Risen

Yore once again woke up with a gasp of air, this time inhaling some dirt since he was face down on the ground. He briefly coughed heavily and sat up. The sun was rising. It was morning. There was a bit of a nip in the air and Yore shivered.

Yore felt around his chest. He was back to normal! No shattered chest, no broken or even cracked ribs. He could breathe normally again, without any pain. He didn’t have a hole in his chest where he was skewered. However, he was still dizzy.

Morrow fluttered in front of him. “You really did yourself in that time.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You used too much of your own blood to create those weapons. You nearly caused yourself to pass out mid fight. You practically gave that… ‘Minotaur’ your life.”

So that’s what happened, Yore realized. He had drained himself of blood to create those weapons and in the process weakened himself.

“What happened to the Minotaur and those knights?”

“The four of them made quick work of that Minotaur as it tried to flee. The wound you gave it in the hip really slowed it down and gave them a strong advantage.”

“Four of them? I only saw three.”

“Yes, there were the three copper knights that engaged it in melee with a fourth that threw lightning at it. That one was bronze.”

“So that’s what happened. I wondered where that bolt of lightning came from.”

“They slew the creature not that far from here. I could hear the roars as they killed it. They came back and found you and the other corpses. They took their bodies away, but left you and your sword behind. They didn’t seem to care much for it. Is this what you meant by something being trash?”

“Har, har, har. In a way, I suppose. My sword would have been nothing more than a big knife to one of them and wouldn’t have fit their grip well. It is more like, ‘one person's trash is another man’s treasure’ sort of thing.”

“Interesting.”

“It’s a saying that we have, meaning different people find different values in things. What may have no value to one person, may be the most cherished thing for another.”

“Does that also mean that you are trash since they didn’t want your corpse, but wanted their own fallen.”

“Aren’t you a delight? But to them I probably am. They most likely wouldn’t have any use for a random corpse, but many people value their own dead. Militaries where I come from try to recover bodies of the fallen so that their families can honor them and properly lay them to rest. I’d imagine that is why they took their own dead.”

“I wonder what was up with their different colored armors. I wonder if it is a rank thing,” Yore mused allowed.

Yore dizzily got to his feet, picked up the blood iron sword the knights had tossed away, and let Morrow lead him over to where he said they killed the Minotaur. All that they found though, besides signs of a struggle, was an impression in the ground where they seemed to have slain the beast and lots of fur.

“That’s odd. They must have taken the body. It’s weird that they would have left mine then. Unless they have uses for the parts.”

“Maybe you really are trash if they wanted that thing and not you.”

“Thanks Morrow,” Yore said, tiring of Morrow’s repetitive jab. “You know jokes aren’t usually that funny after the first time.”

Yore was bemused by this. It just didn’t make sense to him. Why take one body but not another, unless they really couldn’t do anything with his but could completely use the Minotaur’s for parts like the native americans used to back home. Maybe being Human was why they didn’t take him and they just didn’t have any use for other random people and it would be sacrilegious to use other people for parts. But why not take his sword then. They could have at least melted it down. Maybe they didn’t think there was enough there for the effort. He was clearly missing something. We could try to find them and ask them, but a corpse walking back into the middle of heavily armed Giants didn’t seem like a wise idea.

“I guess let’s get moving again.” Yore said to Morrow.

They set out, once again heading down stream. Yore was hoping to not stumble upon those exact soldiers again, but maybe another squad. The last thing he wanted was to have his corpse taken by them just to get killed every time Morrow resurrected him.

As they traveled, Yore recalled the fight and what he seemed to do with his powers as they chatted. He held out his hand and envisioned a little iron ball, no bigger than a pebble. A small amount of blood seeped out of his hand and formed a rigid, rusty iron ball. Yore then envisioned it to be smooth and polished and the ball smoothed out. The color was a mix between iron and blood red, but perfectly round and smooth. He then envisioned it morphing into a tiny blade. The iron ball elongated and formed a sharp tiny blade like a small arrow head.

“You really seem to be getting the hang of that.” Morrow said.

“It’s like you said, I instinctually figured it out. During the fight, I needed a weapon, even if it was just a knife and before I knew it, I had one. As crude as it was, I then figured out that I needed to also focus on the properties. My mistake was creating too big of an object.” Yore held up his sword in the other hand, inspecting it. “Now that I’m thinking about it, I wonder if I can reclaim what I’ve used.”

Yore focussed on the sword and envisioned it turning back into blood and re-entering him. It then proceeded to melt down and seemingly disappear into his hand. The dizziness disappeared and he immediately felt a bit warmer.

“Whoa!... Hey Morrow, why didn’t my blood get replenished when you resurrected me?”

“I figured you made that sword for a reason and I didn’t want to reclaim it like the rest of your blood when resurrecting you. I thought that you might need it and you would replenish your missing blood over time anyway.”

“Interesting,” Yore said and thought it over for a moment. Then he concentrated on the tiny arrowhead still in his other hand. He envisioned it growing to the size of any actual arrowhead and blood once again seeped out and it grew in size. Then he envisioned five more and once again blood seeped out of his hand and formed five perfect duplicates of the first. Then he envisioned them spinning and morphing into a kunai.

To Yore’s surprise, the arrowheads did exactly that! They raised into the air and spun as they merged into a kunai and gradually slowed their rotation before landing back into his hand.

Yore stopped walking as a realization dawned on him.

“What’s the matter Yore?”

“I just realized that I have more control over my blood than just forming and reforming objects. I can give them motion, give them different properties.”

Yore thought back to the moments before his last death while he stared at the Minotaur.

“I think I poisoned the Minotaur with my blood knife.”

Yore recalled the Minotaur bleeding pretty profusely from the wound as well.

“I might even be able to control more than just my blood.”

Yore looked at Morrow, the leech-bat.

“You were right. You said that you were a reflection of my power. I jokingly asked if that meant I was a soul sucking leech. I think I might actually be a soul sucking leech. Or at least a blood sucking one.”

“I’m glad that you’ve accepted who you are as a person.”

“Fuck off! But really, I think I might have some control over other creatures’ blood. Also, that was a better joke than just calling me trash again.”

“Only one way to find out! Try in the midst of battle, pass out and die once again!”

“You really are an ass hole, you know that?”