The Darkness of Humans

A/N: Any speech text between \ is being spoken in Equestrian language.

Equestria, Canterlot
17 of April, 1038 A.L.B., 14:30 P.M.

"\FALL BACK\" A pony clad in a scorched golden armour yelled, trying to project his voice over the roars of the battle. "\Team Harmony has been pushed back, get your flanks unto the carriages!\" Passing him, waves of different species passed the pony, reigning from griffins, to ponies, to diamond dogs and even dragons. All showing signs of being in a recent battle.

"Don't let them escape; our Lord will not take weakness as an answer." A being, who wore a set of onyx steel plated armor, screamed his voice, calling his allies. All of whom seem to walk on two legs like a minotaur, only they lacked the lower body of a bull and the horns.

One of the beings charged at a fleeing diamond dog, thrusting its sword through its neck. The poor creature, choking on his own blood as the blade was pulled back, making the now limp body to fall to the ground. "HAHAHA, Yes, flee you cowards, no one can match the army of the Dark Void." The overconfident over their power, that he didn't have time to register as a blue blur descended and decapitated his head. Its face frozen in one of shock as the blood pours out.

"\Ha, stupid humans. They always get too cocky when fighting. Only good thing of that, is for you getting killed.\" A pegasus pony with a prismatic mane passed through the crowd of humans, her cyan coat partially cover with her armour and blood, on her flank she had engraved a cloud with a rainbow lightning bolt, slicing any human that got too closed to her wing blades, she manage to bring down half a dozen in a few seconds. "\Hey Rares, how you holding up there?\"

Across the field, a pearl white unicorn was bringing back a bow with an arrow; her royal purple mane styled in such a way that it described the mare as very sophisticated; on her flank she wore a set of three sky blue diamond shape gems. The mare wore elegant, yet sturdy armour which appear to be made of some kind of leather material, with a large quiver where arrows sat at the waiting for them to be used.

Aiming the weapon at a human who was about to bring down an axe onto a griffin. Releasing her hold the arrow raced through the air before implanting itself on a small opening on the neck armour of the human, the griffin took the opportunity to bring its razor sharp talons unto the human's chest, pricing through the armour and cutting the human's flesh and guts.

"\Apart that our plan to defeat the Dark Lord failed, I say I'm doing splendid darling.\" The mare looked to one side and spotted a group of three humans, charging towards her at full speed, swords stained with the blood of its last victims staining the blade. "\Well I never, three brutes against moi? Must be their death wish to fall by my hoof.\"

Taking one of the arrows from the quiver, the mare took a small red gem out of a pouch that she wore. Placing the gem into a small slot on the tip of the arrow, before placing it on her bow, bring it back and aiming the weapon at the charging humans. "\How touching.\" She let go of the arrow for it to sail through the field before impacting with the human on the middle of the group.

The moment the arrow made contact, there was an explosion of fire that enveloped all of them, walking out the humans were on fire, desperately trying to put the flames out. All for nought as the flames consumed them, their bodies falling to the ground, the air filling with the smell of burning flesh. “\Ugh, 10 years of me doing the same routine with this humans, and still can’t stand the atrocious smell.\”

During the mares little rant, an arm from a human landed on top of her, earning a high shriek as the mare was caught by surprise. “\APPLEJACK! Don’t you have any respect? You know how much I detest having to clean the blood from my majestic coat.\”

“\Oh can it Rarity, we are at war and all ya are worry ‘bout is getting a little dirty.\” A orange pony with a blonde mane replied, her mane tied up into a short ponytail, having to shorten it due to her wearing a very bulky armour, covering most of her body, but still allowing quick manoeuvrability, her flank sporting three red apples.

“\I’ll have you know, my coat is white and you have no idea what a nightmare is to remove th- Behind you!\” In a flash, the orange mare flipped around just in time to parry a sword from a human who managed to sneak behind her. The human was twice the size of her and his sword was as big as the pony.

