//------------------------------// // First Encounter // Story: Elements of Blood // by TwinkleSparkle //------------------------------// In the following few weeks after the full conversion of the elements things took a drastic turn in Ponyville and the near towns. The Elements of Blood, lead by the powerful queen Twilight, took on their shoulders to turn all the town’s ponies to vamponies, making them under the direct influence of the hive mind of the expanding Red Kingdom. In less than three weeks, the capital city of The Red Kingdom, Erythroprya (previously: Ponyville) was fully converted and under the direct control of the Black Castle. Needless to say the entire city has become a city of vamponies. Also, Queen Twilight Sparkle performed a spell to cover her entire kingdom in darkness. Both to make life easier to herself, and to her new servants. These actions, of course, were first unnoticed by the central government of Equestria. But after full connection was cut with Ponyville, and the strange shift of power felt by both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, made Canterlot really concerned about what exactly is going on there. “Still nothing from Ponyville, Lulu?” Princesses Celestia said on the breakfast table. It became a frequent question now for Princess Luna, as she was the responsible of communications and intelligence department. “Nothing Tia, unfortunately.” Luna said with a heavy sigh. “Same as the last two weeks.” “But how can’t we get any Intel out of Ponyville? Even Twilight is out of reach, and her energy is strange.” “I don’t know Tia. I just can’t reach them. I’m making my entire telecom team and hackers’ team gather whatever possible info from there. But there’s no connection what so ever. It’s like the entire Town got off grid. Not just that, it seems that I don’t even have access to the dreams of these ponies anymore. Either they never dream, or they sleep only in the morning.” “But how can an entire Town be sleeping in the day all together. Unless they all turned in to Vamponies or something.” “Is this really the time to make such tasteless jokes sister?” “You’re right. I’m sorry Luna. I know that this is a sensitive topic to you. I should’ve never brought it up.” “It’s okay sister. I never forgot about it in the first place. I thought I could enhance the power of ponies by merging them with bats, the most powerful creatures of the night. But I ended up doing nothing by creating an eternal, immortal and fearsome terror. I created these monsters, as well as when I became the monster.” Celestia stood up from her seat, went to Luna and wrapped her arms around her and started stroking her mane gently. “It’s not your fault my dearest sister. You could’ve never expected this to happen. Plus, it came out with an outstanding outcome. I mean, wasn’t the same experiment that created the fourth race of the ponykind?” “I- I guess you’re right. They were the ponies who saved the country from the threat of those monsters, and became my loyal guards. I couldn’t have been more grateful to them. They all mean a lot to me.” “See, it was not that bad after all, was it?” Celestia said, giving her sister a light kiss on the cheek. “However, we need to get to the bottom of this matter. We need to send our best field agents there to get us a throughout report on the situation there.” Luna heaved another sigh, closed her eyes, and said with a sorrowful tone. “I already did that. But as soon as an agent enters the boarders of Ponyville we lose connections with him. Even his dreams and mental connections go completely off grid.” Celestia listened to her sister and slowly sipped her morning coffee. “So, should we assume that Ponyville taken by a certain force of evil that trapped even the Elements?” “I can’t verify this hypothesis, while I can’t deny the possibility either, but is it wise to mobilize our troops based on mere assumptions?” “Do you have other choice Luna?” “As a matter of fact, I do my dear sis.” “So, out with it already.” “I will go there myself sister. As the lead agent and the head of the Intelligence department. And as the princess of the night.” “I can’t approve that Luna. I can’t approve to putting yourself in the face of the unknown.” “Don’t worry about me sister. I didn’t become the head of the Intel Dep. just because of my looks.” Celestia Sighted and closed her eyes, then opened them to look intently at Luna. “You already made up your mind. When are you going?” “In the afternoon, I’m to be there in the evening to see everything in action.” True to her word, Princess Luna was at the borders of Ponyville at sunset. What she found there was the strangest thing. Even though it wasn’t fully dark yet, the entire city was already pitch black. It wasn’t