“RAAAAAAAAAAGH!” I screamed my wordless warcry.

The Thestrals opposite me gathered their wits and did their best to counter my charge.

They still failed.

The Thestrals liked to posture and flaunt their supposed 'superiority'. But the truth was, only a few of them were accomplished warriors. Most of the Halfbloods dealt primarily with already captured prisoners, and thus could strike from a position of power.

But if you were to replace that unarmed and weakened prisoner with somepony who could fight back, and was competently powerful enough with spell and sword craft… Then that superiority folded like a house of cards underneath Pegasopolis during a defensive siege.

...Or rather how Pegsopolis had expected defensive sieges to go...

Swords sliced at exposed necks. Swarms of daggers danced like Pegasi in a vicious dogfight between the flailing limbs of ponies. The Earth Pony battleax sang and cleaved a Thestral skull. Spellfire did the rest.

I left no survivors.

But that didn’t mean I was unscathed. The chainmail now had a few holes in it, and the cheek below my left eye had a pain too sharp to be a simple bruise.

However my time was running out.

I pressed on.

To say I didn’t know where I was going would be true, in a sense. But that didn’t mean I was directionless. Just as the blood roared in my ears when I met a few more patrols, I could feel a sort of song carrying me towards some goal that had always been far off in the distance, but now was so damningly close that I could almost reach out and touch it.

I now knew what Tia had meant when she described the First Spellbook's 'song'.

It was like the endless halls of black stone and tattered sigil-less banners were lined with a choir of Old Alicornia, telling me where to go.

Victory or defeat, fate was to be forever changed on this day.

I stopped just around a corner. The choir seemed to be focused on an ornate door in the middle of the next hall. I peaked around the corner.

Only to pull my head back instantly.

There was a gathering of guards around the door.

And a noble couple who stood on either side of the door, the mare in a black evening ball gown, and the stallion in red finery.

“I’m telling you Albrecht, Lord Bloodmoon ordered us to guard his quarters.” the noblemare grumbled.

“Tch.” the stallion snorted. “As if the Lord Bloodmoon would need such a thing. We should be out hunting the livestock. It’s been a good while since I’ve been on a hunt. And what fool would try to loot the Lord’s quarters?”

“You may go, my husband.” the mare declared. “But I will not disappoint our Leigelord.”

“I think I-” the stallion stopped. “Garlic.”

That was my cue.

I flung a small crackling vial towards the crowd of Thestrals.

SZHRAAACK!

Lightning gleefully crackled over the Halfblood’s armor, embedding itself in the Thestral’s eyes and teeth. The vampires fared marginally better, in that they were only stunned for a moment as compared to fried to death.

But it was enough.

My now slightly blunted and nicked arsenal spun around my head, but the ax flew.

“Reeeeeeeee!” the noble stallion screeched in an unequine scream, the battleax now embedded in his face, the clove of garlic dancing merrily on the handle’s lanyard. The mare hissed like a snake as she saw her husband get mutilated.

It was too late for her though as the Moon’s Blessing manifested with a bright flash.

The noblemare’s head sailed through the air, away from her falling body. A blue glow wrapped around the ax handle and pulled it from the stallion’s face, before coming down again and again.

The risk that the Halfblood’s survived was one I couldn’t take, and the swarm of daggers went from stallion to stallion, plunging themselves into the exposed necks.

The noblestallion however was still trying to fight the battle ax, even though his head was now a bloody smear on the floor. The Moon’s Blessing stabbed itself into his ribs, and he finally fell silent.

The Choir of Alicorns was the loudest it had ever been.

Dimly I became aware of a tired stiffness gripping my limbs. But I pushed the feeling away. Getting here to this door had been the easy part.

My quest was far from over.

Undoubtedly, there were arcane alarms ringing in Bloodmoon’s head when I gripped the entrance of his personal lair with my magic. The door and the surrounding wall ripped itself out of being a permanent fixture in the castle and floated above my head, ready to be used as a projectile if the Lord Bloodmoon was waiting within.

The inside was dark and smelled of rusty iron. But nothing otherwise leapt out with their fangs bared.

Despite my time now being very limited, I waited for a moment. I had come too far to not be cautious. Especially when it came to the first vampire himself.

