As Maud had predicted, Vinyl didn’t return for a few weeks, but when she did she came with thousands of diamond dogs.

“Where is she?” Sky paces worried.

“I am here. You break in the new mare yet?” Vinyl asks leaning on him as he looks down to his several thousand diamond dog warriors.

“Hardly. I only got a few hours sleep really.” Sky explains.

“Oh, she keeps you up that long?” Vinyl asks smirking.

Sky yawns. “No. It was kinda hard when she looks at me with that one expression the whole time.”

“You make any progress at least?” Vinyl asks now with a disappointed expression.

“I learned about her. That’s a good sign.” Sky says shrugging.

“So what is the plan?” Vinyl asks smirking.

“Go get the leader of those warriors and have our quartermaster see to supplying them all with food, drinks, and have the smiths inspect their equipment.” Sky instructs.

“Sure thing…sir.” Vinyl says almost humorously before walking off.

“You get Rainbow, Maud, and all other ranked of captain and higher to meet me in the war room.” Sky instructs.

“You got it. I’ll see you there.” Vinyl says throwing a hoof over her shoulder.

“My lord, why are we on such a heightened state of alert?” A Belgica officer asks as he and several officers walked with a stallion along the walls of border fort in Bellpound.

“We have word the overlord has divided the army he is personally leading into two. A majority of it is heading north try and help another army besiege Valhendge in the north. Lady Alexander is taking half of the remaining army of hers to go and join up with the army there to repel them. The rest of the overlord’s army is heading here to besiege us. We have to hold them off till the rest of the army she is leading here arrives with fresh reinforcements. Our young prince will be leading them and bringing these fresh reinforcements. He is leading around seventy-five thousand troops here. If we can hold out, we will crush this part of the overlord’s army and deal a blow to their effort and avenge our losses from the battle of twin peaks.” He says inspecting the guards.

“How long till he gets here?” Another officer asks.

“In a week.” The lord says.

“It seems our ruse has worked.” Sky says looking at the border fort through a spyglass, counting how many ponies were manning the walls as the lord inspected.

“So now we spring the trap?” Maud asks as she taps her spike gauntlets on the ground a bit.

“Yes. Warriors!” Sky calls withdrawing Peruro and raising it into the air for all of them to see the flaming sword. “Begin our assault!” Sky orders and there was a cheer and they started to move up over the hill to become in clear view of the fort, pushing along ballistas and catapults they had made to get into position.

“My lord, it is the army!” One of the officers calls, immediately spotting the army moving into the field.

“Quickly! Send our fastest pegasus messenger to the prince before they encircle us!” He orders as the drums started to be beaten, alerting the entire fort to the attack.

“And there goes the messenger.” Sky says as Vinyl walks up to him. “Judging from how many are on the wall, I think our vampire witch has fooled them all with the illusion spell on her.” Sky says.

“Yes, she did.” Vinyl says smirking.

“I wonder what will be ready first? Our forces setting up or the defenses getting together to defend against our siege?” Sky says watching as the ballistas and catapults were set up in position as the infantry formed ranks in front of them to discourage any thoughts of charging them with cavalry or air forces.

“Yeah. They are almost ready to even fire at your orders.” Vinyl says almost excited.

“You want to give it as I will let you.” Sky says as his force moved to envelop the entire fort making it so no one could escape, even the pegasi defenders couldn’t guarantee they would make it with the archers and crossbow users waiting to fire.

“You need to take it down from the top and work your way down.” Vinyl says cracking her neck.

“Oh, don’t worry. We are ready.” Sky says smirking before giving the signal and the order went out to start firing.

Arrows pelted the fort and they heard many cries of pain as many of the archers went down from the arrow fire. Most of the flying soldiers firing down on anypony they can see and even those that are running out to back up their soldiers were pelted by arrows and brought down the ground. Vinyl herself licking her fangs and eager to drink and enjoy all the blood. Then the ballistas and catapults started to fire launching rocks and giant bolts at the fortress as well the only thing that Vinyl noticed wasn’t being fired were the new arrows Twilight developed.

