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Bloodstones

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Bloodstones are small spherical red gemstones that sorcerers can create from the souls of living beings. Although possessing a Bloodstone can enhance a sorcerer's magical strength,[3] they are primarily created to be part of a spell that can open a gateway to the dimension inhabited by the Elder Gods.[4][5]

Sorcerers usually create Bloodstones by taking part of a donor's soul, transforming it into a ball of energy, and then transmuting it into a smaller physical form.[3] However, on at least one occasion, a Bloodstone was conjured out of the blood of its creator.[6]

The creation of Bloodstones usually has a corruptive effect on those whose souls are used in the process. In some cases, this is because the sorcerer creating the Bloodstone establishes a mental link through which he transmits some of his evil into the donor.[3][7] However, in other cases, the creation of a Bloodstone leaves a hole in the donor's soul, a hole that is quickly filled by black magic.[8]

Once conjured, Bloodstones are fairly durable, but they are not indestructible. Immersion in a volcano's lava can destroy Bloodstones and release the energy contained within them.[4] Additionally, if a Bloodstone is only partially complete when the spell creating it is disrupted, then that Bloodstone may disperse so that its energy can join with something else being formed from the donor's soul.[8] It's also possible that, if a Bloodstone were created by a demon who was disrupted very soon after its creation, then that Bloodstone's essence would return to the donor and make them whole.[9]

History

Ananym (Earth-616) from X-Infernus Vol 1 3 001

Witchfire holding a Bloodstone Amulet, designed to hold the bloodstones

In the late 13th century, the sorcerer Belasco obtained five Bloodstones which he planned to use to open an interdimensional passageway through which the Elder Gods he worshipped could invade Earth. After abducting a woman named Beatrice Portinari, whom he intended to make the mother of a demon-race he planned to father, Belasco sailed south to Pangea in Antarctica because his masters had told him that was where Mount Flavius, the perfect site upon which to carry out the spell, was located. For safekeeping, Belasco made Beatrice wear the incomplete pentagram that was part of the spell in a locket, but kept the final Bloodstone that would complete the spell on his person. However, this precaution backfired because, after Beatrice died in childbirth, Belasco attempted to retrieve the locket with the other four Bloodstones from her body, but discovered that it had been lost somewhere within the ancient Atlantean amusement ride through which they had been traveling on their way to the mountain.[4]

Seven hundred years later, Shanna the She-Devil found the locket in the boat where it had been dropped so long ago,[10] and she and it soon fell into the hands of Belasco who entranced her, intending to use her as he had used Beatrice.[11] After climbing to the top of the volcanic Mount Flavius, Belasco put the final Bloodstone in its place in the pentagram and completed the spell that opened the gateway. However, only seconds later, Shanna's lover Ka-Zar attacked, ripped the locket off Shanna's neck and hurled it into the mouth of the volcano. As it flew through the air, the locket snapped open and the Bloodstones fell out of the pentagram and landed on the lava. With the pentagram disrupted, the spell that had opened the rift was negated, and the passageway began to close. Before they were sealed away, the Elder Gods punished Belacso for his failure[4] by banishing him to an interdimensional limbo.[5] Only one of the five Bloodstones survived the volcano's fire.[7]

Trapped in Limbo, Belasco eventually kidnapped the six-year-old Illyana Rasputina[5] with the intention of using her to escape. During the seven years that Illyana was trapped in Limbo, three Bloodstones were created from her soul and placed within another Bloodstone Amulet. Eventually, the now-teenaged Illyana managed to escape from Limbo, taking her medallion and its Bloodstones with her.[12]

Still trapped in Limbo, Belasco was able to manipulate the Atlantean android Dherk into finding the lost Bloodstone near Mount Flavius and making it part of an engagement ring that Ka-Zar wanted to give to Shanna. Once it had been placed on Shanna's hand, Belasco was able to use the link he had previously established with her soul to act as a bridge through which he could return to Pangea. Soon after returning, Belasco kidnapped both Ka-Zar and Shanna, and performed the ritual to create a new Bloodstone from the soul of Leila, the young Tree People girl who was Shanna's step-daughter. Belasco planned to take those two Bloodstones, hunt down Illyana and her locket, and then use the five Bloodstones and the locket to again summon the Elder Gods to Earth. However, Ka-Zar managed to seize Belasco's sword and use it against him, and only being accidentally teleported away by Shanna saved Belasco's life. Once he was gone, Leila revealed that she had taken the ring from Belasco before he was teleported away.[13]

Later, when the Beyonder removed Illyana's dark side, her Soulsword and the Beatrix Medallion were transferred to her best friend, Kitty Pryde, making her the Guardian. Almost immediately afterwards, Kitty was attacked by one of Belasco's demons and her inexperience enabled him to defeat her and take the Medallion. The demon then conjured a fourth Bloodstone from Kitty's soul but Illyana, to save her best friend, chose to reclaim her dark side and disrupt the demon, hoping that, if she had acted in time, the Bloodstone essence would return to Kitty.[9]

