Russell's mind felt scattered, literally.

As he tumbled down the dark hole he was thrown down, he had not one but millions of different perspectives, Every one of them seeing the same thing, sensing the same environment. But there was no thought, no feelings; fear, anger, longing-nothing. It was as if the world was a very long play and he himself was a very sleepy audience. He felt what could only be defined as nothing, yet everything, because fundamentally, they are one and the same.

And they exited the tunnel and he could feel himself merging again, the bits of his mind coming together, to form into one single entity that could be called Russell. And this time, he had a body.

He sat up and looked around, the red rocky ground stinging his palm. And, there was nothing to see, literally.

Red mist rolled on the ground, so thick he couldn't see more than twenty feet in front of him. It smelled, weirdly, like burning coal and garlic. His eyes stung. The mist tasted spicy in his mouth. It swirled and twirled in front of him like a freakish dance performer. Above him , the sun was blood red through the mist.

Russell stood up and looked around. If he needs to survey this area, he needed to get to a higher place. So first, he has to see which way the ground is sloped. Best way to do that is let a ball down on a comparatively even surface, where it can roll without strain.

Russell searched for his pockets and made the next big discovery.

He was naked.

'cause why not?

"Woop!" He yelled as his hand instantly went to cover his private parts, although he suspected the red mist did a very good job with that. The environment suddenly felt much colder. He wished there was a fire around.

Wished, mind you.

His hands, still close to his private parts, burst into flames.

"AAAAHHHH!!" He screamed as he fell back on his butt, his hands not even there to protect it. They were too busy flailing over his head.

He waved it above his head like a flag until he realized it wasn't hurting, not even a bit.

He brought them down, in front of his eyes. His hands burned like twin torches, bright and orange. His hands appeared black inside the fire. Bright red spots ran on his skin like ember.

Wow.

Russell had never considered himself a hero or some other magical thing he was not, that was solely Vivi's job-

His fire snuffed out at the thought of her.

Wherever he's been before, whatever he'd seen that made him question the world he knew, he'd been leaning on Vivi and Vivi had been leaning on him. She was always the hand to hold and the ear to trust.

But now she was not there anymore, and he was all alone, again. And he'd hurt Vivi. Who knows how deep he cut when he plunged his talons in her shoulder. She might be...

No!

He could not afford to believe that.

For now, at least.

He wished his hands to burn again. His hands flared up like hot coal.

Now he took the time to look at them at awe.

His hands were black as, well, coal. As they burned, fissures appeared on it, spewing bright orange and red flames while exposing a brightly glowing interior. The fire made a very distinct hissing noise only heard with charcoal furnaces.

He would've experimented all sorts of different things with it, but suddenly he felt a very sharp and distinct pain on his back. Before he could think anything, he was flung up in the air and slammed to the ground.

Russell couldn't scream in shock, but his ribs screamed for him. Black and yellow dots danced in front of his eyes, his ears registered a perpetual whistle.

" I see the chaos has freed you as it freed me," said a very familiar voice.

Russell rolled over to face the monster that once resided in his mind and was once again, utterly mortified.

It was a cow, or at least it's face was.

The rest of it's body was of a Bear's, grey, furry and huge, easily twenty feet tall.

"No matter," he said in that strangely hissing voice of his," Reforming has left me hungry. You'd make an excellent appetizer."

The enormous body slammed down on him just in time for Russell to jump out of his reach. He landed barefoot on the ground.

Now, Russell may have had very jumbled and very repulsive emotions for that creature, along with some very chosen words he would've wanted to say. But at that moment, all that flooded his mind was sheer power of panic.

Russell didn't know how the cow headed demon could possibly eat him, and he didn't want to find out.

Alas, you don't always get what you want.

The thing stood up on it's hind legs, Russell had time to notice it had a lizard-like tail. Then it faced him and the cow head split lengthwise, revealing rows upon rows of daggerlike teeth. A rope-like tongue came out of it's sideward mouth and saliva dropped to the ground.

"Clow glere," it said, which probably meant something Russell did not care about. He did what any person who has recently gotten firepower would do.

He ran.

Somewhere in the back of his head, the logical side of his head said that he was already dead, how is he even going to die again. However, the rest of his mind was too busy tearing itself apart in panic. He heard something heavy drop on the ground behind him, then thundering noise of pounding footsteps.

He probably went about twenty yards before the large clawed hand slammed into him, sending him flying. He landed silently but painfully.

Before he could rise up again, a paw pinned him down.

"More running, boy? Come on, now. Amuse me!"

Russell wriggled under his paw like a captured lizard.

"What does it feel like? To run from everything? From me. From our Lord. From your father," a wet slippery feeling filled Russell's backside, probably it's tongue, "From Lupa."

Russell stopped wriggling.

What?

"Oh please, boy. I've been inside your head. I know every nook and cranny of your mind. I know you want her. I know how you want her," the cowhead continued.

What is he talking about?  Of course not! Lupa is a werewolf and I ... I'm a human. It's not possible!

"And I presented her to you, just the way you wanted. And what did you do?" The monster spit, it fell on the ground and made a clump of red clay. The force on his back increased, "Anyway, be grateful. You'll meet your end quicker now."

But, but, I wanna see my team again. I wanna see Vivi, I wanna talk to Arron, I wanna work with Elli....I wanna tell Lupa, tell Lupa...

.....

Know what? Let's stop running.
"You know," Russell suddenly found his voice, for some reason, all his fears were suddenly gone, like magic, or shock, "You're right about one thing."

The cow must've thrown a confused glance at him, because there was no comeback.

Russell screamed "Consumptious!", bent his hand to his back and grabbed it's large furry paw and summoned fire. He was done running. It was time to experiment.

The cow, comically, mooed and scrambled back. Russell jumped back on his feet and, surprising himself, lunged forward, his fists now two balls of bright orange flame.

His first punch caught it in the abdomen. The hand went straight into the flesh, making a charred hole into it, where it burned like a furnace. The cow pulled himself free and tried to slice him, but he was untouchable, literally. Hard as rock and hot as fire, because that's what he was.

The cow managed to dodge his next punch and tried to run, but Russell wasn't going to let it go so easily. It was that thing's fault he was stuck here, so far from his team. Someone has to pay.

Russell chased it, black blood trailing from it's wound, slowing it down. As he got closer, it lashed out, but Russell parried and punched. Again and again and again and again.

Sooner than later, the creature was a steaming carcass on the red ground. It's magnificent furry hide bloodstained and torn.

Oh yes, it's very magnificent hide.

A few hours( Russell judged by the sun) later, a very hungry Russell stood up, wearing a exotic fur coat. A chunk of meat in his hands. He summoned flame in his hand, cooking it. Closing his eyes he bit into it.

How did demon meat taste?

It tasted like hell.

The demons black ink blood was making it's way to his right. That meant to his left was higher land.

Taking ten more chunks of the black and white meat, he walked towards the higher ground, a silhouette in the mist, burning fire in his heart and hand.