“What’s happening?” Pait cried out.


    “H-here, I think I can project what I see into Master’s soul world.” Alysia dered.


    “Ahhhh! Turn it off! Turn it off!”


    “Alysia, you should be turning into a drill now.”


    “I’m working on it!”


    We plummeted down quite a distance. I used air to blow away the smoke and to slow my descent, kicking off a step when I needed to. The heat grew as I reached the bottom, where dark material undted menacingly, red light glowing out from the cracks.


    My feet hit theva and then fire erupted across my body. Did I make a mistake? I tossed all of my clothing into my soul world. Heat Immunity didn’t transfer over to the items I was wearing. Anything of decent enough quality would have survived that brief exposure and everything that was destroyed probably wasn’t worth it anyway. It wasn’t my best armor, although given my history of losing armor it was hard to say that I bothered with anything longsting.


    “I’m ready!”


    “Let me know if you can’t handle the heat.”


    Alysia wasposed of plenty of incredible alloys that should be able to reach the limits, butva wasva and I didn’t want to risk her being harmed. If I couldn’t use her, I’d figure something out. I had already sunk to my knees. I waspletely naked, so it was good I was in a ce I was unlikely to see anyone else.


    “Go for it.”


    I mmed Alysia down into theva, pushing her down as far as she would go. Then, her body started turning, the des of her drill-like form moving in a circle. She started to move down more and more into the muck. Creating an air bubble around my head, I allowed myself to sink in behind her. I was plunged into darkness, but I only had one direction in mind, heading straight down.


    Theva felt like a strange puddy, like trying to swim through y. Although I could recognize the incredible heat, it didn’t feel the least bit ufortable for me. Under Alysia’s unstoppable des, she was able to cut through it and move downward. Once I waspletely buried, she picked up the pace, turning faster and faster. I could feel a strange pull. As theva behind the drill tried to fill in space I was on, it would catch on my legs like arms trying to grab me and hold me in ce.


    “Faster,” I ordered.


    “Y-yes!”


    Her drilling sped up once again, and the movements were soon fast enough that a trail line was left in theva. All I could do was hold on as Alysia used her strength to move forward. I lost track of time as I was pulled through the swampy muck like a worm. It was a rhythmic process, too strenuous to allow me to lose my attention, but too smooth to keep me focused. That was before we suddenly hit something and stopped.


    “Alysia?”


    “We’ve made it through theva. We’re at the end of the volcanic shoot. It’s rock from here on.”


    So, we reached the rocky part of our journey.