Lucky Souls

Chapter 5: The Place We Sought

"You've gotta be kidding me…" She whispered to herself, her tiny blue head poking out behind a still smoking pile of debris.

Before her was the place she had sought, the palace of Boletaria, in all its glory. She had heard legends of the place, of its grand beauty. People would travel for miles to see its lush wildlife, its forests, the colossal snow-peaked mountains with fields of flowers at their feet, but what lay before her was nothing of the sort.

The mountains were cracked, dry and dead, whatever wildlife existed here certainly didn't anymore. The palace and its surrounding areas were a sham of their former selves. Whatever they looked like before, she mused, they definitely didn't hold the same grace.

The castle appeared as though it had gone under siege, and thinking about it, it probably had. The mighty walls were destroyed, blasted apart and thrown every direction, corpses of knights and civilians lined the streets leading up to its former majesty, and those who remained, weren't human anymore.

A mighty cry suddenly drown out all, and shooting a glance to the air, what her eyes beheld she couldn't believe. They were stories back home, nothing more. People would tell of the legends, of brave knights who would go in search of treasure, fame, glory, and would battle these drake-skinned beasts. She never believed such things could actually exist, but in this place, anything could be made a reality.

"A dragon…" The words escaped her lips in disbelief, but at the same time, she couldn't help but entertain a chuckle, it was a real live dragon! Her childhood wonders were coming to life in a flash as she watched the great beast fly over the smoky ruin of the keep, and into the distance.

She couldn't help but feel a little melancholy, were this land still its former self that would have been quite a sight. She shook the feeling from her mind, time was of the essence, and she could expend no more of it.

Absent-mindedly, Konata kicked a helmet in her sudden vigor, and her body went cold as she noticed the noise had alerted pretty much every shambling husk of a human in the area, and all of their dead eyes were currently locked right in her direction.

"Oh crap."

Thrown to the ground roughly, her glasses flew from her tender face, sliding across the slick ground and into the darkness. Her eye quivered for a moment, and she felt her collar roughly yanked from behind, bringing her eye level to her captor.

She wore a mask across her face, revealing only a single ever-present eye, bloodshot and manic; this person was not sane, clearly. Her attire consisted of torn leather and chains, and she carried a blunt axe, made of stone.

"Traitors to the king will be dealt with accordingly…" She mumbled to herself, throwing the pink-haired girl to the ground once again in a fit of laughter, but where the humor was, she couldn't tell.

The woman left just as quickly as she came, locking the iron-clad door behind her, leaving the young girl trapped alone in the dark and dank cell.

Her tears had long since dried, but soon enough her cheeks were red and stingy again, salty streaks slowly making their way downward. Boletaria was definitely not what she had expected, it was no longer a place fit for anyone, and while she did her best to stay strong, she couldn't help but allow her tears to surface.

She stood up slowly and picked up her glasses, positioning the spectacles back in place over her nose. Making her way to the door, still sobbing silently, she rubbed her hands across its cool surface. Normally, she would be able to wreck a door like this in an instant, even if she was still an apprentice mage; she was not to be trifled with.

The door however, seemed to be reinforced for such things, and she didn't wish to waste what little energy she had left trying to open a door. The only other way she noticed, was down, flights of staircases going ever deeper into whatever dungeon she was in.

With no real choice in the matter, she stumbled over to the cases, making her way to the very bottom in an effort to find something, anything.

At the bottom, she saw something she figured she'd be used to by now, corpses, lots of them, littered around the room and shredded apart. She wasn't used to it, however, and couldn't help herself when she heaved onto the bloody ground at her feet, her knees buckling and sending her downward in the process.

In her coughing and wheezing, she heard slight movement around her, slithering in the darkness. She stood up as fast as she could, visually scanning the room with her palms open, ready to blast any threat into oblivion.

Upon closer inspection, she saw the movement came from one of the corpses, or something she thought was a corpse. She figured it was a Dregling, but it was no such thing. The movement came from a man, covered in injuries most dire, gently slumped against the wall.

"Hey…you're human, right?" The man whispered before coughing violently, a trickle of blood sliding down his chin as he did so.

