The steel of my sword sparks as it scrapes along the dirty pavement of a university located in the upper quadrant of the Bronx in New York City. Perplexed gazes are cast in my direction as I weave my way through the campus toward the stadium.

The cheering of the crowd, while the football players run onto the field, is deafening when paired with the band's blasting instruments as I near the structure that seats eight thousand warm-blooded, adrenalin pumping humans.

Pushing past the ticket collector at the entrance, I ignore the girl who reeks of alcohol and asks if she can touch my sword. I keep my stride the same though I have two humans and a security guard rushing after me.

I step out onto the field, breaching the area designated for fans as if I am the long-awaited third challenger in this two opposing team game.

The padded players stand up straight, confused as I have interrupted them before they can make the first play. None of them say anything to me. They part, making way for me as I walk to the center of the field.

The coaches feel differently. They are yelling at me to get off the field while more security guards begin to trickle onto the painted turf in pursuit of the crazed man with the sword.

The football players closest to me appear to be very aware of the fact that I am no man. They can sense their impending deaths in the energy that is starting to swirl around me like black smoke. It's the same look I have seen for thousands of years. While humans' conscious minds might not be exceedingly perceptive, their subconscious minds often have no trouble detecting they're in the presence of a dark being.

By the time I reach the center of the field, white electricity is entangling with the black sphere that is growing larger around me with each millisecond. The energy storm around me is too intense for me to hear the yelling of the security guards, but I can tell from their flushed faces they are still telling me to get off the damn field and to drop the sword.

Raising my sword high, I plunge it into the soil I stand upon. I kneel, clutching onto the leather wrapped handle as I shut my eyes to help block out everything around me. I've been preparing for this exact moment for three months.

As I pull the power that resides in my blood to the surface and push it out of me, the cold that thrives in me becomes less. Soon, heat begins to fill me.

When I can feel nothing but a scorching heat in every part of me, I open my eyes. "Dieddus endatura sani," I say in our archaic tongue.

Let the blood flow indeed.

Releasing the black energy sphere, I push it all out in front of me. A beast's face that matches the one that sits atop of my sword appears from within, his mouth stretched wide as he bears his fangs. All the energy I pushed out collapses into itself. I brace myself for what comes next.

The blast that follows destroys every warm-blooded being it touches; fanning out and growing wider as it consumes humans before they can even think to scream. It's all over in a matter of seconds.

I stand, clothes shredded from the massive amount of power I forced out of my body. I lift my face to the sky feeling warm blood rain down on me. My power isn't like an atomic bomb blast that is man-made. Its purpose is to do one thing and one alone—spill blood. It's a strange sight to see all the structures still intact and, yet, not a single human among them.

Seven million humans gone in five seconds.

New York City is the most crowded city in the continental USA, and I have wiped it out in a single blow. Everything is bathed in rich red tones. There aren't even any fleshy bits left. All the humans popped and their blood spilled out the moment my energy came into contact with them.

The dense population helped grow the blast. Each life taken, feeding the unquenchable bloodlust of the inner beast I unleashed upon them. The consumption only stopped because New York City is surrounded by water. The few areas that aren't were protected by demon incantations to make sure I do not take more than what is needed, for this is only the beginning.

The creatures that will rise from the underworld will be thirsty, very thirsty.

Looking out at the crimson glistening and soaking into the ground, dusk is upon us. The only judgment that awaits humanity is going to be the deliverance my kind brings down upon them. We will cut their numbers in half and enslave the rest until we can establish order to the chaos in the aftermath.

When the last of the sunlight fades, the ground beneath my feet begins to quake as the moon in the sky turns red and dark clouds with lightning trapped inside begin to roll in. The temperature in the air drops 30 degrees.

The glow of lights of cities against the sky I could see in the distance vanishes. Phase two has already begun. We will not only bleed the world today but we will also submerge it in total darkness.

Without power, humans are even more helpless than they already are. We'll strip them of their lights and their ability communicate with others. When the mayhem begins to flood into the streets, we will be waiting for them.

The ground cracks, webbing out from my sword in the shape of a heptagram with me in the center with the mark of the serpent scored into the ground.

I shield my face when intense heat shoots up like a geyser from each of the seven points of the star. When the heat dies down and all I can feel is the frosty air again, I uncover my face. Standing before me is an army of seven million first born, all frozen in time at the peak of perfection as we are.

The sons and daughters we sacrificed look the same as they would if they had been raised among us instead of the underworld. Their powers, however, are different. They are strong like the warriors of the Darkos bloodline with a bloodlust that has their eyes glowing red like demons eyes do. Their power feels feral in nature like my own.

I didn't just raise an army of the firstborn. I raised beasts like me from their prison in the underworld. After today, we will no longer have to sacrifice our firstborn to our Creator. The deal the Dark Prince made with Haysha has been completed. The vampire race is no longer beholden to the Blood Sacrifice in any way. We are truly free to do as we please, to grow, and thrive as the humans have done for millenniums.

A large male with dark hair steps forward at the same time a female with white hair does. My throat tightens. The female is the spitting image of my mother. Nakasha...

It's been so long since I have thought of my mother I forgot her firstborn under the new order was a female. More importantly, Nakasha is my full-blooded sister. She would have been the eldest if the Dark Prince hadn't have made that deal with Haysha. Nakasha's existence is probably the reason he offered up the firstborn to our Maker in exchange for his army. After all, he wouldn't have wanted my mother's first offspring to be from a male that wasn't him.

"Sani." The male's gruff voice pulls my attention to him. His features favor the males of the Darkos bloodline. He must be one of the many firstborns my father had to watch be sacrificed as he took many unpaired and young females into his bed.

The Dark Prince used my father as a means to build him the most powerful army this world had ever seen. He killed and bred many under the Prince's orders. So as I scan the faces before me, I know many of them share my blood.

"Sani." He repeats again, his fangs elongated as he steps toward me.

The female grabs his arm to halt him.

"Ninea." She keeps her gaze trained on me, waiting patiently while the male at her side grits his teeth amid the impatience growing inside him.

"Endatura sani." I pull my sword from the ground, my command needing no other explanation.

The warriors disperse and screams soon fill the darkness that has overtaken this rock. The Dark Prince needed me to raise my brethren but what he doesn't know is I am the one who controls them. The Prince can force them to kneel as he does me, but he won't be able to command them like he does the rest of the vampirie.

If he wishes to rule as a god once more, he better keep his end of the deal we made otherwise I will bleed this planet of all life: human and vampire alike. I will take this army and destroy everything so that there will be nothing for him to rule over.

He often forgets that a beast like me only craves one thing—sani...blood. The kind of thirst I have does not discriminate between human, demon, or vampire. It's a thirst to kill, to spill blood and watch it bathe the streets in glistening ruby red.

"Ratus?" The female with white flowing hair asks.

She is the only one who did not leave the moment I released them to go forth and spill what the hunger inside them is starving for.

"Da."

Yes, I'm ready. I was born ready for I am, and always will be, nothing more than a savage beast who houses no mercy and kills without remorse. But even a beast such as myself has a weakness.

For Kinley, I'll do anything. I'll forever be the monster splattered in her kinds blood and she'll forever be the forbidden fruit I'll never taste.

*Note~ There is a bonus book of Trisley's beginning that is still a work in progress. Feel free to check it out as it is within this same book, along with a cut scens, and reader/author discussions.