Blood Magic: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

 

 

Some blood may be indicated to be more powerful than others. Common types are human blood, the [[Royal Blood|blood of royalty]], the blood of a special line, a child's blood, or [[Virgin Sacrifice|virgin's blood]]. Sometimes only a single person's blood has power, and any other blood is powerless.

This trope is [[Older Than Feudalism]], with blood and sacrifice being powerful magic in some of the oldest tales. A very old Greek [[Curse]] was for a witch to run three times around the house she wished to curse while menstruating. Especially potent if it was her first period. In more recent works it is frequently the alternative to [[Necromancy]] as the "evil magic".

 

 

Frequently a part of any ritualistic [[Blood Bath]]. When it's the blood itself doing the damage, you have [[Bloody Murder]]. When the magic is used to extend the user's lifespan, it's [[Life Drinker]].

 

May even overlap with [[Tome of Eldritch Lore]], which is often written in man's blood on parchment made of human flesh. Is often a cause for a [[Superhuman Transfusion]].

 

** By drinking someone's blood and then standing on a symbol also made of blood (which doesn't have to be theirs), Hidan can turn himself into a living voodoo-doll for his opponent.

* The ''[[Princess Resurrection]]'' manga uses blood magic as a fairly major plot point. The anime changed it to [[Technicolor Fire|fire/energy.]]

*** Technically he almost fainted twice due to him trying to seer shut some unrelated injuries. By unrelated injury, we mean a deep wound in his abdomen which was inflicted onto him in that same battle.

** In the [[Fullmetal Alchemist (anime)|2003 anime adaptation]], Mustang ends up creating a transmutation circle out of his own blood {{spoiler|in order to defeat Pride.}}

* Some of the magic in ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'' works like this. At one point, Negi bites his thumb hard enough for blood to pour out, then creates magic circles for The Thousand Bolts (the ultimate lighting incantation) and pulverizes a mountain sized rock. Blood of powerful mages also seems to carry a certain amount of energy in it if Evangeline is to be believed. ''If.''

 

* In ''[[The Sandman|The Sandman: A Game of You]]'', menstrual blood is used to power a spell to send the characters to the land of the dead and come back alive ( {{spoiler|mostly}}). The spell is repeated with blood from a cut palm in ''Death: Time of Your Life.''

* Another parody happens in ''Lenore: The Cute Little Dead Girl'', when she pricks her finger and spills a drop of blood on a doll. It turns out to be a vampire that was cursed to be an inanimate plaything, and her blood broke the curse. Unfortunately, he realizes he's still in a doll's body because the curse didn't break properly; she'd been embalmed.

* This is how Atrocitus created the Central Power Battery for his [[Green Lantern|Red Lantern Corps]]. In addition, he is capable of scrying through arcane blood rites.

* [[Conan the Barbarian]] once battled a witch who used a particularly nasty curse triggered by blood. Only a single drop of spilled blood was necessary to cause her victims to age rapidly and die within seconds, leaving behind a withered corpse. The only protection against the curse were magic talismans owned by three brothers who were the witch's enemies.

 

 

* In ''[[The Princess and the Frog]]'', Dr Facilier turns Naveen into a frog as to have an easy means of extracting blood for a voodoo talisman that turns Naveen's [[Beleaguered Assistant]] Lawrence into a copy of the prince for his own ends.

* In the first ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'', Will's blood was needed to break the curse on Barbossa's crew. A blood sacrifice was required from every cursed pirate, but they had cast Will's father overboard before learning this, so Will's blood, as the closest living relative, was used as a suitable substitute. {{spoiler|Once Jack cursed himself, he also added his blood to lift the curse "at the opportune moment".}}

* In ''[[Silent Hill (film)|Silent Hill]]'' Christabella unintentionally invokes this trope when she stabs {{spoiler|Rose}} in the chest. The blood gushing from the wound destroys the church, allowing {{spoiler|Alessa}} to enter. Then all hell breaks loose.

* ''[[The Golden Voyage of Sinbad]].'' The wizard Prince Koura uses his own blood to create a homunculus.

* Also in ''[[Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger]]'', when Zenobia uses her blood to animated the [[A Load of Bull|Minaton]].