She didn't answer at first, she couldn't trust anything in this place, and it could just be a demon trick, why would it be though? This was a pretty unusual place for a demon just to wait around and play tricks on the passer bys it would likely never get; more likely, this man was another prisoner of the psychotic woman with the mask.

"T-That's right…" She breathed out quickly, thanking the makers above that she had at last found something sentient she could have a conversation with, anything with, the interaction alone was the only thing that kept her sane at that moment. "I'm Takara Miyuki." She said a little more casually, slowly making her way over to the injured man as he hacked up a few more times.

"Takara…? Name seems familiar, but…I don't know." The man rambled, his blurry vision slowly closing in on the woman before him, her pink hair and slender figure suddenly positioning themselves directly in his field of vision, causing his nose to fire its cannons directly on cue, like water out of a faucet.

"Oh! Are you alright!" Miyuki motioned quickly as the man dizzily slumped against the wall, shaking him several times until he snapped out of his trance, rubbing his head bashfully as he did so.

"Fine, fine…so, Takara, huh?" He groaned as he sat up as best he could, trying not to lose any more blood than he already had. "Shiraishi…Shiraishi Minoru." He joyfully said as he extended his hand, which was awkwardly taken and shook by the shy mage.

Miyuki let her eyes drift over the man, saying he was in bad shape would be an understatement. Something had eviscerated this man; his innards were only being kept inside of him by his own hands, which were latched over his abdomen like a lock. His legs were broken, this much was obvious, they were twisted in unnatural directions, and the bones stuck out in all the wrong places.

She figured he probably didn't have a lot of time left, she was a mage, but she was no healer. She knew nothing of the clerical arts, and couldn't assist this man in the slightest; she could do nothing but keep him company until the inevitable.

"What are you doing here, Takara-San…?" He mumbled as he allowed his head to slump downwards once more. "This is no place for kids…scratch that, for anyone…" He finished with a groan, clenching his eyes and teeth as he held onto his gut in pain.

"Well, I was assisting a friend, a search and rescue mission. I was separated from my group…I don't know what's become of them." Miyuki said downwardly, her mind suddenly thinking up every thing imaginable that could possibly be befalling her friends at that moment, and she shuttered at the thought.

Even with his glazed eyes and blurry vision, Minoru could see this girl was in need of support. Unfortunately, physically he was in no shape to be helping anyone, he could only console her with his words.

"I'm sure your friends are fine…this land can be deadly, but if you're alive, they have the same chance, right? I know better than to get my or anyone else's hopes up in this place…but that's all you can do, right?" He assured, gently reaching his armor-clad hand out to touch the girls shoulder.

"Right." Miyuki nodded, trying her best to just believe in the mans words, after all, it was a miracle he was still alive himself considering the injuries he had sustained. As the armored-hand slowly slumped back down to his stomach, Miyuki noticed something on the glove, an emblem, and not just any emblem. "You…you're a knight of the king? Of King Allant?" Miyuki asked, noticing the slight change in the man's face as she spoke the words.

"Heh…King Allant is no king of mine. In my childhood, I called that man a brother; I would have died for him in a heartbeat. I do not know what he has done, what hells he has unleashed upon these lands, but he must be stopped." Minoru angrily exclaimed, once again groaning and gripping his stomach tightly. "That woman, the one with the mask, she is one of his servants, one of the ones responsible for all this…"

As he spoke, Miyuki watched as his hand slipped into his pack, pulling out several herbs, and a strange wand of sorts. The wand was yellow and black, and was shaped like Jacob's ladder. The dying knight took the girls hands in his own, and placed the objects within.

"I was saving these if I ever got into a rough spot…but I think I'm a little past that point." He said with a chuckle, slowly releasing the girl's warm hands from his own. "The herbs are for healing, and before you get your hopes up…they can't heal me. When digested, these herbs will give you burst of energy, but if taken constantly, can be dangerous. They can heal injuries, but only minor ones. I've heard there are herbs to heal even greater injuries…but I've never seen one, in his final days during his descent to madness, the good King Allant banned the clerical arts from our kingdom, so the knowledge was lost." The knight explained, now turning his attention to the other object in the girl's hand, the wand.

