The pitiful sound of pained groans and the shuffling of heavy chains filled the room. In front of the dark purple dragon, six slaves, all male dragons in their early twenties, were being chained to each other by Shorok and Drachen, as well as a large stone pedestal behind them. They fought, trying to rebel against the two dark dragons.

One of the dragons, an ice dragon, was being increasingly difficult, throwing his weight around and yelling at Drachen, who by this point had lost more than enough patience, so walloped the uncooperative dragon in the face. He moaned in pain, before Drachen punched him again. He appeared to swallow his painful cry, gritting his bloodied teeth firmly.

The other dragons weren't in much better positions. Bloody cuts covered their bodies, punishments for not being compliant. One of them had had his arm cut off entirely, tears still streaming down his face as blood dripped from the stump, his body slumped to the side slightly.

Spyro watched without emotion as the bloodied dragons were tied up and beaten into silence and submission, before turning to the old electric dragon standing next to him, pale-faced and providing a massive contrast to Spyro. He was covered in scars as well, large and ugly, his dark blue horns were cracked and blunt. He sported two brandings, one on each shoulder: the Aethercrest and the ancient draconic symbol for slave, 'tenedaris', a name that had been thrust upon him. He was Spyro's personal slave, and was especially useful due to the immense source of knowledge for the tyrant.

The Dark Overlord cleared his throat, causing Tenedaris to jump, whirling around to look at him. Spyro had to try not to scoff at the fear in his expression.

"Go grab the headpieces, and fit them all with the neural gems," he ordered.

Tenedaris shuddered, before nodding and running off to the corner of the room where twelve metal headpieces sat on a large table, as well as a pile of small pink gems. The old dragon grabbed each of the pink gems, putting one into each headpiece, located inside the forehead. Once he had done that, he grabbed six of them and fitted each one to the chained up slaves in the middle of the room, making several trips due to only being able to carry two at a time.

Around the pink gems in these specific headpieces were small holes dotted around it in a ring. The other six headpieces that still lay on the table had long wires that protruded from them in a ring shape around the pink gems, and they were to be inserted into each of the holes in the slaves' Tenedaris was fitting the headpieces onto his fellow slaves, Spyro turned to Drachen.

"Go get the shadowclaws and venomfangs, three of each. And be quick about it," he said quietly.

"Yes, Master," Drachen acknowledged with a nod, before he left the room.

Spyro then turned back to see Tenedaris fumble with the fourth headpiece. It landed on the ground in front of him with a clatter. A low growl rumbled from Spyro's throat, and Tenedaris paused cautiously, halfway through bending down to pick up the headpiece. The pause angered Spyro even more.

"Hurry up, Tenedaris!" he snapped harshly.

Tenedaris jumped, leaping back into action and quickly grabbing the headpiece. The earth dragon that he stood in front of started whimpering, and it got louder and louder the closer the headpiece got to his head. He turned his head away as much as he could, refusing to let Tenedaris fit the headpiece on him. Tenedaris growled with frustration and re-angled the headpiece, proceeding to try and fit it again. The earth dragon turned his head again, this time with a loud, high-pitched cry of defiance.

"Shut him up, Tenedaris," Spyro demanded.

"Do I have to?" Tenedaris whimpered back.

"I said shut him up," Spyro repeated, his calmness almost more terrifying than an outright scream.

"Obey your Master's orders, welenol," Shorok scowled.

Tenedaris flinched at the insult, before punching the earth dragon hard in the jaw three times. The third blow was accompanied by a crack as the left hinge of his jaw broke. A stifled cry made its way out of the earth dragon's maw, but he held it back as to not face the wrath of Tenedaris, who clearly did not want to assault him.

Quickly, the headpiece was fitted, and Tenedaris moved back to the table to grab the fifth headpiece.

Soon, Drachen walked back in, three shadowclaws and three venomfangs following him. They each stood quietly in front of each of the slaves, staring them down directly into their eyes, never moving. Each of the slaves squirmed uncomfortably.

Meanwhile Tenedaris was then instructed to put the other headpieces on the shadowclaws and venomfangs. None of the slaves envied Tenedaris, as the old dragon had to get up close and personal with the dark dragons to get the headpieces on. At least they were all at a distance, even though it was still small.