Belasco later attempted to recreate the now-dead Illyana but only succeeded in creating a soulless copy he called the Darkchild. Needing power to keep Belasco from getting Illyana's soul, the Darkchild pressured Pixie (Megan Gwynn) into agreeing to give up her soul in order to save some of her friends who had been transported to Limbo by Belasco. From Pixie's soul, the Darkchild created a Bloodstone that she placed in her own amulet, but she didn't stop there and began taking even more of Pixie's soul into order to create more Bloodstones and a soulsword for herself. However, her spell was disrupted when Anole attacked her, and the partially-created second Bloodstone dissipated, its energy leaving her amulet and joining with the unfinished Soulsword to become Pixie's Soul Dagger.[8]

Belasco's daughter, Witchfire (Ananym), later took Illyana's original Bloodstone Amulet (with the three Bloodstones) from the Project Purgatory soldiers who had found it in Limbo.[14] Then, after the recreated Illyana had recovered her Soulsword and become more human, Witchfire confronted and defeated her, taking the single Bloodstone from her and adding it to the three already in the Bloodstone Amulet. When some X-Men journeyed to Limbo to find Illyana, Pixie was captured by Witchfire who used her soul to forge a fifth Bloodstone which she then placed in the amulet to summon the Elder Gods to Limbo. However, even as the X-Men began battling the Elder Gods, Illyana and Pixie combined their powers to break the spell by using the Soulsword and the Soul Dagger together to pry the last Bloodstone out of the amulet, causing the Elder Gods and Witchfire to be sucked into the portal and out of Limbo. In the aftermath, Pixie found that the newest Bloodstone was now part of her Soul Dagger.[15]

After the Project Purgatory soldiers stole the Bloodstone Amulet back from Witchfire, they kidnapped Pixie in order use their technology to extract enough of her soul to pull the Bloodstone out of the Souldagger.[16] Once that was done, they added it to the amulet and summoned the Elder Gods to Limbo, believing that they could use the amulet to control them and force them to attack the demons of Limbo. However, that plan failed and the Elder Gods instead used Portal Epsilon to travel from Limbo to Earth. As part of Illyana's secret plan, the fully-powered mutant Legion confronted the Elder Gods and destroyed them by writing them out of reality. Legion then freed the five Bloodstones by dissolving the amulet that had held them, and gave them to Illyana who kept her three and later gave the other two and the Soul Dagger back to Pixie.[17]

Ka-Zar the Savage Vol 1 12

Notes

  • The first appearance of the Bloodstones was in Ka-Zar the Savage #12 but they were merely called the "blood-red stones." They were first referred to as "Bloodstones" in Uncanny X-Men #160 and that name was used in almost all of their subsequent appearances.
    • Oddly, a different term was used in two of the last comics in which they appeared. In New Mutants (Vol. 3) #17, two people (including Illyana) referred to them as "soul gems" instead of "bloodstones" and, in New Mutants (Vol. 3) #21, the terms "soul gems" and "bloodstones" were both used.
  • Nothing has ever been revealed about the origin of the first five Bloodstones possessed by Belasco. Although it's likely that he conjured them himself, this has never been confirmed.
    • Three Bloodstones are known to have been created from the soul of Illyana Rasputina during the seven years that she was trapped in Limbo. Of those three, Belasco created the first and the third, with Illyana herself creating the second.
    • Another Bloodstone was created on Earth from the soul of Kitty Pryde, but that Bloodstone apparently dissipated and its essence returned to her.
    • Another Bloodstone was created in Pangea by Belasco, using the soul of the Tree People girl Leila.
    • Two more Bloodstones were created in Limbo from the soul of Pixie (Megan Gwynn), the first by the recreation of Illyana known as the Darkchild, and the second by Witchfire (Ananym).
  • In all, twelve different Bloodstones appeared in stories published over the course of almost 30 years. Of those twelve, four were destroyed, one dissipated, and five were returned to Illyana and Pixie. Nothing has been revealed about what happened to the other two: the last of the original Bloodstones (last seen as part of Shanna's ring) and the one made from Leila's soul (last seen in Belasco's possession).
  • Given that having parts of their souls exist outside their bodies is a vulnerability, it seems likely that Illyana and Pixie would have taken steps to re-integrate their Bloodstones back into their souls. However, there don't seem to be any mentions of them having done so.
  • Although the Bloodstones that were created during the Black Sun limited series were also used in a pentagram to summon the N'Garai, they were significantly different from these Bloodstones. Not only were they much larger and ovoid in shape, each of them contained a person's entire soul, not just part of it. Once they were shattered by the Soulsword wielded by Magik (Jimaine Szardos), those souls immediately returned to the soulless bodies from which they had been taken, fully restoring those people to normal.
  • Although the mystical gem known as the Bloodgem has sometimes been called the Bloodstone in stories, there is no connection between it and these Bloodstones.

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