"Now, this…I can tell you're a mage." At the words, Miyuki almost gasped, and retracted herself slightly. Mages weren't the most kindly looked upon people, they would harbingers of death and destruction, and many with the power to use magic could not control themselves, and ended up misusing it, the knight could tell however, this girl was different. "This is an amplifier, it will direct pure magical energy into this wand, and expend it at twice the power, but with a cost, twice the energy. You may be more powerful using this wand, but you'll grow fatigued much quicker…be wary." The knight finished with a cough, this one would be too much for him however, and before he knew it, he saw himself collapse onto the ground with a clack.

"S-Shiraishi-San!" Miyuki desperately called out to the knight, shaking him roughly as his glazed eyes slowly opened.

"It's alright…I was prepared for this. I can't ask you to do anything for me, except this, survive. This place is ruthless, and it won't let you rest, it'll feed on your fear, it's a living thing, and it needs to feed like anything else." Minoru whispered, his voice trailing off more and more as he felt his life fading from him.

"Please, please don't die…I…what do I do?" Miyuki was out of options, she couldn't allow herself to just sit back and let this man die, she had to do something and quick if he were to survive.

Her heart sunk as she heard movement behind her, the sound of stone scraping against stone, and a low-pitched giggle. She turned cautiously, the catalyst still clutched in her hand, and a pain in her chest. She saw the woman, that same bloodshot eye glaring directly at her, she was scared, she knew the corpses that littered this dungeon were her captor's victims, and Minoru, was likely one as well.

"Traitors to the king will be dealt with!" The woman suddenly screamed, running at the pink-haired mage in a frenzy, lifting her large blunt axe to the air with a screech. Miyuki barely dodged the large axe, jumping back slightly and tripping over several bodies, and unknowingly, pushing herself up against the wall, cornered.

The downward slam of the axe was followed by another, but Miyuki saw this one coming, and had ample time to move out of the way as the axe of her attacker suddenly slammed into the musty walls, effectively sticking itself in its surface.

Tick tock, Miyuki thought, she needed a plan, and glancing to the catalyst, she attempted to center herself, to allow her magic to flow into the device, but she had no time. The woman suddenly wretched her axe from the wall and wasted no time in attempting to charge her prisoner once more.

Miyuki expected another slash with the axe, but this was not so, instead she was met with a hard kick to the stomach, which sent her flying backwards into the wall, her back going numb with pain as she coughed out. She had no time to react as the woman suddenly followed up her kick with a knee to the stomach, causing Miyuki to drop to the ground and clench herself, spitting up blood and saliva as she did so.

"Hehe…so foolish. You should have known better than to betray your king, he is so kind, so just, why ever would you betray him!" The woman angrily demanded to know, light giggles between her words making her seem more manic by the minute. "I will show you, the punishment for betrayal!" The woman screamed suddenly, raising her axe to the air in an attempt to sink it directly into the girl below her.

Miyuki clenched her eyes shut and prepared for whatever death awaited her, would it be instant? Painless? She hoped so, but she wouldn't find out, as suddenly a sword split out of the woman's abdomen, and at the sound of blade on flesh, and realizing she wasn't the victim, Miyuki's eyes widened as she saw the deranged woman let out a bloody gurgle.

"You…traitors!" She screamed as she turned around, seeing the wounded knight Minoru, sword desperately clenched in his hands, ripping the blade through the woman's stomach, allowing himself a laugh at the irony.

"Miyuki, now!" The knight yelled as loud as he could, expending the last of his energy and slowly falling to the ground, he had done his part, the mage needed to do hers.

As much as she couldn't believe she was doing it, Miyuki found her center. She allowed herself a calm moment in the chaos, and found her Zen. She clasped her hands over the wand, pointing it at her captor as she struggled to remove the blade from her torso.

Miyuki recalled her training. Her mentor taught her that magic is an extension of the self, and that its power, be it good or evil, weak or strong, would be determined by the user. If the user was shaky, scared and confused, the magic could take hold of them; they could lose themselves in the power, and drown out everything else.

