Darkness.....it engulfed her completely in those final moments, the last ounces of her precious life draining ever so sudden from her face, that one final defiant glare towards grim adversity as wearily she raised her sword and gave one final blow of death to her assailant before he drew his blade painfully from her impaled cuirass and her bleeding breast and blood spewed forth unto the cold, stagnant grounds of the moors..... upon which her lifeless body fell, nary a cry of sorrow or of agony to the seething black pain that crept so fiendishly through her tattered and broken figure, clenching her bones and her muscles in its thick, obsidian talons. Silence now....silence befell her. The war cries and vicious shouts of her men....they faded into the distance, out of earshot....nothing left but the miserable quiet. Heavy were her eyes, unable to stay open, unable to keep her breathing just a.....few moments longer....just enough to aid her men in battle....and then pass on. Nay the Fates would have it so it seemed, and so.....her eyes closed and she died... Gone was she.....Arjuna, the Silent Warmaiden....

[i]"Mortal......mortal...... Please, Thou must awake. Thou must stir before the beasts come to consume thee whole."[/i]

Then....a voice filled her ears, a woman she could tell rather by the sound of it. Softly, Arjuna's eyes peeled open, still the hot, searing pain resonating through her chest from where that bastard's sword had stuck her. It still bled too, as noted by the trickle of crimson issuing from the wide, gaping chasm in her cuirass. By the Gods, she lived! But wait.....this was not the battlefield.....these were indeed cold, foggy, and definitely muddy moors that reeked of swamp rot, but these were not the moors of Dralentath! No....these were not the moors of anywhere, except.....except....

[i]"Good. I feared thou would be at the bottom of a Blood Lizard's gullet by now, yet...such a dreadful demise is but imminent."[/i] That voice again. Quickly, Arjuna stood, not a struggle against the lumbering weight of her armor. She whirled around and there her eyes beheld the [url=http://i1096.photobucket.com/albums/g322/Sugarsandrainbows/Demons%20Souls%20Fanart/6jfvkk.jpg]woman.[/url] Gods! What be this foul place? The woman, a maiden was she, but there was....just something so....off about her, namely how her eyes were obscured by flaps of skin that.....dear Gods....were they sewn to her face?! [i]"Be not afraid, fair knight."[/i] Whispered the maiden, sauntering closer to the rather disturbed Arjuna, who in return backed away a bit. [i]"I am not one of those creatures who crave the flesh of mortals. I am but a being.....cursed for eternity to roam these forsaken lands....blind, weak...and without a drop of water to grace my parched tongue. Soon, I shall become one of them though....the creatures who doth roam these wretched fields, haunt these ghastly moors, and lurk beyond every wall, every tree.....salivating for a taste....of blood."[/i] From the seams upon her face, blood gently trickled down her porcelain cheeks as the woman, adorned in nothing but tattered rags and a sullen cloak to boot....she wept. [i]"My humanity....I but feel it slipping away each day...each waking hour I am to spend imprisoned here. All hope....it is but lost for me....but for thou....thou art a newly-dead. Thine humanity flourishes while mine....drifts. Perchance thou could discover....a way to reverse this horrid reckoning."[/i]

Arjuna, rather quizzical now instead of fearful, she gazed at the brooding woman with eyes of scrutiny. Her message of impending woe, simple it was, yet Arjuna couldn't help but feel there was....some sort of cryptic meaning to the maiden's disparaging words. Had Arjuna possessed a voice of her own, she would ask the maiden of what she meant by such negative ramblings, and most importantly.....where was she? Cursed lands.....monsters....the loss of humanity, these were but the few clues the knight was given to decipher her current and definitely dim location. Why the very swamp she and the mysterious woman tarried in conveyed a foreboding and unwelcomed atmosphere. This place....it was not meant to be seen by humans....let alone walked upon. As the woman in black rags rested her aching and withering figure upon a downed tree, Arjuna knelt in front of her, an expression of complete befuddlement twisting her face with concerned wrinkling. The woman, though she could not see....to Arjuna's surprise...she could sense what Arjuna was trying to ask, [i]"Thou wish is to know where we are, correct?"[/i] Mournful she whispered. [i]"Fair knight, art thou as blind as I? Thou must know this is not the realm of mortals anymore. Thou art gone from it.....forever. This....is the Netherworld....where the dead and the undead but linger in eternal suffering. It ails me to deliver to thee such a grim revelation, but thou wouldst discovered it even had I not informed thee."[/i]

Oh her pierced and bloody heart, it sunk in the chasm of her chest. Arjuna.....was indeed dead, and she was indeed lost forever....twisting and turning...through the Nether....