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Favoured of the Gods3,353 words
Knowledge 3,351 words
Decision2,929 words
To Conquer4,767 words
To Butcher6,727 words
A Sea of Blood5,625 words
Home5,294 words
Siege Breaker6,961 words
Draconica Irae4,285 words
Fall of the Mountain4,218 words
Honor the Fallen4,254 words
The Road3,613 words
Steel and Doom6,779 words
Sacrifice8,563 words
Forgive Me4,507 words
Suffer14,827 words
To Shatter6,904 words
Rise11,250 words
Never Broken17,952 words
Epilogue9,471 words

A Sea of Blood

Ten years.

I look around for the millionth time.

All that greets me is the grey and dark blue of stone walls.

Ten years. It is all I have seen for the past TEN DAMNED YEARS.

This cell. This damned cell. Nothing more than a pocket dimension created within the raging magics of the Mouth of Madness portal. Time has no meaning here. Ten years or a thousand. It is the same one second, one heartbeat, for everything outside this cell, for everything outside the Mouth of Madness.

I came to the Draka hoping that they could kill me.

I hoped that they would take mercy on one of their own and put me out of my misery.

Any other creature that had tried had failed. It had been the same every time. I would be attacked, wounded, hurt and then I would feel it. Anger unlike any I had felt before. I would pass out only to awake, finding myself in a pool of my attacker’s blood.

If any would be able to kill me, it would be the Draka.

I had hoped they would free me.

Instead they locked me here.

My eyes fall on the old Draka sitting on the other side of the cell.

He is ancient, but knotted muscle still ripples under ancient blue scales. His robe is made of fine silks and silver plates. His eyes are calm, yet always focused.

He says his name is Nobu’Dai, Grand Master of the Draka.

As always, he sits there, telling me of the Draka. Of their…our culture, our ways, our legends. He tells me I am Draka. He tells me that it is my purpose as Draka to always succeed and never falter.

The only time he moves is when I attack, hoping to force him into killing me. Every time I attack he defeats me in seconds, sits down, waits for me to wake and begins to tell me of the Draka once more. Every time, for the past ten years.

Often, too often, I feel frustration and anger overcome me and I have another blackout. He tells me that I fall to something called “Blood Madness”. He tells me that he will snap me out of it every time. And he does.

My blackouts have gotten rarer. What ten years ago happened four or even five times every day, barely happens once a week now.

For the first time in ten years I speak, my voice ragged and slurred because of lack of use, missing lips and my shattered lower jaw. The disfigurement has become scar tissue a long time ago, but it still hurts.

“…Why…?”

His eyes widen for a split second, as if surprised that I finally speak.

“Why what, little one?”

“Why…do I… fall…to Mad…ness?”

He looks at me for a few moments and answers.

“All Draka, even myself, are in peril of falling to the Blood Madness. It is our burden to bear. But you hold this burden more than others. You fell to the madness when you barely a pup and your body came to see this as a natural response to conflict. The Madness is a death sentence, little one. It is death for all around you and even yourself. It is only by a quirk of fate that you survived in your state, long enough to seek us out, and for the past decade it has been only due to me stopping you that your mind has not been consumed by it completely”.

“Then…why help? Why…not…just kill…me?”

“Why not just kill you indeed? Why not just put you out of your misery? Why not just spare the world of the risk of having you lose yourself completely to the Blood Madness?”

He stops for a second, as if to consider it.

“Is it because you may be special? Or maybe I see some hidden potential in you? … NO.”

“You are not special. I see no hidden potential. All I see is a weak, pathetic, self-pitying excuse for a Draka”.

In the blink of an eye he lunges, grabs me by the throat and slams me to the wall.

“YOU ARE WEAK, THERE IS BARELY ANY MUSCLE ON YOUR BODY. YOU ARE A RUNT, SMALLER THAN ANY SELF RESPECTING DRAKA SHOULD BE AT YOUR AGE. YOU ARE PITIFUL, REPEATEDLY ASKING FOR A POINTLESS DEATH, NOT EVEN ATTEMPTING TO GIVE YOUR LIFE MEANING”.

