//------------------------------//
// Chapter Three: Blood of the Fallen 
// Story: In the Eyes of Death 
// by HydeYmir 
//------------------------------//

Coughing up blood, Clay spoke. “How did it come to this…” Clay said, laying on the ground bloody and beaten.  As he laid there he began to lose consciousness. 

“I should have never accepted that job….” Clay said coughing up blood, before falling unconscious. 

Flashback, A couple of weeks ago


After establishing himself as a new player in the underworld Clay began his new life in Equestria. Known under the alias of Ghost, Clay took on hits from anyone who had money. Like this he built his reputation up for the better part of ten years. After all that time he became the deadliest contract killer that Equestria had ever seen, until he was approached by a strange pony in a hood…

A bar room 

Sitting at his usual table Clay was having dinner until he was interrupted.

A hooded figure was standing above him staring. “You- You’re the Ghost aren’t you? You have on that mask.” The figure said shakily. From the tone of their voice they sound like a woman, an older one at that. 

Giving her a slight nod the lady took a seat. “Speak.” Clay said as he continued to eat his food. 

During his time in Equestria, Clay had his mask enchanted with multiple spells. One such spell allowed him to reshape his mask with a thought. So when he wanted to eat he could leave the mask on, but make it so that it had a hole for his mouth. 

“I need you to kill somepony for me…. Yeah.” She said as she rubbed her arm nervously. “I need you to kill Sir Adolf Blueblood.” She said, the last part was quieter than the rest. 

One of the biggest selling points on the Ghost is that he doesn’t ask questions. He just gets the job done.

Nodding his head Clay stuck his hand out which was promptly filled with a large bag of bits or as he calls them gold coins. Sticking the pouch in his bag on the floor he finished up his dinner with the woman sitting across from him awkwardly. Getting up he walked over to the bartender, as he made his way over the lady left in a hurry. 

“I need the location of one Adlof Blueblood.” Clay said, causing the barroom to go quiet. Everyone knew that whenever he asked the bartender for the location of someone, that was his next target.

“Sir Adolf Blueblood? I don’t know…” the bartender said hesitantly.

“Don’t mess with me Sliver Glass.” Ghost stated calmly.

“Geez, I was joking, joking. Although this will cost you a bit more-” Sliver was cut off by Clay slamming a bag of gold coins on the table. This one was smaller than the one he received from the hooded lady. “Hot damn,” Silver said, letting out a whistle. “That’s a lot of bits. Ok, Blueblood should be in the capital where the princesses are located. He is the former Captain of the Knights that protect the princesses.” Clay nodded and headed for the door. “Oh and in case you didn’t know, the capital is located in the Everfree forest!” The bartender called out as Clay walked out of the door. 

When he got to the main road he hailed a carriage that was being pulled by an Earth Pony.

 From all of his years in this new world Clay discovered that there are multiple types of ponies. The main three being Unicorn, Pegasus, and Earth Pony. The unicorn had a horn on their heads that allowed them to use magic, which is different from quirks. The pegasus has wings and can control the weather. And the earth ponies are by far the physically strongest out of all the others. 

“Hey there the name is Popcorn! Now where might I be takin’ you today?” The earth pony asked in a chipper tone.

“The Everfree, more specifically the Castle of the two sisters.” Clay said tiredly.

“Umm I can take you to the City of Eclipse but I can’t take you directly to the castle.” Clay stared at the man confused.

“The City of Eclipse is the town that surrounds the Castle.”

“Ah. Sure, that works.” Clay said as he boarded the carriage.

It was about a six hour long journey to the City of Eclipse. As Clay settled down on the Carriage he began to check all of his equipment, which has become part of his routine. He no longer wore his Aizawa costume as it got old and torn up over the years; now he wears an old turtle neck cloak, underneath he wears chainmail followed by a black shirt. And on top of all that was his scarf. His lower half consisted of some black tactical cargo pants and a pair of sneakers. And of course he has a bag that he takes with him everywhere since he technically doesn’t have a home. 



Reaching into a holster on his waist he pulled out a dagger. It’s a heavy full black dagger that he picked up year one in this new world. Cleaning it has become a soothing action to him. After cleaning his dagger and sorting out his belongings Clay got comfortable and went to sleep.

Three hours later

“Stop the carriage.” Clay said as he shot awake for his nap. He could feel the bloodlust of four creatures coming from in front of them. 

Popcorn confused, stopped and watched as three earth ponies and a griffin came from the bushes in front of them. Before popcorn could say anything Clay walked out to meet with the four.

