//------------------------------//
// Slaughter 
// Story: Excerpts from the Luna War 
// by Sapare 
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"-- and then I struck him right in the face, that poor guy lost a tooth!"

The boasting pony brought his half full mug down on the wooden table to emphazise his statment, causing a wood on wood thunk to haul through the crowded inn, and be lost in the various other conversations occuring. Spirits in the tavern were high, at least those of the guests more so then those of the owners. 

It was today that the royal army had arived in Hoofington, and met no resistance as it moved in to occupy, and subdue the helpess city. With Luna's forces nowhere in sight it had been a perfect victory for them, if they had the sense to be cautious they would have noticed that it was almost too perfect. As the night continued and the Celestia's ponies drunk and partied and abused their 'victory' over Hoofington the ponies of Hoofington readied themself.

Luna's army had infact not retreated as the royal forces thought, and were actually still here, in Hoofington. After our initial investigation of Hoofington we found that the ponies living in it had a habit of building themselves secret hidden rooms to protect their families in case of an invasion. With the incoming danger being ponies rather then Gryphon's and the expected collateral damage less on the population and more on those who would fight, it was not difficult to persuade these ponies to hide our troops instead.

All we had to do is arm the citizens and tell them to wait for our signal, two thousand soldiers and and unacounted mob of ponies against a drunken and unorganized 'army'. Some of us, those required to start the massacre, had to blend themself in with the army ponies. Acting as if we were fellow Celestia supporters, or just a pony who was very content on getting drunk tonight. But the task was not all that difficult, it was not like anypony wanted to find an enemy they had to fight. 

Picking myself up from my desk and gave a nod to the rather exausted looking unicorn pony who had been assigned as a bartender, who nodded back. I trotted toward the pony who had just made such a ruckus and smiled at him and his friends, grinned back rather drunkingly as they sized me up.

I came to a hault infront of the pony I had singled out for the sole reason of his obnoxious bragging and then suddenly, but for me perfectly expected, his wide grin was replaced with the metal of a short blade as it penetrated his skull and ended him in an instant.

I grabed this blade with my teeth and pull it from the skull, quickly focusing on his compleetly stuned two friends, cutting ones throat before the other one toumbled backwards off the table and tried to squirm away, stuck on his back. His eyes shone up at me with such utter terror, pleading me. And I would be lying to say that it left me cold, I had never even dreamed of slaying a fellow pony when I joined Luna's nightguard. But my duty was to protecting her, no matter the enemy. I made it quick, the blade right between his eyes.

I once more removed the blade and looked up and around me. By now the bartender had given out   weapons to all those who had been assigned one, and they had proceded to murder any pony of the royal army that was present, which were a lot. Outside I heard the loud bang and thunder of the signal, the blood that had been spilled in here would be nothing compared to that outside.

My body felt heavy as I sat down at the table those three ponies had just partied at, right besides the still blood spewing royal soldier. For whatever reason I could not take my eyes oh his now lifeless body, shuddering as I let the blade drop from my mouth.

This whole... massacre, had been my idea. After sizing up the odds it had been clear that a outright battle would be too costly, even if we won. As such I tried to find another way, and I did.
I do not believe there are many ponies in this city who were happy at the idea of slaughtering the royal guard like this, this cowardly. But sometimes there is no space for honor, only surrival.

Not that my conscious will ever agree to that. How Luna deals with this is beyond me, I know how much she loves all of her subjects, including those on Celestia's side. And for a moment I wonder if this is really worth it, maybe surrendering would have done better for everypony, but by now things simply had gone too far to think about going back.

By now the slaughter taking place outside had gone into full motion, led by our soldiers the citizens of Hoofington would be willing to help us at every turn, their fighting spirit fueled by the mistreatment they had suffered today. We made no plans to take survivors, but neither did we specify that mercy was dissalowed, we simply let everypony do as they wished.

Still, I refused to leave the tavern even after all the other ponies, at least those still alive, had left it. I assumed they were going to join in the 'battle' outside, but I would not be surprised if some of them were as shaken as me and simply wanted to find a place were the screams would not find them.

The battle of Hoofington, strategically seen a brilliant victory that would go into every historybook of Equestria, or at least those of the Lunar Empire. But moralisticly it was a disaster, after today neither side would consider each other ponies anymore, just enemies.