He releases me from his grip, and regains his calm.

“Yet, you are still Draka”.

He looks at me and his eyes seem to soften for a second.

“You have no strength, little one. You are weak, slow and small. There is only one thing I see in you, boy. An indomitable will”.

I am startled. Indomitable will?
How can he say that? I came here hoping to die. No strong-willed creature would do that.

I lift my eyes to tell him but, as if knowing what I am about to say, he stops me.

“You think yourself weak-willed for wanting death but you do not see everything”.

“Your death wish is a result of your sin and Draka pride, yet you did not surrender to despair and still you go forward.
You have fallen to the Blood Madness a thousand times, yet still, you go forward.
Over the past ten years I have seen you fall to the madness lesser and lesser and even begin to almost force yourself out of it with nothing more than grim determination.
You always go forward, Spike”.

I look up. It is the first time he has called me by my name.

“You will never be rid of the madness, Spike. You have fallen to it too young and far too often to ever be able to keep it at bay as other Draka do. It will always be there. At the edge of your mind, fighting you for dominance until the end of your days.

Let me teach you, Spike. Let me teach you how to discipline your rage”.

Lifting me up, he continues.

“Learn what I have to teach you, Spike. If you wish to learn, I will teach you to take the mad fury burning your mind, and transform it into a cold rage.

Fury is wild and self-destructing, Spike. It strengthens you, but kills you in the process.
Fury is flame.

To discipline that fury is to freeze that flame. It is to take that anger and hatred piece by piece, and use it as a tool to push forward, while never allowing it to overcome you”.

I continue to look at him. Why would he teach me?

I open my mangled mouth again.

“W…hy…live…on?”

He bursts in laughter and spreads his massive arms wide as if to encompass the cold stone cell.

“Good, little one, good. You are starting to ask the right questions.
But that, little one, is a question only you can answer. For what reason, do you live?”

His smile widens even more and, with joy and finality he says.

“You will seek battle, Spike. As all Draka before you have, and as all Draka before you shall, your nature as a Draka will make you seek battle.

Through that battle you will gain insight and understanding, for pain and hardship is what leads us to knowledge.

Through that battle you will understand why you live, and why you fight.

But, if you allow yourself to fall to madness, you will die as a mindless beast, hated and forgotten, not as a warrior, whose name shall echo in the minds and hearts of others, for eons to come.

Learn what I have to teach, Spike. Then, should you still consider that you have a sin to atone for, take the pledge to join the Legion of the Damned. Find battle and your doom alongside the Legion.

Fight, for the sake and joy of battle itself.

Fight, for your absolution.

Fight, for knowledge of yourself.

Fight, and die, having understood why you fight, and having finally forgiven yourself.

It has always been your choice, young Draka?

Will you die today, here and now, a broken, empty shell?

Or will you die another day, in glory and honor, as a true Draka?”

The battalion roared as they charged.

Ingulek Heart-Piercer screamed a manic laugh as he felt the press of over five hundred daemon cavalrymen. His massive rat-like head split into a lunatic grin as he regarded the almost one thousand changelings, all hollow eyed and buzzing over him.

Yes, this would be grand, his heavy cavalry battalion would feast on war today.

He bellowed another grunt of laughter, lifting his massive dadao sword and leveled it to the single warrior that was speeding towards them. Even though the warrior was almost half a mile away, Ingulek’s daemonic sight caught a glimpse of purple scales, green hair and black armor. Whomever this warrior was, he must have given up reason due to his fear. No sane creature would willingly run towards a full charge of five hundred daemons and their six legged steeds.

The cavalrymen howled, sensing that blood would soon flow, as they closed in with the warrior.

A hundred feet.

Ingulek took his proper position at the back of the charge, as was his right as leader of the warband.

Fifty feet.

His whiskers twitched as the warriors features started becoming more defined.

Thirty feet.

Ingulek felt his fur stand on end as an aura, as cold as the heart of northern Jotunharr, hit him.