Once Tenedaris was finished fitting the headpieces onto the dark dragons, he grabbed the wires protruding from around the pink gems and moved over to the slaves, inserting the wires into the holes in their headpieces. The slaves and the dark dragons were connected.

"Alright, let's begin…" Spyro muttered, before reciting a spell in the ancient draconic tongue.

Slowly, as Spyro chanted, the pink gems in all twelve headpieces began to glow brightly. The six young slaves began to hyperventilate, fear filling their hearts as they watched the gems glowing. They began thrashing against their chains to try and free their limbs so they could tear out the wires in the headpieces, but without prevail. Two of them were bawling.

The screaming got worse and worse as some sort of hot radiation began to flare up inside the headpieces, concentrated on their foreheads where the pink gems were placed. One by one the slaves began to collapse to the ground, writhing in agony. Even the shadowclaws and venomfangs were growling, shuffling about in discomfort.

Spyro then finished his recital, calling on the pink neural gems to start focusing in on the slaves' sentience and their mind, opening a channel inside their brain. He paused for a second, before uttering one last word.

"Rega."

At the word, which meant 'flow', the six dragons burst into loud, painful screams as the wires that had been inserted into their metal headpieces slowly began to glow pink, an ethereal energy rushing through them, from the slaves to the dark dragons. Smoke started rising from the slaves' heads, the intensity of the radiation from the crystals in their headpieces continuing to increase, their screaming getting hoarser and hoarser as they collapsed to the ground, writhing.

As the visible pink energy made its way to the dark dragons, they each gave loud pained growls and hisses, finally keeling over in pain. Some of them shook, some of them reached up to their headpieces, their skulls throbbing in pain.

Spyro remembered from the past experiments that the dark dragons always felt pain when doing sentience transferals, but it made him nervous every time, nervous that something would go wrong. It was a very difficult process that didn't always work. At least one dark dragon died every time this process was conducted, or the connection to the slaves were cut off early before their sentience could be properly extracted from them, usually by the slaves dying.

The purple dragon held his breath, knowing that this was the point where things could go wrong. He just wanted a fully complete, fully faultless transferal.

Of course, he wouldn't get one. A venomfang's headpiece exploded with a bright pink flame, causing it to fall to the ground with a thud, dead. The headpiece on a shadowclaw exploded shortly after. One of the slaves ceased moving, ending the connection to a shadowclaw. They were all connected to different dragons, so that was three failures. Spyro hoped that the other two would work.

Luckily they did, as the pink energy dissipated from the wires connecting slave and dark dragon, and the crystals in the headpieces stopped glowing. Silence swallowed the room. Tenedaris quickly ran forward and took the headpieces off the three dark dragons that had the complete process run on them.

"Alright, speak," Spyro then ordered.

"Yes, Master Spyro," the three dark dragons said in unison, bowing their heads, their voices low.

"Thank the ancestors, at least it worked on half of you. Much better results this time. Alright, I want you three to go with Drachen to the rest of the sentients, and the one shadowclaw that's still alive, I want you to go back to your post," Spyro said darkly.

Drachen and the dark dragons nodded, before they all began to file out of the room. Spyro then turned to the slaves, eyeing the two fire dragons that had been freed from losing their sentience. "You two, go back to your station. Get back to work," he ordered. "Shorok will take you back."

Shorok unchained the two dragons, before pushing them forward violently once they were up on their paws. The other three dragons, two ice and one electric, just stared forward blankly, confused at what was going on. Spyro sighed, satisfied at the sight before him, knowing it at least half worked, although he was still pretty annoyed that it was only half.

The Dark Overlord turned around, looking at Tenedaris. "Tenedaris, I want you to execute the other three in however you deem it fit, and then burn the bodies with the one already dead," he said.

Tenedaris stiffened at his order, his gaze moving towards the slaves. The two fire dragons, still sentient, looked absolutely terrified for their lives, murmuring prayers to the ancestors under their breath. The other three dragons, two ice and one electric, had scared expressions, but they were emotionless compared to the fire dragons, having been stripped of their sentience, their soul, their emotions.

The old electric dragon turned his gaze to his paws, but his gaze was forced up again as he heard pawsteps. Spyro was walking towards him. Tenedaris' breath caught in his throat as he looked up at Spyro, shying away and making himself look small.

"Are you questioning my order?" Spyro whispered.

