Aurora glanced at where his majesty the vampire Lord sat, she let out a smirk then returned her attention to Stephan who was visibly disturbed by the third part of the solo race. He wasn't familiar with these encounters. Stephan tried his best to contain his frightened heart. It felt as if time froze and his mind went blank.
He thought he would be able to push himself further but he was exhausted. Since he was pulled to Masmoenia, he knew he would meet many death flags but not this way. He also knew he wasn't ready for things like these.
He glanced back, looking at how far he progressed, telling himself since he came all the way to the third part, it would be best if he kept going; However, no matter what kind of excuse he was giving himself, he was in a dire situation at the early stage of the game. Who makes a game so hard from the beginning?
'But it isn't a game… It's reality. Reality has always been a shitty game.'
The clock was ticking and Aurora was looking at the third part, completely uncaring if it was suicide or not. He tried to summon all his courage again, yet, it was only a fleeting ethereal mist; his thoughts turned difficult to control and he lost the focus he had. There was the thought of death everywhere; everything screamed of death.
"You know…" she started. "It's only when you are submerged by fear that courage is born. You cannot say someone is courageous when he doesn't experience fear. Are you giving up?"
His vision was full with a devilish mechanism installed right in front of him. There were ten pillars on each side inscribed with strange drawings and writings. The iron columns were connected in pairs by strings that seemed as sharp as a knife. It looked like looms were placed in a way that made the threads horizontal, except that the thread was deadly. Between each pair of columns that faced each other were statues holding each a weapon. He was confident the devilish statues were there naught.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Isn't it obvious? We are supposed to cross it. Don't forget the timer!"
"That timer of yours is defective. Each thing you hold between the palms of your hands is defective."
Right in the middle of the road, between each five pairs of pillars, stood a strange creature. It didn't seem like a statue like the others but it stood like them. Subconsciously, he looked up and shifted his gaze slowly till he reached the head. The monster or the monster knight, maybe it was a gargoyle. It certainly had a gargoyle head.
It didn't move. There was a tail coming out from its back, frozen in the air instead of being loose on the ground. The gargoyle stood like all other statues with a big halberd, the point buried deep on the ground.
"Do you want to understand what this third part is about?" she raised her finger suggesting an explanation.
"You owe me this much, no?"
"Very well. Those threads are made of a hard metal that only exist on this planet, you wouldn't find it on Earth. Touching those threads means instant death. They cut through the flesh directly like sharpened blades. Well, I can suggest we keep crawling till the end but there are those statues in the way. They aren't only there for decoration. Once they sense your presence, they will swing their whatever weapons they are holding, cutting your body into three if they caught you. Crawling wouldn't be ideal in this situation so you gotta find another solution on how to take care of this."
"Then we mustn't crawl. If the statues are waiting for us to reach their range, while being on hands and knees, it would be hard to get up and dodge. Even if we roll, we wouldn't be quick to do it and we cannot roll till the end since at one point, it will be hard to keep our bodies turning."
"Exactly! Furthermore, there is that warrior in the middle. As soon as we reach it, it will be hard to dodge it. Unlike the other statues, it has enhanced speed so you gotta be agile to dodge correctly."
"Then how about a limbo dance," he said. "We will not do the whole limbo dance stuff, just we will need to go under the bars with our backs facing toward the floor. When passing under the bar, we must be careful of touching anything."
"Way of making the game more challenging!" Aurora clapped her hands while jumping. "As expected from my dear disciple!"
"I didn't mean it that way," his voice expressed the shock he felt because of her abundant imagination; she always found a way to twist his words. "I meant that we should only do that part when we have to bend backwards, nothing more. It will help us in being ready for the statues and dodge."
"That's what I said! Such an amazing thing, your mind! I didn't think of limbo dance before. I was just thinking on crawling or using you to help me roll like what you did earlier."
"So you were thinking only about your pathetic self… You selfish stinking nerd!"
"Let's start!"
Aurora started jumping with one feet, switching them both. She bent backwards, not turning her head or neck to the side. She had her focus all on the threads. Stephan cringed at her stupid dance and successful attempt for limbo dance, fortunately all threads were at the same height, approximately fifty centimetres.
"Yeah! I did it! A child's play!"
Stephan sighed and proceeded doing the same thing as she did. However, unlike her who was used to her body bending all over, he had never attempted exercises like these. It was said that the limbo dance was started from lowest height and the bar was gradually raised, signifying an emergence from death to life.