Twenty feet.

He dropped his dadao sword as his eyes met the warrior’s, and saw screaming Death within them.

Ten feet.

He opened his mouth and loosed a panicked scream.

The battalion hit the warrior with the same effect of a wave smashing itself on the side of a cliff.

The first row of heavy plated daemonic cavalrymen disappeared in a geyser of blood.

Igulek’s world exploded in a torrent of horrified screams and howls of pain as the charge’s own inertia pushed panicked cavalrymen into the grindhouse that was the single warrior.

Daemons howled as arms, legs and heads flew, surrounded by capes of blood. Nightmare steeds whinnied in pain as legs and bellies were sliced apart. Heavy hell-forged plate groaned as it gave way to blows so strong that hell-steel was both sliced and shattered in single strokes.

At the back of the battalion, Ingulek managed to stop his steed and set his wide, blood-shot eyes on the scene before him. He saw explosions of blood and body parts peppering the length and width of his assembled battalion and changelings melting as they were engulfed in firestorms of pale green flame.

For a moment, the press of armored bodies gave way to a welter of blood and, in the second it took for it to dissipate, he saw the warrior up close. A behemoth of purple scales, ancient scar tissue and green hair stood, straight-backed, a curved blade in each hand as he walked towards Ingulek, heavy armored daemons falling like leaves around him. He saw the warrior’s black gromril baroque armor awash in crimson. He saw the lipless mouth and steel lower jaw, pale green flames still clinging to dagger sized fangs.

Worst of all, he saw it’s eyes.

Ingulek lost control of his bladder as those eyes hit him and the glacial stare of inevitability fell on him. His nightmare steed reared and fell dead to the side, bloody froth bursting from it’s mouth as the beast’s animal instincts made it’s heart burst apart with fear.

Ingulek cursed as his leg got trapped under the one ton bulk of the dead steed, and began pushing against the body, trying to free himself. In desperation he yelled and screamed, all the while looking at the battle.

With every second that passed, the warrior moved one step closer, his arms and blades a maelstrom of motion, as his swords fell and rose with the methodical rhythm of a butcher’s cleavers and the speed of thunderbolts. Daemons screamed as arms were cut even as they tried to swing their weapons, legs were sliced apart even as they tried to run and armored bodies sliced in halves even as shields and weapons broke before the warrior’s attacks.

Every stroke of his blades, flashing steel that ended daemonic lives, every movement, perfectly timed actions that put him in the perfect position to strike and left no openings.

Everything about this warrior was like a perfect clockwork engine of destruction, no wasted movements, no useless actions. The art of murder was displayed and perfected in his motions, and it was more horrific than any berserk rage or righteous fervor would have ever been.

No noise, save from the cutting edges came from the warrior. No howls, no bellows, no oaths and promises of doom. There was no need. His stoic face, as unmoving and unforgiving as a stone statue’s, said everything they would need to now. They were nothing more than meat to him and they would die like meat. This simple fact, terrifying in it’s simplicity, had turned once fearless, battle-lusting daemons to panicked quails before a hunter’s traps.

A moment of dead stillness hit the area as the remaining fifty daemons managed to run clear of the warrior’s blades in their retreat. They looked at Ingulek and then at the warrior again. In little under a minute, the warrior had butchered over four hundred and fifty cavalrymen and burned to ash and cinder a thousand changelings. Now, as if a slaughter of such magnitude had been nothing, the warrior kept walking towards them, not even breathing hard. With not even so much as a nod, the remnants of the once feared heavy cavalry battalion turned tail and ran, goading their steeds to greater speed, if only to put as much distance between them and the warrior as possible.

Ingulek screamed and cursed at the deserters, his leg still caught under the carcass of his steed when a thump returned his attention to the warrior. He had pierced one of his blades into the ground and had grabbed the larger of the two in a two handed grip. Plate armor groaned and veins stood out, as the muscles of his arms and chest visibly bulged, and he lifted his blade above his head. With a single, massive slice he brought his blade down and an explosion of dust and slicing wind roared towards the fleeing daemons, cutting them to ribbons even as they screamed.

