And as I glanced about at my surroundings, my heart still pounding, I realized what had happened, what manner of place I had so fortunately fallen into. I was in an ancient crater; the slope down which I had slid was merely a pile of fine volcanic ash covering the boiling, steaming, heated mass below, a mere crust over an inferno. Somewhere within the depths, the carcass of the dinosaur--for such I knew the monster must have been--was being boiled to shreds. My own weight had not been sufficient to break through the surface in my swift descent; I had moved too rapidly to be badly burned by the scalding steam and hot ashes, but the monster’s weight had spelled his doom. But Maliche was dead. I was alone. “My God!” I exclaimed, as a sudden realization came to me. I was in the “realm of hot ashes” of the prophecy. Was the monstrous dinosaur I had seen destroyed, the “fiend Neztpehua”? I was convinced it was so, positive that the dinosaur had been there since the days of Kukulcan. And a strange elation, a sudden unaccountable joy thrilled me. Everything had come out precisely as it had been foretold. I had met every peril, every danger of which Katchilcan had warned me. So far, I had come unharmed through all. My way had been “made easy.” Was there some unknown, some supernatural power watching over me? Was there some magic in the Book of Kukulcan? I tried to reason, tried to convince myself it was all nonsense, all superstition, all the state of my nerves, of my overtaxed muscles and brain. But I could not shake off the belief, could not argue mentally against obvious facts. So fully had the idea possessed me, that I felt absolutely convinced that I would yet come to the Cave of the Bats, to the Bridge of Life and would enter the hidden city of Mictolan.