“Where are those arrows?” Vinyl asks looking around.

“They won’t be used in this battle. Saving them for when we next meet Alexander in a battle. Give her a new surprise,” Sky says, telling Vinyl he considered defeating that mare more important than taking this fort and cutting her supply lines.

“You seem to have a hard-on for that goal of yours.” Vinyl points out.

“She is one of their, if not, their best general, from what I have seen,” Sai says as Vinyl noticed Maud had disappeared on them.

“Where’s Maud?” Vinyl asks raising an eyebrow.

“With the dogs. She insisted joining the assault.” Sky says as the infantry readied themselves to charge with the ladders and battering rams they had.

“Seriously? What is driving her…she’s not pregnant yet?” Vinyl asks tilting her head.

“She is a warrior by either nature or was raised to be one. Personally, I think it is the latter from being taught by her father,” Sai says.

“Yeah. That guy was good though…you think you will ever make a general?” Vinyl asks.

“He is a good commander, but he doesn’t have the command ability to be a general or the thinking for one. He can lead an army to victory in a battle, but he can’t plan out a campaign,” Sky informs.

“Maybe use him for small battles?” Vinyl suggested.

“He will be a commander, but never a general and you, you will be my vampire queen.” Sky whispers into her ear.

Vinyl giggles. “Only if you give me more followers.”

“You can have your own cult if you wish,” Sky whispers into her ear.

“Oh? What kind would you like?” Vinyl asks teasingly as she leans against him.

“Make whatever kind of cult you want as long as you aren’t killing ponies or any other civilians.” Sky whispers into her ear before Vinyl felt a pulse of magic and noticed that Raven’s mages were going something.

“I’ll make the sex type then. By the way, Raven’s calling.” Vinyl says as her horn glows a bit.

“No. Looks like her mages are…yeah. They are manipulating the weather…howling winds that should make it harder to hear the dogs and Maud.” Sky says as the weather started to take a nasty turn.

“Maybe they can make it rain for us too.” Vinyl says as a thunderclap sounded out.

“I told them not to as that hurts our ballista, catapults, archers, and crossbow users performance.” Sky says.

“Too bad. It would have been more dramatic.” Vinyl says slightly disappointed.

“I know.” Sky says as he saw Rainbow giving a speech to those under her command, starting to get them hyped up and motivated.

“Times changed even when I first saw you. Thought you were just a hot-headed Overlord that just wanted to take over the land for himself. Now, look at it.” Vinyl says wrapping a hoof around him.

“And look at you. Off your mountain in the middle of the day.” Sky says.

“Never had a reason before now.” Vinyl says shrugging.

“Now you are a queen of an even bigger empire and have permission for your own cult.” Sky whispers to her smirking.

Vinyl licks her fangs at that. “It’s a fun future to have.”

“And you have a future foal to look forward to.” Sky informs.

“How can I forget? You taking me just to put one in me.” She says hitting his chest.

“No, I take you because it is fun to both of us and you love it.” Sky corrects her.

Vinyl pushes him away playfully. “Shut up.”

“No.” Sky replies simply.

Vinyl sticks her tongue out and moves away to escape his coming grasp.

“So. Have you seen the dogs fight yet, because I have not.” Sky says.

“I was only in a few fights when they came to us. They are like barbarians…not that you are one but I can’t help but imagine that sexy body of yours not in armor and just in some cloth armor, fucking me on my throne. I believe a hostile takeover comes to mind?” Vinyl asks grinning at him.

“And their fighting capability?” Sky inquires.

Vinyl deflated rather quickly at that point. “It’s very organized at times. But when it’s small skirmishes, it’s every dog for themselves.”

“…I think I may have made a horrible mistake.” Sky says after a pause.