* In ''[[Pan's Labyrinth]]'', the blood of a child is called for to open a gate, though the heroine refuses to take it. It still {{spoiler|technically works - it just happens to be the protagonist's blood. [[Secret Test of Character|And it would not have worked had the baby been used.]]}}

* In ''[[Blade]]'', it's of little surprise that the ancient vampire artifact runs off of blood. Blade is strapped into a huge bloodletting device that causes his blood to fill up all the magical symbols below him, rather similar to the picture above.

* The page image comes from the first ''[[Hellboy (film)|Hellboy]]'' film; Ilsa and Kroenen kill their guide in order to resurrect [[Big Bad|Rasputin]].

 

== Literature ==

* Melisandre of ''[[A Song of Ice and Fire]]'' uses blood magic to {{spoiler|cause the death of Renly Baratheon}}, and claims credit for the deaths of {{spoiler|Robb Stark, Joffrey Baratheon, and Balon Greyjoy}}, but whether that's truth or fiction [[Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane|is very unclear at this stage]]. The maegi Mirri Maz Duur also uses blood magic to {{spoiler|"heal" Drogo}} and the favor is returned by Deanerys when she {{spoiler|burns the maegi alive as part of the magic to awaken her dragons.}}

* In ''[[Stardust (novel)|Stardust]]'', the witches use the hearts of living stars to prolong their youth as a form of blood magic.

** Unicorn blood is so potent that drinking it can preserve the life of a somebody who is already dying, but the act of taking it is said to curse the killer with a "half-life".

** This is further refined to just needing the octogram, ''two'' small bits of wood and a fresh egg.

*** Of course, most wizards go all-out with the magical foci anyway, because if you're not going to [[Rule of Cool|fill up your ceremony with arcane gibberish and dribbly candles]], why did you even become a wizard in the first place?

* In the ''Dragonlord'' series by Joanne Bertin, blood magic is frequently employed by the antagonists. In ''The Last Dragonlord'', the [[Big Bad]] uses the lives of prostitutes to charge a magical artifact. He then sacrifices a member of a specific bloodline in order to attempt to enslave one of the titular dragonlords. In ''The Dragon and the Phoenix'', the blood of the high priest is used to bind a dragon, and the magic of the dragon is used in turn to imprison and harness the power of the phoenix.

* In the ''[[Young Wizards]]'' series, healing spells require blood (that isn't from the patient), usually the healer's own blood.

* This is one type of magic used in the ''[[Evie Scelan]]'' novels.

* Thaumaturgy in the ''[[Deepgate Codex]]'' books.

* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s ''[[Gaunt's Ghosts]]'' novel ''Blood Pact'', the witch makes extensive use of this. {{spoiler|On both the prisoner and Maggs -- she didn't realize she had gotten blood from both of them at first, but when she did, she tried to use Maggs to assassinate the prisoner.}}

** This is [[The Fettered|a severe limitation on their power]], since the quantity of blood is very important. The storm that covered the Canim's invasion is mentioned as having cost ''millions'' of their own lives to pull off. For a long time after the Canim invaded no magic was used, because they had an insufficient source of it. {{spoiler|When they started using it again it was revealed to be mostly fueled by Aleran slaves who had defected to the Canim and given permission to be drained after other Alerans killed them.}}

* In Orson Scott Card's ''Hart's Hope'', blood is the essential source of magic: the more precious the blood, the most potent the magic. In order to exact her vengeance, Queen Beauty therefore {{spoiler|kills her own newborn daughter, which allows her to acquire powers that make her able to subdue the gods.}}

* In Andy Hoare's [[White Scars]] novel ''Hunt for Voldorius'', the Alpha Legion uses it. The White Scars find bodies drained of blood.

* In [[Robert E. Howard]]'s ''[[Conan the Barbarian]]'' novel ''[[The Hour of the Dragon]]'', one reason why Xaltotun let his allies die.

** In "[[The Phoenix on the Sword]]", Thoth-Amon, immediately on regaining his [[Ring of Power]], uses the blood of the man he murdered for it to summon a powerful abomination against his old tormentor Ascalante.

* Blood is noted as being particularly potent for drawing spell forms in the ''[[Sword of Truth]]'' series, though it's trickier for ''lasting'' spell forms as blood will eventually dry out and thus weaken the spell. The People's Palace in D'Hara is a spellform<ref>which, for reference, saps the magic of any non-Rahl wizard and bolsters the magic of any wizard of the Rahl bloodline</ref> that manages to get around this through the novel method of leaving the blood inside people. The blood therefore is always fresh, and people are always allowed to travel through the halls of the palace, keeping the spell ''very'' powerful.