I banished the Moon’s Blessing again, but lit my horn as brightly as I could comfortably maintain, and dove into the gaping wound in the wall.

Nothing jumped from the shadows to attack me... Which put me on edge.

I was sure there’d be some monstrous thing lurking in here. Either Bloodmoon himself or a cherished 'pet' at least. But all that greeted me was dusty furniture that smelled of old blood.
I cast my gaze around the room, wary of every shadow.

Still nothing.

“What’s your game Bloodmoon?” I whispered, which sounded far too loud in the crypt-like room. I cast a glance above me, suddenly suspecting he was hanging from the not too tall ceiling.

There was a distinct lack of the telltale glint of fangs that signaled a lunging vampire falling from the ceiling.

Was he really not in here? It was possible, given the other prisoners were causing chaos elsewhere in the castle. But did I expect that the Lord of the Castle would join in hunting them?

Not for a single moment.

I looked around again, shining my horn just a tiny bit brighter. My eyes glanced over the bed. Or what I had assumed was the bed.

An open, dusty coffin greeted me. Very distinctly lacking anything resembling a body.

“Where are you leech?” I asked again quietly. But again, my unease grew as nothing lunged for my throat.

I snorted to myself. Every moment I wasted looking for Bloodmoon was another moment he drew closer. And my instructions were clear, get the amulet before confronting Bloodmoon. Otherwise vanquishing him was impossible.

I almost began to lament the fact that a spell that found mysterious magical items didn’t exist when I realized I could still cheat a bit.

The choir.

It was muffled, but the clear sounds of singing Alicorns was coming from behind a dusty bookcase.

I let loose a grin that wouldn’t look out of place on a vampire Lord’s face.

Instead of finding the proper thing to open the hidden chamber, I ripped the bookcase away from the wall as well. Spilling dark apocrypha to the floor as I threw it aside as well.

Bloodmoon had to already know I was here. So why bother finding the 'proper' way?

A passage seeped in shadow was now exposed to the dusty room. Cautiously, I let my light shine into it. A descending stairway made of black stone loomed from the darkness.

“Great.” I deadpanned. Of course the amulet wouldn’t have been directly behind the bookcase, but a mare could hope. I maneuvered what remained of my swords so the tips pointed both forwards, and backwards. If Bloodmoon decided to attack me on the stairs, he’d suffer at least a few impalements for his trouble.

Down and down I went, with only the light of my horn to guide me. I didn’t have a good idea what the layout of the castle looked like, but I was fairly certain I went down several floors worth of floors. Glumly, I realized going through Bloodmoon’s chambers may have been totally unnecessary if you could blow a hole through a wall to the hidden stairway. Except for the fact I didn’t even know this existed until a few minutes ago. That made me feel slightly better. But not by much though.

There was still the Vampire Lord in the area that I needed to deal with after all.

I took my time on the stairs. Fighting in a cramped stairway was a nightmare waiting to happen. If Bloodmoon was going to ambush me, here would’ve been an excellent candidate to leap from some hidden nook. And yet… Nothing rushed up or down the stairs at me.

“Curiouser and curiouser…” I mumbled to myself. What was the leech planning? He had to have known I was here. It would be foolish of me to assume otherwise. But there were too many decent spots for an ambush already… If I were a bloodsucking parasite, I would’ve chosen one of those places... Unless there was a better spot up ahead?

Finally, after what seemed to be forever, but couldn’t have been longer than five minutes, I reached the bottom of the stairway. The narrow doorway opened up into what looked like a natural cavern, albeit one that had been modified to act as another room in the castle. The cavern, for the most part, was empty. Except for the dark figure of a pony who stood next to a stone plinth in the middle of the room.

There was only one pony who it could be.

“Ah there you are Lord Bloodmoon.” I greeted when he didn’t immediately lunge forward in an attack. “It's recently come to the attention of the Everfree Revenue Service that you owe several thousand years worth of back taxes, and I’m here to collect.”

Lord Bloodmoon was dark grey Thestral, with a dark greasy mane that was held back in a knot behind his head. His beard and mustache were cut short, but were meticulously trimmed. A thick, heavy and ornate robe fell around his shoulders, gold thread reflected my hornlight. His eyes were closed in such a way that he looked asleep, except for when he seemed to lightly chuckle at my antics.

