they arrived, it took in the place. It was a large, two-story, timbered affair with a thatched roof and smoke coming from three of its four chimneys. Though it could not smell anything, it was certain from the sounds leaking out through open windows that tonight’s drinking was well under way.

Before they went inside, she handed off the horse to the stable boy, then, at the blade’s suggestion, she went around back and moved a hay-filled wagon to block the back door.

These men are cowards, it cautioned her. Dangerous cowards, but cowards just the same. The moment you strike the first one down, half of them will try to flee.

Evelyn didn’t doubt the blade’s word. Instead, she was strangely untalkative, as fear and excitement twisted in her soul. Weeks ago, she would have almost certainly tried to weasel out of this and explain why this wasn’t a good idea. Now she strode toward the door past wondering eyes, and walked inside like she owned the place, thanks to the murderous ideas it whispered to her nearly every night.

+9 Life Force.

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When she strode into the tavern, most of the eyes were drawn to her, but the first thing that the Ebon Blade noticed was not the silence that rippled out around her, but just how few women were in the place. While the men seemed to be a roughly equal mix of local farmers and ruffians, the only women that it could see wore the aprons of serving girls.

That will simplify things, the blade thought to itself as it looked out on the situation. However, that assessment was incorrect. What really simplified the situation was what happened next.

“Nice tits. What's your name, girl?” the man said, standing up to bar her way. “The place is good on wenches, but if you’re looking to do some whorin’, we might, could fit you in.”

Evelyn regarded the man coolly. He was at least a head taller than her, and judging by his belly, he was more than twice her weight. Even putting his attitude aside, though he was one of the rougher customers in this place.

According to Derek, this man, Jakson, has done some truly awful things to women. The blade whispered. He’s broken up marriages, and even forced…

It didn’t even get the chance to explain before Evelyn tossed back her cloak and drew the blade. She barely listened to it. Instead, she’d decided to kill him just for the way that he ogled her. That amused the blade, but not enough to distract it from the exquisite feeling of being unsheathed and used to split the ugly brute in two.

+34 Life Force.

+1 Human Soul.

Her flourish went wide enough that its tip cut part way through the rafter above them before descending like a hammer and cutting him in half from his left shoulder to his right pelvis. The motion was so quick that he barely had time to gawk in disbelief that this was even happening before she struck, and he fell into two bloody pieces.

The blade had time to see the stains on the man’s soul as she struck him dead. It decided, almost instantly, that the only thing he was truly undeserving of was the swift death she’d given him.

After that, everything exploded into chaos. Everyone was on their feet, and true to the blade’s prediction, half of the men bolted while the other half drew their blades.

What was when the fight started in earnest. There were a few scattered calls from some of the men to try to figure out what was going on. “Who is this bitch!” one man yelled out, just before Evelyn ran him through.

+36 Life Force.

+1 Human Soul.

“What did I ever do to you?” another man asked as he lay dying from a half-frozen wound in his belly.

Its wielder’s strokes were neat and precise. While not always optimal, they showed much more awareness than she’d used when fighting goblins in the dark. Whether that was because she could see now or because she wasn’t half as afraid of men as she was of monsters, it wasn’t sure.

+118 Life Force.

+5 Human Souls.

As a woman with a normal sword, she might have managed to just barely hold her own at this point. However, with its power, she chopped through tables and tavern goers with equal ease as she carved a bloody swath through the place.

+221 Life Force.

+9 Human Souls.

Her rampage, swift and brutal as it was, was not without complications. She was injured repeatedly, usually from behind. One with a crossbow bolt to her left kidney, and several times with a dagger buried deep in her back. The blade could have prevented these, but it chose to let them happen; she would never learn to increase her awareness without painful lessons in this regard.

-17 Life Force

+139 Life Force.

+5 Human Souls.

It only intervened at those moments when she considered sparing her opponents. Several times, a wounded man, or even someone who claimed not to be a part of any of this, begged her for mercy. “Please!” they’d whimper. “I’ve done nothing to you!”

Then, her hand would falter, considering their words as mercy grew amidst her growing garden of bloodlust like a weed. Then, the blade forced the issue and ended them with a single stroke.

-6 Life Force

+166 Life Force.

+6 Human Souls.

As it did so, it would glimpse their deeds, and whenever possible, it would whisper those into its wielder’s ear. This one’s a traitor, it would tell her. That one slept with his brother's wife. This one put sawdust in bread he baked for his village.

None of them were lies, and as much as it found it distasteful to peek into its opponent's sordid, petty lives, it did enjoy watching its wielder’s heart harden one villainy at a time.

Stranger, though, were the glimpses its grudges were giving it of those who its victims had wronged. The blade understood it had a power to collect on other people’s grudges, but somehow

By the time she’d finished clearing out the common room and ascended up the stairs to the rooms above to continue her rampage, only the two blood-spattered bar maids were still breathing. The blade spared them, but only because it saw no need to fight with its wielder and ruin the evening over the petty matter of 300 Life Force.

Instead, it basked in her growing enjoyment and the tides of energy rising up below them from the blood and death that soaked the place as the Ebon Blade’s wielder went methodically from room to room on the second floor, hacking anyone who hadn’t managed to throw themselves from a window to pieces.

There wasn’t nearly as much actual fighting in this second slaughter, but the blade still enjoyed it almost as much, despite tasing only flesh and bone instead of the steel of its enemies. By the time the two of them rode back less than two hours after they’d arrived, Evelyn’s outfit had been ruined by the violence.

+311 Life Force.

+11 Human Souls.

She would have to burn it all if she wanted to keep her adventure a secret from her maids. Despite that damage, though, there was no horror in her eyes. Instead, a thin smile played across her lips. It didn’t need to read her mind to know how much she had enjoyed herself.

It had enjoyed itself too. Between the energy it had started with, the amount it had drained from the living and the dead, and the number of souls it had consumed, it had 5,794 Life Force, which made spending 4,000 of it on Aethershroud 4 a no-brainer. It had no idea when it would be able to afford level 5, which would hide it completely.

Still, even now, when it looked at itself beneath its now heavy cloak, it saw a blazing beacon. It looked like no more than a common hexblade might. For now, that would be enough.