I turned my gaze to my window after being woken up by a sonic boom and a flash of light to see if there was a storm outside, but what I saw outside was a pillar of Dark Magic mixed with Moonlight Energy. “That’s… odd.” I said to myself, trying to sense the source of this unusual, yet familiar, combination of magic. Normally, mages aren’t capable of using Lunamancy{1} unless they are given a temporary buff from my mother, Nocturnis, but I’m the only one who is able to use Moonlight at will. You see, my mother created me from a strand of hair that was imbued with a balance of both Shadows and Moonlight, thus making me have a balanced affinity of Dark Magic and Lunar Magic. It’s also the main reason why my hair is black while parts of it is pure white, but, while I have a balance, this entity is using a large majority of Dark Magic. For all I know, it could be some Shadowmancer{2} trying to use Lunamancy. I thought, and I knew something like that could end in disaster.
I jumped out of bed and went to my closet to equip my Moonlight Assassin attire and gear. The set consisted of a white T-shirt, dark purple cargo pants, grey boots, a dark blue mage overcoat with black and purple shoulder-guards attached, and Shadowleather{3} fingerless gloves. As I clamped the top latch of my overcoat(which was a crescent moon), I opened my window, transformed into my Dark Mist Form, and flew towards the beacon.
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As I landed in front of the pillar, I started to sense another energy that sent shivers down my spine. This energy radiates pure malice, this thing isn’t something mortal… it’s demonic. My thoughts halted as I noticed a dark figure emerge from the dark-light, and it kind of threw me off guard once I saw it clearly. “What the hell?” I stated to no one in particular.
The demon(?) took notice of me and stared me down from across the field for a moment before it spoke, “Well well, what do we have here?” it spoke in a feminine voice that bled regality, “Who, and what I might ask, are you?” Wait, this thing doesn’t know who I am? That’s… new, normally any demon I’ve come across have called me “Moonborn” or “Shadow-spawn”, and on one occasion, when I pissed off their king, it was “Bastard of Nightfall”(heh, that one always made me laugh).
However, this moment right now really threw me for a loop, and its appearance threw me off as well. All of the demons I’ve met normally had some sort of reptilian appearance, but this one looked like a jet black horse with a horn and wings of the same color, its mane and tail looked like a starry sky with a purple filter flowing in an invisible wind, and it was also equipped with cobalt regalia consisting of only a helmet, chestplate, and hoof-guards. I also noticed that it had a white crescent moon on the chestplate and a teal one on a purple splotch on its flank, and that’s when everything started to come together in my head. This thing must be wanting to take down my mother and take the moon’s power for itself! I thought, trying to form some sense of action, If that’s the case, then I need to stop it! Of course, I need to know what its intentions are first before jumping to conclusions. I took in a breath before speaking, “My name is Shadiseus Lunarium Nocturnis, and might I ask who you are and what are your intentions here?” I calmly asked after introducing myself.
“Well now, isn’t this a surprise.” she said in that regal tone, “You are the first one to ever show such politeness toward me.”
The hell is she on about? I’m only being diplomatic until I decide to kick your ass.
“Very well, since you asked so nicely, I shall answer your request.” that tone is really starting to bug me. She raised her head to look down on me like she was a freaking queen, “I am Nightmare Moon, Goddess of the Moon, and Mistress of the Night!” she finished her boast with a fanged grin.
OH HELL NAW!!!!
That’s where I draw the line. “Like hell you are!” I yelled, causing her smile to become a scowl, “There’s only one moon goddess, and that’s my mother, Nocturnis!” with a bust of silver flame I summoned my scythe, Blue Moon, and readied myself into a battle stance.
“FOOL!” she boomed, her very voice causing wind to cut across the field and blow my hair and the bottom of my overcoat back, “YOU DARE CHALLENGE ME!?” My only response was me lunging at her with a flurry of slashes, and she only had enough time to summon two shadow blades to block my attacks. We performed this dance for a moment until she tried to get me with an overhead swing, but that left her open for me to counter with an upward slash sending her skyward. She managed to regain her balance with her wings and began to fire Fast Arcane Bolts down upon me, but I used my Dark Mist Form to fly towards her while dodging the oncoming projectiles. I managed to get close enough with only a few grazing me before splitting into four forms of mist to get behind her and slam both of my feet into her back, but, as soon as that happened, she flipped over and grabbed my left leg with her right hoof and wing. We continued our close quarters duel while plummeting to the ground with her being on offense and me on defense. She got a few hits on me at first, but I managed to free myself from her grip before we hit the ground.
We pulled ourselves off the ground with both of us having cuts, bruises, and me with scorch marks. Fortunately, Nightmare was fairing worse than I was due to the gash in her chestplate from my earlier counter-attack, and, apparently, she noticed this as she brought an armored hoof to her chest. She watched her blood trickle down from her armor as she realized that my scythe can cut through armor like butter with a heated knife, but, as this happened, Nightmare started to shake not in shock… she shook in complete… unadulterated… rage. Yeah, if I thought she was mad at me for challenging her, then this was where she got pissed. “Now you know why they call me ‘Shadow-spawn’.” Nightmare Moon looked up at me with hatred in her draconic eyes as I continued, “It’s because that I fight like the shadows themselves… I don’t care how I win a fight against threats, especially when they threaten Nocturnis.”
She stood there seething while I had a cold, emotionless glare, “Grr, YOU WILL PAY FOR YOUR INSOLENCE, WHELP!!!!” Nightmare bellowed while her horn seemed to burst into black flames, her pupils shrunk to the size of pinpricks, and her mane and tail started to flail around like crazy. She screamed to the heavens creating an explosion of Dark Magic that almost threw me off-balance, and I also had to cover my face to keep the dust she threw around out of my eyes. When I uncovered my face as the dust cleared, I saw that her eyes became pitch black, her regalia became full-body armor, and her mane and tail seemed to radiate pure Moonlight.
Crap, she has a Champion Form{4}!? there was no way I could fight her in this state, and my Champion form requires more Mana and Moonlight than I can handle! The thing is: Mana and Moonlight are two different energies to the point that if there is too much of one, then the other will try to convert that into the minority energy, but that will also cause a chain reaction where one energy keeps converting the other and vice versa. This will eventually lead to the persons Mana and Moonlight reserves to overload, and create a catastrophic internal and external singularity. In other words: you burn from the inside out, and then you go boom. Realizing that it was either that, or get obliterated by a demon… horse… thing I lowered my head. “Guess there’s no other choice.” I sighed, my hair covering my face from view.
“Do you surrender, Whelp!?” she was getting cocky.
I looked up with a smirk as I gathered as much Mana into my hand to form a ball of pure shadow. “If this is where I die, then you’re going down with me!” I yelled as I threw the shadow sphere into the air where it exploded to part the clouds, revealing the moon. The moon’s light shined down upon me as I started to feel empowered, and I screamed at the top of my lungs while rapidly absorbing as much Moonlight and Mana as I can. I felt myself growing larger and more powerful with every passing second as a beam of silver light rained down upon me from the moon itself. As the light faded, I could see Nightmare no longer with a face of rage and confidence, but now her face showed utter shock. "Prepare yourself, Nightmare." I said in a low tone, my body burning with energy to the point I felt like I was on fire.
"I'm just getting started!"