One had to be strong when using magic, a strong mind was necessary, for without it, they would be no more than demons, a body without a soul. The soul was the key, and the soul would be lost without the mind, and the mind would be lost without strength.

Miyuki had lost herself to magic several times, only to be lulled back to peace by her mentor. Her mentor was caring, gentle, and very patient. Most mages in training would be reprimanded for the slightest mistake, as that was all it took. Her mentor used a different philosophy, the learning experience. Mistakes would always be made, and punishment for them wasn't the right idea, instead show what should have been done, make it a lesson. Her mentor was often criticized for this, and was an outcast in regular and mage society for her peculiar ways, but those who dared get close to her, knew how loving and kind she really was.

Her bubbly eyes tore open in a flash, determination practically seeping from them. The catalyst glowed ever brighter, and her pulse quickened, this, she figured, was what the expression 'truly felt alive', was like, and allowing herself a light smile, she knew she was a student no more.

A beam of light suddenly tore its way from the wand, blasting into the deranged woman and sending her flying across the room, crashing through the wall, and revealing sunshine to the prison. Miyuki's eyes glazed at the bright light, and slowly standing up, she made her way to assess the damage.

Poking her head through the hole, she saw it led directly out of the castle, not only that, it led into a deep ravine. Her eyes drifted ever downward into the seemingly infinite darkness, if the blast of magic combined with being impaled didn't kill that woman, somehow, then the fall surely did.

Drifting out of her Zen, Miyuki mentally slapped herself as she remembered Minoru. And turning around, she gasped at the sight.

She didn't know how he did it, it didn't seem physically possible, but somehow he had done it. Her eyes drifted to the brave knight, his entrails were completely gone from the shell of his stomach, laid out behind him in a train of blood and fluids. Somehow, he had found the strength to drag his battered and broken body, losing bits of himself along the way, and stand with two completely broken legs. This was too much for any man, the strain was just too much, but perhaps he was no regular man.

What struck her the most, what stapled itself into her heart at that moment, was his face. It wasn't one of anguish, of disgust, anger, all feelings she thought would be evident in the knight at that moment, it was a smile. His face had molded itself that way, eyes gently closed, mouth curved into a wily grin, whatever he felt in his last moments, she knew it was peaceful.

She wanted to cry for him, to thank him, but she knew it would be disrespectful. He died as bravely as he lived, and spent his last moments protecting others, as knights do. He was the perfect knight, in her mind, and he had a death befitting the perfect knight.

Miyuki wanted to do something, a memorial maybe, or just say a few words, but she really didn't have the time. She did what she thought was best, and gently moved his body so he could be laying on his back, and his sword clasped in his hands, however, she dared not change his face, she could not change it.

She allowed herself a sigh, and with a weak smile on her face, she gave the knight one last bow, and slowly made her way up the many staircases, and out of the dungeon.

Reaching the top she was relieved to find that her captor had absent-mindedly left the door to the dungeon open, how lucky! She tucked the catalyst Minoru had given her into her belt, and stepped out into the sunshine, or what one could call sunshine in the ever-present overcast of dark clouds in Boletaria.

She had hoped the knights words would prove true, that her friends were safe, and they would be reunited soon, but she could not just hope, she needed to play her part as well.

"Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap! Crap!" The calls of the bluenette echoed throughout the hall she currently found herself running through, a legion of husks behind her, claws bared and hungers ravaging, they intended to claim their prey, they hadn't fed on fresh souls in quite some time.

She followed the hall to an intersection of hallways, and stopped as she quickly decided on a direction. "No time!" She moaned, randomly picking the one to the right of her and running down it and nearly breaking down the door at the end, collapsing to her knees as she entered the room.

Catching her breath and grabbing at the stitch in her side, she surveyed the room. "Wow." Was all she could manage, wherever she was, it was some type of torture room. She saw iron maidens, stretching racks, whips and chains, all the good stuff. Were a normal person in the same situation, they would probably turn tail and run…but this girl was far from normal.