“What? Why?” Vinyl asks confused now.

“That means they are reckless, right?” Sky asks now concerned.

“When they are alone like a cornered animal. It’s pretty obvious that even a command from a leader wouldn’t reach them as they only see an army and only a few of them remain so they go out swinging.” Vinyl explains.

“Who is in command of them from their tribe?” Sky asks.

“His name was Buster.” Vinyl informs.

“Let’s hope he surprises me and proves my worries are unfounded.” Sky says as it looks like Rainbow had motivated those under her command and their morale was very high now as they were shouting.

“You just need to make sure you don’t break off any of the armies because that would be your undoing.” Vinyl says raising an eyebrow at him.

“I know. There will be no escape for our enemies.” Sky says before hooking a hoof around her and pulls her beside him.

“Want to do that barbarian play by play now?” Vinyl asks cheekily.

“I want your knights on standby to charge in at a moment’s notice in case we need to salvage the assault.” Sky whispers into her ear.

“Okay sexy. Anything else that needs to be ready?” Vinyl asks licking her fangs at how much blood will be spilled.

“Yes, I want as little damage done to it as possible for stage two of this plan.” Sky informs making her curious as this was the first she had heard of this.

“You going to tell the other parts to me?” Vinyl asks leaning her head in.

“Later my queen.” Sky teases.

“You teasing bastard.” Vinyl mutters slapping his cheek.

“You know you prefer it that way over no surprises from me telling you everything.” Sky says.

Vinyl sticks her tongue out at him again.

The bombardment of missiles and artillery fire continued for nearly half an hour then Rainbow and her forces start their attack, charging with ladders and battering rams. “They are making good progress.” Sky says watching the assault from the now established main camp.

“The question is if we can hold out long enough to take them out.” Vinyl says.

“Or will our new troops breakthroug…what was that?” Sky asks seeing a dust cloud rise from the fort.

“Oh boy.” Vinyl mutters.

“What was that?” Sky asks again looking to his wife.

“Maud and dogs are going to go crazy in there.” Vinyl says smiling now.

“Oh good. Was worried that the enemy was causing it.” Sky says.

“Nope. That’s a sign that the dogs are doing their job.” Vinyl says patting his back.

“This is good and bad.” Sky admits as Raven walks up to them and from the looks of it, inquire what just happened as well. “Raven…can you and your mages repair earth? Make it looked like tunnels never were there?” Sky asks.

“I can try.” Raven admits.

“I will need it for my plan.” Sky says.

“My lord, it’s dogs. Dogs tunneled in and are attacking us from the inside.” A soldier informs as the lord frowns as his men were trying to hold the walls, but were being pushed back to try and avoid the missiles and the artillery of the overlord.

“Pull back. Get away from the sight and firing areas of their artillery.” The lord says gritting his teeth angrily.

“But my lord, that means abandoning the wall.” An officer says.

“We have no choice. If they have dogs, we need to fall back. There is no way to defeat those that can attack you from the dirt.” The lord says before pounding the ground hard. “Damn you, Overlord!”

“Oh, you are speaking of my husband?” a neutral voice says.

Both the soldiers and the lord turns around slowly to see Raven floating above them as her eyes glow with magic.

“When did she…?” One asks before she unleashed her magic and the only things left were the helmets that were flung off their heads when the magic hit them.

“Oh. She finished. That was quick.” Vinyl says looking through a telescope.

“Huh. I half expected Maud to beat her there.” Sky says as Maud comes up from the stairs into Vinyl’s view.

“I had to deal with the inside trouble.” Maud says looking into the spyglass.

“Maud…but why aren’t you over there in the assault with the dogs?” Sky asks confused.

“I was.” Maud says blandly as Vinyl puts the spyglass down.

“Did you slay or capture anyo…” Sky stops, seeing Maud giving him a very decorated helmet that is bloodstained, obviously of a very high ranked officer. “You did well.” Sky says.