Mouth agape, staring at the pool of blood and ruptured flesh that had been the last of his warriors, Ingulek felt his bowels void themselves as he heard the warrior behind him start walking again. Shivering, he turned his head and opened his mouth to scream in horror. It ended when the warrior’s armored boot crushed his skull.

Without breaking stride, Spike looked behind himself, at the advancing line of his Legion. Deep within the recesses of his mind, beneath the raging fury and instinctive viciousness, a cold calculating intellect that subdued the anger and concentrated it into nothing more than complete focus, a small spark of regret bloomed. They were the only family he had left and he had frightened them, the way he was now. He made a mental note to apologize to them after the battle. However, now was not the time to dwell on it. Now, Spike had only one singular purpose, and his entire being revolved around it. Now, was the time to kill.

Shagga ran alongside the rest of the Legion. They were one mile behind Spike and they tried their best to catch up to him but it was impossible.

This had been the fourth battalion Spike had singlehandedly obliterated and still he was making headway.

Even whilst running, Shagga still felt her hand shiver slightly. It had not stopped since Spike’s outburst when he had seen corpses of the two adult ponies and their dead children.

She had not understood what had happened at that moment but now, seeing the way Spike fought, she understood everything. She understood that for a singular moment, she had witnessed Spike succumbing to the Blood Madness. She understood that, for a single moment, her Darraor had become nothing more than a primeval beast, violence and savagery given form.

However, Spike had done the impossible again, as he always did. He had grappled with his own insanity and bended t to his will. Now, Spike reduced all that stood in his way to nothingness.

Shagga knew that it was not as if Spike had become suddenly stronger or faster. He had simply taken the entirety of the rage boiling in his mind and morphed it into a focus and clarity of mind unlike anything she had ever seen.

This was Spike unencumbered by limits, remorse or even one iota of diversion, be it mental or physical. Spike had simply cut himself from the world and dedicated his entire being to one goal, to reach the Boutique as soon as possible. Anything that stood in his way was nothing more than meat to be cut down.

Shagga shivered again. In the end, none of it mattered. She would be by her Darraor’s side, whether she was afraid of him or not.

Twilight watched the ramparts, trying for what seemed like the hundredth time to count the army amassed outside of Canterlot Castle. The last time she had done this she had given up at thirty thousand daemons and undead. She did not even want to try to estimate the number of changelings buzzing around the castle, the only thing preventing them from attacking being the large shield that she and the Consulate of Unicorns maintained.

Still the numberless changelings chipped at the mighty shield, breaking wings, bone and flesh against it but not stopping. Large stones and corpses thrown by bone constructed trebuchets broke to pieces upon contact with the shield and great spheres of black fire, belched forth by hellfire canon-like constructs, peppered it with incandescent heat. Twilight could feel the unnatural existence of that dark flame even beyond the security of the shield.

Yes, the shield held and offered security for now, but for how much longer. Already half the Consulate had either fainted or gone into comas from the strain of holding the shield and even Twilight herself felt exhausted.

If a week ago anyone would have told her that she would be keeping a shield up, while under constant bombardment, for three days, she would have laughed in their face. However, here she was, doing just that, the knowledge that the few ponies that had escaped the sacking of Canterlot within the Castle, the only thing that drove her on.

Again she tried to make a mental note of what forces they had at their disposal. Less than four hundred royal guards manned the ramparts now, most of them having died under the savage blades of the daemons, the relentless assault of the undead and the suicidal attacks of the changelings.

A little over one thousand civilians now crammed themselves within the protective walls of the castle, the once proud and powerful nobility of Canterlot, reduced to a haggard, wounded and panicked mass.

Everypony was afraid, and Twilight was no exception.

Steps behind her made Twilight quickly turn, a small knife in her hand. The sight of the atrocities outside the walls and ethereal shield had made her jumpy, to say the least.

“Easy sugarcube” Appleack quickly said, one hand raised and a plate of hay and dandelions in the other.