“Surrender in the name of our Lord, or forever burn in Tartarus.” The human threaten the mare, pushing his sword down as to crush the pony.

“Now ya see. We no surrender. We fight fer country. So ya burn in Tartarus.” The mare’s human speech wasn’t that good, but it was good enough to get her message across. With one mighty push she made the human to stumble back a bit. Before he could recover, the mare dashed forward, swinging the sword to the legs, cleaving the right one clean off.

“ARRGH, You little piece of shit. You will regret doing that.” Using as much Strength as he could, the human flung himself to the still body of the mare, just metres before striking the mare. Only for him to feel a cut in his body, then another and another.

“You. Done” After saying that, the human body burst blood from multiple cuts that appeared across his body, the metal from his armour cut open like it was butter. “\Boy, the varmint nearly got me back there, good thing that they are so predictable.\”

********

On the rooftops, a silhouette could be barely seen, hiding its shape by a black cloak and using the smoke of the battle to further hide itself. “You are mine now, Orange Titan.” Positioning a crossbow unto the railing of the roof, the female human aimed the weapon towards the Orange mare, which had just defeated one of their allies Juggernauts. “Once I take you out, my Lord will grant me power and I’ll prove that I’m the best of our warriors.” Inching her finger closer to the trigger of the crossbow, the woman took controlled breaths, aiming the arrow carefully between the mare’s eyes.

All of a sudden, something pass right over her, she heard the sound of metal cutting through something hard. In just a second, her crossbow split in half, the arrow never having time to been released as it just disappeared from its place. “What?!”

She then felt as something thin and sharp stab her in her back, electing a cry from her. Reaching back she removed the offensive object, only to find out it was her own arrow that was about to be used on the orange mare. “H-how-?” She couldn’t say anything else as a limb wrapped around her mouth, impeding her from screaming in shock, just for her to silence her as cold metal rested on her neck.

“You try hurt friend?” There was a soft voice that was painted with acid, in a swift move; the assaulter sliced the woman's throat open. Now with her scared for her life as she tried to stop the flow of blood from seeping through the new opening on her neck. Just before her senses could stop working, she managed to sneak a glimpse of her killer.

A canary yellow pegasus stood behind her, her long pink mane tied into a long ponytail slipped in front of her. She wore barely anything for protection, only having some hoof-wrists and a small harness on her chest that hold a set of daggers and some vials of different colours. Her flank showed a trio of butterflies, which seemed to be stained with blood at the moment.

That is all the woman could see before the darkness overtook her. Falling to the ground now dead, the blood from her throat making a large pool under her body. “Then deserve dead.” The mare spoke softly, a bit of remorse in her voice as she took yet another life. No matter if it was for the better of her kingdom or her love ones; she still fined it hard to accept the fact that she killed a living thing.

********

“\Dang it, wha’ is taking Twi so long? Anypony know wha’ she was lookin’ for?\” The orange mare shouted, trying to make her voice hear as she kept at bay three Juggernaut humans.

A little ways from there, a group of humans were running desperately, shouting as they went. “Run! The Pink Demon is coming, she-” The poor individual didn’t manage to finish what he was saying, as a large hammer head smash him from the side, sending him and a few others of the fleeing humans to a wall.

“\Come on guys, it’s no fun if I always win at tag. I know, I’ll close my eyes, so you can have it easy to get away.\” A pink mare with a bouncy step and mane yelled out with glee. She wore a sort of jester style armour, the metal varying between golden and silver, with a few gems encrusted on the metal, given a shine when the light hit them, carrying on her hooves was a large hammer, which had a colour scheme of a candy cane..

One of the braver humans who wore a lighter set of armour, in counter of the normal attired of his allies, stepped forward towards the mare, taking its change to kill it by surprise when she couldn’t see. When he stood but mere metres, he leapt at her, swinging his set of twin swords for her head.

