Prompt: Salamanders are valuable to sell as alchemical components, but they are also overhunted and becoming scarce. You find one that has strayed too far from the magma, its skin beginning to cool and harden. It would be easy to capture it like this. What do you do?

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Daoloth was still not certain how he had ended up working with the dark flaxen chestnut courser but here he was. Moritz was silent and had a tendency to lead them through more dangerous sections of the dungeon. He had asked for any guide willing to help guide him using a contract he had gotten his hooves on but he had not expected to be tossed with the silent survivalist who gave the blue courser the creeps.
Daoloth was not the only one it seemed as Copycat, the oceanic courser’s mimic companion, always kept the blue courser between itself and the mysterious stranger. Little stubby wooden legs kept the mimic moving and they had to be extra careful not to accidentally light on fire with the heat and lava around them.
“Are we going anywhere in particular?” Daoloth asked.
Moritz shook his head in response.
“So we are just wandering around the Earthen Furnace?”
Moritz once again shook his head.
Daoloth took a deep breath but kept his mouth shut. He didn’t think further questions were actually going to get him any answers and only annoy his guide so he became silent. Noticing the increase in lava flow around them he did become tempted to say something but instead turned to his companion and realized that the mimic needed a hand.
“Hold on a moment?” he asked his guide.
Moritz stopped and turned to watch as Daoloth lowered himself to lay on the warm stone and allowed the mimic to climb onto his back. Balancing itself on top of some of the bags on Daoloth’s harness it settled in. The courser rose and the group continued on their way through the furnace.
Eventually they came to a series of lava pools and the oceanic courser could see something skittering from pool to pool. Shuffling out of one, across the short distance, and into the next one. They were faster, faster than Daoloth could even dream of being.
“What are those?” he asked.
He was unable to figure out what he was looking at, just that they were small and fast.
“Salamanders,” Moritz replied.
It had been the only thing the chestnut courser had said thus far and it almost surprised the blue courser and his mimic companion. They watched, still and silent, as the quiet courser moved towards the pools of lava and began to pull out some sort of small boxes, setting them up along the pathways between the pools. Traps was all Daoloth could assume they were.
“They’re valuable to sell,” Moritz added.
That caught Daoloth’s attention. Looking from Moritz and his traps to the little salamanders, he wondered if he could catch one for himself. He knew that would be a challenge though and with the lava his companion would be no help in this matter at risk of catching fire. Daoloth, while a bit cold, would not risk his little treasure sniffer. While Moritz was busy, Daoloth began to wander around the pools, looking for anything of interest or a means of catching a salamander for himself that didn’t rely on ‘borrowing’ one of Moritz’s traps. The oceanic courser wanted to spend as little as possible and gain as much as possible. As he wandered his mimic began to shift on his back.
“What’s up? You smell something?”
The mimic began tapping his back with one of his legs, indicating a direction. Looking in that direction he saw a salamander, faded in color and skin hardening, sitting on the stone too far from the pools to reach. Grinning, the courser trotted over and picked it up. A thought to maybe toss it back crossed his mind but instead he placed it inside a bottle that Copycat had pulled out from his bag.
“Good find,” Moritz said, nearly making Daoloth jump out of his skin.
“Thanks,” he replied, still feeling uneasy.
With a salamander obtained and Mortiz’s traps set, they continued on their way through the Earthen Furnace and back up to the Overgrown Caverns.