"Kinky!" She let out with a laugh, running over to the devices and running her hands across one, allowing her mind to deviate from whatever she probably should have been thinking about, and instead slathering it with perversions.

At the sudden sound of shuffling and moaning, the bluenette raised a brow, and turning around, she let out a small 'eep' as she noticed the legion of husks behind her, snarling and growling.

"Guys, come on. We can work this out!" She nervously tried to bargain, but these demons would have none of it as they drew ever closer. Backing up slowly to the wall, she needed a plan, she could cut down a few, but she certainly couldn't take them all.

Her plan came in the form of something she bumped into, and glancing at her feet, she saw a tub of oil, and at that, a sly smile tore itself across her face.

"Burn baby burn!" She yelled with a laugh, grabbing onto the large tub and pushing it over with a heave and a ho, causing the slick liquid to dump onto the ground below, and drain out at the feet of the horde, she noticed there were no torches, so she would have to improvise. She clenched her sword as hard as she could, and scraped it across the floor like a match, causing sparks to fly in every direction, and the oil to erupt into spectacle of flames.

The husks screamed and groaned as they were slowly cooked to a crisp, and one by one they dropped to the ground dead, black, and smoky.

"Just the way I like it…" Konata mumbled to herself with a smile, slowly dropping onto her bottom and rubbing a hand over her sweaty face as she watched the horde continue to burn.

Honestly, she was surprised at how good she was at this. She didn't know much of swordplay, her father had taught her a few tricks, being an ex-knight and all, but that was about it. Oddly enough, she found she was extremely resourceful in tense situations, and could quickly devise a plan with the tools at hand, even if they were simple.

As her heart thrashed in her chest, and the adrenaline pumped through her, she felt good, better then she had in a long time. This was a lifestyle she could definitely see herself getting used to, the action, the danger, the romance, she wanted it all.

She mused that if she didn't have an important mission, she would really be enjoying this. She had always entertained the idea of becoming a knight when she was older, but her father would have none of it, he always seemed very adamant about his hatred towards the knights, he never really divulged further on the subject though, it seemed to be a personal matter.

At the thought of her father, she resigned herself to the idea of fun at that moment; she really did need to concentrate at the task at hand. The small bonfire she had caused was slowly starting to die out, and making her way through the pile of corpses, she noticed a few of them were still slugging around, amazingly enough. Heaving a sigh, she decided not to test her luck and just leave before more of them showed up.

She backtracked her way to the intersection, and took the other path, finding that it led back outdoors. She squinted her eyes at the light, passing her hand over her face in an attempt to shield it.

"Man that's bright…" And at her words, that's when she realized it, she jumped behind the nearest thing she saw, which happened to be a wooden barricade, and covered her head. She heard the smashing and exploding, and turning slowly, she realized a ball of fire the size of a horse had just been flung in her direction.

Peaking like a mouse out of its home, she saw that the attack came from the same scale-ridden drake she had seen soaring in the skies earlier. The beast was roosted upon a hill several hundred meters away from her, perched into its nest, its neck drawn high, looking for the prey that had eluded it.

"No way…! That…was awesome." She had to admit, even if she almost died, that was the coolest 'almost-death' she had ever experienced. The mighty dragon slowly lowered its head, seemingly oblivious, apparently it wasn't that bright.

She didn't really feel like testing the theory however, and slowly crawled her way out of the barricade and into the open, slithering across the ground like a snake, getting as low as she possibly could.

The dragon suddenly breathed, loudly, she could practically smell the rankness of its blood-soaked breath from where she was huddled over, in fact, she did. She coughed once at the smell as it worked its way into her nostrils, and that one cough was all it took. The dragon sucked in wind, and blew fire expertly, this time in a large jet stream, which it slashed across the area like a whip in an attempt to fry its tiny prey.

If she was slithering like a snake before, she was galloping like a horse now. On all fours she made her way to the nearest thing she could hide behind, which luckily for her was the solid stone wall of the mighty Boletarian palace. King Allant was known as an expert military tactician, and he knew how to erect structures that could withstand any siege, and even though he was a villain most inhuman, she secretly thanked him for that.

