Trial of Hunger: Alice

It was Alice's first time in the Everworld, and it was as strange as everyone promised it would be. Especially Seta, who waited patiently for her answer to their question - an important one. What makes you think your ghost wishes to return after what happened? What will be different this time?

Everything about this made her nervous: The possibility of failure, the pressure of answering the question correctly, and the reason she was here at all. She was here to retrieve Kirby - her Impidimp, one of the first Pokemon she'd ever caught in Unovr. The Pokemon she'd chosen to sacrifice in order to ensure Moltres would hatch and rise on her side. The players' side. His sacrifice wasn't in vain - they'd succeeded - but she'd done it without his permission, without him even knowing what was going on. She just did it, because in that moment it'd been a game to her, and that was the optimal choice.

"I am changing," she murmured. She didn't know if it was good or bad. She just felt that the sacrifice of Impidimp in Unovr had been a changing point for her in this game. "I don't know if Impidimp will want to return with me, but I hope he will. I was treating this like a game, like something I had to win. I didn't even think - I just did it. And it's made me realize that everything here is real. He's real. His existence is real, and it matters to me." Maybe here was even more real than her waking life, where she floated through her life half-awake until she was able to return to Unovr. Here, she felt alive. Here, her choices mattered, and she was seeing the consequences of them play out before her. "I just want him back. I'll go through any trial you like."