The first round of The General Games was just a series of tests to analyze how smart each child was, pretty simple really.
Well, actually, it wasn't that simple as we were all forced to take tests for 3 days straight.
This emulated the amount of work the Generals had to go through without any sleep, and those that fell asleep during the time, well, let's just say that they were quietly escorted out of the room, nothing bad happened to them afterwards, yep, definitely nothing bad.
Anyways, I didn't have any time to pay attention to these kinds of things as I was hurriedly being put under both time and pressure, as I knew that even those that stayed awake during the whole time, but scored badly, would get kicked out.
The good thing was, I remembered some of the questions, especially the longer ones, because they had been more fun for me during my first run through, and so, I just picked the correct answer and then moved on, on most of the harder, more time-consuming questions.
I even finished a few of the tests early, before time was up, but that was kind of dumb, as I would then have to battle with my sleepiness out of having nothing to do.
You might be wondering why I never went back and double checked, well, it was because I had always had the mentality that double checking would just lead me to second guess my answers, and because I was answering a quarter of the questions from vague memories alone, I knew that it wouldn't be a healthy practice, at least in this case where I was also extremely deprived off of sleep.
Finally, after 3 days, we were released.
I mean, it was getting to the point where it was hard to breathe, as my brain had shut down far enough so that I had literally lost the human trait of being able to unconsciously breathe.
So, with large, dark bags under my eyes, I groggily flew back up to my bunk as the turbines turned on, and then immediately hit my new, fresh, clean sack.
This was probably the only time that I would ever be grateful to those damn cleaning bots, but that was a story for another time, as I slowly drifted off to la la land.
...
Waking up early in the morning, as my mind still woke up at the appointed 5 o'clock time like back in the L, I couldn't help but shake my head, yet I still had to get up.
Raising my head up slowly this time, as to not bang my head again, I took a look around, trying to find the protagonist of this book.
And, there he was, not even tired by the 3 day test session as he was doing exercises on his bed, a true monster.
I pressed the button to ask for a lift down, and the turbine below me started blowing, but, because everyone was passed out hard, none of the other children woke up.
Taking my time and floating down, I then waited, before a door appeared in front of me.
Walking through, I found myself in a hallway where there were two passages, one to the men's bathroom and one to the ladies bathroom.
And, for those that thought about exploring the area, the door unfortunately blocked anything beyond the hallway to the restrooms.
I went into the bathroom, casually did my business, and then left after washing my hands.
But, you see, this was all just a facade, as although the watchers probably knew this fact, because they were monitoring everything including how much liquid was in my bladder, I was doing this mainly to trick the protagonist.
You see, he had noticed me looking at him, and if I didn't have a good reason for being awake at this time, and after such an exhausting event, he definitely would have gotten suspicious of me.
Walking back through the door, I found myself under the rows of my bunk, but instead of heading back to sleep, as I knew I couldn't, I started taking a walk.
Again, this would be less suspicious then lying in bed pretending to be asleep, as, even I couldn't fully emulate a sleeping person without my Magician Instincts, which, unlike my stigma, had been left with my body somewhere in space or something, waiting for me to return back to the world of "My Side of Midnight".
Casually strolling around between the rows and columns of bunk beds, I eased my mind and meditated, something that I had learned to do during my first run through of this book.
I was somehow able to take the blandness and order of the rows and colors to calm my mind, and then, with that, I would meditate, bringing my mind to another place whilst my subconscious would continue walking my body around.
Finally, I "awoken" as I found myself back under my bunk.
Not even bothering to fly back up, I waited 5 minutes until I heard the robotic voice once again.
"All numbers, please move to the testing rooms."
Hearing this, I immediately walked through the door that had appeared and entered a room with about 100 chairs lined up in rows in it.
Taking a seat where my number was, I clenched my fist and started using that meditation that I has just done to calm my shaking body down.
After all, I was about to do something horrendous for the second time.
We all sat there, and were called into a room one-by-one according to our number.
From my memories, I knew that this was a test to see if the children could make the hard decision, as a General would have to always choose the better option for the country, no matter what.
So, when my number was called, I trembled due to the memories of Valens.
Walking into the dimly lit room, I just stared as I saw my "mom" blindfolded and tied to a metal chair, red splatters all over the floor from the previous children that had taken the test.
I felt the cold weight of a pistol being pressed into my hands as I heard the robotic voice once again.
"Your task: Kill your mother."
I raised the gun up, holding it with both hand, peering through the sights at my "mother's" head.
"Bang!" I pulled the trigger without hesitation.