The cries of bloody murder rang out across the naval battlefield. Mad with bloodlust, both sides tore at each other with naught but fury in their eyes. The vampires were affected by the surprising display of subliminal magic far less than the humans, but even they wanted to close in with the kingdom’s marines and let loose the dogs of war. Bodies toppled over into the dark waters, their flesh torn open and their blood and guts slipping out and dyeing the sea red with gore. It would only be a matter of time before the lack of foes turned ally against ally and the whole fight would devolve into an uncontrolled melee.

A choir that rose from beneath the waves was all that kept the cultists from turning on the vampires in their mindless fury. Valka paused her own personal assault and nodded towards the gore-filled water to show her thanks before continuing on in her task. With every swing of her cutlasses, wood, bone and meat went flying. She hacked her way through the Kingdom’s marines, careful not to accidentally cleave an ally in twain.

The fight was going splendidly with remarkably fewer casualties than expected on Darksol’s side. It would only take a few more minutes to clean up the mess.

Suddenly, the aura that only could have belonged to one of Darksol’s two rulers filled the air. The malice that radiated out from Alexis as she landed on one of the few unoccupied kingdom ships made everyone not yet restored to sanity snap out of their rage. The force she exerted was intense enough to force all but a handful to seize up entirely and an even smaller number found it difficult, if not next to impossible to even breathe.

“Where. Is. Your. King?”

Perfectly enunciating, Alexis was obviously livid. She never talked like this unless she was beyond furious. Worse yet, her rage was so great that she was beginning to slip from her human form to something altogether inhuman.

“He left!” one of the marines said, trying to avoid dying.

“I. Know. That… WHERE. IS. HE?!”

“He could be anywhere! He left over a week ago! No one save his own court knows where he went! He likely went to gather support or reinforcements!”

Alexis’ eyes burrowed into the terrified marine, her normally human eyes (save for the red of her irises) had completely switched to compound ones made up of smaller ones of similar likeness. Her entire body was shifting into a far more bestial and even insectoid one, and if this kept up she might fully become something far more disturbing and far more massive than even the Swarm Queen that was currently destroying the former capital of the Siempre Dorado Kingdom. She reached out and ‘caressed’ the face of the marine who spilled the beans, her twisted claws slightly slicing through his flesh as her formerly beautiful face bared its massive razor-edged yet needle-like teeth in a sinister grin.

“You get to live.”

With those four words, the entire rest of the surviving kingdom mariners exploded into a fine red mist before joining together to form a massive blob of red liquid that flooded down Alexis’ throat. The cracking sounds from her body as it transformed back into something more human combined with the sight of it happening turned out to be enough to shatter the sole survivor’s mind and reduce him to a shivering mess that was huddled in the fetal position, rocking back and forth while softly weeping.

Alexis, now having regained control of herself, sighed and silently chastised herself as she realized that she came far too close to going absolutely (and quite possibly permanently) mad. If that had happened… She shuddered at the thought. That form was the peak of her power, but to compensate for that power she would become nothing more than a blood-starved beast. If Kain didn’t step in and sate that form’s bloodlust for a long enough time, then even the planet she was on would not be spared from that form’s seemingly bottomless hunger for life energy. That form was truly a ‘last resort’ and a ‘final deterrence’. To tap into it was to doom the world, if not the universe.

Looking over at the stunned servants of her nation, she clicked her tongue and flew off. The fleet would have to follow its orders and wait where it was. The false intel she had provided to the Siempre Dorado Kingdom was just that, false. As if she would risk sending mortals, let alone her own kin, into the hell she had created. They would just become collateral damage, and that was not something she wished to have happen. She would have to let them dawdle where they were while she tended to the ongoing destruction of the city of Madrid.

…

This was not good. They were no match! Whatever being it was whose angelic voice gave them the courage to rush headlong into this hell was not some saint, nor a messenger from Lumina herself! No, only a demon could have tricked them into trying to stop these abominations! It would have been better if they had swum for it and tried to make it to the opposing shore. Even if they would have been surrounded by infidels and non-humans it would have been better than rushing to their demise.

Hiding inside a ruined building, a handful of the ‘lucky ones’ waited until the sound of skittering legs and chittering mandibles faded before attempting to check if the coast was clear. It was, and so they made a quick dash to another ruined building and waited a bit more. They hid in the wake of the monsters, taking the reverse of the path that the unholy abomination had taken to enter the once crowning jewel that was their shining city.

Now their city was far from being called anything marvelous. Its streets were filled with gore and rubble, drained husks of men, women and children laying scattered about like common refuse and what wasn’t being destroyed by the monsters was ablaze with fire. It was as if the End Times had come. No, that was incorrect. The End Time HAD come, and the almighty Goddess Lumina had found their nation wanting. Doom had come to mankind, and all that could be done was to weather the storm and hold out until the Goddess arrived. When she did, she and her angels would smite the monsters and the wicked, cleansing the planet and leaving it open for the pure and saintly to inherit.

The group moved position again, trying to stay out of sight and earshot of the monsters. They more than once had to dive for cover as a small swarm of fist-sized mosquitos buzzed past. Just a few more houses to go and they could escape the massacre! As they dashed to the next ruined structure, one of their number tripped and scraped their knee. The group panicked; If the monsters caught the scent of blood, they would surely come running.

Pulling the child to her feet, the group decided they could no longer play it safe and bolted the rest of the way to the ruined wall. They clambered over the rubble, taking care not to accidently draw blood and after what felt like an eternity of hiding and running from the monsters, they had at last made it out of the doomed city. But they were not out of the woods yet.

The group froze as it beheld a figure gracefully float down from the sky. It was a woman with skin so white you might mistake her for being made of the finest wax. She was clothed in a ballroom gown fit for a queen, if not a goddess, and her eyes glowed with a crimson light. A Vampire!

The group huddled together and the only two adults stepped forwards, their hands holding a sharpened wooden stick as if that could hold back the fiend that stood before them.

“Do what you want to us, monster. But don’t you dare lay a finger upon our children!”

The vampiress peered behind the two adults and spotted the five children. To be more precise, four children and one infant. The vampiress’ countenance shifted ever so slightly, softening just a barely perceivable amount.

“You should count yourselves fortunate that I too am a parent.” The monster said before exploding into a swarm of bats and flying back towards the city.

The group, or rather, family thanked their lucky stars and after realizing that there were no more monsters around made a run for it. They never looked back at their now-damned former home, and simply kept running until their legs gave out. They had lost nearly everything, but at least they were safe and had each other. And that was all that mattered.