D/N: Mmm, back again! This chapter, I plan to get things moving! YEEHAW! Hahaha. Man, I'm tired. . Yes, I act like this when I'm tired, so there. I'm also avoiding my homework. . Jeez. Anyway, continuing on from last time. Let's do a little recap for those of you too lazy to go back. Chihiro has just left on her quest to find the palace of the Gods with a glowing thing that could care less what happened to her. Hehehe, foreshadowing much?

-cries- It's already chapter 8! So far into the story. . . don't ask me how many chapters I plan to make this; probably fifteen, around, but you never know. .

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Chihiro stumbled over a hidden tree root and bit back a swear as her toes throbbed in pain, bleeding in her shoes, yet she didn't dare falter. They had been going for a long time and Chihiro had learned in that time that anything she said would be completely ignored by her guide. It continued adamantly upon its course no matter what happened, and, after a while, the human decided that she really did hate the thing.

Both of her knees ached from numerous scrapes and bleeding cuts, her hands ached from trying to catch her when she had tripped so many times. Sweat dripped down her spine, between her shoulder blades, and between her breasts; her forearm had taken care of what threatened to overspill into her eyes and blind her yet the rest itched madly as it stuck against her skin. The sword beat a rhythmic pulse upon her leg as she walked, serving as a constant reminder that there would be danger, there had to be. These woods had nearly killed her before, and Haku had been close to her at the time.

Suddenly, Chihiro tripped again over what she hoped was another root root. She screamed as she fell, and the ground gave way from under her feet. Dirt flew into her face and open mouth as she slid down a tunnel-like path, both of her arms thrown up in front of her face to protect herself from the small pebbles and splinters of roots that got in her way, unable to stop her movement with straining heels.

She was rammed full force into a wall of hard-packed earth and rock, and cried out in pain, her insides feeling as if they all had been hammered constantly by spikes. Sprawled out in a darkened place that smelt musty and of soil, the only good thing Chihiro could find about her current situation was that she had stopped moving. Sitting up gingerly, her head came in contact with a low ceiling. She was thrown flat onto her back once more with another moan, the hand that felt in better condition instantly rubbing the spot that was rammed by the stone. Her fingers came away sticky with what she half-hoped was blood.

The next time Chihiro tired to sit up, she did it slowly, one hand feeling for the roof. Assessing her bodily condition, she reasoned that she wasn't too badly injured; merely sore. Her hands stretched out before her, feeling around her, wondering where she was. Above her was a crumbly ceiling of packed soil and tree roots; there was no way she could try and dig her way out. Before her, she felt another crumbly wall, and below her, a floor of cobblestones. The edges of the stones felt worn down to her questing finger, as if it had once been frequently used as a road or a footpath at one point. Getting on her hands and knees, she began to follow the path, seeing no light to guide her and having no other choice anyway.

She crawled on and on, realizing that there was an open path here. The height of the tunnel began to increase as she went along, as if someone had removed dirt enough for a person a foot shorter than her and never finished their task. As her excitement grew, she remembered the glowing orb, and reality came crashing back down on her again. Stopped in the middle of the dark tunnel, her fears began to grow into an almost wild panic. The new environment had distracted her from the plain fact that she had lost her guide in the spirit realm; she probably couldn't make it without the stupid glowing thing, no matter how much she had hated it. If she couldn't make it, then she couldn't help her friends, she wouldn't have the hope that had sparked within her earlier, despite her best efforts to keep it away.

Chihiro bit back her tears as they threatened to overspill her lids; it was a bad time to be pessimistic. She would cry when she could see sunlight, or some sort of light, again. When she could see her own hands in front of her face; she didn't want to suffocate within this blackness from a lack of fresh oxygen. With that thought in mind, she pressed on, her mind a merciful blank.

She didn't know how long she was crawling except for the fact that her knees and palms ached from having her weight pressing upon them for such a long time. The tips of her fingers felt scraped and worn from bumping into unseen obstacles in the darkness. And, yet, she didn't pay any attention to them; she could see light.

Up ahead in the tunnel, a small pinpoint of light, one she thought she had been hallucinating, was growing larger with every few inches she crawled. It was yellow-orange and flickered, the sign of firelight, not sunlight. Chihiro couldn't help but cry out with joy, and began to move faster, ignoring her pain, only focusing upon the light, her last grasp of sanity in what seemed an insane world of shadows.

The source of the light revealed itself to be a lantern, hung on a long metal pole that stood next to the wall, the lantern itself made of black iron. A cheery little flame brightly illuminated the tunnel for only a few feet radius. Chihiro's arms wrapped around the pole, and she curled her body up around it, crying from both relief, anger, fear and sheer exhaustion. She didn't look up until a black shadow fell upon her.

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D/N: -is amused- My keyboard looks like I decided to murder someone before typing this. . . hahaha! Man, I need to stop painting with my fingers. . . Ah, it's too amusing to stop. :3

Anyway, forget about my bloody keyboard. Mmm, I've been getting writer's block so often, I'm not sure when the next chapter is going to be produced. ' Sorry, but I've just been so drained. . . that's why I ask for anyone's ideas! You don't have to give me one, but they're welcomed. Heh, yeah, I know: I'm pathetic.

So, read and review! And keep me warm with those flames. . .