Stonefang mine was as it had been before he left: dry, stuffy, and blisteringly hot. The scent of melted ore clung to the walls. And as the universe grew denser, and he came back to it, these were the things he felt first.

And second to come was his sight. As his body lurched up from nothing, he saw the movement, the running. The figure scampering off down a shaft, deeper into the mine.

"Yurt!" He yelled, knowing that it was to no avail. The figure was off, and he had no choice but to pursue.

They ran down the dirt tunnels, stumbling over uneven surfaces. They bolted past several demonic miners, corrupted entities forced to work for no reason other than working. The Lizard-men looked up, and readied their pickaxes, but before they could attack, the two runners were out of sight.

A fat minister stood next to an elevator shaft. It laughed at the presence of its new prey, and let loose a fireball. Yurt, coming first, dodged out of the way and then charged the Minister, cutting open its grotesque belly with his hook.

The Champion came swiftly behind him, and raised his sword.

"There's nowhere to go. Turn around Yurt, look at me."

Yurt's face turned, and the Champion saw it for the first time. He was a young man, as young as him, with sharp blue eyes like dagger, and dark hair. But that was only half of his face. The other was a burned, mangled wreck. It stunned him, and managed to make him hesitate for a moment.

That hesitation was enough. Yurt, holding the still cackling Minister in his grasp, rushed toward the massive shaft and jumped down into it.

"You've got to be kidding me…" The Nameless said aloud, then the realization struck him: He can't die. I can. He knows this.

He ran to the wheel and began to turn it, as quickly as he could. Each turn of the crank came agonizingly slow, and he wished that he could just jump down like Yurt. When he saw the elevator, a simple wooden platform, come up, he ran to it before it had even fully raised, and began to lower it again.

By the time he had reached the bottom, it had been over two minutes. Two minutes.

And at the bottom of the shaft, lying there, was the crushed body of the Minister, somehow even more disgusting than it had been before. Yurt was nowhere in sight.

He cursed, and took off down the tunnel exit from this place.

But what awaited him was a maze.

Tunnels and their offshoots webbed throughout this area. They had no distinguishing features, and each looked just like the next. The tunnels went up and down as well, forming a labyrinth in three dimensions.

There was no point in running, anymore, so he slowed. It was better to pace himself. If he found Yurt, he'd take up chase, but for now he was just as likely to find some hint of him walking. And it made it easier to scan the tunnels for any such clue.

He took turn after turn, not knowing if it was the right one, and occasionally making an arbitrary decision simply because it popped into his head. Right is always correct, so let's go right this time.

A childish part of him considered calling Yurt's name again, but why? What good would it do? Why would he ever answer?

It was then that he first heard the rolling.

Oh no.

It was behind him. The end-result of an unholy union between a beetle and an armadillo. And he could feel the Earth above and below him quivering with the force of its approach. If it crushed him when he was like this, he was truly done for.

He ran.

Behind him, he heard it gaining on him. It was moving down the shaft at least twice as quickly as he could run. Maybe three times. It grew louder, and the entire tunnel started to shake so much that he stumbled, and almost fell. He could imagine the result, if he fell. He'd never have time to get back up before it was all over, and the juices inside his body were squished out through the joints in his armor.

Somehow, with that thought, he found it in him to run slightly faster.

The heat came, heat on his armor, and heat on his back. These things had magma and fire under their skin. It was the only explanation. It was so close that it was going to plow him over and flatten him, he was done for, there was no hope.

And then he saw the intersection.

As quickly as he could, he dodged to the side, almost fast enough. The rolling beetle clipped his back, and he was slammed against, and partially through, the tunnel's wall. It dragged him along for a few more meters. His body was being grinded between the edge of the living boulder and the wall.

But eventually, it moved past him, and kept going. He slumped.

It took him a few seconds to realize that he was alive.

It took another few seconds to realize that none of his bones were broken. Though his armor had been in better condition.

Thank god. He thought, and squirmed inwardly as he remembered Sage Freke, and remembered what he might actually be thanking.

But there was no time for that now. He needed to find Yurt.

He went back to the previous intersection, the one that he had tried, and failed, to duck into, and began to walk down it. The tunnels remained quiet, very quiet, and he realized, now that the rumbling was gone, that if he stayed perfectly still. He might hear the heavy trudging of another echoing through these caves.