"N-n-n-no, I…"

"Why the hesitation then? You are my slave. My personal slave. You will do as I say, or do you want to get taken to the torture chamber instead? Remember what your new name means, Tenedaris. 'Slave'. Don't forget that."

Tenedaris gulped, the action a struggle due to his mouth being completely dry. He slowly nodded, breath hard and ragged. "Y-y-y-yes, Master Spyro," the old dragon stuttered.

"Good. Now, go dispose of them. Be lucky I've given you the non-sentient ones. They're nothing but mindless animals now," Spyro growled, before he turned and left the room, leaving Tenedaris to his own devices.

The Dark Overlord marched down the hall, taking small peeks into rooms and corridors that he walked past. The slaves were working hard, excavating more of the mountain out to find some crystals, gems and minerals to use. Others were being used as training dummies for the dark dragons, as the sounds of loud fighting came from some of them.

Spyro turned the corner, walking past one of the many rooms that the slaves were kept in overnight while they slept, two venomfang guards posted out the front of it. This was the dragoness' room by the looks of it, as two young girls, both probably about eighteen, sat there vomiting on the floor, their bodies thin and their ribs poking out of their bodies. Spyro just shrugged it off, not even stopping at the doorway; they were slaves. It didn't matter. They looked hungry but they didn't have enough food to feed everybody. It was common for fights to break out amongst the slaves over scraps of food.

He continued down the corridor, passing by another room. This time he actually stopped, peering into the room cautiously. It was scattered with a large amount of younglings, all resting. His eyes roamed all over the room. Every child was one that he and his army had taken from their homes, ready for training. It was almost time for the training to begin. They'd been here for a couple of weeks, and Spyro believed they'd settled in enough to begin their training.

Spyro was about to walk off again, but paused as his eyes made their way towards one specific youngling that stood out from the rest. Almost immediately after landing his eyes on the child, he tore them away from him, not wanting to stare at the violet scales that covered his little body.

One day, they would be side by side.

But it would be a process to get there, and right now, Spyro couldn't even look at the whelp. He needed to prepare himself for being around him. He wasn't ready. The whelp reminded him too much of… her.

Cynder.

The name tore at his mind. As much as doing this was hard to do, he had to do it. He had to tap into his dark side. But Spyro didn't want to do it alone, which was why he tried to get Cynder on his side, so that they could do all this together. As a family. He was hoping that her dark side was still there lying dormant, and that he could appeal to that side of her.

Turns out that side was long gone. Dead.

Cynder had rejected Spyro. There was nothing left between them now except contempt. She was as good as dead to him now, just as much as he was to her, Spyro could count on that much.

A low growl of anger rumbled through Spyro's throat at the memory of his ex-mate and their past life. A part of him longed for that past life to return, but he was here now, doing what he had to do. All of this was being done for a reason. And Cynder wasn't here.

The more the purple dragon kept telling himself that, the more anger he could feel rising up in his chest, hardening his heart and causing a wild heat to flair up in his throat. He grit his teeth together, breathing heavily.

Spyro realised he was still looking into the room that had all the children in it. That had the purple whelp in it. With an even louder growl, he snapped his gaze away from it and stormed off, continuing his march back to his own living quarters. For who knows how long, Spyro just stood there, staring at the ground, digging his claws into the hard rocks as he huffed.

The thoughts of Cynder would not leave his mind. He didn't even know why he was thinking so hard on her. This never happened when he met her in person. Maybe it was because they were always fighting, and the thrill and adrenaline that battle brought him overpowered the longing that he still felt for her.

Overpowered the heartbreak.

The third time Cynder had said no to him, he had been a furious wreck the day he got back from Warfang, even though he had a victory in returning with the Sound Gem, which he was putting to good use. He had roared, screamed, and killed. So many slaves were lost that day. The body count was fourteen.

Spyro was not a thinker anymore. He did not think on thoughts like these, he did not hesitate, and he did not doubt himself. Why was he now starting to do that?

Damn you, Cynder. Damn you, you worm! the Dark Overlord thought, screwing his eyes shut.

The long, wordless roar forced itself out on its own, without warning. The agony in his chest was unbearable. It had been so long since he had felt so emotionally worn down, and he hated it. He didn't even know why he was so upset. He was the Dark Overlord. Successor of the Dark Master. He couldn't afford to be feeling this way.