The griffin standing in the middle was taller than Clay by about a head and was smoking a cigar. The only weapon that Clay took notice of on him was a short sword on his waist. The other three also had weapons but Clay didn’t take them into consideration.

“Now we can do this the easy way, or the hard way.” Clay said as he took a step closer to the giant bird. “If we go the easy way nobody will have to get hurt. Now if we take the hard way, one of you is going to die.” Clay took another step forward trying to scare them off. He really wanted to go back to sleep.

The group began looking at each other in silence before they all burst into laughter. 

The main griffin stepped up. “You think you're a tough guy don’t ya. I don’t see no horn on your head so that means no magic. No wings means no flight. That makes ya an earth pony.” The griffin said in a deep raspy voice. Taking a puff from his cigar he blew the smoke into Clay’s face. “Let’s see you try to beat us—” before the griffin could finish his sentence Clay kicked his opponents legs out from under him causing the griffin to fall on the ground. When on the ground Clay stomped on the griffins neck until he fell unconscious.

All of the ponies were horrified at what just happened. One of the three charged at Clay who countered with a spin kick to the jaw, breaking it in the process, knocking his opponent clean out. 

The other two took out their swords to which Clay took out his dagger. Instead of charging at Clay they dropped their swords and started to run away. Clay on the other hand wrapped his scarf around his daggers hilt and threw it into the back of one of the ponies. Ripping it out he went to throw it at the other one, but he got too far away. Shrugging his shoulders Clay made his way back to the carriage while cleaning his dagger. 

Popcorn looked at Clay in fear. “Thank ya for saving m-me.” He said as his whole body was trembling. That was the most violence that poor Popcorn had ever seen in his life.

“Yep.” Clay said nonchalantly as he got back into a comfortable position in the carriage. “If you get me to Eclipse before nightfall I’ll tip you extra.” He said trying to get Popcorn's mind off of the brutality. 

“Yessir!” Steam blew out Popcorn's nose as he reared up. He only has two hours before nightfall, but still three hours of land left to cover. What Popcorn does not know is that Clay planned to give him a good tip for the start. 




The hours flew by as Popcorn raced against the sunset. All of his efforts weren’t for nothing, because in the end Popcorn made it to Eclipse City before the sun set. Clay was still sleeping when Popcorn made it to the City, so they both rested under a tree on the outskirts of the city limits. 

After an hour of rest Clay woke up to Popcorn next to him in the carriage. After gathering all his stuff Clay slowly and made his way out of the carriage as not to disturb Popcorn. And just like he promised Clay left a big bag of bits, around 150. 

“Goodbye, Popcorn.” With that said Clay made his way into the city. 

Clay’s main goal was to find his target and scout out the surrounding area. And since it was nighttime he was also looking for an inn to stay at. He found the castle of two sisters easily as it was the largest building in the forest. Next to the castle there were two mansions. One of the mansions had the insignia of a Compass Rose, the main part being yellow, and the parts in between being blue. The other mansion had the insignia of an Eclipse.

Going off of common sense, Clay made his way over to the Compass Rose household. While stealthy going over, he noticed that the Mansion had a sizable chimney. Using his scarf and knife, he made a grappling hook that he used to throw on the roof. His plan was to go down the chimney when everyone was asleep and take out his target. 
While on the roof Clay looked down in the back to see if any windows were open that would make for a good escape route. That’s when he felt it.

Clay turned around fast enough to see a sword aiming down on him. Using his scarf he managed to block the sword, barely at that. Clay knocked his opponent down with a kick that knocked his feet from under him. The mysterious attacker fell down and without a second to lose Clay kicked him off the room. 

“Who the hell are you.” Clay said silently as he gripped his scarf. He turned around to walk away but as he did an arrow shot him in the head. “Ahhggh!” He yelled out as he stumbled backwards. Clay reached up and grabbed the arrow out of his forehead, but when he did grab it his mask split in two and fell off. “Motherfucker,” Clay cursed under his breath. 

“That’s a weird word.” A voice came from behind Clay. He whipped his head around to see no one. “Peekaboo!” The same voice said from behind Clay once again. Once again Clay turned around only to be slashed by a sword across his chest, the sword ripping through his chainmail. 

Screaming out in pain Clay stumbled backwards and fell off the roof, causing blood to spill everywhere. Coughing up blood Clay tried to get up only to find out that his right leg was broken. “Damn, I got to get away.” Pushing through the pain Clay stood up and made a break for it. As he was running further into the forest he looked back every couple of seconds to make sure nobody was following him. After a few minutes he found a cave and took cover In it. 