“Thank you. But that was Raven.” Maud explains.

“But you got this one, right?” Sky asks as Rainbow’s soldiers scaled the walls as the dogs opened the gate to let the rest in.

“Yes.” Maud says simply.

“You, Rainbow, and Raven…I am not sure who has contributed most now.” Sky says.

“Then try all of them.” Vinyl says smiling.

“Would you be alright with sharing top honors?” Sky asks Maud.

Maud just shrugs.

“Very well. Mark that the top honors for this siege are a tie between Maud, Rainbow, and Raven.” Sky instructs his aide-de-camp.

“Yes, Overlord.” He says bowing his head.

“After we finish mopping up then comes stage two of my plan.” Sky says.

“Can you tell me now?” Vinyl begs.

“Well, you see…” Sky starts.

The Belgica army moved as fast as it could to relieve the border fort after not having received news of it being besieged three days ago. The prince heading up this spurred them on as this was his kingdom’s personal lands, but when they arrive, they saw it was damaged, but there was no attacking force.

“Where is everyone?” One officer asks as they all look around as all the reinforcing army entered the fort.

“My prince, no one is here. The entire fortress is completely abandoned.” A soldier says.

“No. There has to be one at least. Find any sign of them. Bloodstain even. Now!” The prince calls out.

“There are.” The soldier says before there was a rumbling sound. “What was that?” The prince asks.

“Sir! There’s GAH!” A soldier yells before falling into a sinkhole that came up as a hole in the ground and passes all the dogs crawling out and charging at the soldiers.

“What…dogs?! Of all the times for them to start raiding.” The prince says before seeing that the overlord soldiers coming out of the holes as well. “What?!”

Soon arrows start to rain down on them and they try to cover themselves from the charging forces and forces, but couldn’t block both and soon the front lines suffered from one of the two. The prince noticed through all of this that his troops outnumbered them greatly and try to rally his troops to push them back, but they were thrown in such disarray they weren’t responding to his words as they fought for their life.

He then sees some of his troops being thrown away with crushed chest plates. He gasps shakily at where his troops were flying from and it was getting closer. The prince turned tail and started to run off, trying to get away from the force that was killing his troops. Only to feel a sudden strong hit in his back that clearly broke his spine and sends him flying into the air before landing hard and splinters his spine more. The prince screams in pain before feeling a hoof hold him down and looks to see a mare holding a bland expression that scared him to no end. The prince then grunts as she punches his muzzle and breaks and shatters it, causing immense pain and screams out before Maud punches his chest plates and bends them inward, crushing his ribs before punching it again and breaks into his chest cavity. The prince chokes as Maud gets up and walks off, letting him choke on his death as he stayed buried halfway into the ground and kicks away an approaching soldier and kills him on impact as he hits a tree. The prince reaching a hoof out to her as his vision faltered, almost as if reaching for Death himself.

“Maud Pie has slain the enemy commander!” One roars out, further demoralizing the enemy.

Maud only cracks her hooves as she looks to the soldiers who were not engaged in fighting at the moment. “Well?”

The ambush was bloody and quick. In the end, the overlord’s forces had slain more than one hundred and fifty thousand soldiers and taken many as thousands of prisoners as well from both the siege and the ambush. This was a decisive blow that had wiped out half of Alexander’s remaining forces, destroyed her reinforcement, and cut her supply lines. Sky at the time was confident that, with this, he had put her in check, but a week later he had learned he was not the only one who had found success. Despite their orders and best efforts, Alexander had caught up to the half of the army he had sent to feign her heading north. Out of the seventy-five thousand more than forty were either captured or slain in battle while Alexander’s force had come out with less than ten thousand casualties. This made Sky make another hard choice. He had to abandon what they had gained and withdraw to the fief of Buttercourt to regroup and watch.