Only for her to duck at the last second, the blades passing right over and making the human lose his balance as he didn’t expect for the pony to dodge the attack. He managed to recover quickly by rolling in the ground, quickly dashing for her again, only for her to move to the side, missing once again.

Frustrated with his failed attempts, he jumps to the air ready to strike her down. The mare didn’t move this time, and he was sure that he had her this time. Until he saw her take out a small ball from a pouch and smash it into the ground. The area was quickly surrounded in a thick smoke and engulfed the mare and the humans near it.

“\Let’s play hide and seek now. I’m sure you’ll do fine.\” Now with his vision affected, he struggles to find this damn pony, looking at every part of the smoke. He heard the clatter of hooves from behind him, quickly swinging his blades back he managed to make contact with flesh, only to realise he had just hit another human.

“\Nope, that’s not me.\” Following the voice he dash towards it cutting through another of his allies. “\Come on silly billy, this game isn’t hard, here I’ll show you\” The man couldn’t understand a word this pony was saying, so he thought it was a taunt to him. “Show yourself, only a coward will hide to avo-” He stopped, feeling something pressed against his back, reaching for it he brought a small black ball that had a rope which was sparking, just reaching the ball. “Oh fuc-” BOOM!

The explosion cleared out the smoke, revealing a large scorch mark on the floor and several limbs hanging around it, as well as the cleaved bodies of the other humans. “\Awwww, leaving so soon, well it was fun while it lasted.” The mare simply hopped away, swinging her hammer side to side, swatting away any human that may come across.

“\Pinkie, for the last bucking time, this is a war, not some party game. Why can’t you get it through that head of yours?\” The blue pegasus landed next to her pink friend, giving her an even stare.

Pinkie, as that was her name; just continue smiling, even on such a grim circumstance. “\Oh lighten up Dashie, I know we are in a war, I just want to make it super duper extra fun to be in it.\” She said as she continued avoiding attacks from multiple enemies.

“\Just le’ her to her antics Dash, she still get the job done.\” Applejack said, pushing back another human trying to bring her down. “\All ah care abou’ is gettin’ out of here alive. Where the hay is Twilight?\”

As if in response, a window from one of the high towers shattered, the shape of a robed equine could be seen falling out of the window. The figure flipped right in mid air, righting itself up before landing on its hooves, scattering dust from the ground.

The pony was a lavender unicorn mare; her purple mane was kept in a uniform shape, two stripes of distinct colour standed out from the rest of the mane. A large star with five smaller ones surrounding it as a cutie mark could be seen as the robe that she wore move with the wind.

“\Twilight. What happened to you, why did you jump out of a window?\” The yellow pegasus from the rooftops descended out from the air, landing next to her friend. “\Your hurt, what happened?\” She asked with concern in her voice, as she reached for a vial that she had on her, offering it to the lavender mare.

Taking the concoction, the mare stared up to the now open window. “\I had to do something involving him.\” All of the present individuals looked towards she pointed, looking at a shape in the window.

“\I’m impress Miss Sparkle, you lasted two minutes longer than our last encounter. A shame that you still can’t so much as touch me.\” The figure from the window spoke, electing glaring looks from the mares below.

“\Silence you despicable being\” Rarity shouted as she fired three of her arrows towards the figure. Only for the arrows to stop when the figure raised a hand in front of him, a gray aura enveloping them.

“\Tsk tsk tsk, now miss Rarity, I though you would have learned by now.\” The arrows started to turn around as they gained a deep glow, with a wave of the figures hand, the arrows were sent flying, passing over the heads of the mares.

The projectiles flew through the air, cutting the air as they pass, before embedding themselves into one of the carriages that was stationed for the retreating troops. A few seconds pass before the glow in the arrows intensified and then released the power all at once in one explosion.

The explosion was large enough that it took about half a dozen of the carriages, the poor souls that had been inside them didn’t have time to scream in pain or terror, as the explosion tore through them quicker than the eye could see.