a cloud of darkness, nor a darkness bubble. It was that the boarders of Ponyville and some villages beyond were at an eternal night. The sky itself was dark, with stars and all. And the only one who could do this partial night spell is the same that can turn the eternal sky to night. And Princess Luna was sure as hell that she didn’t make that. Another strange thing that there were walls around that darkness. As if this piece of land made itself separated from the entire land of Equestria completely. Hell, there were even guards on the walls, and they looked like batponies. Though she was sure that these were not her loyal servants. That’s when The Princess of The night started to have a really bad feeling about all of this. At the beginning Luna thought about casually approaching the town. But she remembered what happened to the agents before so she performed some spells to check the surroundings of the town and the magic flow around it. She felt something so, familiar, something that brought with it some nasty memories. Could it be that Celestia’s nasty joke was actually true, but how?? Then she remembered the brief phone call that she had with Twilight. As everything started to make sense and all the puzzle pieces fall into place. Luna didn’t feel the world around her. That’s when she knew that she messed up. The moment that Luna opened her eyes she was, expectedly, tied up in chains. She was being dragged through a hallway of what seemed as a castle. All the walls were dark, which reminded her of her quarters of the royal palace. The different thing was the stripes of red light illuminating the halls. Also, the walls were decorated with a strange banner of a red background and two black bat wings and black fangs in the center. After a while they stopped at a large gate which had the same style as the banners decorating the walls. The entire gate was red with two large, black handles shaped as bat wings. As soon as they arrived there the gates were opened and she was dragged to what looked like a throne room. As she stood up and looked in front of her: she saw something that had her sad, happy, confused, infuriated and speechless. It was her friend, twilight, sitting on the throne. Not just that, the rest of the elements were surrounding her, and they all showed what she feared. “Leave her and go out.” Twilight ordered the two guards who were dragging the princess to this room. The two guards obeyed and left the room. Luna stood up and looked in disbelief in the direction of Twilight, who was slowly moving to meet her. “T-twilight?” Luna stuttered. Is that really you?” “Why yes.” Twilight said in a sarcastic way. “I am Queen Twilight Sparkle. Queen of the Black Castle and the ruler of the Red Kingdom. And I formally welcome you, Princess Luna of Equestria, to our lands.” “What are you talking about Twilight? What happened to Ponyville?” “It’s Erythroprya now princess, the capital of the Red Kingdom. The kingdom of darkness and blood.” “Erythroprya?! The Red Kingdom?! Twilight?! What are you rambling about?!!” Twilight started laughing at the confused Princess, followed by the rest of the Elements. Fluttershy, the one who was standing closest to the throne, shot the princess a dirty and impatient glare. She called to the Queen impatiently. “With all do respect, your grace. Will we keep chitchatting with this bitch for long? I want to usher her to her cell and have some fun.” “Flutters, darling. You need to be more polite. She may be a prisoner, but she’s a representative of another country nevertheless.” “Shut up both of you.” The Queen said angrily to the now terrified elements. Then she turned to the dumbstruck princess in front of her. “You should excuse my subordinates. They can get a bit, annoying at times.” “F-fluttershy, Rarity! They have all turned into vamponies.” “Oh! Now you got it. And you call yourself the princess of the night?” At that moment Luna fell to the ground, crying hysterically. “It all came back to haunt me. It all came back to me.” Luna managed to say between the sobs. “Oh, don’t worry about it Princess. You won’t really feel any guild in a few hours when I execute you in front of all my subjects tomorrow as the first step of taking over Equestria.” Luna looked up at Twilight, terrified. Luna looked in Twilight’s eyes and saw evil beyond imagination pronounced from her eyes. Only then Luna knew that she was too much consumed by darkness. She was far beyond being brought back. Luna at that time closed her eyes and gave up completely. She didn’t even hear what was going on around her anymore. The only thing she felt was when she was dragged out and then she felt her body slam into a wall. She then felt a cold floor beneath her, after which she lost consciousness.