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There were footsteps; distant, but coming closer with each passing moment. As soon as Ava noticed it, her head slowly turned toward the noise; her breaths becoming shallower with each inhale, and then Hakuro appeared. 

To be honest, Ava wasn’t sure what she expected to see, but it sure wasn’t the asian tarzan from yesterday. Though looking at him, his appearance did stir Ava’s thoughts. He was still wearing the ridiculous outfit from yesterday, so it might not be cosplay after all, but having a nimble guy like him around could come in handy, as his traversing skills could definitely be useful in these anomalous surroundings.

But as Ava was pondering about potential uses for hatman, her attention was suddenly pulled in by Alexander. He had been saying god knows what, and was now pressing his back against a wall, probably pretending to be a detective or sneaky dude or something; everyone had their own way to deal with stressful situations, but wasn’t that a little extreme? Maybe Ava was the odd one out, as her preferred way of dealing with stress involved facing it, followed by running towards it at full force, getting to the root of it, and pulling it out completely.

Unfortunately, she had not gotten such an opportunity, as her stress levels skyrocketed again due to the sudden voice appearing behind her, resulting in Ava releasing a squeaky yelp. When she turned around, her confusion once more reached peak levels, her glassy eyes barely able to register the bird in front of her. Really, blinking occasionally was the only sign that she was still alive as her entire body froze in front of the raven, who was talking with Hakuro; why was he not shocked by this entire scenario anyway?

The bird spoke again, but it’s words didn’t make sense at all, in fact, none of this made sense, not their surroundings, nor the raven itself. Ava would’ve been absolutely sure she was hallucinating if it wasn’t for Alexander and Hakuro experiencing the exact same events; to be honest, Ava wanted to slap them for actually making her believe the raven.

And then it mentioned something; it was Laurence. The sudden shock of being teleported to a different world completely stole her attention, but it was right after Ava and Alex followed him into the alley that it started; it was [i]Laurence[/i] who got them stuck here. Ava looked up to the raven, her eyes regaining their spark, followed by a loud slap, both of her hands pushing against her cheeks as her eyes filled with determination.

[color=lightgreen]“Let’s do it, let’s get to Laurence. If he stumbled into this place like us, he’ll be alone.”[/color] Her worried eyebrows raised slightly as she thought of what Laurence might be experiencing. [color=lightgreen]“You two might not think much of it, but I would be [i]terrified[/i] to be-”[/color] She clenched her fist as she looked to the ground for a second before pulling her chin up again. [color=lightgreen]“I’d be scared.”[/color] Her cheeks still red and stinging from her little pep-up, Ava’s stress finally dimmed and the root had been pulled out as she walked up to Alex and softly punched his shoulder with a smile. [color=lightgreen]“Besides, Alex is totally right, staying in this cramped corner won’t fix anything.”[/color]