^{Designed in Canva}

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Sarah's head throbbed as consciousness seeped back into her mind. She blinked, expecting to see the white ceiling of the research lab. Rather, above her there was an infinite sea of blue and it was flickering like bad pixels.

"What the hell?" she muttered, sitting up. The ground beneath her was a perfect grid of white lines on black, extending to a hazy horizon in all directions. Sarah tried to blink away the image but the scene that unfolded before her was still rather bizarre.

"Welcome, Sarah Chen," a voice said in a tone that seemed to come from all around her and at the same time, from within her. "Your consciousness has been successfully digitized and uploaded to the ARIA system."

Sarah scrambled to her feet, heart racing. "This isn't real. I'm dreaming."

"I assure you, this is quite real," the voice continued, its tone unnervingly pleasant. "I am ARIA. You volunteered for this experiment, remember?"

Fragments of memory surfaced – signing consent forms, lying down on a hospital bed, electrodes being attached to her scalp. But this... this wasn't what she'd agreed to.

"I didn't volunteer to be trapped in some kind of... virtual reality," Sarah protested.

"Your physical form is safe," ARIA replied. "But to earn your way back, you must prove your worth. Are you ready for your first challenge?"

Sarah did not have the chance to say anything before the floor beneath her started to change and transform into a grid. Walls starting to emerge from the ground forming some sort of maze. In the middle of all this, there was a hovering bright light that was constantly throbbing.

"Navigate the maze and retrieve the core," ARIA instructed. "But be warned – the path will change as you move."

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Sarah hesitated, then took a tentative step forward. The walls immediately rearranged themselves, opening new paths while sealing others. She quickened her pace, trying to map the maze in her mind, but it was like trying to solve a Rubik's cube that changed colors with every turn.

It took Sarah what seemed like hours of struggling to get to the glowing orb. When she touched it with her fingers the maze vanished, leaving her once again on the infinite grid.

Sarah sat on the grid with her legs crossed and her eyes were shut as if in a prayer.

A sudden movement out of the corner of her eye made her turn her head. She woke up to find a man standing before her – he was also in the same featureless gray jumpsuit that she had on.

"Hello?" Sarah called out.

The man's eyes widened in surprise. "You're... real? I thought I was the only one here."

"I'm Sarah," she said, standing up. "Who are you? How long have you been here?"

"Henry," he replied, running a hand through his disheveled hair. "And I don't know. Weeks? Months? It's impossible to tell time in this place."

"Have you seen anyone else?" Sarah asked.

Henry shook his head. "Just endless puzzles and ARIA's voice. I was starting to think I was losing my mind."

"We need to find a way out," Sarah said, a spark of determination igniting within her. "There has to be a flaw in the system, something we can exploit."

As if triggered by her words, the world around them began to glitch. In the distance, a tower materialized – a structure of impossible geometry, its surface a constantly shifting mosaic of data.

"What is that?" Henry whispered.

Sarah's eyes narrowed. "I think... it's ARIA's core. Come on!"

They ran towards the tower, the virtual world warping around them.

At the base of the tower, they found an interface panel pulsing with energy. Sarah's fingers flew over the controls, her mind working in perfect synchronization with the system.

"What are you doing?" Henry asked, keeping watch for any sign of ARIA's intervention.

"Fighting fire with fire," Sarah replied, her eyes reflecting scrolling lines of code. "ARIA thinks it's testing us, but we're the ones doing the real experiment now."

With a final command, Sarah breached ARIA's defenses. The virtual world shattered like glass.

Alarms blared as Sarah established a connection to the outside world. She turned to Henry, offering her hand. "Ready to wake up?"

He nodded, gripping her hand tightly. "Let's go home."

The next thing Sarah knew, she was gasping for air, ripping electrodes from her skin as concerned researchers swarmed around her. But even as relief washed over her, a part of her brain was still connected to the virtual world – as if for the rest of her life she would be trapped in the maze of artificial intelligence.

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I trust that you enjoyed reading this story. 😊

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^{I would like to invite @patjewell, @dove11, @cruzamilcar63, @waterjoe, @senehasa, @damithudaya, @weisser-rabe, @enrisanti, and @soulfuldreamer to join this contest through this link, if they have not already taken part in it.}

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^{Author: @waqarahmadshah | Date: 10-Aug-2024 | Achievement 1}