* In L. Jagi Lamplighter's ''[[Prospero's Daughter|Prospero Regained]]'', blood can give power and life to those in [[Hell]]. Kinda awkward when hellish mosquitoes have figured out you are alive and so have blood.

* In Teresa Frohock's ''[[Miserere: An Autumn Tale|Miserere an Autumn Tale]]'' names written in blood are particularly potent magic.

* In [[Stephen King]]'s ''On Writing'', he describes some symbolic associations of blood with life and death, sin and redemption (through sacrifice), and how they're used in ''[[Carrie]]'' as a parallel to the titular psychic's emerging powers and rampage.

* Malkar and Vey Coruscant in ''[[Doctrine of Labyrinths]]'' are accomplished practitioners. They have been using this to keep themselves young and vital for who knows how many years. One of Vey's many epithets is "Queen Blood."

 

== Live-Action TV ==

** The emphasized plot point that Buffy and Dawn have the same blood is the key to allowing Buffy to save the world from the aforementioned portal with a [[Heroic Sacrifice]].

*** The trope is specifically lampshaded by Spike in the same episode.

'''Spike:''' "Blood is life, lackbrain. Why do you think we eat it? It's what keeps you going, makes you warm, makes you hard, makes you other than dead. 'Course it's her blood." }}

** Blood of a Slayer, if drunk by a vampire, gives the latter great powers and [[Nigh Invulnerability]] for a while. In Season 3, this is used {{spoiler|to heal Angel.}}

** Willow uses deer blood in her magic to resurrect Buffy.

** Angel is temporarily made stronger after he drinks the blood of Hamilton, the Senior Partners' liaison, during the [[Grand Finale]].

** Spoofed in "Reprise" where two Wolfram & Hart employees are following a list of instructions for a goat sacrifice.

* In ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]]'', Azazel's lackeys used a squicky blood fueled ritual to communicate with him. Brady does the same to communicate with his master, {{spoiler|Pestilence}}.

** In the fourth and fifth seasons, blood can be used to construct a sigil that will temporarily dispel an angel from the area.

* In ''[[Friday the 13th: The Series]]'', almost every single one of the cursed items must be powered by a death to derive their benefits.

 

* The Aztecs believed that the sun needed to be fed on the blood of sacrificial victims daily to prevent it from dying.

** The Mayans practiced ritual bloodletting (and sacrifice, too, but only when they were desperate). They also had a ritual ball-game that was not only ruthless, but ended in the winning team being sacrificed at the conclusion.

** A common story from the German and Dutch North Sea coast is, that in the past people made live sacrifices when building dykes against floods. Burying a dog alive under the new dyke would work, but a human child was considered preferable. The important part was, that a living thing had to be given to the spirits.

 

 

* In the ''[[Vampire: The Masquerade]]'', all vampires gain their abilities obviously from consumed blood. However, a few [[Splat|clans]] take this one step further by developing a blood-based system of sorcery stronger than the hedge magic any human can learn but weaker than the Sphere Magick of Mages. The most well-known practitioners of blood magic are Clan Tremere, whose original members were Mages in life.

** ''[[Hunter: The Vigil]]'' features the Cainite Heresy, remnants of an ancient cult that weren't too happy after being dicked around with by a vampire claiming a direct connection to God. They were given their vampiric blood magic by another hunter organization known as the Birds of Minerva to create the Rites of Denial, special powers meant to deny vampires their innate advantages.

** ''[[Changeling: The Lost]]'' has Tokens, magic items that activate with a simple burst of [[Mana|Glamour]] or with a simple [[Power Levels|Wyrd]] check. Either of these can be foregone- and the items can be used by mortals- by paying the "Catch," a "dread cost." Examples? One, a minor thing that empowers your car, requires you to run your car on a pint of your own blood (one point of lethal damage); another one, a more potent one called a Pledge Stone, requires you to rip out your own tongue and burn it (one point of lethal damage and you don't have a tongue).

** And in ''[[Mage: The Awakening]]'', blood sacrifice (namely, draining a being, including a human, of its blood until it is dead) can be used to replenish [[Mana]]. The use of blood can also correspond to the powers of Mastigos or Thyrsus mages.

