Lizard?

Alexander opened his eyes slightly shocked. In his mind was segmented the picture of the vampire striking his head. He felt the same feeling he had back then and suffered a small mental breakdown in his seated position. Then he looked to his right and subsequently to his left, he was still in the cave but there was no vampire to be seen.

'Had it been a nightmare?' He thought to himself. He smelled something repulsive that made it difficult to breathy, it smelled rotten. He looked around himself, in a pool around him he saw dried blood. It was his blood.

He got shocked and shouted with a high pitched voice. 'How am I still alive?' he pondered. It all seemed nonsensical. He replayed the event in his head over and over. It was such a strange occurrence. The feeling of being pinned against a wall and having one's life be completely in someones else's life was terrible.

It was a feeling of desperation, of aghast and honestly despair. When he thought back to the exact moment before his lights went out, he would let out a small shout. He felt extremely uneasy.

To distract himself he thought back to other memories, memories of his childhood. However, the recent memories would not leave him alone, his fall, his suffering and his struggle for survival. He remembered that he could barely think. He could barely think.

This fact had shocked him as currently, he was thinking clearer than ever, all his memories felt more detailed than ever before. How come to the change? He simply wanted to escape this torment, that's all he wanted. He got back into his mind and targeted the specific point that he had no control over.

There was no such place, he started hyperventilating.' Please don't be what I think it is', he thought to himself. Each second made his hyperventilating become faster, had the salamander abandoned him?. 'Please, please don't be so' he thought. But each second he scoured his mind, he could not find another entity or creature living there.

He knew that he had captured a powerful spirit and thought that it would be his way out of this. If it had disappeared, how would he survive this?

Then he thought struck him hard as stone. If the salamander had disappeared then his magic would as well. He tried activating his firehands ability and it succeeded. Half of him had expected it to fail quite drastically.

This meant that the spirit was still inside him, but where was it. "Salamander, are you there," he asked his own consciousness, it felt strange to do so. He got no response which made him even more confused. He tried again, and again but nothing worked.

As a last resort he tried saying "lizard", he got a response.

"How dare you, have I not told you not to call me a lizard. I am Salamanded the great Alburazath Kanako Zelado the third of the second force"

"You shall be punished for your grievances"

He felt the fire start spreading through his entire being. His anxiety shot through the roof, the pain he was about to go through made his eyes go wild and sparratically shake. Then the flame came, this time it was white and hell was an understatement to describe his pain.

The pain was so mind-shattering that, Alexander had a tough time screaming if not breathing. He shook vigorously on the floor, trying to empty out some of the energy the pain brought with it. The last thing he needed was for the pain to continue at this pace. It was terrible pain.

Then like all things, it ended. The relief came like a buss waiting for you to climb on even though you were late. Why did magic have to be so painful? Nobody had told Alexander anything about this pain, it was as if he was the only one experiencing it, otherwise, why wasn't it a famous rumour.

After the sense of relief came joy, the joy of hope. The pain was not comparable to the complete despair he would feel if the salamander had disappeared. With the hope regained he sat up straighter. Even though the salamander had not left him the question of his survival was still pestering him. How was he alive?

He decided to keep disturbing the salamander until he received an answer.

"The great Albuzath Ke… ladoo of the third fifth force" Alexander had not realised that he had managed to completely butcher his name.

"..."

"Hello"

"..."

"Stop ignoring me"

"..."

"Hello"

"..."

"Hello" he shouted in his mind.

"..."

"Lizard sto…"

Before he could finish his sentence, the fire had spread through his entire body. This time green fire emanated from him. The feeling was comparable to being stuck in the sun for an entire day.

His eyes were jerking all over the place, it felt like his entire being would be shattered. He started hitting the floor repeatedly until his arms started bleeding. He shouted as loud as he possibly could as a way for him to release some of the tension.

Then, it disappeared as it came, abruptly. He was left laying on his stomach sweating. It took him a fair share of time before he could recuperate enough to think coherently.

"Will you answer my question"

"..."

"liz…" Once again he could not finish his sentence.

The fire that emanated from him this time was yellow. Alexander had put his hands on his ready to withstand the pain, nothing came. If anything it felt pleasant, he looked at his hand. It was shining in a strange fashion.

"Wha"...

When he tried to consciously think, the pain appeared quite suddenly. It was nothing compared to the previous one, this one was more like holding your hand above a candle. It still hurt like hell, and Alexander screamed but it was bearable.

In the middle of his scream, he noticed that the pain had disappeared.

"Wh"

When he had begun thinking again the pain resurfaced. Then he would shout, the pain would disappear, he would start thinking only for the pain to resurface. This cycle repeated itself, for at least an hour before the yellow flame disappeared.

Alexander would have been drenched in sweat but he had no liquid left in his head. He felt traumatized, he thought about whether he should give up but scolded himself for even thinking such a thought. That was not how he acted, period. He asked again.