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It's funny.
Extraordinary, life-changing days often start off the same as normal ones, with no one being the wiser. They creeped up on you and before you knew it, they descended on you. That was the exact situation luz found herself in on sunny day in bard class.
"I hope everyone is ready for the bard trial!" said the teacher, who had drawn 'Bard trial today!' on the chalkboard behind him
"Because you're all dead meat if you're not. and I mean that literally!" he said jovially, with a smile on his face.
"It would be a fairly quick death, though, so don't worry about it too much! Now, let's begin..." said the teacher, wheeling the trial in like teachers in the human realm wheeled in old TVs that they played edutainment for the kids on.
"Psst- skara, what's this trial about?" Luz asked skara, who was sitting next to her. when she wasn't hanging with boscha, skara was actually a decent person. Very chill.
"it's an ancient ritual, older than the empire itself!" hissed skara
"What?" asked Luz
"It puts your sense of rhythm to the ultimate test. But, if you mess up too much, you'll be eaten alive by the judge. Literally." said Skara.
"Oh" said Luz. She was trying to make a strict habit of not being eaten, by judges or otherwise, so this might be a detriment to that plan.
"Good luck." said Skara, completely genuinely, patting luz on the shoulder.
"Behold!" said the teacher, pulling off the sheet
The sheet came off to reveal..
"The judge of rhythm!" said the teacher, gesturing towards the device. It looked a lot like the DDR machines back in the Human realm, except the 'pad' was it's tongue, which luz realised was the way it ate losers.
"Now... Who wants to go first?" asked the teacher.
All the other members of the class were trying not to be called on, but luz raised her hand.
"Ok then, human, you're up" said the teacher.
Luz ran up to the trial, got on the tongue and took a deep breath. It was go time.
The music started. Luz danced like a woman possessed. Due to her lack of friends, Luz had lots of time for things like going to the local arcade. She had poured too much (metaphorical) blood, sweat and tears into the DDR machine at that arcade to be intimidated by this demon realm version.
The song wasn't a long one, but luz gave it her all anyway, and claimed her sweet reward.
"New high score. Perfect!" the machine declared.
"Yes! All that time spent at the arcade wasn't 'wasted' after all!" said luz jubilantly.
"So, what do I get for achieving a perfect score? Extra credit?" Luz asked the slack-jawed classroom (including the teacher).
Just then, luz felt something peculiar. It felt like her whole body was tingling, vibrating, humming with life. Her body began to glow bright red. Just as soon as it started, it all stopped.
"...ok, no idea what all that was about." said Luz
"Human, come with me, we need to speak to principal bump" said the teacher, gently grabbing luz's arm and dragging her out of the classroom. Luz sincerely hoped that this would turn out to be nothing, but, she was never that lucky.