“Applejack, I’m so sorry, it’s just…”

“Don’t ya worry about it Twi, here” she said, pushing the plate in her hands “Ya gotta’ eat, keep yer strength up”.

Twilight smiled, looking gratefully at one of the few ponies that had kept her nerve during this whole ordeal. Applejack had done her best to help whenever she could, although Twilight knew it had been hard for her.

The attack three days ago had been too fast and too unexpected for them to save everybody and, even though they had managed to find Granny Smith and Big Mac, Applebloom and the other girls at the picnic had been nowhere to be seen. The survivors had been pushed to Canterlot Castle and, for all they knew, anyone outside the castle was most likely dead.

For all her apparent strength, Twilight was sure she had heard Applejack crying on a few occasions, even though she had made it a point to not to be seen doing so.

In the courtyard of the Castle, Pinkie did her best to play with the foals and take their mind off of what was happening. Even though the pink pony’s mane was lank and deflated, she still did her best to raise everypony’s spirits.

Twilight knew it was hard for her to do so, especially with the Cakes and their children having been among the missing ponies, but she appreciated it nonetheless.

She started eating, trying to hide the grateful tears that stung her eyes. Even with so much loss, the two mares still helped her and the others. But gratefulness soon turned to sorrow, as the knowledge that only two had been left hit her again, as it had done so many times in the past three days, since the siege had begun.

The plate started trembling uncontrollably as Twilight broke in tears. She wept for Rarity, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. She wept for the Cutie Mark Crusaders. She wept for everybody she knew that was not here.

The strong orange furred hand of Applejack lightly grabbed her shoulder.

Twilight turned to see AJ’s wet eyes.

“N…Now…c’mon there…sugarcube” trembled AJ’s voice as she tried to still it “It…It won’t do if…if anypony else sees their princess crying, right?”

Twilight brought her forearm across her eyes and showed AJ a small, quivering smile.

“Yeah, you’re right, I have to…”

AJ saw as Twilight’s eyes widened in horror and her plate fell and shattered to the ground. She stared beyond the ramparts and towards the daemonic army.

As Applejack turned and saw it, she screamed.

A single, obese and bloated monstrosity had separated itself from the rest of the daemonic army and stood in the middle of the no-man’s land between the castle and the daemons.

On a chain tied to one of his six putrescent arms were Celestia and Luna, both shackled and obviously weeping.

The thing opened it’s two mouths and it’s voice carried throughout the great Castle.

“Little Princess, know that I am Nerg’Cathal. Know that your head will be the final gift I offer your former teacher, before I make her and her sister my brides”.

It left the words sink into the hearts and minds of the ponies in the Castle, then it added.

“Know that you shall all die”.

Hellfire cannons roared, catapults let loose cart sized boulders and arrows flew. The bulk of the daemonic army had been assembled on the outskirts of Ponyville in preparation for Spike’s attack.

Boulders shattered against his flesh and armor, arrows broke against purple scales and black gromril plate and Black Flame ignored armor to sear Spike’s soul. But with all this, Spike did not falter even a step. He took it all. The impact, the pain, he took it all without a sound and simply attacked, carving through line after line of dead-pike and daemons, inexorably drawing closer to the daemonic artillery.

Shagga smashed a dog headed daemon’s shield aside with her bardish ax and headbutted it, feeling the bone and cartilage of it’s snout break. Before the daemon could recover, she snapped her ax in a quick stroke to it’s knees and crushed the prone daemon’s skull with her great tower shield.

Sparing the corpse no more time than enough to spit on it, Shagga took back her place in the advancing line of the Legion of the Damned even as another wave of daemons, the few that had escaped Spike’s blades, broke against the Legion’s shield wall, that followed exactly fifteen feet behind the Darraor.

Shagga brained a crab armed abomination and spared a second long glance to Spike. The Darraor tore through daemons and undead like a farmer through a field of wheat, even while great stones, arrows and black flame crashed and exploded around him, without so much as slowing him down. She would have been amazed at this, but Shagga had fought alongside Spike for the better part of the past two millennia. She knew that once Spike began moving forward, nothing alive or dead could stop him.

