Hopeless ?

Another Day

Walking through marsh lands was not an easy task, nor a pleasant one.
The lengths one go's through to stay alive are sometimes amazing, one finds themselves doing things that they didn't think that they could do.
Finally the knight reached solid ground, pulling himself out of the muck he found a dry spot where he could scrap off all of the mud that had attached itself to his clothing and armor.
The sky had been dark all day as he had been walking, looking like it might rain---but it wouldn't it hadn't rained in months now and even this bog was starting to dry up, it would be gone in another month.
Nothing seemed to grow anymore it just withered up and died, along with everything else.
Months, it had been months since he had seen another human who was still alive and not a corpse.

The knight left the bog and made his way south again since he had to make a detour around an enemy camp and go through the bog.
As time wore on he noticed a faint smell in the air, smoke.
Where there's smoke there's fire. Looking up into the sky he saw a large plume rising up into the heavens.
Making a run for it he made his way towards the burning area to find out if some one was there, anyone.

As he came closer to the source of the smoke he saw that it was a human town that was on fire, maybe someone was still here, still alive.
As he emerged into the town square he was greeted by a foul stench, a smell he knew, the stench of death hung over the square.
There in the middle of the square was a Shade, who greeted the knight with a hiss and shrieked "ALL HUMANSSSSSSS MUSSSST DIE!" With that the Shade started towards the knight ready to add another skull to its collection, it seemed to smile as if anticipating the kill.