“\You monster. You will pay for all the lives you have ruined.\” Fluttershy shouted, flaring her wings out ready to take off, only for a lavender hoof to stop her. “\We can’t fight him right now Shy, we need to retreat now.\”

“\Oh, don’t worry about that, you aren’t going anywhere.\” The figured started to climb out of the window, the gray aura was surrounding the base of his boots as he started to walk down in the air, like an invisible stairwell was present for him.

“\Girls, to the carriage, now!\” Twilight shouted, before her horn started to glow, weapons all around her started to float into the air, and as one entity they flew straight for the descending human.

“\Please.\” He reached for his belt, bringing forth a onyx blade that had a glow of its own, he stopped an axe that was heading towards his head before breaking it in half, the weapon feel to the ground as if it had just lost its life. “\Simple incantations spells won't stop me.\”

“\Maybe, but it will slow you down enough for us to escape.\” With that, she turned around and started to gallop towards one of the awaiting carriages.

“\hmm, we’ll see.\ Archmages, stop them.” Upon those words, three figures in robes jumped out of the window, they approached the ground rather quickly as they were enveloped in a white aura. Upon impact with the ground, they created a shield that absorbed fall, landing safely.

“You heard the Master, get them.” The human in the middle of the group said before creating a dark portal in front of him, walking through, he vanished in thin air, the portal closing behind him. The other two Archmage did the same, disappearing through their own portals, leaving their Master to finish off the bothersome weapons.

********

Screams could be heard everywhere, either being from a doomed equestrian, or from a human who was too confident of himself. In the field, a group of ponies could be seen running, going towards the rescue zone, where carriages sat waiting for taking as many soldiers away from this battle.

“\Twilight, just wha’ the hay wer’ you lookin’ fer in there, that ya caught the Dark Lord’s attention?\” applejack huff as she ran ahead of the group, taking down any human that may get in their way. “\I’ll tell you when we get out of here, but right now we need to get all our troops out of here and-\” She stopped there, feeling something with the ley lines in the air.

“\What is the problem Twilight?\” Rainbow Dash asked her friend, as she swooped down onto some humans to let a group of griffins and dragons get away. “\Archmages!\” She leaped to one side, just avoiding a fist that had flames surround it.

The rest of twilight’s friends stopped in their tracks, seeing three figures start to walk out of dark portals, their robes covered most of their faces, hiding any features that they may had. “\You guys again. I swear, if I have to deal with more of you sinners in the magic arts, I may just explode of annoyance.\” twilight said as she lowered her stance, horn at the ready.

“In the name of our master, we asked of you to surrender.” The archmage in the middle spoke, before calling forth a fireball into the palm of his hand, the light illuminating the hidden features of his face, showing a bandage tied around his eyes. “Or die an agonizing death.”

“\We’ll never surrender to the likes of you\” Rainbow Dash said as she sailed through the air, aiming for one of the side archmages. But was stopped when she hit a barrier that had formed around them. “Death it is then.” The middle archmage threw the fireball, aiming to the middle of the group.

“\I got this.\” Pinkie exclaimed as she went to the front of the group, standing on two legs, she raised her hammer and stood in a batting stance. “\swing batter batter swing batter batter SWING!\” Upon the fireball reaching to them, Pinkie Pie had managed to swing her hammer, hitting the projectile back to the sender.

The archmage was covered in flames from head to toe, but didn’t ran in pain. The flames started to die down, revealing an uninjured human, the having eating through the ropes, only leaving a human with some regal wear, the blindfold also having been burned on the fire, revealing pupiless.

“\Ugh. That always makes me feel uncomfortable.\” Rarity looked away, perturbed by the sight of the pupiless human. “There is no escape to your fate. Surrender and our master.” He turned around and took hold of an invisible being that stood behind him, the magic from it beginning to vanish to reveal the yellow pegasus, holding a blade on one hoof. “May give you a painless death.”