Shagga returned her attention to the battle at hand and ordered a crescent moon formation. Anything that would escape their doom at the hands of Spike, would soon find it on the waiting spears and blades of his Legion.

She would make sure of it.

Mortdecai Heart-Taker laughed when the female pony screamed again, as her own daughter, now nothing more than an undead filly, tore through her stomach and began devouring her entrails.

Oh, how he had enjoyed this.

Initially, he had despised Nerg’Cathal for taking more than half the army to lay siege to Canterlot and leaving him with the rest of it to secure their position, but Mortdecai had found a good way to pass the time.

He had ordered the army to stand outside of Ponyville and await further orders, while he and his thirty lieutenants and warband leaders, enjoyed themselves by taking survivors out of their hiding holes and tormenting them.

But now, there was only one building left standing. An oddly shaped and colorful one with many odd and frilly dresses adorning it’s display windows. The last family had told him it was called the “Carousel Boutique” before he had finally given them the sweet release of death.

He took a deep breath and licked his lupine lips. The wolf headed daemon smelled eleven females in that building and his six eyes glinted at the prospect of pain he was about to visit upon them.

But he had gotten greedy on the last family. He had killed them too fast. He would savor this last feast. He would force them out of their illusion of safety and he would feed on their screams as he would let his lieutenants have their way with them.

Yes, he would make this as slow and as painful as possible. Maybe he would even allow the rest of the army their leftovers to have some fun.

He would, if only they stopped with the damn noise outside the town. Mortdecai had created an almost sound proof magical bubble around the center of the town so as to not have any interruptions of his pleasure, and it had been quiet and calm for the past few days. But in the past fifteen minutes, a cacophony of muffled sounds had begun from where he knew they were stationed.

They were either under attack, just doing target practice or fighting amongst themselves with no other distractions present. Either way, it did not matter. Even if they were under attack, Mortdecai knew for a fact that no one could overcome an army of almost twenty thousand daemons.

He would not deny himself his pleasures.

Rarity looked from a corner of the window at the approaching daemon. It was hideous, a wolf headed monstrosity, a twelve feet tall horror of pulsating, deformed muscle. Six yellow eyes regarded the boutique and glinted in the firelight, like a predator out for fresh prey.

She squeezed the pair of scissors in her hand and gave a quick nod to Rainbow Dash and Vinyl Scratch that stood on other side of the only entrance to the boutique.

Rainbow held the remains of a mop, it’s tip sharpened to a point, and Vinyl, a small hammer.

The plan had been made.

Rarity, Rainbow and Vinyl would do their best to try to blind the monster, and create enough of a diversion to give the others time to run. It was a desperate plan, but it was something. They couldn’t just wait for death. The least they could do was to try and fight and try to at least save the fillies.

Fluttershy, Derpy, Octavia, still unconscious on Depry’s back, BonBon and Lyra and the Cutie Mark Crusaders stood, hidden in the dark, ready to make run for it.

They had protested long and hard against this plan, knowing that Rarity, Rainbow and Vinyl were going to sacrifice themselves to offer them a small chance to flee, but in the end, it had not been much of a debate. The three mares were resolved to do this and nothing would deter them.

SweetieBelle and Scotaloo sniffled, looking at their sister and adoptive mother respectively and Vinyl had left her tinted glasses on Octavia’s head.

This would be goodbye, one way or another.

They could only hope that some would be able to escape.

“Don’t you cry, kiddo” Rainbow said with her trademark smirk “Big girls don’t cry”.

Scotaloo sniffled again.

“I love you, mom”.

Rainbow turned her head to the door, refusing to let anyone see her tear filled eyes.

“Love you too, baby girl”.

Mortdecai smashed his studded mace into the door, turning it into kindling.

Immediattely, three females jumped at him, aiming for his eyes.

Mortdecai smirked. What a waste of time. He saw nine other females, children and adults begging to run for the door. The three attackers had most likely thought they would be able to blind or distract him long enough for the others to escape. Pathetic.

