ALERT: ATTENTION! Emergency, the exam is suspended, return to the city immediately!

  Liz was forced to wake up from a loud alert message early in the morning. The message was blasting from the badge on repeat. Her hands were trembling after a sudden awakening, she reached onto her chest and unpinned her badge. She was looking at the thing blasting the same message. Although the message was clear, her sleepy brain couldn’t comprehend what it meant.

  “What is going on?” she said, and looked for her companion.

  Although the sun was already rising from the horizon, it was still dark. The tall trees blocked all the light. Surprisingly, he was up, which made her think that he might have actually been doing his part this night, or maybe he was doing it all along. The milky fog was still here on the fourth day, covering the ground like a blanket of snow.

  “The damn thing won’t stop screaming,” Liz complained. The message was now ringing in her ears, reminding her of her foster mother waking her up in the mornings.

  “Maybe you should listen to it.”

  “Yeah, have you always been this smart?”

  Even though she had woken up abruptly, without sleeping enough for many days in a row, the hot mineral water from the hot spring was doing its magic, and she felt not as crashed as she usually would.

  “What happened? What’s the emergency?”

  “I have no idea? But I know one thing for sure, the exam has never been suspended before.”

  “Really? Never ever? Something horrible must have happened.” Liz was surprised by that, but learned not to question this man. He was really shady, but he knew a lot of stuff, and he was reminding her of Zywa. He had a similar aura, as if he experienced something that no human should ever experience.

  “Even when many people were killing each other, or even when Zayah was on fire, they didn’t stop the exam.” The Hat Man turned toward Liz and continued. “We need to return to the city and see for ourselves.”

  Whatever was happening was way bigger than the exam itself. They had no choice but to return to the city, so Liz just nodded to him. The bigger question was where they were, or how to get to the city.

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  She was trying to figure out how to go back, should we go to the labyrinth, or try to find Zayah themself. The message was not clear on which way to go, so it probably meant which way they found necessary.

  “So, where do we go? Should we find the labyrinth or the city?”

  “I don’t know, that's your choice,” he let out a big sigh, “It's embarrassing, but I'm the one who is lost.” His hat was facing down when he said that.

  Liz laughed, “I forgot about that!” After she stopped giggling, she said, “Okay then, I think let’s retract our steps and go to the labyrinth."

  “Fine by me.”

  Now they had a plan to follow. However, it was really annoying to speak over the loud gramophone blasting at them.

  “How do I turn this thing off?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, also tired of it. This repeating message had become an annoying noise and was less of an important instruction and more of a nuisance.

  She grew really annoyed with this thing when Liz realized something.

  “Wait, where is your badge?”

  “I don’t have one.”

  “What do you mean you don’t have one?” There was dread on her face. “Polo said to us that it is our number one priority to watch our badges,” she was waking back in force in panic, ”We need to get you one before you fail the exam.”

  “Did you not listen to the damn thing? The exam is suspended.” There was a strange worry in his answer, even if he tried to mask it behind annoyance, Liz could still sense it. “It doesn’t matter anymore,” he concluded.

  “I guess you're right. So what are we gonna do with this noisy little thing?” Liz asked.

  The Hat Man went to her, grabbed the badge out of her hands, and lightly (for his standards) flicked it, giving it a ‘concussion.’ The badge was silent after that, even though it looked fine from the outside. Everything inside was mixed into a metal salad.

  “Yeah, that will do it,” the man said.

  “I guess that’s one way to do it,” Liz confirmed sarcastically.

  When everything returned to peace, Liz grabbed her things and was ready to go. She looked, for the last time, at the beautiful hot spring. Now it was covered in a white blanket of fog, like luxurious foam, dense and creamy. At that moment, Liz thought she would never forget this place, that whole day.

  “I think we will be by the exit if we walk the whole day.”

  The Hat Man didn’t say a word, just patiently followed her through the rough forest.

  For some reason, Liz didn’t feel nervous at all. She had no clue what was happening. The only thing she knew for certain was that she didn’t fail the exam, and that alone was enough to calm her down.

  Whatever was happening wasn’t that bad, right? Liz thought.

  The Hat Man, on the other hand, felt the opposite. His body was tense, the body language as if he was a spring that was too highly strung. Liz knew he could sense something. She thought he had some sort of weird intuition. He was like an animal that had instincts for that sort of stuff. Because of how alert he was, she was more paranoid with every next step.

  This morning was even colder than usual. And the wind was strange, it felt like it was bringing something unsettling, it smelled dread. Even the rustle was trying to say something. The deeper they headed, the more on edge they were. Now her instincts were also sounding all the alarms she had in her body. Her hands were shaking. To calm herself down a little, she was squeezing her hilt, making her knuckles turn white.