His roar of agony died down to a few choking sobs, before he pawed angrily at his eyes to dry them, biting his lip forcefully to stop his cries. Only one tear managed to break free, but it was one tear too much.

With a growl, Spyro bent down and began to use his plasma element to burn a large ancient draconic rune into the rocks around him. The rune was 'dabion', meaning 'evil'. Once he burnt the rune into the ground, he sat down, muttering a short ancient draconic incantation, before the rune began to glow with a deep red colour.

A strange sensation swelled up in the Dark Overlord's chest, but it wasn't one that was unfamiliar to him. He had done this before. It was the summoning of more dark energy into his body. His dark purple scales began to darken even further, starting to get dangerously close to the colour black. Spyro felt his teeth and claws get longer and sharper, and his emotions started to disappear.

That was the main reason for doing this. Emotions were pitiful for someone like him. He couldn't afford to have such strong emotions. He needed to harden up.

With this also came more power, which Spyro knew would be helpful.

The eerie, otherworldly sensation left him, the glowing of the rune on the ground fading away. But the effects on Spyro did not. He felt fresh, less emotional, darker, and much more powerful.

His anger still persisted tho, and he wasn't surprised. Rage was often something that came with so much darkness. He was never an angry person, but since becoming the Dark Overlord, his rage had done nothing but grow. And once more, grow it did. Angry at Cynder, angry at himself for showing emotion, angry at the half failure of the sentience transferral…

It was all growing up into a monstrous amount of anger.

Spyro needed to get rid of it.

The Dark Overlord stormed out of his room, making his way back down the corridors and into one of the excavation halls. Everybody froze, even the two shadowclaw guards that were standing there supervising. Usually Spyro's presence didn't faze the shadowclaws, but the anger that seeped from him was enough to do so.

He looked over the crowd of slaves, before pointing at two of them, a fire dragon and an electric dragoness. "You two, follow me. Now," he demanded aggressively.

Both slaves looked at each other with fear. They knew what was coming. Trying to fight against it wouldn't make anything better though. So they dropped the crystals they were carrying, and tentatively walked forward, out in front of the crowd towards Spyro. The Dark Overlord just stared at them, his face dark, before turning around abruptly, checking behind him once or twice to make sure the two slaves were following him.

Hissing and growling from the shadowclaw guards then sounded behind them, followed by the sound of the other slaves getting back to work.

The trip to the torture chamber was long and terrifying for the two slaves that followed Spyro. They knew exactly where they were going.

The faces cast their way were painful. Other slaves making their way from room to room, often led by a shadowclaw or venomfang guard, cast them fearful gasps, running out of their way, scared of Spyro and scared of joining the fire dragons. Some showed compassion towards the two slaves, but it was rare and brief. Dark dragons patrolling the cave halls of Dark Peak gave nasty snarls and hisses.

They arrived at the chamber at long last, just as Vhara was just walking out of it. She turned towards them, narrowing her eyes.

"I've just finished. The chamber's all yours," the she-venomfang said with a ghastly smile, blood and venom dripping down her long fangs, before she left with a flick of her tail.

The edge of her tailblade sliced across the left foreleg of the fire dragon, causing him to yelp in pain and bring his foreleg up to his chest.

"Shut up," Spyro growled.

The fire dragon was ready to start sobbing, hearing Vhara's hushed laughter fade away the further she walked from them, as well as trying to deal with the throbbing pain in his leg.

Spyro was quick to get moving again, rushing the slaves back into action. The electric dragoness stretched out a wing to support the limping fire dragon as best as she could, as he was unwilling to put pressure on the deep slice in his leg.

What awaited them in the torture chamber was a horrid, despicable sight, the aftermath of Vhara's wrath staining the floor and walls. It almost looked like a can of dark red paint had been thrown carelessly at the wall with the amount of blood that had been sprayed across the wall.

Below the blood splatter lay a mutilated dragon, appearing to be about sixteen to eighteen, his abdomen torn open and his stomach and intestines torn out of the cavity, hanging out of it, leaking blood and digestive juices. Both eye sockets were empty, and the tongue hung from the mouth shredded into three separate strips. All four limbs and the wings were amputated, and the neck was disfigured and rotten; the poor kid had likely died from poisoning.