Alexander didn’t fare much better as out of the original two hundred thousand troops she had, she was left with less than sixty-five thousand and quite a few were wounded from the fighting. When she had heard of the capture of the fortress and then the destruction and capture of all her reinforcements, she grew pale and about to ordered all of her forces to retreat to the north to regroup with other allied forces. It was only when she was informed a few days later of the overlord’s withdraw that she swore her heart started beating again and was thankful he hadn’t pressed for an attack on her remaining troops who she quietly withdrew back through Buttercourt and to the fort. When she arrived though, she found it mostly destroyed. The overlord had decided to raze it to the ground since he couldn’t hold it.

Alexander was disheartened by this. Now with only her remaining troops, she had to not only garrison the fief border, she had to do it with no real defensive fortifications. She had scored a great victory with her recent actions when she pursued the overlord only to learn it was a feint and the overlord was never there, but a sorceress using an illusion. To top it off, the sorceress had even managed to escape the battle. That was her only saving grace. She figured correctly if both parts of the split army had reconvened with the feigning force undamaged, the Overlord would have pushed on hard into Bellpond and tried his best to disrupt the supply lines of the central allied forces as well to ease some of the pressure they were putting on his central invasion force. Though, besides that, it seemed like everything else was horrible news. There was even news that the dogs, who she had learned had joined the war on the side of the overlord, were raiding Butterash fief now. It felt like the overlord could see the future and it felt like he was holding her heart in a hoof and was squeezing it little by little.

“What will her response be?” Sky thinks aloud worried as the campaign entered its second month.

“I thought you knew?” Raven asks.

“I don’t. We dealt her army a near mortal blow, but we didn’t walk away unscathed either.” Sky says as his armies injured were being treated outside, having reunited with the remains of the feigning force.

“Yes. But the fact is able to do this at all is an accomplishment in of itself,” Maud says.

“We can’t let our guards down yet. Our other forces to the north of us are still fighting hard trying to make headway.” Sky says trying to think of a new plan or figure out what Alexander could be planning besides building new fortifications out of wood at the moment.

“I am sure we will receive word on them soon.” Twilight reassured.

“I hope soon. I really want to prepare.” Sky says looking at the map.

Sky and his army rested and recovered for a few more days when news arrived that made the army’s morale rise back to a high after taking so many loses. The central invasion force lead by Moonlight and Dekmus had pushed the defenders back and had secured Valhedge and, doing so, forced the northern defender to withdraw from Wellcoast in fear of being hit with a pincer attack. The operation had finally achieved its first set of objectives by taking the border fief and now stood poised to strike deeper into the heart of the province of Belgica.

“Excellent. We may have taken losses from the other two, but we have rolled back their lines. Now, we can press our advantage.” Sky says getting up.

“You sure you are ready?” Twilight asks concerned.

“This changes the whole situation now. We are going back on the offensive. We march on Bellpond.” Sky instructs.

The army advances, but they encountered little resistance at the border or even in Bellpond. Alexander had turned out to, have abandoned it and fell back to a more advantageous position with her army as it was slowly being bolstered with reinforcements and its morale was slowly recovering after its major defeats.

“With this, we are finally making good headway.” Sky says looking at the map intensely. “Have we finally located where Alexander is?” Sky asks Vinyl as she enters.

“Yes. She is in Butterash and I got a good look at her. Me likey.” Vinyl says.

“Oh boy.” Sky mutters rubbing his head.

“We also know that Dark Tail is in Ostborough making progress and Moonlight have made his move on Bridgefield and now with Alexander’s position, I know what to do, but there is one thing I want you to tell me Vinyl.” Sky says.

“Is it something sexy?” Vinyl asks cheekily.

“You didn’t let me know when you had given birth and I still haven’t met my child. So my question is, when will I get to meet our daughter?” Sky asks.

“When she’s good and ready.” Vinyl says flashing her fangs happily at him.

“Is there some reason why I haven’t met her yet?” Sky asks.

“Yes. And I won’t tell.” Vinyl says proudly.