** Expanded in the supplement "Street Magic". Adepts can benefit from blood magic, with at least one of the new metamagics revolving around ''cannibalism.''

** In earlier editions, a magic user used his own blood as an ingredient in creating a homonculous, possibly inspired by the Sinbad example.

** One of the material components for the Cacodemon spell (which summoned a powerful demon) was a bowl of mammal blood, preferably human.

** In the book "Complete Arcane" for 3.5, the Prestige Class of "Blood Magus" is described as "formerly deceased spellcasters who, when returned to life, gain an understanding of their blood's importance..." They can create a homonculous as explained above, but they have many other abilities as well, a particularly frightening one being "Bloodwalk". With Bloodwalk, a Blood Magus can teleport by entering the body of a living creature the same size or bigger, either leaving peacefully or [[Tele Frag|exploding out violently]].

** The Maho Tsukai from the ''Oriental Adventures'' can, like the 3rd Edition Blood Magus, use his own blood as a replacement for the material components for spells. He can also use someone else's blood, although that takes more time and more blood. Finally, he can use large amounts of blood (enough that it's represented by Constitution damage rather than regular hit point damage) to apply metamagic to his spells without using a higher-level spell slot.

* In ''[[Legend of the Five Rings]]'', practitioners of ''maho'' fuel their spells by spilling blood, often their own. The explanation given is that ''kansen'', malevolent spirits, are attracted to the caster by this act and will then exert their influence over the world in accordance with the mahotsukai's wishes.

* In ''[[Deadlands]]: Reloaded'' the Whateley Blood edge allows you to spill your own blood in order to gain "[[Mana|power points]]".

* In ''[[Exalted]]'', all [[Necromancer|Necromancy]] spells require a sacrifice of blood as part of the casting. In most cases, this is nothing more than a token sacrifice, and ''The Black Treatise'', the Necromancy [[Sourcebook]], notes that necromancers [[Does This Remind You of Anything?|tend to keep bandages handy.]] For the most powerful rituals, though, more gruesome sacrifices are required; Necromancy is very much [[Black Magic]] in the world of ''Exalted''.

** Likewise, Scions of the Aesir get access to Jotunblut, which allows them to use the blood of the giants to make mortal companions stronger. At the highest levels, it allows mortals to turn into giants themselves.

** A character with Shape Shifting and Conjuration can create items out of their own blood. A character with Advance Shape Shifting and Conjuration can create items out of ''other people's'' blood.

 

 

== Video Games ==

* In ''[[Planescape: Torment]]'', crystallized blood droplets are used for [[Healing Potion|healing potions]].

* In the ''[[Dominions]]'' series, spells from most schools of magic are cast using "gems" which are basically elemental forces (fire, water, etc...) concentrated into portable form, and the casting prices of spells are listed in these gems. Instead of gems, however, one school of magic lists spell prices in blood. These prices are listed in increments of one ''blood slave'', each of which must be drained completely empty, with high-level spell costs running into the hundreds. Blood magic is conspicuous in battle, where mages or priests are surrounded by a white-robed flock they systematically stab, especially if the mages start losing and set the slaves to charge into the spears of the enemies while they themselves flee. ''[[Dominions]]'' is not a happy series.

* In ''[[God of War (series)|God of War]] II'', at the Temple of the Fates, Kratos is required to capture a translator to read the incantation needed to open his path. Said incantation ends with the reader offering his blood as a sacrifice. Cue [[Oh Crap]] just before Kratos bashes the guy's head in against the altar, his blood draining into a pattern etched onto the floor.

* ''[[Clive Barker's Jericho]]'' has Wilhelmina "Billie" Church, a powerful blood mage. Her blood magic and abilities play a very important part in the game's story, and her spells can bind enemies and set them on fire.

** The Sumerian Demons Inanna and Ninlil also rely on blood magic (referred to as sanguimancy ingame). While Inanna uses the blood of Innocent people bound to torture wheels, Ninlil has herself locked within an Iron Maiden to spill as much of her own blood as possible.

** In ''[[World of Warcraft]]'', according to the background warlock's life tap ability (convert health to mana) works exactly like this (they sacrifice their own blood to gain mana), using it to summon most of their demonic pets, empowering their weapons or, curiously enough, a number of beneficial effects like summoning party members or Healthstones which can be consumed like a potion.