She caught her breath as she peaked around the corner once more, and as she suspected, once again the dragon seemed to have lost interest. She wished it would just make up its mind and either fry her or just leave, but it seemed that wasn't an option.

Just as the thought crossed her mind however, she watched as the dragon flew off, disappearing from her field of vision as it flew over the castle walls. She let off a laugh, and slapped herself on the chest, raising her arms to the air in a small victory cheer.

"That's right! You better run! No stupid dragon is gonna get me! Ha! Haha!" She continued her laugh as she made her way through the only door she could, but as she opened it, she felt her heart shoot up into her throat.

Not only was this the dragons lair, it still contained the dragon, slowly perched in front of the door, almost as if it had expected the young girl to attempt to enter. Staring at the beast for a moment, her laughter slowly subsided.

"M-My, what lovely teeth you have…" She quivered out, only to be met by a thunderous roar that sent her flying against the wall she was currently backed up against, slamming into it like a ragdoll and collapsing onto the ground.

The dragon raised a claw in an attempt to stomp onto its prey like a bug, but that's the advantage of being so small, you're hard to see. And as the bluenette noticed, apparently this dragon had eye problems, as the claw smashed pretty much nowhere near her, and instead right through the wall next to her.

Scrambling to her feet she had no time to make bad eyesight jokes, even if she had currently cooked up about twenty in that moment, and instead decided to just high tail it out of there.

She ran past the dragon as fast as she could, only to be suddenly swept off her feet by a rough and thick object.

As the tweety birds slowly removed themselves from her dizzy head, she saw the object was the dragon's tail; which was currently thrashing back and forth in an attempt to swipe at her.

She couldn't help herself as she stood up and wretched her sword from its sheathe, this was too perfect of a set up. "I've always wanted to do this!" She yelled with a laugh, charging the dragon like a bull and jumping mid-run, landing onto the dragon's tail with a thud and wrapping herself around it like a tree trunk.

"Holy crap!" Was all she could manage to bumpily word out as she was swung back and forth on the beasts appendage, nearly losing her lunch in the process as she felt a slimy liquid making its way up her pipes.

The dragons head twisted and turned as it attempted to spot whatever tiny creature had made itself known on its person, and fire erupted from its mouth like a chimney, smoke and flame bellowing out of the beast as it roared in rage.

Sword still in hand, the bluenette carefully kept one arm wrapped around the tail as she was flung around, and with the other, expertly stabbed the beasts tail with the blade, causing a roar so mighty the very earth shook below them.

One last whip of the tail and suddenly the young girl was sent flying, crashing down hard on the ground and rolling down the first few steps of a nearby staircase.

Her ears rung, loudly, she acquainted it to the sound of complete silence, when one can only hear the ringing of ones own ears, except it was stronger than that. She blinked once or twice, sitting up slowly and grabbing onto her head instinctively. Apart from a few scrapes, amazingly, she was uninjured, and slowly standing up her heart shot up into her throat once more as she saw the dragon staring her down.

"Oh man…" She mumbled, now weaponless and out in the open, she was pretty much finished she figured. The dragon heaved backwards, preparing a special flame for the prey that dared injure it, and shooting forward, a cool blue flame suddenly spat from the dragon's jaws, exploding outwards towards the tiny defenseless girl.

The flames were suddenly halted, a shield the size of a person suddenly slammed in front of the bluenette, and before she had time to ask who what or why, she was yanked to the ground behind it.

The flames curled around it, scorching everything but the direct path behind the shield, instantly turning whatever it touched to ash. As the breath of the dragon finished, the shield was suddenly wretched from the ground back into the arms of its wielder, and staring upwards at her savior, the bluenette almost laughed when she saw a cute, tiny little knight, clad in full armor, her dull pink hair busting out of her helmet, and a triumphant grin on her face.

"Wow…!" She breathed out at the knight, a cocky smile making itself present on the knight's face as she raised her brows at the girl below her.

