A Blade or Weakness

  ?Blade felt like he was falling into a pure white sea, unsure of where he was or what would happen, yet he heard a voice.

  ?“... ... ...”

  ?Or was it a voice? He had some doubts, but simultaneously he also had a feeling. And that feeling felt like reason enough.

  ?“Bla… li…”

  ?A rope thrown to a sinking man. And for some reason he wanted to grab that rope, for what reason he did not know. But he trusted this voice, he knew he did.

  ?“Blade... please…”

  ?Grabbing what felt like nothing more than an invisible rope, he took hold of whatever he could and began dragging himself up.

  ?“Blade... please… live…”

  ?Dragging himself into consciousness, Blade woke up to an unconscious Aisha lying on him. He had questions, all of which could only be answered by her, yet if he had to decide between the trust of his sister and his own curiosity, then he would choose to trust her.

  ?As he repositioned himself, he felt the ache of the wound that had befallen him, yet he only winced, as much of the damage had healed. Noting the healing bandages, he unwrapped them gently, planning to retie them after checking, and saw that his guess was correct. His torso was mostly healed, yet the healing was quite weird. Touching the wound, he felt pain, but it felt far too hard to be normal flesh. Opening more of the bandages, he saw that blades were sprouting from the wound, yet not to cause harm. The weapons had in fact sealed the wound, healing him in a weird way.

  ?Now that he looked closer, he saw that the bandages had barely any marks of blood, yet they had alleviated the pain as it began quickly creeping back on him. Tying the bandages back around him, and making sure they were fitted this time, he repositioned Aisha on his chest so she could rest better.

  ?He thought about it. His body was made up of weapons, every weapon. It had partially been why the cut was more egregious. From the information, he could conclude that his body was still primarily human, but that if left alone, it would heal by creating weapons in its place, overriding the human part. It didn’t seem like it did any bad though, as at a closer look, the wounds, though closed by blades, were being covered by skin.

  ?But it then left a new question with him. What was Severance truly? He had at first simply thought of her as the manifestation of his core, but after deploying Moonfire Armoury for the first time, that idea felt busted. She couldn’t be his weapon part either as it was now clear his body was both human and blade.

  ?If she truly was the Authority given form, as that was what his core and by extension Moonfire Armoury was. As he thought about it, she never really had been 100% truthful with him. Sometimes it was for the better, but she had never given a straight answer of how she knew so much. Her story didn’t really make sense either. If she had been with the previous holder of the Authority of weapons, it made no sense how she knew so much about him. She had been with him for as long as he remembered, so none of it held any logic connecting it.

  ?Even with his fragmented memories, nothing about Severance made any sense or held any logic to it. It made him wonder how much of what he had been told was true. Picking up his coat that Aisha had removed to bandage him, he pushed himself off the familiar he had been leaning on before picking up Aisha and wrapping her in the coat to keep her warm. He was a bit unsure how her familiars worked though. Were they like his weapons, were they things that could exist without constantly feeding it mora, or was it still siphoning mora from her?

  ?The answer came quickly as the familiar dissipated into mora, yet it left Blade more worried about Aisha’s state than anything else.

  ?Blade couldn’t hold her as close as he wanted as he ran, reason being his chest screamed in pain each time anything touched it. Guessing his nerves weren’t used to weapons covering the places where skin and tissue should be. Could only hope it got better as it developed, as he really doubted it would be the last time he was damaged as such. At least when his skin fully regenerated, the pain would stop.

  ?He was aware he could bring her to the abyss, the problem was more if she could handle it. He himself had been on the brink of death the two first times he was there, both of which were only because of Aira and his connection. And even then he didn’t have the strength to do anything, even almost dying his second time. Right now, Aisha was weaker than he had been back then, so would she even survive it? He couldn’t trust that Aira would be up, or even awake enough to help him, so he had to do his best with what he had.

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  ?Finding an empty house at the outskirts of the village, he noted the destruction that was there, but ignored it as the bed was still intact. Laying Aisha on the bed, he tucked her in comfortably before focusing on her open wounds. Letting her head rest on the edge so her hair fell freely, he began with examining the wound that had happened there.

  ?Moving her hair, he saw the extent of the damage that had happened to her. Seeing the deep cuts hidden behind strands of her, and the shattered glass shard stuck and scattered around, he began with picking away whatever pieces of glass he could get his hand on. He needed to be precise as to not cause even more damage, and had to carefully remove the pieces, yet he also understood that even if the larger pieces were removed, the smaller ones would still remain.