“Does have to do with feeding?” Sky asks.

“She will latch onto anything DAMN IT!” Vinyl yells.

“So that is why?” Sky says getting it wasn’t milk she was drinking, but blood.

“Yeah. When some of my followers had a foal, they would always suck the blood of the father, constantly.” Vinyl describes.

“I see…when she stops that phase, I want to see her.” Sky informs with authority.

“Heh, only if she stops feeding on so much.” Vinyl says grinning.

“I think I can make you agree.” Sky says returning her grin.

“You are evil.” Vinyl says leaning towards him.

“I think conquering you in bed is one of my favorite pastimes.” Sky says.

Vinyl sticks her tongue out at him.

“How many times have you surrendered to me now?” Sky asks smirking as he rubs her back.

Vinyl slaps his hoof away and looks dignified as she walks off a bit. “Many times. But that doesn’t mean you can place another in me.”

“We both know you can’t resist me or the bed.” Sky says smirking.

“That you know of.” Vinyl retorts.

“Come back here.” Sky instructs.

“No.” Vinyl says simply.

“War-related.” Sky says making her reluctantly back up.

“What is it?” Vinyl asks coming back closer.

“We are going to hit Alexander and capture her, taking out one of their best commanders.” Sky informs.

“And how are you going to do that?” Vinyl asks with an eyebrow raised.

“Now is the time to reveal how superior our salamanders are to normal wildebeests.” Sky informs.

“That’s it?” Vinyl asks.

“They can do things not even you know about.” Sky says smirking.

“Okay. You are holding back way too much.” Vinyl says as she kept an eyebrow raised.

“And how many times has that saved us?” Sky asks before grabbing her and starts petting.

“Around two.” Vinyl says grinning.

“Well, it is about to be three.” Sky says holding her.

Vinyl just rolls her eyes at this point.

“Now Vinyl, I have a very special mission for you and your vampires.” Sky says.

“Which is?” Vinyl asks.

“After we secure a few more territories, I want you and them to go to the mountains to search for the dwarves and initiate political contact with them.” Sky says.

“Really?” Vinyl asks raising an eyebrow.

“Yes.” Sky says simply letting his neck be wide open on purpose to bribe her.

“No. You can’t do that.” Vinyl says pushing him away.

“You don’t get to say that.” Sky says smirking before raspberrying her.

“Hey!” Vinyl yells trying to push his head away.

“You had your chance to get my neck. Now I get yours.” Sky says before continuing.

Vinyl laughs and kept trying to push him away. “Stop!”

“Never.” Sky calls before feeling her bite him.

“Idiot.” Vinyl says muffled as she sucks his blood.

“Who is my little vampiress queen?” Sky asks petting her again.

Vinyl hisses as she kept sucking.

“That is right.” Sky says as Twilight came in to see this followed by Raven.

“What did we miss?” Twilight asks.

“We know where Alexander is hold up now, but that isn’t why I called you two here.” Sky says holding Vinyl as she sucks happily.

“What do you need?” Raven asks.

“Twi, Ra, can you two work together and make a working version of the arrows Twi came up with?” Sky asks.

They both look at each other before looking back to him. “Um…sure…” Twilight mumbles.

“Also, I made her tell me about the daughter she gave me.” Sky says getting their attention.

“How is she?” Raven asks.

“Apparently, babies of vampire nature have quite the thirst for blood and will latch onto anything.” Sky informs.

“So not yet?” Raven asks.

“Not for a bit.” Vinyl says stopping her drinking.

“So when will you be able to fulfill my request you two?” Sky asks.

“Maybe in about a few days.” Raven says.

“I will wait as patiently as I can, but remember girls, we have to get it fast and right. The plan and many lives will depend on it.” Sky informs.

“We know that part. Tell us something we don’t know. Otherwise, shut up so we can focus.” Raven says bluntly.

“The moment you finish, we march on Alexander.” Sky says.