So he stood, and listened. After a few moments, he placed his ear against the wall.

And then he heard it.

A faint rumbling.

No…he thought, That's not fair. I avoided it. I avoided it.

But it was there, and it was getting louder.

He breathed deeply. He had to do something, anything, to get out of this. He couldn't run again, he hadn't been fast enough before, and on top of everything he was now fatigued. He thought of all the things he had on him. Was there anything he could put up as a massive shield? A barrier that could hold this thing back from killing him?

As he searched himself, he found it on his back: a rusty spade. He'd taken it off of one of the Demons when he first came here and kept it because it might come in handy someday. The memory of a spade being useful at one point was vague, but it was there.

And then, as the rumbling increased. A piece of dirt bounced off his helmet.

He looked up. Chunks of dirt and dust were falling all around. These caves weren't stable. The dirt was soft.

He pulled out the Spade and started digging.

It was a tremendously stupid course of action, he realized as the first mound of dirt only pulled out enough for his toes to go under the surface. But it was all that he had. He relaxed his mind, and he welcomed the speed and strength of the Demons Souls inside of him. The spade, at first moving at a quick, but very human speed, now became a whirlwind. The dirt was tossed aside faster than gravity could work, and soon it wasn't even resting on the spade, he dug deeper, and finally the hole could fit his body. He jumped into it and kept digging.

The rumble grew loud, and he felt the heat. His upper body was still above the hole. He looked up, and he saw it there. Rolling toward him, a half second away from crushing him. Desperately, he ducked.

He felt its back touch him, very slightly, as it rolled along him, putting his back on equal level with the floor. But there were no crushed bones, and he was alive.

He looked up, now. Ahead of him the ball was slowing down, and coming to a stop.

Damn it.

He kept digging faster. Thank god these monsters moved ponderously slow when they weren't rolling. Still, its plodding steps antagonized him, and made him more fearful than he would have been if it had rushed him.

The pile of dirt on the side of the hole began to blot out the tunnel itself, so he dug on the other side. Making a soft wall between the magma creature and himself. It kept up at the same pace, not reconsidering its desire to kill for a moment. It is human nature to consider slow creatures less vicious, but this monster alone stood to prove human nature wrong.

Finally, his head was under when he was standing. He kept digging, deeper. There was no longer any logic behind the digging, he was just doing it. Dirt flew up out of the hole, tossed six feet or more straight up, through the shaft. But still the monster came.

And then above him he saw its orange, fiery eye, looking down on him. He kept digging, paying it no heed. A splash of dirt hit it, and it made a strange screeching sound. Then, he felt something warm shooting down toward him, and it felt like fire touched his back, he screamed.

Above him was its tongue, glowing a bright orange with pure heat. He swerved away from it, and placed his already burned back against the side of the pit. Facing it head on. An insane, vicious idea that only a trapped man can think of came to him, and he swung his spade at full force. The edge of the blade turned orange as it hit the bright tongue, but it swung true, and severed the appendage from its owner.

Above, the thing screamed again. Boiling hot saliva rained down on him, and the tongue squirmed at the bottom of the hole. With the heated shovel, he began digging faster.

Then the ground suddenly felt very loose.

He realized in that instant that he had been hoping to dig down into another tunnel this entire time. But given the circumstances he hadn't considered what that would entail.

He was about to fall, and he had no idea how far.

Dirt and rocks gave way under and around him, and he grabbed at the powdery walls. His fingers slipped through them and in an avalanche of dust he spun, and prepared himself for a violent landing.

His armor took some of the fall, the desperate, pathetic roll that he managed to pull off took more of it. It still hurt. He groaned, and looked up.

Yurt was standing right in front of him.

The two of them stared at each other for several seconds.

Yurt turned and ran.

"Get…back…here…" he murmured groggily, and pulled himself through a mound of dirt to stand up. He felt his armor dangling around him. After all the punishment he had put it through, it was in shambles, and he let the shambles fall to the ground. His arm guard and gauntlet gave way. The plate on his back, which was burning hot, thankfully fell off of him, its severed straps no longer keeping it in place. He was moving faster, but still not as fast as Yurt.

Then, there was a light ahead of them. The color of fire, like all the lights here, but a light nonetheless. He looked up, and saw it: the tunnel ended in a river of lava, one that other monsters were bathing in. They didn't seem to notice them yet, and as Yurt saw this too, he ground to a halt.