"No, please, no need for thanks, I was just-"

"You're so cute!" The bluenette squealed, shooting up in a flash and shaking the tiny knight, bouncing and giggling like a kid in a candy store.

However cute the knight was, Konata suddenly forgot, as the cute little face she wore before was suddenly replaced by the face of a monster, it was pretty akin to the dragon, actually.

"I am not cute!" The knight yelled, stomping on the ground immaturely, completely forgetting the menacing beast behind her. "Now run, citizen! Leave this to a professional!" The knight exclaimed proudly, drawing her sword and heaving her enormous shield upward, quite the feat for such a small girl.

Konata had no intention of arguing with the frightening little girl, and instead just decided to heed her words and run as far away as she could, and glancing back as she did so, she couldn't even believe what she saw, the girl was charging the dragon head on, she figured she must've been insane, or maybe just wanted to die really badly, and in this place, she couldn't blame her.

"Now beast! Get ready to die, in the name of the knights! I, Akira Kogami, will see you fall!" Her battle cry screeched to the heavens, and her spirit was that of ten men, she held no fear as she closed the gap between her and her opponent, she held no fear as she saw the whites of its eyes as she drove her blade into its scaly hide. She held no fear.

The same could not be said for the one she saved, as Konata crashed into the nearest room she could find, she collapsed onto the ground in a heave of sweat and coughing. This place would be the death of her, she mused, this place would tear her apart. This place would chew her up, spit her out, and do it all over again.

This was place was mad, this place was damned; this place was filled with death and dread, violence and chaos, insanity all around. This place was fit for no man, this place was fit for no one but the soul-devouring demons that now inhabited it, this place wasn't fit to spit on.

This place had ended an army, a kingdom, a nation, and this place would surely consume the rest of the world as well, and end them too. Then why, she thought for a moment, did she feel so good? As she saw her reflection in a pool of muddy water below her, she couldn't help but laugh.

"Yeah, this place is pretty messed up…" She breathed with a giggle, slowly standing up with several more hard breaths and a cough. "But I can't give up now." She grinned, clenching her fist as tight as she could, she intended to be the exception to the statistic of constant death and dread, she intended to put a stop to this, she intended to save her friends, save her father, she she'd do it all.

The Monumental was right, this place couldn't be allowed to continue to thrive, to expand, it would surely mean the end of everything, and while she thought this task would probably be better suited to someone trained or experienced in this sort of thing, she knew no such people existed anymore.

This land had taken the best of them, and now only people like her were left. People who had lost their way, were they here by chance? No, she thought, things like this were rarely left to chance, and while she didn't really believe in destiny, she believed in purpose, and that all things and people had one.

"And this…is mine."

Author's Note: I really need to learn how to write, my god I hate my writing. I have a really hard time doing action scenes, because I can SEE it in my head, I can word it too, but it never comes out quite like what I pictured in the ol' noggin. Well, as for the chapter, mostly action, some back story for Konata and Miyuki and…character death? Yes, that's right, character death. Based on how the story was progressing, some of you may have seen this coming, but probably not this early, in fact, I'll be surprised if anyone even read past that point, character death is a BIG NO NO for most readers, even if the story is set in a dark, violent AU setting. Well, let me tell you something. I think it takes a lot of guts to kill off a character, simply because of how hated it is by readers. Minoru's death really was necessary to the story, in fact, considering the character he was based on in the Demon's Souls verse; he shouldn't have even been alive in the first place. I will assure you this, this story WILL NOT end in a slaughter of all the main characters, that isn't my thing. I take character death very, very seriously, and I don't do it often. If character death is necessary for the plot, then it will happen sad to say, but that is such a rare thing, so please, don't worry your pretty little heads too much. By the way, I only realized after writing it that you don't really know how Miyuki got to where she currently is, well, I don't really feel like explaining it, leave it up to the imagination, I say! The Monumental lost the other girls, so, wherever they went is a mystery even to me, so dropping them into a random situation sort of fits, because they were randomly dropped into different places across Boletaria.

P.S. : REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW, REVIEW. I can't get better if people don't tell me I suck more often! SO DO IT, THANKS!