“Charming.” he drawled in a thick accent as his eyes opened. Inwardly I shuddered. His eyes were pitch black orbs, like the eyes of one of the great carnivorous fish that would attack ponies occasionally in warm seawater.

The stallion looked like the image anypony thought when they heard the word “vampire”. But it wasn’t that he looked like the stereotype. No, in fact it was the opposite. The stereotype was him.

“And hovv mvch am I expected to pay this... ‘Everfree’?.” His words were warped with his ancient accent, as if they never gotten the news that words were pronounced differently now.

“I would imagine quite a lot I’m afraid.” I stated, casually moving closer. It would give me less time to react, but it could also set him off balance if I put myself in a “vulnerable” position. “However, I’m feeling very generous today. How about I just take this and we’ll call it even?” I grabbed the shockingly tiny object off the plinth with my levitation and pulled it towards my waiting hooves.

The vampire’s eyes widened in horror as he realized what I had done. One of his hooves tried to instinctually grab it, before his conscious mind stayed said hoof before it actually touched the amulet. It was surprisingly ornate, given how old it apparently was. An iron bat winged pony grasped what appeared to be a silver white rock, which was bound in bands of dark metal.

“...Yov knovv.” It was not a question.

“ Oh I’ve known for some time now.” I grinned, the amulet placing itself gently into my waiting hoof, continuing my casual stroll forward, which had somehow got suddenly more menacing. Which, to be fair, the balance of power had suddenly shifted in my favor. “Couldn’t tell anypony though. With as much as your Halfbloods get away with, you must have decent spies.” I began to explain. “Couldn’t plan ether. Nopony willing to talk knows where your lair is.” I continued. Bloodmoon began to back away to circle around the cavern, he didn’t look too concerned overall, but it was clear he wanted distance. “I just so happened to find one of your ‘livestock’ villages. From there, all I had to do was play the hero and volunteer myself in their stead. And well…” the loud crash of thunder sounded. We must be closer to the outside than I thought… “You can guess the rest.”

“Yov expect me to jvst… Believe that you ‘waltz’ into my home…” He looked away in thought. “VVhy tell me this? VVhy tell me vvhat yov did?” He looked back towards me. “VVhat is point? Yov have made it farthest, is trve. Bvt yov mvst knovv you vvill die here.” Despite being totally black orbs, they looked filled to the brim with confusion. “Hovv covld yov not?”

“Wovld yov like to knovv the trve ansvver or the insvlting ansvver?” I stated, mocking him with his own accent. I stopped moving, not willing to let the vampire have access to the stairs. “Because they’re both the same. After this you will never again know peace.” I let a small smile slip. “You will never plug this hole in your castle, not completely. You rely on our blood to live forever. Your Halfbloods can’t possibly feed you by themselves, there are far too few of them. But yet Ponies know I’m here, how long before another band of heroes does the same thing I did and come here seeking vengeance for all that you’ve done?”

I had a secret weapon that helped with my success thus far, but I wasn’t going to tell him that until it was halfway into his throat.

“Win or lose here, your fate has been sealed. Especially when the new Sun Princess finds out.” I grinned maliciously. “And out of curiosity, how is your terminal case of sun allergies coming along? I’m dying to know.” If he was dumb, taunting him would cause him to attack, and thus in easy range of merely poking him with the amulet.

“Yes? And?” he asked conversationally, which made me inwardly sigh in disappointment “Let them come.” he said simply. “My strength grovvs the more my enemies bleed.'' The stallion sat on his haunches, not willing to lose face, but at the same time not get any closer than he had to be. “Is VVay of Final Sibling.”

"Interesting you mention that actually..." I replied. At his look I continued. "Oh yes, I know about the siblings."

"Yov knovv more than most then." Bloodmoon nodded. "Then yov knovv that povver comes from taking from yovr svperiors yes?"

"I do." I nodded. "Which leads me to my point. Tell me, what exactly has that gotten you? You are the Lord of a small fiefdom, and owe allegiance to nopony. And yet…” I let slip another dramatic sigh. "Who else do you have to take from? What more could you possible have? How different are you right now,then from before you sold your soul? I mean really? You had wealth! You could’ve hired a whole nation as your bureaucratic underlings! You could’ve had their absolute loyalty if you just gave them coin! And you would’ve been respected by all the nations of the world!”