"Yurt…!" He called out. "Give me back that binding, now."

Yurt looked up, his scorched face just as horrid as it had been before, and then ran to the side, down a passage he hadn't seen. When he reached the end of the tunnel he ran too, tailing Yurt more closely than he ever had been before.

The tunnel they were now in was open on its left, facing out to the baths of lava that the bizarre rock creatures softened themselves in. He didn't have time to consider why they did this. All that mattered was getting Yurt.

Ahead of him, Yurt took another right, and he followed. The footing became even more unstable, but he could tell that they were back in human tunnels, dug by either men, or the demons that they had transformed into.

Yurt turned another corner, and kept gaining distance, but the whole time, he managed to stay on him.

"Yurt, I'm going to catch you eventually, just give up!" He yelled after him, as he ran.

There was no response.

And then Yurt turned another corner, very sharply, and then stopped. In his haste, the Champion didn't consider why. And for the rest of his life he would regret that he didn't. He would forever regret that he hadn't backed away, and had instead lusted after catching Yurt so much, that he had forgotten simple caution.

He saw it when he turned, too.

A faint yellow light, directly in front of them, gently pulsing.

In a flash it came back to him:

"…They even used the Soul Arts for mining," Yuria said.

"Well, of course. You beef people up. Make them stronger."

She shook her head, and smiled gently, "no, not like that…well, actually, nevermind, they did. You're right. They looked a lot like you, those miners."

"Like what?"

"Strong. Very much so, and iron-willed."

He looked out into the center of the Nexus, as if she'd be able to see his expression through his armor.

"I'm not iron-willed," he said.

"You are. A normal person would have given up by now…they would have a hundred times over, but you keep fighting. Just because you don't remember who you are, or what you should think, does not make you weak."

There was a pause.

"Back to the miners, though," he said.

"Oh, well yes," she murmured. "They built gigantic pulses of light and force. Concentrated explosions focused on a specific are;, that could demolish entire sections of the mountain at a time, if they were strong enough."

"That's…really something."

She nodded. "I'm not sure if they're all deactivated…if you ever go back to Stonefang, watch out for them."

"No need to worry." He'd said to her, with absolute confidence. "I'll be fine."

And at the time, for whatever reason, the thing that seemed most natural to yell was, "Yurt! Watch out!"

And then a thunder took the tunnel. A great rending cacophony of sound and violence. There was no sight. Sight was blown away with everything else. There was no sound because their ears were blasted to oblivion. The force acting upon them prevented them from feeling anything, along with the gaggle of rocks that came down on their heads.

And the world became a void.

-

When he came to, he could hear Yurt groaning.

He tried to move. He wouldn't. He felt solidified, cocooned in the Earth. There was no way to escape. Worst of all, he was face down. It made it hard to look up, hard to breathe.

But he did manage to look up. And when he did he saw Yurt, laying there. His scarred face dazed. His hair encrusted with dirt. When he came to, he shook it out, and pieces of earth flew across the dark room, barely lit by the Champion's mostly concealed augite, and by something else, off to the side.

For a while, they were both silent.

"Well, we're trapped then," said Yurt. "I guess that this is horribly ironic…in more ways than one."

"…What is?" the Champion asked, when he'd come to enough to talk. He still felt unusually light-headed, and he couldn't figure out why.

"I stole your binding assuming that it would make me invincible," Yurt said. "I wasn't prepared for the possibility of being stuck somewhere."

"Why…" The Champion murmured. "Why did you steal it…we could have helped each other."

"I just explained my reasons, and I already explained to you why I have them. You know why."

"I know, but…it's wrong."

"It's wrong to consume everything that's left of a human being for personal gain. It didn't stop an entire kingdom from prospering off of it."

There was silence between them, then.

"Yurt," he asked, and he realized why his head was foggy. Blood was leaking from underneath his helmet. "…Were you going to kill Yuria?"

"Yes."

"Why? Please…just don't kill her."

"She's a witch."

"I know…but...she's not a bad person. And out of everyone I know here, which is everyone I know, now, with no exceptions…she's the only one who actually knows me, who sees a person inside of me. The Nexial binding…you pay your price for it, Yurt. You lose yourself."

"Duly noted."