** ''Warcraft III'' introduced Blood Mages, but despite the name they ''don't'' practice any of this; most of their spells are fire-based. Lampshaded by one you meet in the Blasted Lands, who says Blood Mages "eat normal food like normal people."

* In ''[[Guild Wars]]'' a Necromancer's blood magic skills often have you sacrificing health to achieve an effect. The same class also uses Death magic, which exploits your dead opponent's corpses (and therefore blood) for similar effect, and their innate Soul Reaping ability, which heals you upon an enemy's death.

* This is one of the ways a Servant is summoned in ''[[Fate/stay night|Fate Stay Night]]''. You take some chickens, put them to sleep, kill them, draw out their blood and make a magic circle. Then, you can either use a catalyst for a specific hero or just the general term of inducing madness in order to get a Berserker. Rider and Caster in ''[[Fate/Zero]]'' were also summoned in this manner, and it's more noted upon there as well.

* In The Elder Scrolls V ''[[Skyrim]]'' {{spoiler|The only way to open the old Blades headquarters in Skyrim is with the blood of a dragonborn.}}

* ''[[Dragon Age]]'':

** What's important about Blood Magic is that it is pure life force, and can thus provide plenty of energy. And it isn't limited to Mages, either. Anybody can learn how to tap into it, even a warrior (exemplified by the Reaver, who uses a different path, but one which still uses the power inherent in blood as energy). Since it was originally taught by an Old God (demons are the only ones who still remember it in most cases, however), it may not even be evil. The Soldier's Peak DLC introduced Avernus, who had worked out how to change blood as the fuel source for the Taint. And then there are the Chantry Templars, who gain their abilities from the energies within lyrium (apparently - that it is possible to wield what is essentially Templar-created magic without using lyrium might speak to some other source), all without being Mages. While the Fade is probably the easiest source to learn how to use (and the one with the least reliance on an outside source to power one's spells), it's definitely not the only source. Indeed, it might be that ''anybody'' could learn how to use magic, as long as they were willing to use something else as fuel.

** The state religion of the Chantry demands that all persons with magical abilities have to permanently join the Circle of Magi and be confined to their towers where they are constantly monitored by templars who are to slay them at the first sign that demons have possessed their bodies. Every mage who tries to escape from the Circle of Magi or refuses to join is treated as being potentially possessed and killed. Since blood magic is not officially sanctioned by the Chantry, blood mages share the same fate as all other apostates.

** The Joining - Grey Wardens gain their powers by drinking darkspawn blood. {{spoiler|The cost to this is the Darkspawn Taint eventually ''will'' overtake every Grey Warden, turning them into a Darkspawn themselves. They avoid this happening by suicidally venturing into the Deep Roads and trying to kill as many Darkspawn there as they can.}}

* Another [[BioWare]] example is in ''[[Jade Empire]]''. The defenses of Dierge were broken when the sacred fountains were polluted with human blood. {{spoiler|Useful in the nastiest way possible if you take the Closed Fist option}}.

* Taken to the extreme by Vladimir the Crimson Reaper, a [[Whatevermancy|"hemomancer"]] in ''[[League of Legends]]''. Not only are all his abilities blood-related (including draining the blood out of his opponents and into him and briefly turning into a near-invulnerable pool of blood) but he fights with an orb of blood which hovers in his hands that he shoots at his opponents.

* Taken to another extreme in ''[[Final Fantasy Tactics]]'', in which human sacrifice is used on a titanic scale {{spoiler|by Lucavi, inciting a war with hundreds of thousands of casualties to spill enough blood to raise the [[Big Bad]] Altima.}}

* Shao Kahn created Skarlet out of blood collected from various battlefields in the newest ''[[Mortal Kombat]]''.

* According to [[Cute Witch|Marisa]], Remilia Scarlet from ''[[Touhou]]'' utilises this for a few spellcards. [[Running Gag|Blood is amazing!]]

 

== Web Comics ==

* Timmy from ''[[Parallel Dementia]]'' can use blood magic.

* In ''[[Familiar Ground]]'', how they know that Toad's wizard is evil.

 

== Web Original ==

* Fey has used this in the ''[[Whateley Universe]]'' against a dark mage who was trying to enslave her.

 

== Western Animation ==

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Magic and Powers]]

[[Category:Bloody Tropes]]

[[Category:Older Than Feudalism]]