Karellian tried not to carry anything too important when he was entering the furnace, knowing well that at any moment he could lose everything to a nasty fall or a pathetic trip on a small rock. That still didn't stop him from having a full-body panic after he tripped ever so slightly on a loose brick, hearing the sound of something in his bag falling out. He attempted to turn and find it, maybe even catch it, but to no avail- the stones behind and in front of him were completely bare.

His head bolted around, he shuffled through his bag, and he tried desperately to find out what he had lost. All of his tools were still there, as were all of his rations. Eventually he got to his specimens, and that's when his panic became bad enough to cause him to shake. All of the specimens he had in his bag were ones that he had found in the furnace, but that didn't mean that any one of them could fall and survive the lava below. In fact, most of the bugs he had picked up would barely be noticed before bursting into flames and sinking into the lava.

The courser heard a small noise from besides them, and he quickly turned his head. There, on one of the stones closer to the lava, a flame salamander was staring up at him, making happy little noises as its skin brightened around the lava, some of the orange melted rock dripping off of its body as if it was water. Karellian looked in the salamander enclosure, and found it to be empty.

He sighed in relief. Exceedingly grateful for the fact that none of his more fragile critters had met with an unfortunate fate. In fact, the flame salamander might have been the only specimen he had that could survive something like that. He was grateful, but he was also annoyed at how much of a panic he had been put into.

If he could yell at the salamander in the lava, he would, but he knew that the poor thing wouldn't understand anyways.