  ?Taking a breath of air, he steadied himself before checking and making sure she was fast unconscious. When he was sure, he made a dagger with runes inscribed on it, and a dagger with a chain attached to it, having multiple different spells inscribed on each chain. He then remade the daggers into a smaller, thinner, yet sharp knife and a dagger with a string attached. He would have to remove the pieces and skin all together.

  ?Making the needle float for now, as he began cutting pieces of flesh away from her head, making sure to keep the damage to a minimum even as he prioritized getting away all the glass. Even unconscious, her body squirmed slightly, and he could only think about how much pain he was causing her. Only praying she wouldn’t wake up, he continued on.

  ?As he began cutting away another part, he made the needle begin tying up the aftermath of what he left behind, yet as the squirming got worse, he had to hold her down. Opening a portal, chains shoot out, binding all her limbs without digging too deep to avoid any scars, yet as they did, it made some of her clothes rise up, letting Blade see a better extent of the abuse that had been inflicted on her body.

  ?With open eyes, he momentarily forgot what he was doing as he inspected her skin. He had never truly seen this side of her, only ever seeing the kind side—the side she wanted him to see. The closest had been the snowy night they had promised to communicate better, yet it hadn’t been properly upheld by either of them. The more he saw, of this side of Aisha, the less he realized he knew about the truth.

  ?Remembering what he was supposed to do, he closed back her clothes as he continued cutting away the glass and tied it back. By the time he was done, the table beside him had a pile of glass-infused flesh. Though he managed to get most if not all, he still had some doubts. Repositioning her so her back was facing upwards, he quickly cut up the back of her neck to have his doubts confirmed. Finding not only more glass, but also irreversible scars so deep the flesh had grown around it. He cut the ruined flesh away, he tied it up. But curiosity led him on as he continued cutting up her neck, only to find the same ruined scars of flesh. Taking it all, he tied it all back, yet noted how different her neck looked now. It was clear things had happened to it. He wondered how much more of her body had such scars, contemplating checking more of it but deciding against it. If in the end she wanted it gone, it was her decision, not his. What he had done was already overstepping boundaries.

  ?Making the needle and knife vanish as their purpose was over, he rolled Aisha over and propped pillows under her head to make it easier on her lungs to breathe. He then did his best washing her hair with whatever he had access to, and patched up her neck and all other open wounds he could find.

  ?He continued staying with her for the next few days. Washing her to the best of his abilities without intruding on her privacy, trying his best to feed her, and talking to her about the day.

  What he talked about was simply things like the weather, the state of the village. Anything that he could talk about.

  ?One day the villagers came to apologize, explaining to Blade what had happened before he showed up. Though it didn’t give him the full picture, it at least told him about her life from when she came to the village. Yet he was unsure how grateful he should be, after hearing how she had gotten the glass damaged. For now, he dismissed them, not necessarily doing anything against them, but not helping them much either. He kept them from threats but that was about it. Otherwise, he kept himself by Aisha’s side, telling her anything he could think about.

  ?Sometimes he wished she would wake up like she had done when they first revived Severance, yet that never happened. She stayed quiet, still. A dead person inside a body treading between life and death. After the initial few days, he noted an increased spike in her temperature, and after a few talks with the villages, he found out it was most likely just a sickness caused by the open wounds she had held on for so long. They said it would pass eventually… Hopefully, it will pass soon.

  ?Sitting there and watching every movement, it went on for more than two weeks. Two weeks of continuous talking to someone who seemed more and more likely to be dead for each hour that passes. And he was forced to go through more than 300. He barely slept, barely ate himself. About 6 months in the Origin Realm, and this was where he was.

  ?At the start of the third week, Blade was practically pushing a boulder in a hill aimed to push him down. The wait crushed down on him, and so did the possibilities.

  ?On the third day of the third week, he was about to give up.

  ?“...”

  ?The silent shrug of blankets instantly got his full attentiveness as he looked down at Aisha moving. It was slow, careful, but it was more than enough for him as tears fell from his eyes. Words suddenly lost all meaning, the pain in his chest felt crushing yet alleviated. Yet as he hugged Aisha when she got up, everything else ended. This was enough, more than enough.