[color=9B111E][center][h1]Ruby[/h1][/center][/color]

Images of a foreign land flashed through Ruby's mind, visions of strange warriors and odd temples bringing crinkles to her forehead. None of this made sense of why she was here; she was no kind of fighter. 

Then the sight of the gold mask watching her rang through her mind like the sound of a broken bell, and a shudder ran through her small frame. Just the sight of this man caused goosebumps to run across her ghostly skin, and she had thought the warden had been bad.

Wait?! Tasking us?! As in... she was supposed to face ... that?  

This was madness! This - this was..... this was suicide. 

Pale hands fiddled with the knife at her side as everything was starting to set into her heavy chest.

All she had ever done was try to protect her sisters. Who cared if those assholes had died in a bloody mess, they had deserved it and now... now she was a disposable pawn going to be thrown at a being that hardly seemed human. 

Then, as she finally seemed to finally accept that even if this wasn't the end she had expected, it was just leaving her a dead woman walking, a new fear raised its head. The screaming of the stones was deafening and despite herself, she could feel herself screech out as she felt the world crash down above her.

[hr]
Bright, sanguine eyes shot open as Ruby tried to understand what was happening. She had never thought she had been scared of death; it had always just seemed such a silly thing to worry about, considering she technically had already died once. It seemed the world was just finding all new kinds of ways to make her second-guess this belief.

Blinking, she blindly took in the bright light, until finally her sight returned. The sweeping views of the fields of grass and mountains in the far-off created a gasp to escape from her lungs. Ruby had never seen such a sight before in her life, all she had done was live in the dark and dangerous cramped spaces of the red light district and now. Now, there was a whole new world right in front of her.

Just as fast as the beautiful sight and fresh smell reached her, she was reminded once again of her fate. Looking back at the other figures, she eyed them one by one before looking back to the mountains and taking a deep breath in. It seemed like the Warden had found a whole new way to torture her, with such a beautiful freedom so close, and yet she had her marching orders.

The question rode the cool air to reach her ears, and it was then that Ruby turned to look at the skeletal man with a questioning raised eyebrow.[color=9B111E][i] 'Friends'?[/i][/color] She let out a small pfft and rolled her eyes, they were decidedly not friends. Unfortunate souls who had been played seemed like a much more accurate term.