Chapter Two; In Which Seris Keeps a Secret (But It’s Not Really Important)

After I gave myself time to let my thoughts slow down, I decided to explore a bit before I checked to see what happened when I pressed the gem again, in case I went even farther from home. So, I picked myself up off the ground. When I looked around, there weren’t buildings, not even huts! Only trees, trees and… Was that a playground? I walked up. When I got closer, I saw one kid on each section at a time. There were kids who had scaly skin, some who were super short, some super tall! There were kids who had animal-like features, kids with stretchy skin, kids with all sorts of looks. None of them seemed older than me. There was someone ‌at the start of the whole thing, just standing there, watching everyone go by. I walked up to him and asked him what this was, but he just said,
“W?tha”
I was confused, as you rightfully would be, but looked around nonetheless. I decided to ask again,
“What is all this?” I asked.
He replied, “Wtha ni hte falems rae oyu syanig?”
I sighed, he was going to be no use to me, but there was another person over by him on the other side of the ‘starting platform’, so I walked up to her and asked her the same thing, ‘What is this madness?’ and to my shock, she replied in English!
“What do you mean by madness? And why aren't you talking in Treian? I thought I was the only one in the whole of Treept that wanted to learn English!”
I blinked at her, visibly confused. “Wha- what do you mean Treept? I-I live in England, not bloody Treept!
She sighed, clearly disappointed in me. “You sure you’re not messing with me?”
I said, “Well, no. Ya see any cameras around?”
“Whats?”
“Uh, ya know… cameras… WAIT, LEMMIE GUESS… YA DON'T HAVE CAMERAS IN tReEpT,” I yelled mockingly
“Well… no bu-”
“- yeah, uh-huh. That's what I thought. Well anyway, back to whatever this is.” I gestured over to the setup.
She sighed, “well if you really don’t know and aren't playing me….”
“Which I'm not,” I interrupted.
“This is what’s known here as The Test. People under the age of 10 can go on to practice, but once you are ten, you HAVE to do it”
“And that’s the… short answer, right?”
“Yup.” “... Huh,” I looked over to “The testing area”
“What if I told you a little secret?”
I looked back, my interest piqued, “Hmm?”
She lowered her voice to a whisper, “I know how this thing works. I’ve sat and watched people go for HOURS and just wrote down what rank and class I thought they would get, and what they did get. At first, I was off most of the time, but as time went on, I started getting it right. And now I know the system to getting the score. However, I can't tell anyone.”
“That’s ok. Do even visitors have to complete The Test?”
“Only if they're ten, older people won’t be fit for it if they’ve had more time to train, and anyways, the entire course is set up for kids, so they would be too big, and the whole course might break.”
I sighed, this wasn't good. I was 10, and just became ten today, so I couldn't back out now. “Well, I am ten. So I suppose I have to do the test now?”
“Yup.”
“Wish me luck then”
“WAIT!” I turned around as she yelled it. “I’ll lead you to where you register for it.” She then proceeded to drag me to where you apparently “registered” for the test. It took hours, even though we were the only ones registering, and it’s what I imagine the DMV is like. When I was finally done, I had to wait in line for another solid 30 minutes with all the training kids there. Once everyone finished, the judges announced, “ATTENTION! There is a newbie here by the name of Seris Essarcny coming up to try The Test!” or, at least that’s what the girl said they did. Yes, I did have to tell my name to her. The first test was monkey bars. Easy peasy, lemon squeezy, I’ve done this a thousand times at my park. I passed that with extra points for flair, in my mind. Next was a bit harder, an obstacle course. However, it only slightly slowed me down. Next: jump rope. I never had very many friends at school, but I wasn't horrible at it. Then was the hard part. Swimming. I absolutely detested swimming, I would always fake drowning or a nosebleed in gym class to avoid it, and now I had to do 5 laps!

I had probably failed that test, but now was the final “rank test”. Now THIS is what i was talking about! A giant rock wall. There wasn't any harness but I could probably do it…