Ok, so swords are tricky to shade. But the first thing you want to do is to try and figure out in your head what it would look like from different angles and how the sword is shaped. A good thing to keep in mind when designing a sword is that most swords are straight and taper off at the end, and swords also have to be balanced so that one end isnt heavier than the other. From what you have right now, the blades look much heavier than the hilt and it would be really hard to use. So think about that stuff. And for colors, try to think of what its made of, because a maroon sword is kind of weird, but you really can have it any color you want, as long it looks like metal or something. Also the grey outlines with the maroon sword doesnt look very good to me, i think its because the outline is lighter than the sword. I would suggest making the outline darker than the sword. Also, if the hilt is supposed to split off, you want to show some kind of mechanism or something like that to make it look like it splits, also if it splits vertically, you would probably want the handle to be a bit bigger than it is already, but i dont really know.

These forums have a built in zooming system, just click the image to zoom in. Also please post the original (not scaled up) version so that we can do edits and stuff easier. Also your process is fine and it looks great!

It still looks kind of odd to me, but I don't know why...

I think that the original looks better, but, I would make it a little bit bigger, not that much, just so that you can get the details and proportions in there better. Also try giving it a proper outline because it looks like there is an outline everywhere there is orange, but at the white there is no outline.