When you appear as a corpse even after death... apparently (at least for me) it\'s only you that sees it that way. So the duel challenger would probably have had no idea you looked like a corpse in your client.
The weirdest I\'ve seen when was I was in a room with a Trepor that had just reset. I ran up to attack it to find it was already taken, and then shortly after it was dead. Eventually I asked \"is anyone there?\" only to find that there were two other players in the room. Both were completely invisible to me, even after they started talking. Apparently my client never received info that they had entered, and so never displayed them even when they attacked or moved. I\'m not sure if it\'s related to packet loss or not.
So if someone runs up and tries to take an npc you just approached, keep in mind they may not have been deliberately rude... they actually may not be able to see you. (But 99% of the time they probably just are one of those rude ar... er pigs).