“\Stay away from her!\” A new voice rang out as something passed right through the robeless archmage, splitting him in two. The remaining two face towards the new attacker, the dust of the battlefield obscuring the view of anyone, except for the archmages, who used the magic aura of all living things to see.

The humans could see the shape of a unicorn; its magic was being projected towards a thin object that levitated in the air. “\If you dare to lay a single of your disgusting hands on her, I will make every second of your death, slow and painful.\” The dust started to slowly set, revealing a brown unicorn with a spiky black mane.

“\General Cinnamon! It’s good to see you sir.\” Twilight said with a bit of joy, keeping herself fixed on the remaining archmages. “\Not now Miss Sparkle. I need to get you lot out of here, everyone else has already left the battle, and we are soon to be overwhelm.\” He lowered himself into a fighting stance, ready to lounge at the enemy. “\I’ll buy you some time, you get to the last carriage and I’ll catch up with you.\”

“\But Cinna-\” Fluttershy looked towards the brown stallion with worry on her eyes. “\Don’t worry about me Shy, I’ll be fine.\”

“\You heard him Shy, let’s get out of here, before is too late.\” Rainbow Dash said as she started to fly towards the landing zone. In no time, the group had left the area, the brown stallion facing the two humans who stood in his path to join them. “\Lets make this quick, he launched himself forwards, towards the two humans who had summoned barriers in front of them.

********

“\How much longer do we need to stay here? The humans are starting to get the upper hand.\” An armoured pegasus asked to his companion as they defended their position against hordes of humans, trying to kill them. “\General Cinnamon said just a few minutes, if he wasn’t back by then, then we should leave.\” replied his companion griffon.

One of the humans managed to jump across their heads, landing right behind the two. “Die you puny creatures.” It was about to strike until a Pink blur smashed right on top of him. “\Nope, denied.\” Pinkie Pie jumped off the corpse, the two guards surprised to see her there.

“\Get to the carriage, now!\” Came the voice of Rainbow Dash, making a path through the humans for her friends to follow. The guards did as instructed and put themselves on the drivers section, strapping themselves to it.

“\Wait, where is Cinnamon?\” Fluttershy asked scared. Looking the way they came, she couldn’t spot the brown unicorn. “\Fluttershy, we have to go. He can get himself out of this, he-\” Twilight stopped, seeing as a multitude of the humans were being sent across by an unseen force.

In a second a figure burst out of the sea of bipedal creatures, breathing hard after the hard task of fighting through so many forces. “\Here? Well that was convenient.\” The brown unicorn looked to the group in front of him with worry and despair. “\You need to get out of here right now!\”

“\What is it now? What’s the problem?\” Fluttershy came down next to the unicorn, concern clearly on her face. “That would be me” Came a familiar voice from the crowd of humans.

All of the equestrian turn towards the voice, standing right there was the human from before, the one who was leader of this group of humans. “\The Dark Lord?\” One of the guards said in shock, never expecting to see the supposed leader of the humans in person.

“\I’m afraid that all of you won’t be getting out of here. So I’ll say this once, bow before me or I’ll have to kill you all. I can be merciful.\” He reached for his onyx sword, the blade glinting from the light that came from fires all around. “Sometimes.”

He took a step towards the lands natives, but had to stop in defence as a brown blur slammed a blade into his own one. “\All of you, out of here now. I’ll hold him off.\”

“\No, we lost too many today, we are not leaving without you.\” Fluttershy started to approach the fight, but was forced back by the unicorn’s magic. “\That is an order, now get out of here, Equestria still needs you to fight this war.\”

“\But-?\” She was grabbed by her friend Rainbow, pulling her towards the carriage. “\We have to go now Shy, he is right and you know it.\” weighting her option the yellow mare boarded the carriage, with soon everyone else following. “\GO!\” With that the guards started pulling the heavy carriage, flapping their wings to make it lift off the ground.