‘How did he get on the roof without me noticing.’ He thought to himself as he used his scarf to bandage his wounds. ‘And he clearly was behind me, but when I turned around he wasn’t there. But instead he was where I was just looking. He didn’t make a sound…’ A thought clicked in his head. ‘I didn’t think they would appear here but it had to have been a quirk…’ Clay grunted as he wrapped his chest wound tightly. Once that was done he walked out of the cave to find a sturdy stick. He used that and some of his scarf to make a splint for his leg.

“Better than nothing.” He said as he coughed up more blood. Leaning against the cave wall Clay went to take off his mask, only to remember that it was broken in the fight. ‘Where did that arrow come from…’ was his last thought as he drifted into unconsciousness. 

Daybroke and with it Clay rose. Still in pain for last night's encounter all he could do was sit there and think. ‘If I’m up against quirk users I’ll have to use my quirk. I haven’t used that in almost ten years. There was no need to until now.’ Clay put a hand over his face. Touching his forehead he laughed. ‘That’s dried blood.. that arrow pieces me through my mask.’ With that Clay went back to sleep. 

It was nighttime, Clay has been awake for a few hours now. He collected some berries around the forest and went back to his cave. He repeated this process for about a week. After a week he was good enough to move and all that was left from the slash on his chest was a huge scar. He still had a limp but his legs no longer seemed to be broken. He doesn’t know how he healed so quickly but he isn’t complaining. 

Since it was night and Clay was feeling like he could finish the job, he decided to go back to the Blueblood Manor. However this time he waited until a servant walked out and jumped him. He took the servants uniform and styled his hair down to cover his skin. He still wore his scarf and under it rested his goggles. He stuck his knife in his pocket. Once he had his disguise on he walked through the front door.  He made his way to the second floor and walked up to a short red female Pegasus with a blond mane that was wearing the same uniform as him. She was holding some kind of stick.

“Excuse me, do you know where Sir Adolf is?” Clay asked the pony with a fake smile. Not like she can see it with his hair covering it. 

She blinked. “Sir Adolf? You mean Sir Blueblood.” She used the stick and smacked Clay in the shins. That hurt a lot more than he cared to say, especially with his sore leg. “Now what makes you think you have the privilege to bother Sir Blueblood?” She questioned with an eyebrow raised. 

Clay reached up to scratch his head. He motioned for the Pegasus to lean in closer to him. She did reluctantly. “His mistress told me to deliver a message to him.” Clay whispered in a nervous tone. A quarter of that nervousness was really, he had no idea if Blueblood had a mistress or not. It’s just that when his client is a female it’s usually because her husband is cheating on her.

The Pegasus’ eyes shot open before she played it off. “He is on the third floor, 5th room on the right.” She said as she walked away quickly.

Following her instructions he quickly found his way to Adolf. Knocking on the door a woman half naked opened it. Pushing her out of the way he found a old fat unicorn sitting on a bed surrounded by multiple younger female ponies. 

Looking at the fat white unicorn with a blonde mane he spoke, “Are you Adolf?” Clay questioned as his dead yellow eyes peered through his hair. 

Adolf Blueblood's face turned red. Once Clay saw that, it confirmed that he was in fact Adolf. He started to wrapped his scarf around his knife. “Who are you to come in here and interrupt my—”  Blueblood didn’t finish his sentence, because Clay buried his knife in the unicorns neck. Using his scarf Clay recalled his knife making a fountain of blood gush out of Blueblood’s neck out onto the surrounding ponies who were in bed with him. They all were in shock from what just happened so Clay had a minute before the screaming started. 

“Welp, my job is done.” Clay said as he made his way out of the mansion. On his way out he saw that same red Pegasus, she was carrying a towel. Clay walked up and snatched the towel from her causing her to stop dead in her tracks. 

“What do you think you're doing!” She yelled as she scowled at the human. She looked down and froze. Clay was cleaning his knife and scarf with the towel he just took from her. “Is that b-b-blood?” She questioned with her ears pinned back on her head. Right on que the screams started from upstairs. 

Clay slicked his hair back to reveal that he wasn’t a pony. “Yes it is. Thank you for the directions and the towel. You were a great help.” Clay said as he smiled kindly. The Pegasus fell to her knees in shock. Clay walked out of the mansion without any trouble. 

“Where do you think you're going?” The same voice from last night asked. 

Clay tensed.

“Not a talkative one, are you?” The mysterious pony questioned.

No response.

“Well then. Can we at least exchange names? I like to know my opponent's name before I kill them.” The ponies' tone grew darker as he spoke. 