“But fie!” I suddenly exclaimed. “You lost your wealth! You lost your reputation! And for what?! For a chance to be the simple Lord of a small nation forever?!”

I began to point angrily. “If you had deserved being more than that, you would’ve done more by now! By your own rules! Why would you want to be just that forever?! Here I am, born a peasant, now a General of whole armies! Facing you! The first and most powerful Vampire there ever will be! And I see it in your eyes that you know that I have a real chance at defeating you!”

I was beginning to pant heavily. “So tell me ‘Lord’ Bloodmoon, tell me why you shouldn’t you submit to the amulet’s caress and save yourself the pain of being mediocre for just a little longer?!”

The vampire watched me with careful eyes.

“... Yov don’t knovv do yov?” he asked almost sadly. “Yov come here to my home with no regard for yovr ovvn safety. Yes, I knovv yov Lvna Hydrabane, sister and General to the newly risen Alicorn of the Svn. Yov are formidible, is trve. Bvt yov do not fear the vnknovvn. Yov do not fear the grave. Yov do not fear death. No yov embrace it!” He swirled his cape as he began to pace. “I have seen Gods die child. I have seen their final moments. And they too fear death. So tell me Lvna, vvhy shovld they fear death, but yov shovld not?...” he looked pointedly towards me.

“How can I fear the unknown, when so many simply can't even understand me?” I asked

“... Hovv do you expect this to go.” the vampire asked after a few moments. “Do yov expect me to attack yov? Doing so wovld be svuicide on my part! Or do yov vvant to vvait, grovving tired vvaiting for me? Yov vvil not move away from door, yet I cannot force yov.”

I noted where the stallion was... I had to do this perfectly.

"I know what I would do." I replied cryptically.

I blinked, slower than I usually did.

But at the same time, I both summoned the Moon's Blessing and threw the last vial of 'holy' water, flashing the Moon's blessing as brightly as I could.

My eyelids suddenly grew bright pink as they kept my eyes protected against the sudden light!

"HSSSSSSSS!"

SZHRAAACK!

I opened my eyes and lunged forward.

The stallion hadn't been expecting both the light and the lightning... He half fell half lunged sideways, lightning dancing over his features as he tried to at least escape the room. But I pushed the Moon’s Blessing forward, already looming upon him.

I launched forward, telekinetically helping myself propel forward, my swords trailing behind me and in position to catch and funnel the monster from escaping. I couldn’t leave him to his own devices.

“Hessssg.” he gurgled as the Moon's Blessing stuck itself in one side of his neck. But I couldn’t be too lucky, he still retained the state of mind to begin attempting to dodge my sudden fury. He skillfully ducked under the first blade, almost panicking, but got swiftly entangled in the swarm of swords. While any cuts he gotten from the steel and gold swords were swiftly healed, the Moon’s Blessing seemed to proactively hurt him.

I didn’t expect him to be down quite yet, I pulled the Moon's Blessing back out and began to slash at his face with the with it, which took advantage of its bladed brethren’s distracting swarm.

The stallion took an opportunity to slip between an opening and almost fully escape, slipping past blades like a cloud of smoke.

Give him not a single moment of respite.

I refocused the swarm to curl onto the vampire from above to try and pin him to the floor, taking a quick sidestep to veer towards the direction in which he attempted to escape.

He began to howl in fury, not really being given an option on what to do. Already, several swords were trying to impale him from above, slowly pushing him to the floor. The Moon’s Blessing was one of them, its silver light shining brightly in Bloodmoon’s angry eyes.

He managed to push the glowing blade with a foreleg just enough for it to slightly bite into his shoulder instead of his face.

He howled in fury, but not otherwise able to do anything more than to focus on out speeding the oncoming tide of over-turning blades.

I finally tackled him as he began to break through the far wall. He brought his other hoof over to push the amulet out of my hoof, sending it flying.

And we both fell into the open sky.

The vibe!
https://youtu.be/4rWCeo6Xadw?si=LQB9L5kWb_MC9jQx