“\Go, and don’t turn back.\” The brown unicorn said in a small whisper, seeing the carriage speed away from the battlefield. He was brought back to reality as a knee hit him in the gut, emptying his lungs, before being punched in the face and sent skidding on the ground.

“\So only one remained. Tell me, is it really worth it to die in vain? When soon all of them will die?\” The human chuckled to himself, seeing the unicorn start to stand up.

As he rose up, he noticed a small glim coming from the ground. Upon closer look, he saw that it was a small locket, inside a picture of a young yellow pegasus and a brown unicorn, petting the pink mane of the filly.

“\Sorry Shy, guess I won’t be able to keep that promise.\” He spoke in a slow whisper, picking up the locket with his magic and placing it around his neck. “\But I won’t go down without a fight.\” He took hold of his sword, channelling as much magic on his blade as he could muster.

“\So desperate to die? Very well then, I’ll make it quick for you.\” The Dark spun his sword on his dexterous fingers, each time a black aura forming around the edge of the blade, the wind that it created enough to reveal his face, blue eyes that faintly glow and a blonde hair that covered part of his eyes. “\Any last words?\”

“\Yes.\” He lowered his stance ready to charge him. “\I hope you get a new army\” With that he rocket forth, striking hard against the Dark Lord’s dark blade. Upon impact the energies trapped inside each blade exploded, enveloping a large area around them, destroying anything in its path, this being the buildings and the other humans that had remained to watch the battle unfold.

********

Up in the air, the passengers of a carriage being pulled by a pegasus and griffin could see the explosion from where they were. “\Brother, NOOOO!!!\” The pegasus screamed in horror at seeing the large ball of fire.

She spread her wings, ready to take off and go back to the battlefield. Only for her friends to hold her down and she struggled against their hold. “\Fluttershy stop, you can’t do anything.\” Rainbow Dash said, pushing the mare back into the carriage.

“\No, I gotta save him, he needs me.\” She tried to push through, nearly succeeding only for her to be surrounded on a magenta glow. “\Shy, you can’t do anything, he’s gone.\” She said bluntly, hoping to bring some sense into her friend.

“\N-no, he can’t be, he is all the family I have left, he can’t be gone, he-he-\” She couldn’t hold it anymore, her last family member, her brother, her guardian...gone. She curls herself into a ball, letting the tears flow as she came to face the truth.

“\Ahm sorry sugarcube, but ther’ wasn’ anythin’ we coul’ do.\” Her friend Applejack placed a comforting hoof on the crying mare’s shoulder, trying to ease her grief. “Don’t worry Shy; we’ll make him pay soon.\”

“/And how the hay are we supposed to do that?\” Rainbow dash flew in front of her lavender friend, giving her a glare You saw us tried to take him on, and didn’t even close to touching him. Just how are we gonna defeat him?\” This draw the attention of the rest of the group, some murmuring about that there may not be hope.

“\Because we are taking the battle to our grounds.\” She replied calmly, not faced by her friends statement.

“\How exactly are we doing that?\”

Twilight reached into her coat, taking out a small vial that had a forelock of blonde hair. “\By bringing him into our base, alone.\”

********

On the ground, the Dark Lord watched as the carriage speed away. He could have easily brought down the cart with its passengers, but he saw it as a waste of time. Plus he could use what they had to his advantage.

“Master, are you ok? We saw the explosion from the castle.” A foot soldier came running to his master’s aid, behind him came a group of archmages healing spells at the ready to save any of their fallen compatriots.

“I am fine Arthur. Just a small tussle with one of the inferior creatures.” He eyed his coat, which had been slightly burn in the conflict. “But my wears didn’t fare so well.”

“Master, shall we pursue them?” The foot soldier looked towards where his master was looking at. “No, leave them be. No need to waste any more man power.” He turned around, started to walk back towards his fortress, walking on top of any body that may piled the floor.

He was grinning as he formulated his plan, to bring this land to destruction for his kind to rise, as the true rulers that they are. “Soon, we will be more powerful than ever, and nothing will stop us