Inspirational quote: No beauty shines brighter than that of a good heart.

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Lauriel was extremely petrified of and traumatised by Section One before she had even gone in there.

She was working with Anastasia, however unlike Anastasia, Lauriel was not halfway inside.

"Well, what are you waiting for then?" Astera snapped at her. She was holding a clipboard and was currently jotting notes down, a bit frustrated because Lauriel still hadn't started the test.

Lauriel didn't respond.

"You've got nine minutes and twenty seven seconds. You've really got to go in there. See, your 'partner' Anastasia is already at the beginning of the second section."

Lauriel took a deep breath. It was now or never, so she went in. Although as she was in there, she genuinely couldn't stop thinking about what she actually had to do at this section.

Section 1: Crawl in a box through life threatening tarantulas.

That didn't seem too unpleasant, did it? Plus Lauriel was already halfway inside and no tarantulas were trying to kill her yet.

Boy, did that not last for a long time.

Unexpectedly, Lauriel felt something crawling up her back. She was convinced it was something miniature , although she wasn't so sure about it.

She then turned around slowly, and realising it was a tarantula, she screamed.

"Aaaaaaaah!"

More of them came tumbling down on her straight afterwards. It probably would have been better had Lauriel not looked up at all.

Tarantulas were infesting her at the moment. Name one place, arms, legs, hair, there was no part of Lauriel's body that did not contain any tarantulas.

She tried removing them from her eyes, although that was easier said than done. She took a deep breath, inhaling and exhaling, realising that there was only one true way to do this.

Move slowly.

S l o w l y...

Despacito...

Nearly there... Lauriel thought to herself; and while she was at it, she then came to realise that Anastasia was already on the fifth section in with seven minutes remaining.

She got out of section one with six and a half minutes remaining, realising again that Anastasia was still on the same section.

Section two wasn't so bad.
Neither was section three.
Or four.

The worst sections were section five onwards.

Section 5: Very ferocious chickens are going to try their best to attack you. Your aim is to not let them do that, young delinquent, one touch from a chicken and you die, loser.

Section 5 had accidentally been swapped with Section 4 instead because section five was really supposed to be the one with the ants but Lauriel had just conquered that.

Anastasia was at that section, and she was just about to finish, claiming that she would wait for Lauriel. But before that happened, Anastasia had to admit, she was a bit startled to see her.

"Lauriel? Lauriel is that you? It looks like you."

She was located at the middle of the fifth section, and she was currently placing her right hand on her forehead, like people usually did when the sun was blocking them or they were trying to see or talk to someone that was far away from them.

Lauriel went with the second option because, as far as Lauriel was concerned, there was no sun outside whatsoever.

Plus she hadn't even heard Anastasia try to talk to her in the first place. She was mainly focused on getting past these reckless chickens.

One touch from a chicken and you're out...
One touch...
You're out...

For some reason, this had actually helped Lauriel go through section 5.

Duck!
Swerve!
Gunshot!

Yep. She had killed one chicken. She would have done the same thing to all of them but then she had the feeling that Dr Kozak would have been mad at her because the chickens were technically his from the KOZAHKISTAN FARM about two thousand rooms below this one.

At the end of the simple section 5, Lauriel smiled proudly to herself before turning back to the chickens again.

Guess you guys just got roasted, Lauriel told them, before smirking and jumping to section six, where Anastasia was waiting for her despite there only being about two and a half minutes left.

"Lauriel!"

"Anastasia..."

The two hugged each other, mainly because they were working together and they hadn't seen each other once.

"I'm so sorry I left you out there!" Anastasia apologised, seriously looking at Lauriel now. Lauriel didn't look up once.

"Nah, it's fine. I'm terrible at this anyway."

Then she looked up.

"The flip!" She had shouted at Anastasia.

And the major reason on why she had done that was because, unlike her, Anastasia was clean, not bruised, not looking like a zombie, and looked like she did before the test had even begun.

"How the hell are you not dirty! Or bruised? Or... What?!"

Well there were three options really.

Anastasia wasn't human.

Anastasia probably forced all the animals and insects to fall in love with her and not harm her.
Somehow...

Anastasia killed all the insects and animals in here, although it did say, do not kill any of these insects or animals unless you surely want to perish, which Lauriel had read after she had killed the chicken back at section five.

"I'm used to it. I have seven brothers back at home, haha."

Lauriel didn't reply. She was mainly perplexed on why the flip they were still standing there and what the flip they were still doing standing here.

"Lauriel. Look."

And so Lauriel did. Anastasia had pointed her to a pathway, that seemed to be located right opposite the route they were supposed to be taking.

"What about it..."

"If I didn't know any better, I'm pretty sure this pathway lets you skip both section six and section seven as well."

Lauriel gasped. She did not know that. And neither did anyone else that had taken the test in the past either, by the looks of it.

The pathway was very tiny, but Anastasia was certain that it could fit both of them inside. Lauriel gasped at her, then smiled.

"Are you suggesting that we should cheat? Oh my gosh you're not perfect!"

Anastasia laughed at her and playfully teased her.

"Well of course I'm not perfect. No one is. I'm only nice. And yes. I'm saying we should cheat. You in?"

Lauriel kind of liked this new rebellious Anastasia. This was a once in a lifetime opportunity and she wasn't going to back down from it.

"Well, heck yeah I think we should cheat!"

Checking that nobody was looking, Anastasia looked backwards at the timer, then at Lauriel. She escorted Lauriel through the passageway first then her.

In less than thirty seconds, they had skipped from section five to section eight, with about a minute and fifteen seconds left to spare.

The dinosaur challenge.

Apparently Dr Kozak had gone back in time to get one, shrank it, took it to his teleporter with him, took it to section eight, went out of section eight, made it larger again and locked section eight.

This specific dinosaur was a pterodactyl. A real life pterodactyl.

"Oh my gosh how the hell did Dr K get through with this?"

Anastasia had no idea what Lauriel meant, but she was still fighting the dinosaur.

Thirty seconds left and both of them were still trying to fight the dinosaur, Anastasia still clean, Lauriel looking like a resurrected zombie.

It was when there were only ten seconds left that things sort of started getting really intense.

They were really close to the door, however Lauriel kept on insisting to Anastasia that she should have just left without her.

Five seconds left.

"Go Anastasia! Leave me! I'm worthless."

Four.

Anastasia was out of the door already, sort of, and was staring at her.

Three.

Anastasia couldn't do this.

Two.

She went back inside, quickly dragging Lauriel outside the test again.

One.

She was halfway through with Lauriel, although as soon as it hit zero, both of them were out!

"Oh my gosh Lauriel!" Anastasia cheered in absolute jubilance. "We just survived the perilous obstacle course test!"

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Moral of chapter: Working as a team is much better than working alone.