The sights and sensations around him were so frightening and vivid… Jaune was standing in the arena at Amity Colosseum and saw a girl with short, curly orange hair and green outlines standing in front of him.
He could hear a very familiar voice speaking as if it were in his mind, "Penny? Is that Penny?"
Jaune couldn't move or speak. He felt so numb and his mind was so muddled. He could swear he heard this voice from somewhere before, but where? Suddenly, wires started wrapping themselves around this girl tightly…
Jaune could feel the fear in his heart when the voice started pleading, "No… No! Please… someone save her!"
The wires started to pull the girl back from all directions, causing her arms and legs to spread wide until she started to slowly be torn apart.
The fear in his heart turn into hopeless terror when the voice starting screaming, "Not again! Please! Somebody! Anybody! Make it stop!"
The wires continue to tear the girl apart until she was completely in pieces. Instead of blood, there was exposed wiring and electricity sparking from the remains, and the girl's once green pupils turned dark and lifeless. When it was clear that the girl was dead, the sounds of a spectating crowd reacting in fright could be heard all around him.
The feeling of hopeless terror became so overwhelming that it turned into broken sadness when the voice started sobbing, "I… I didn't mean to… I didn't mean to kill her… Please… make it stop… I… I'm… so… sorry…"
The fragmented pieces of the mechanical girl started to twist and contort before putting themselves back together in a hideous humanlike shape. The girl's right arm was sticking out where her head should be, and the girl's left arm was where her right leg should be. The girl's right leg was where her right arm should be, and the girl's head was where her left arm should be. This twisted form of a girl shuffled slowly toward Jaune, but he still couldn't move.
As she got closer, the girl's eye started twitching and her mouth curled into an insane smile as she spoke in a monotone voice, "Salutations."
That same voice in his mind reacted to the sight of this, "Penny?"
The girl kept hobbling closer and spoke in a monotone voice again, "Salutations."
The feeling of broken sadness within Jaune was renewed again when the voice started yelling, "Penny! I'm so sorry!"
The girl stopped when she was mere inches from Jaune. Without warning, the right arm that was attached to her neck curled downward, grabbed her head, and ripped it off of her left arm socket.
She held her own head out and presented it to Jaune by pressing it toward his face and speaking in a monotone voice, "Salutations."
Even in this state of paralysis and silence, the anguish that Jaune was going through was becoming physically painful when the voice within him started pleading, "It was an accident! Please… Please forgive me for what I've done to you!"
The girl's left arm that was attached to her right leg socket curled upward and grabbed her head. With both hands clutching her head, her fingers started to dig into her own skin, right in front of Jaune. The manic expression on her face was unchanging, even as she ripped her own skin off of her face, revealing the mechanical insides of her skull. After that grisly scene, the mechanical girl fell into pieces again.
A wicked, yet honey-filled voice echoed around Jaune, "This is not a tragedy. This was not an accident. This is what happens when you hand over your trust, your safety, your children, to men who claim to be our guardians, but are, in reality, nothing more than men."
The voice within Jaune was completely hopeless and broken, "Is this… my punishment? To be burdened by my failures… even in death? Was this my destiny?"
Even though these feelings of hopeless weren't his own, Jaune's feelings were starting to match that of the voice, as if they were slowly and uncontrollably becoming a single person. His body started twitching erratically as the sense of numbness started to fade. Everything around him slowly became blurry, and eventually faded into black.
Just like last night, Jaune woke up out of another nightmare, gasping for breath, as if something had been suffocating him. He was back at the Higanbana Inn's bed again. At first, Jaune felt a solemn relief, but when he tried to get up out of bed, his body felt unusually heavy. When he rolled over to his side and twisted his arms underneath him to push himself up, a terrible pain began to course through his arms and shoulders.
Jaune heard the same voice in his dream whispering in his mind, "Wh… Where… am I..?"
This voice caused Jaune to experience a very painful headache, which in turn caused him to collapse back on his bed, grunting in pain.
That same voice became much clearer in his mind, "That voice… It… No, it couldn't…"
As the voice was becoming clearer, the headache started to recede a bit, but when he pulled himself back up, he began feeling nauseous and dizzy.
When Jaune grunted in pain again, the voice in his mind reacted again, "There it is again..."
Jaune crouched down on the bed with his head in his legs when his headache flared again, and grunted in pain again.
The voice in his mind finally shouted, "Jaune? Is it really you?! Jaune?!"
Jaune tried to respond to this voice, but all that came out of his mouth was, "Ugh… Pyrr…", before he felt the sudden urge to vomit.
"Where are you? Jaune? I… I can't see."