A loud gulp sounded as the electric dragoness swallowed the bile that was rising up her throat. The smell was just as hideous as the sight. Following the gulp was a low rumbling sound from below them.

The two slaves didn't get time to react before long, razor sharp pillars of earth shot from beneath them, impaling them through the chest and stomach and out the back. The sudden force from the spikes lifted them from the ground, and both dragons hung suspended in the air, blood dripping from their torsos.

Slowly, the pillars of earth began to sink back into the ground, lowering the slaves back down until they were lying on their stomachs on the ground, bleeding out and hissing in pain, immobilised.

Spyro turned around and raised his claws, snarling as he began to cut into the face of the dragoness. He was fast about it, making quick work of the face, turning yellow to dark red in seconds. The dragoness was forced to close her eyes as blood surrounded them from dripping down her forehead. It was barely a couple of seconds before the claws of death made their way down to the closed eyelids, tearing out the soft organs from underneath them.

A shrill scream tore from the poor dragoness' throat, but it quickly intensified as Spyro reached into the now open maw and ripped out the her tongue. Not too soon later, the Dark Overlord twisted the her head sideways, before grabbing a hold of both her jaws and prying them apart to the point where the jaw hinge snapped. One by one, Spyro began pulling out the dragoness' teeth, before stabbing them into her flesh between her scales. The slave tried to scream but it came out as a bubbly gurgle, her mouth filled with blood.

The purple dragon left her there in agony, before moving to the fire dragon and proceeding to breathe plasma beams all over him, burning the entirety of his body. Shrill screams tore from his maw as his body sizzled and cooked.

Spyro then proceeded to tear off the dragon's tail, before using the tailblade as a weapon to start stabbing him in the back relentlessly. Eventually, he got the tailblade stuck between the spine, and tried to force it out without prevail. He used his earth element to try and get more power behind his pulling, but all he managed to do was pull the spine out of alignment with the tip of the tailblade.

Eventually he yanked the tailblade out, a loud snap emanating from the dragon's spine. A shriek tore from his throat. Spyro then grabbed the dragon and rolled him over onto his back, causing more and more shrieks to come from his lungs. The purple dragon slowly began to cut into the dragon's abdomen, and pried his chest open. He then forced open the ribcage, before reaching in and yanking out the dragon's heart.

The electric dragoness lying beside the now dead fire dragon spluttered, tears spilling down her cheeks as she stared at his fallen comrade. She then looked up at Spyro, knowing she was next. She expected Spyro to do the same thing to her, or something similar. Tearing out her heat, breaking her neck, anything like that.

What she wasn't expecting was to be drowned in lava.

Burned alive.

The weight of the thick, molten liquid that had spewed out of Spyro's mouth was surprisingly heavy, pinning the slave to the ground. Screams of agony tore from her throat, before they slowly died away, smoke and flames rising from her body, now submerged in lava.

The Dark Overlord looked down on his carnage, exhaling in satisfaction, having let out his anger.

With that, Spyro decided it was probably time to get some rest. The sentience transferral took a lot out of him. Using that sort of magic always did. It didn't help that it was the middle of the night as well. He let out a low growl, stifling a yawn, before walking out of the torture chamber; someone else could clean the bodies out later.

Eventually he made it to his quarters, and by now it was getting fairly late and he was tired, especially after the ritual he had just done earlier. He needed to rest it off.

It didn't take long for Spyro to succumb to sleep.

Tenedaris lay down with a depressed huff, looking around at the other dragons around him, all lying down to sleep. If there's one thing he was happy about, it was that he was able to sleep with the rest of the slaves. He was terrified on having to sleep in Spyro's quarters considering he was Spyro's personal slave, but Spyro had been insisted that when he was in his quarters, he wanted his alone time. Time to think, time to plan.

Time to scheme, Tenedaris thought with a low growl.

He still couldn't believe what Spyro had become. Spyro was the hero, the saviour, and now he was… this. Evil, destructive, sadistic. Violent. Angry. Tenedaris could bet that Spyro was worse than Malefor. Even under Malefor's rule, the world had not fallen under so much darkness so damn quickly.

"Hey," a soft voice quivered from beside him.

The old electric dragon looked over to see a young fifteen-year-old ice dragon lie down next to him, eyes wide and fearful.