"But I'm coming back. With her help…I can feel myself coming back. Please, if you have any soul at all, don't do that to me."

"We all have souls. Some are darker than others."

"Promise me."

"I already made you a promise."

"But…you broke it."

"Exactly."

Another pause. This one could have been hours. He couldn't tell. He felt as if he were dreaming. The orange light that was on the outside of his vision came closer, and he realized that it was lava, slowly leaking out of a hole in the wall, and flowing toward them.

"Yurt," he asked, again.

"What now?"

"Why are you burned like that?"

Yurt was silent, and he didn't think he'd answer the question for a long time. But then the fingers on his one free hand came up, and he stroked the burn.

"It's nothing," he said. "A mage did it, when I was younger."

"Why…?"

"Because he wanted to kill me."

"Oh…when you were a kid? Why would he want to kill a-"

"He wanted my soul."

He wanted to say something after that, to ask more. But Yurt's tone made it clear that asking further was not recommended.

"I wanted to apologize to you," Yurt said, in what felt like eons later.

"What…?"

"You're a good person caught in a bad situation, and I never wanted to harm you. But I have, and as it's looking, I'll continue to."

"Please, Yurt…please don't kill her…"

But Yurt didn't answer that, "the truth is: my mission is to kill all practitioners of the soul arts. And from the beginning, this meant you, too. If I could, I would give you a merciful death right now…rather than having you slowly burn in here…but I can't. Both my legs are broken, and I don't think I'd be able to stand even if they weren't."

"Then don't. Let's stop this, Yurt, let's find a way out, together, we'll do it…come on, please."

"Either you're right about losing your identity, or that blow you took to your head is doing a number on you…probably both. Our paths are set, my friend. And for the past few hours, I've been waiting for my opportunity to follow mine."

"…What…?"

"Why do you think I really came down here?" Yurt asked. "Do you think it was to escape? Why would I ever escape to a place as horrid as this? No; I did it to draw you out. I've seen you fight. I watched you on the Tower…you were the one person who could have defeated me. And now, you're out of the way...and I'm headed back."

"Back? What are you talking about? What are you going to do?"

"I hate fire…" Yurt said. "I hate it more than anything. It could almost be said I have a phobia…"

"What are you talking about?"

"…I have to do this…" Yurt whispered. And it sounded like he was whispering to himself. "…I have to. I have to do this…"

His mind came back to him around that point, and he spoke more rationally than before. "Whatever you're going to do, it's probably not a good idea. Now come on, I have moongrass in my pack. I can't grab it, but if you can reach it-"

"I'm not afraid…" Yurt murmured. "…I'm not afraid…"

And then, he rolled out from under the rock that the right side of his body was pinned under, and the Champion realized that he had never been pinned very well. With two broken legs repeatedly hitting the ground, it was easy to see his teeth gritting in pain. He kept rolling, though…and his body moved straight into the lava.

And he screamed, and the disgusting smell of burning flesh filled the small, closed off chamber. The scream became more frantic, more high pitched, and then became the scream of a man who knew he was about to die. His entire body went up in flames, and turned red and fell apart like tender meat.

And then it all started to dissolve.

No…

The pieces of him dissolved into a teal mist, which floated up out of the lava, and then away.

No…

The essence of Yurt's Soul came out of the lava, and passed through the walls of stone as if they were nothing, and then continued on its way back to the Nexus.

He cried out, in vain, in a voice that no one could hear, "Yurt! Please don't kill her! Please! I need her! I NEED HER!"

And all the while, the lava crept closer.

-

Yes, I know. Chapter 7 then Chapter 8 in rapid succession, after a decent period of inactivity. What can I say? Writers are artists, and artists create when inspiration strikes. I've had my fair share of inspiration lately, and I finally realized how I'm going to end this entire plot. (way, way in the future, actually; this is going to be going on for a while)

Anyway, I think I'll put off continuing this for a little bit. I have other projects to work on and such. At least it's not a horrible cliffhanger ending. I would absolutely hate myself and feel like a horrible person if I left people off on a horrible cliffhanger ending for a long period of time.

Of course, you may for whatever reason, feel that this is a horrible cliffhanger ending. Though I can't imagine why. Feel free to let me know if it is, I'm always open to the possibility that I'm wrong. And if I am wrong, I suppose I might continue it sooner.