//------------------------------//
// Prologue 
// Story: New Lunar Republic: The Siege of Moongleam 
// by Crulocrius of Honeycomb 
//------------------------------//

  Starlight Weaver stood at the entrance to the Blossomforth Mine. They had found it, they had found the heart of the greatest nightmare ever known to ponykind! Greater than fear, greater than doubt. Greater than despair,anger,violence,hatred or pride! It was greater than all of these nightmares combined for it was the source of them! It was known as Sha and once he got his hooves on it's heart... Oh the things he would do with it! 
The batpony was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn't notice the massive chest being hauled from the mine until it was right in front of him. He took time to grin before giving his orders
" Bring it to the pools!"
As the casket was dragged to the center of the Vale of Eternal Blossoms, dozens of batponies gathered around, they wore Rust Brown armor rather than the traditional Midnight Blue. They roared and cheered as the chain bridge was laid down around the lake which the entrance to the pools was surrounded by and as Starlight walked across. However, he was interrupted. A lion jumped down from the massive temple looming over them and into his path. Starlight readied his axe, passed down to him by his father.
" Enough!" The lion shouted "You have run rampant for too long, Weaver, but that ends now."
Starlight laughed " Step aside, lion. You confront a force beyond reckoning."
" Your father dabbled in powers beyond reckoning. Where is he now?"
" That's it! I am sick of you!" Starlight charged, axe in hoof, and met the lion on the bridge. They battled in a spectacle of force versus agility. But no matter what the lion did, he was pushed back. But in one last struggle, he finally disarmed the batpony. Starlight then starting using his hooves and punched the lion off the bridge. But when he looked down, the lion was balancing on the water. He pounced back up, clawing Starlight in the process.
" I have fought alongside the buffalo and the zebras and others!" The lion yelled as he prepared to dive-kick the batpony, who had recovered his axe " You are nothing like them!" He attacked and missed, getting is foot stuck in the bridge. Starlight picked up a chain from broken edge of the bridge and threw it in such a way it wrapped around the neck of the lion.
" They are no longer part of my republic!" He pulled the chain towards him sending the lion flying into the blade of his axe, impaling him.
The lion coughed " Equestria will hear of this." The lion wheezed out " They will come for you."
" Yes, I'm counting on it. The armies of Equestria will come for me. And within my fortress they will face all the terrible creatures I have wrought, the boundless power I have mastered! And one by one, they will fall at my hooves. Anypony who would rise against my Ultimate Lunar Republic, will be impaled upon the spires of Moongleam!"
The lion fell to the ground with only a few breaths left in him.
" You lions try to bury your hate and your anger. But such power cannot be contained. It must be unleashed!" He cut the chains of the casket open in one fell swoop, revealing the black, fleshy heart.
" A time will come" the lion spoke as if only wounded "When you will answer for your crimes."
" I answer... to none!" He pushed the heart into the hole in the middle of the platform, and once he did so, a massive blast of black and white erupted from it and for many miles further, wiping out all life. And as he walked away, he uttered his final words to the lion " All who challenge me... will burn in the fires of my hatred!" 
 ONE HOUR LATER
Starlight stood admiring his work. Sure it wasn't all that pleasant to look at, but he had done it. He would come back for the heart in just a few moments. Then he could begin the creation of his Ultimate Lunar Republic. He could hardly wait. " Oh Princess Luna." He spoke with both anger and pleasure " Your first mistake was putting me in power. Your second will be arriving home so late."