"Shut up. We're not meant to talk," Tenedaris whispered, gesturing towards the two venomfangs that stood at the entrance to the large room.

"We're on the far side of the room; I doubt they'd have that good hearing."

"You'd be surprised; I may have been forced to do tests on them that increase their hearing. They haven't been increased yet but their hearing is already exceptional, so shut up."

"I just want to talk."

Tenedaris glared at him, trailing his claw in front of his throat as to say 'we'll be killed'. Afterwards, the old dragon turned his head and laid it down on the ground, not wanting to look at the kid lying next to him. They weren't allowed to talk, have friendly chats, or anything, especially while there were guards nearby.

There was a soft tapping on his shoulder, which Tenedaris tried hard to ignore. Eventually the tapping became way too bothersome, and Tenedaris whirled around with an angry whisper, trying his best to stay as quiet as he could.

"What?" he snapped.

"You seem to be upset," came the ice dragon's reply.

"So?"

"My mum used to tell me that talking about it usually helps."

"Your mother's probably dead. Or worse. Now go to sleep."

"You don't know that!"

"Shush."

"Why are you upset, V…?"

"Do not call me that. Ever. My name is Tenedaris."

"No it's not."

"It is now. Spyro changed my name. Tenedaris is all I'll ever be called. No point getting attached to my old name. I don't think we're going to get out of this for a long time, possibly ever. Now go to sleep, damn you."

The ice dragon finally obeyed this time, and Tenedaris didn't hear another peep out of him. The old dragon sighed. He didn't like getting angry at the kid, but what was he to do? He would get hurt or even killed if he was found making noise, same with the kid.

The kid was right however. He was upset. Very upset. He'd only been here for a few weeks and already he was past breaking point. He, as well as everyone else here, was treated horribly. He'd even lost his birth name, a name which he would not even utter anymore, for the reason he'd just told the kid. His name was Tenedaris now, and it was time to man up and get used to it.

He had more pressing matters to deal with anyway.

Like the fact that he had been ordered, forced, to kill a dragon. Sentient or not, it was one of his own kind. Two more dragons had died from the transferral, a process that he had been in charge of researching. He had been forced to do horrible things. And he hated it.

Tears began to slip down his face, but he didn't pay any attention to them.

This place… Dark Peak… it was torture. Why was he even here? He should've died like the others. Which ancestor… which god… hated him so much that he was forced to live on, and live in this hell. What more would he be forced to do? What more of Spyro's hideous work would he have to do?

Tenedaris had contemplated committing suicide to get out of this, but he was afraid of dying. He was afraid of lots of things. He'd managed to hide all his fears for decades, but no longer. His walls had broken. He was a fearful wreck, and he didn't know what to do.

He was terrified of sleeping.

He was terrified of waking up the next day to be forced to do more terrible things, to research and read up on whatever Spyro wanted him to.

He was terrified of being near Spyro again.

But he had to. He had to do all this, or he would get hurt, or killed, and he was terrified of that too. He had no idea what awaited him in the ancestral realm. The unknown terrified him.

Of course his tired body had the final say, and it took over his mind, his consciousness, as he gave way into deep sleep. A new day of hell was the only thing that awaited him.

Whoopee! Another chapter! That was pretty quick but I'm happy about that; I feel bad for only posting once every few months, so it's good to be writing a lot more frequently. This chapter was especially hard to write, but I hope you all enjoyed it!

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Dragon of Mystery: Hey, sorry to hear you had a sucky week. Glad you had an update to help with it (even though it was a Ghoul Realm chapter haha). Hopefully things have gotten better man. Also glad you've been enjoying this and that you think it's well-written.

lord typhlosion: Pahahaha. Yeah all the characters are gonna be pretty mentally scarred after this lol. I think this chapter might speak for that on a different level, getting to see some other characters too, and their view on things.

Guest: You're welcome! I try to answer all the reviews to the best of my ability; I think it's important to engage with your fanbase. And not surprised; evil Spyro is something that's rare to come across so I can see why it's a bit mind-boggling lol. I can't answer all your questions though, coz spoilers XD, so you'll just have to wait and see if Spyro gets redeemed or not.

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Thanks for the reviews, and keep leaving more! I love hearing what you all think of this! Hope you enjoyed and I'll see you around later.