Jaune tried to pull himself off of the bed and on his feet and briefly succeeded, but he soon collapsed on the floor when he let go of the bed. The impact also caused his own shield, which was placed on the wall next to the bed, to fall on his face. It was difficult for him to even move his arms with any precision, but he slowly reached toward his face and rolled over as he pushed the shield off his face.
When he caught a glimpse of his reflection in the shield, the other voice reacted, "Jaune! I… I can see you! I see your face! Wh… what's happened to you? Jaune!"
Jaune was horrified by the sight of his own reflection. The left side of his face was red and filled with blisters, and there were veins bulging underneath his left eye! He slowly moved his hand toward that part of his face and pressed on his cheek, which caused a burning pain to course through his face. After quickly flinching from the pain, he quickly moved his hand away and took a closer look at his left eye. It was red and bloodshot, but the pupil in his eye was emerald green! It was just like looking at… her eye. The gravity of his situation had finally set in. The Death Maiden's warning was very real and Jaune's inner sense of fear was palpable.
His whole body started shivering, and he uttered one word, "Pyrrha..."
Her voice resonated from within his mind, "Jaune…"
Jaune slowly pressed his hand on the reflection of the shield, as if he was touching her hand again since the Fall of Beacon.
A little girl's voice interrupted the moment between Jaune and his… shield, "Are you two busy over there? We need to talk."
Jaune slowly turned around and saw the Death Maiden 'standing' sideways with her feet on the wall, staring at him with her arms crossed. When he did, he attempted to stand and reacted with anger, "You…"
Jaune was still suffering from physical pain, and collapsed when he tried to stand up. The Death Maiden was completely nonchalant to his suffering, "You know, I don't show myself to a lot of mortals, but when I do, I usually have a good reason. Well? Do you believe me now? You've still got about eight to ten months to…"
Although he struggled to speak, Jaune interrupted her, "What… did you…"
The Death Maiden paused for a moment before Jaune yelled at her, "What did you do?! What did you do to Pyrrha?!"
Her voice reacted within his mind again, "What did she… do to me?"
With a huff, the Death Maiden disappeared into thin air and reappeared on the ceiling, walking upside-down, "As far as mortals go, you really are stupid! When you find something that you can't explain, you just find someone to pin the blame on! First, you blame me for the Grimm attack on this village, and now you want to blame me for putting a piece of that girl's soul in your body?"
The Death Maiden's eyes turned golden, "And this is even after I just came to you last night and told you everything… everything from the start!"
Her voice was trembling with fear, "My… my soul?"
The Death Maiden calmed down a bit, "Yes, girl… Your soul… That's right! I can see into mortal minds. I can hear you in there. Oh, um… don't try to talk to anyone except this… idiot… that I'm looking at! Nobody else is going to hear you from in there."
"But… how did I..? Why am I..?"
The Death Maiden interrupted her, "What? Why do you have a piece of your soul lodged in this idiot's teeny-tiny mortal brain? Because you put it in there, that's why! Think way back to your Beacon days… Like… if you were to make those Beacon days into a book, then I'd say as far back as Volume 1."
The Death Maiden disappeared into thin air and reappeared on the floor next to Jaune, and then started pacing in a circle, "First day of Beacon Academy… Emerald Forest… You find this idiot stuck in a tree. He doesn't know what Aura is. Protect thee by the shoulder… or something. Yadda yadda yadda…"
The Death Maiden had suddenly pointed at Jaune and declared dramatically, "You used your Aura to unlock his! You know… The manifestation of your soul… What happened next..? Oh yeah… You got a little tired and said something like 'he has a lot of Aura', right?"
Her voice started stuttering, "How do you..?"
The Death Maiden interrupted her by making a sound effect that sounds like a buzzer, "EEEEH! Wrong! The reason that you got tired was because you ended up lodging a piece of your own soul in him! Since then, he's been changing very slowly from the inside out. For a while, there weren't any real side effects, but the more that piece of you stayed in him, the more he changed. This mortal's body isn't anything like the Pinecone's! His body wasn't meant to carry other souls! It's like trying to plug a light bulb into a busted-up Scroll… It doesn't work."
The Death Maiden pulled out a small mirror from her robe and put it in front of Jaune's face, "Here we have what I like to call… Exhibit A. See his face? That's just the start! The rest of him is going to start deteriorating if he doesn't get rid of that piece of you! Get it now? Your own soul is killing him!"
Her voice was quiet, but sounded completely horrified, "What?"
The Death Maiden put the mirror back in her robe and grabbed Jaune with one hand, effortlessly picking him up off of the floor and dropping him on the bed before speaking again, "You see, my role in this game is to collect the souls of the dead. I already picked up the rest of you when you died, but I can't get this piece of you out without killing this… idiot. Now, I don't usually do favors for mortals, but I felt a bit generous last night. Well, that and I can't directly interfere with mortal affairs. Instead of just killing him, I gave him one of my Soulstones and the chance to take back his own life. 'Go to Beacon', I said. 'Find that, uh… Aura transfery thingy', I said. 'Use the Aura transfery thingy with the Soulstone', I said. But, nooooooo… He didn't make any preparations to do that, so maybe if he has a second opinion, then he'll change his mind."