He smashed the blue Pegasus to the roof of the house with his right hand even as he swung his left handed mace, catching a white, blue haired Unicorn wielding a pair of scissors on the side. The last one, another white Unicorn with hair that was streaked with dark and light blue, wielding a hammer, ducked under the mace and swung her hammer as hard as she could at his left kneecap.

Mortdecai laughed as the hammer bounced off iron flesh and kicked her in the gut. The nine that had tried to run, stopped dead in their tracks as the three attackers groaned and coughed on the ground. Nothing of worth had been accomplished. All eleven of them would be their playthings for the next hours.

“Oh yes, this will do nicely” Mortdecai said in fluent Equinese, eyeing the girls.

He reached down a lifted a struggling Rarity by the hair, even as Sweetie Belle screamed.

“I will start with yo…”

His last words were stopped by a series of yells.

He looked behind him and was met with a sight that paralyzed him.

It was not the fact that his lieutenants were being butchered by the heavily armored Draka of the Legion of the Damned, not the sight of his warriors being pierced by spears and torn to bloody chunks by sword and claw.

What terrified him to his core was the fifteen foot tall behemoth of black armor, purple scales and green hair that ignored it all and walked purposefully towards him, his cold, green eyes promising, not death, but an eternity of pain.

Mortdecai stood paralyzed for a second, only to do what was intrinsic to his nature. He lifted his left hand, still holding Rarity by her hair and tried to use her as a hostage.

“W…Wait” his voice trembled “I’ll kill he…”.

The behemoth’s right arm moved like lightning and sent his blade spinning. It sliced through the daemon’s shoulder in the blink of an eye, cleaving his left arm off, only to stab into the wall on the other side of the Boutique’s living room. It had been a perfect cut.

Mortdecai opened his mouth to scream.

The behemoth covered the last twenty feet separating them, faster than the eye could see and grabbed the daemon’s face before he even had time to make a sound.

With one hand, he lifted the daemon until his feet no longer touched the ground and put his other hand on Mortdecai’s chest.

A lipless mouth opened and the behemoth said a single word, the many runes on the back of his hand began to glow.

“Moria’Shakai”

Mortdecai tried to scream, his voice muffled by the giant Draka’s hand, as his very soul started to burn.

Spike let the already lifeless husk of the daemon fall to the ground. The aethyric flame of Aqshy, encased in the runes on the back of his hand, would consume and burn the daemon’s soul for the rest of eternity.

Spike had promised the daemon eternal pain, and a Draka always kept his oaths.

Rarity coughed and opened her eyes, putting a hand to her bruised side and broken ribs.

She had expected to see the daemon but instead all she saw was a massive purple scaled giant, encased in a pitch black armor, leering baroque draconic faces sculpted all along it’s surface.

A steel lower jaw and dagger sized fangs with no lips to cover them, glinted red in the firelight.

Behind a mane of dark green hair, a pair of ice-cold green eyes looked at her.

Rarity fainted, not noticing the spark of concern blooming in those death filled eyes.

Author's Note:

Alright lads and lasses.

Ask for it and it shall be delivered.
You wanted Grimdark Brutality? Ye got it my friends.

Like, favourite, follow and all that good stuff if you want.

Most of all leave a comment/input/criticism, as your opinions are more important to me than a few extra fave points.

Grimdark hugs to all of ya

Next chapter coming a soon as possible (the brutality has only just begun).

P.S.

For the concept of the "Cold Rage" that Spike is using, i used as reference a combination of the the martial arts concepts of Mushin (an expression which means "no mind") and Fudoshin (another expression which means "immovable heart" or "immovable mind"). - Wikipedia can give more info on this.

A small note on Draken Runes. They are kinda like batteries. You create a spell and put it into the runes, but once you use it the runes fade. Basically it allows you to have an arsenal of ready spells without having to chant incantations or wiggle a wand, but if you want to use the spell again, you have to reinscribe the rune.
Advantages and disadvantages.

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