Clay reached under his scarf to find his goggles. He gripped them hard, then took a deep breath in and a deep breath out. “My name is Clayton Crow, otherwise known as the Ghost. I’m what you would call a contract killer.” He took his goggles from underneath his scarf, but he accidentally dropped them. He dropped them into a portal at that. He didn’t realize but at that time he made a token. His goggles split and made multiple copies of itself and dispersed into the multiverse. The pony nor Clay realized what happened because it all happened in an instant. He picked up his goggles, and turned around to confront the pony.

The pony was a midnight blue earth pony with a long black spiky mane. He had piercing black eyes.  He wore no shirt exposing his hard earned, sculpted muscles. He sported a scar that’s in the shape of an X that covers his entire lower left side of his torsos. He wore some ragged brown torn up pants, and with that he wore black leather fur boots. The armor he wore was a black leather shoulder and arm guard brace that was on his right arm. And for his left side all he wore was a black leather arm brace. It was the same as his armor on his right arm just without the shoulder guard.



“Will then Clayton Crow I go by the name Shao Dow. I’m what you would call a bodyguard.” The earth pony now known as Shao Dow introduced himself. “I’m surprised you healed so quickly from our last encounter. But really man did you have to kill our biggest employer yet? Like he played us so much and we barely had to do anything.” Shao Dow sulked. 

‘We,” Clay thought. ‘That means the bow user is here..’ Scanning the area Clay couldn’t find hide nor hair of anybody but the pony in front of him. Clay was staring dead at the pony but in an instant the pony was gone. 

“Tsk. Tsk. Your mind is not focused on the battle.” Shao Dow spoke from behind Clay. Immediately Clay did a spin kick which the pony blocked with his arm. “You're strong for whatever you are.. but not strong enough.” Shao Dow grabbed Clay's leg and threw him into the air. The pony jumped up and elbowed Clay back to the ground before Clay could correct himself.

“Damn.”Clay mumbled. Shao Dow was standing right infront of Clay taunting him. Pulling his knife Clay tried to stab Shao Dow to which The pony vanished right in front of his eyes. “As suspected. You have a quirk.” Clay said as he could feel Shao Dows sword coming down on him from behind. Dashing forward, the pony appeared in front of Clay, sword raised and smiling. Clay’s hair started to float up and his eyes turned read. “Gotcha.” 

Shao Dow brought his sword down on Clay hard, to which Clay parried with his knife. Sliding along the ponies blade Clay ran up and kicked him in the balls. Screaming out in pain the pony fell to his knees. Using this chance, clay grabbed the sword from out of Shao Dow’s hand. Raising it above his head Clay was about to bring it down on the pony. 

An arrow could be heard whistling through the air. “Found you.” Clay said as he spun and caught the arrow right before it made contact with his head. Tightening his grasp on his knife he threw it in the direction that the arrow came from. A scream could be heard. 

“Sis!” Shao Dow yelled out. He got back on his feet faster than Clay had expected. He went to take the sword from the human’s hand but instead got an arrow in his unprotected shoulder. Pushing through the pain the pony kicked Clay, throwing  him to the side. His hair went down as he rolled on the ground. 

From the distance you could hear a woman yell, ‘I’m ok!’ 

Shao Dow ripped the arrow from his shoulder causing blood to flow out. “I’m gonna kill you, you… whatever you are!” He screamed in rage. 

“You can try.” Clay said as he slowly got up. His hair rose once again as his eyes locked on to Shao Dow. “But I just won’t die.” Using his scarf Clay wrapped it around the ponies neck, choking him slowly. The archer shot two more arrows from the same position, expecting this, Clay knocked them away. However he didn’t suspect four more
Arrows to come from behind him. The arrows lodged themselves between his joints. Right in his elbows and kneecaps. Wasting no time Clay cut off the parts of the arrow sticking out and left the arrow heads in. Not being able to take the pain Clay blinked, giving Shao Dow the full use of his quirk. 

Taking out two daggers from behind his back, Shao Dow began teleporting around Clay, cutting him in quick succession. Clay had no time to counter him. More arrows were fired and found their way into Clay’s back. Causing him to scream out in pain. Falling to his knees Clay couldn’t take it anymore. 

He gathered the strength to open his eyes once more activating his quirk. 

“What an annoying power.” Shao Dow said right before he slashed Clay’s eyes, shattering his goggles. Leaving him blinded. 

That’s when Clay started to panic. “My eyes! No. No no no no no…. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE! MY EYES!” Clay got up and started flailing around  desperately. Having enough of Clay, Shao Dow ran his sword through his gut. 

Coughing up blood, Clay spoke. “How did it come to this…” Clay said, as he laid on the ground bloody and beaten.  As he laid there He began to lose consciousness. 

“I should have never accepted that job….” Clay said coughing up blood, before falling unconscious.