The Death Maiden's eyes turned golden again, "Because if he doesn't, then that piece of your soul will be stuck to his, and when he dies, I'll be the one stuck with one soul with an extra piece and one soul that's missing a piece."
Jaune tried to get off of the bed, "Wait… I…"
The Death Maiden interrupted him again, "Please withhold all questions until the end of the ride. Thank you!"
The Death Maiden flung out a long chain from inside of her robe, and it somehow wrapped itself around Jaune, tying his arms and chest to the bed very tightly. He struggled to free himself from these chains, but his current physical state made this struggle futile.
The Death Maiden hovered above Jaune and grabbed his cheeks with both hands and spoke to him like he was a baby, "Aww… Who's a widdle mordal? Who is? You is!"
She let go of Jaune's cheeks and spoke to him normally, "Relax. I'm just giving you a little sneak peek of the future you'll face if you don't take that soul fragment out of you. When I'm done, I'll leave you alone."
The Death Maiden disappeared into thin air and reappeared on the wall behind Jaune, grabbed his face with both hands, and stared into his eyes with glowing golden eyes of her own. Jaune could feel his own thoughts twist beyond his control, and started to struggle again! This maiden was doing... something to his own mind, and he was helpless to do anything about it!
Jaune's own eyesight started to fade, and was eventually replaced by darkness as he could hear the Death Maiden's voice singing softly over his head, "There's no earthly way of knowing… which direction they are going."
An influx of colors and shapes clouded Jaune's thoughts as she kept singing, "There's no knowing where they're rowing… or which way the river's flowing."
The colors and shapes in his mind started swirling like a cyclone was shuffling his own thoughts and memories as she kept singing, "Is it raining? Is it snowing? Is a hurricane a-blowing?"
The swirling in his mind stopped as the colors and shapes in his mind were mixed into a dense fog as the Death Maiden spoke softly, "Not a speck of light is showing, so the danger must be growing."
The fog in his mind had burst into flames as she raised her voice, "Are the fires of Hell a-glowing?"
A figure that resembled the wicked demon in his dreams had emerged from the flames as the Death Maiden's voice erupted in his mind, "Is the grisly Reaper mowing?"
The shadows around the wicked demon had dispersed, but the true form of the demon didn't look like a Pyrrha or a Grimm. Off all people, it was the form of Cinder Fall herself that was within Jaune's own mind! The eyes of 'Cinder' were glowing in a burning yellow as flames erupted all around her.
The frightening imagery was finally complete when the Death Maiden shouted, "Yes!"
The 'Cinder' in his mind exploded into a tempest of fire and hate that was vivid enough for Jaune to actually feel his flesh burn! He put up another struggle, whimpering in pain, as the Death Maiden's voice pierced his very soul, "The danger must be growing, 'cuz the rowers keep on rowing!"
The face of 'Cinder' burnt into ashes, revealing the face of a monster unlike any Grimm that Jaune had ever seen. It had a four-lipped mouth and pointed teeth that opened sideways! When this monster roared, the Death Maiden's voice pierced him again, "And they're certainly not showing..!"
Flames burst out of the monster's gaping mouth until they completely consumed Jaune's thoughts, while the Death Maiden's voice pierced his soul yet again, "Any sign that they are slowing!"
The pain that Jaune felt throughout the ordeal was now so vivid, that his once quiet whimpering turned into full-blown screaming! The Death Maiden's voice joined his screaming with an inhuman shriek of her own! The rest of Jaune's body twitched constantly, like it was being subject to agonizing torture! It was as if the very fabric of Jaune's consciousness was being changed… no, violated by someone else! The flames in his mind flickered three times, and he saw something different every time they did. First, he saw an image of Pyrrha weeping in despair. Next, he saw an image of a glowing angel with pieces of metal protruding out of its back to resemble wings. Finally, he saw a man strapped to a burning stake, screaming in agony as he roasted to death!
When the last image faded, the entire ordeal had come to an abrupt end. Everything was quiet and his mind was clear. His body was no longer in pain, and he was mostly unaware of not only his surroundings, but his own sense of self.
Before Jaune fell into the realm of deep unconsciousness, he heard Pyrrha's voice echoing within his mind once again, "No… This… this is wrong. There has to be something I can do… and yet, I remain powerless. It doesn't make sense. None of it makes sense! This isn't how things were supposed to happen! Is… is Jaune meant to share my fate? Why? How can destiny… be so cruel?"