Books by Mark Cheverton
The Gameknight999 Series
Invasion of the Overworld
Battle for the Nether
Confronting the Dragon
The Mystery of Herobrine Series: A Gameknight999 Adventure
Trouble in Zombie-town
The Jungle Temple Oracle
Last Stand on the Ocean Shore
Herobrine Reborn Series: A Gameknight999 Adventure
Saving Crafter
The Destruction of the Overworld
Gameknight999 vs. Herobrine
Herobrine’s Revenge Series: A Gameknight999 Adventure
The Phantom Virus
Overworld in Flames
System Overload
The Birth of Herobrine: A Gameknight999 Adventure
The Great Zombie Invasion
Attack of the Shadow-Crafters
Herobrine’s War
The Mystery of Entity303: A Gameknight999 Adventure
Terrors of the Forest
Monsters in the Mist (Coming Soon!)
Mission to the Moon (Coming Soon!)
The Gameknight999 Box Set
The Gameknight999 vs. Herobrine Box Set
The Algae Voices of Azule Series
Algae Voices of Azule
Finding Home
Finding the Lost
This book is not authorized or sponsored by Microsoft Corp., Mojang AB, Notch Development AB or Scholastic Inc., or any other person or entity owning or controlling rights in the Minecraft name, trademark, or copyrights.
Copyright © 2017 by Mark Cheverton
Minecraft® is a registered trademark of Notch Development AB
The Minecraft game is copyright © Mojang AB
This book is not authorized or sponsored by Microsoft Corp., Mojang AB, Notch Development AB, or Scholastic Inc., or any other person or entity owning or controlling rights in the Minecraft name, trademark, or copyrights.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Sky Pony Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.
Sky Pony Press books may be purchased in bulk at special discounts for sales promotion, corporate gifts, fund-raising, or educational purposes. Special editions can also be created to specifications. For details, contact the Special Sales Department, Sky Pony Press, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018 or [email protected].
Sky Pony® is a registered trademark of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.®, a Delaware corporation.
Visit our website at www.skyponypress.com.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.
Cover design by Owen Corrigan
Cover artwork by Thomas Frick
Technical consultant: Gameknight999
Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-1886-9
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-1889-0
Printed in Canada
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
As always, my family has been incredible through the past months of writing this book. My wife, my son, and Gramma GG have been supportive and understanding of my late-night writing binges and countless weekend writing marathons. Without their help, creating these novels would be a million times more difficult.
I’d also like to thank all of you, my readers. Your countless emails and letters telling me how you’ve embraced my characters and brought them into your lives have been heartwarming and motivating. Thank you for believing in me, and for continuing to believe in and follow Gameknight999 and his friends.
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
I had a lot of fun writing this book. However, because it was about modded Minecraft, that raised some challenges, as I hadn’t played much of the Twilight Forest mod. So it gave me an excuse to do “research,” which, lucky for me, meant playing the mod … a lot. So in this case, playing the Twilight Forest mod was technically working … can it get any better than that?
In my opinion, the Twilight Forest mod is, without a doubt, one of the coolest Minecraft mods out there. There are so many incredible things in it, such as the Labyrinth and the Snow Queen and the Dark Forest Dungeon, that I couldn’t fit everything in this book. So you’ll have to watch some videos to see everything in the Twilight Forest. I recommend Direwolf20’s videos on YouTube; they are fantastic.
In case you aren’t familiar with modded Minecraft, I’ll try to explain it. “Modded” means someone has created their own modifications to Minecraft, changing the game to create something new. These mods are always free, but you never know how well they will run; making mods is not easy. You need to really know programming to create your own mods and have them work well.
Installing the mods to your computer can be challenging, and most of the times when I’ve tried it, Minecraft did not behave very well afterward. There are countless videos on YouTube to help you, but I’ve learned to just use the specialized installers like Feed-the-Beast and Curse. These make it much easier to play modded Minecraft. There are some notes at the end of this book, in the Minecraft Seeds section, to help you try these installers out.
Recently, I’ve been receiving a lot of stories from many of my readers; that is fantastic! You can see them if you go to the BLOG page on www.markcheverton.com. From that site, you can email me your story and I’ll post it on my site. Some kids have even gotten so excited about writing that they’ve self-published their own books online, which is super cool. If you go to http://markcheverton.com/published-kids/ you can see the kids like you who have already self-published their own stories online. Watch the video on that page to see how easy it is to do.
If you’re interested in writing, but need a little help, go to http://markcheverton.com/resources-for-teachers/. You’ll find writing tutorials that I’ve developed based on everything I’ve learned from writing sixteen novels. Check them out; I think they’ll help. You could even show the writing tutorials to your teacher at school, and then maybe you can use them in class … wouldn’t that be cool?
If you want to talk with me, have any questions, or just want to say hi, you can go onto the Gameknight999 Minecraft server. You can find information about the server at http://gameknight999.com/. There, you can find the new overhead map for the survival server, where you can see what people are building and can even zoom in on them like you’re viewing it from outer space. (Hey, a book about Minecraft in outer space … that’s a great idea.) Anyway, the IP address for the server is mc.gameknight999.com, and if you join, maybe you’ll bump into me, Monkeypants_271, or my son, Gameknight999. We’d love to play the game with you.
Please feel free to send me an email from my website, whether it’s about something I’ve mentioned here, or just a general question or comment. I try to answer every email, but please be careful when you type in your own email address. If you do it incorrectly, I cannot reply. I’m on Twitter (@MarkC_Author) and on Facebook (@Invasionoftheoverworld). With your parent’s permission, you can reach out to me and say hello!
Keep reading, and keep writing, and watch out for creepers.
Mark
You can only be what you believe you can be.
CHAPTER 1
WEAVER
The battle, long past, wrapped around him like an ice-cold serpent, the silent screams of the fallen jabbing at him with the venomous fangs of guilt. Tommy knew he was dreaming, but the feelings of terrible loss and sadness washed over him anyway, as if he were there again. This battle was the last one he’d fought in Minecraft, when he’d faced the terrible artificial-intelligence virus, Herobrine. They’d had their final conflic
t at the end of the Great Zombie Invasion, the outcome determined on the burning netherrack plains of the Nether with the Great Lava Ocean at their feet.
Right in front of him, in his dream, Carver slashed at a group of monsters with his great iron axe, cleaving through zombies and skeletons with ease. Next to him, Baker danced a graceful dance of death, her steel blade a blur as she parried the attacks of spiders and zombies and countered with deadly effect. Fighting back to back, the duo was unstoppable, each watching for threats to the other; it was magnificent to see. Those two NPCs (non-playable characters) were historical figures from Minecraft’s distant past, as were the rest of the villagers around them. In fact, the entire scene was from hundreds of years ago in Minecraft time, even though Tommy had just lived it three days earlier. A glitch caused by a lightning strike had caused his father’s invention, the Digitizer, to inadvertently send Tommy back in time to the Awakening, when Herobrine had first entered the worlds of Minecraft and brought all the creatures within the game, villagers and monsters alike, to life.
Now, that adventure was over and he was safely back home … but it didn’t feel so safe. That final battle had replayed itself in his dreams every night, the scenes the same, the outcome always the same, and every time he watched the battle, Tommy felt as if something critical had transpired, but he’d missed it at the time. Every night, he searched for that thing, even though he didn’t know what he was looking for. But this time, Tommy imagined himself soaring across the battlefield like an ethereal spirit. Since it was a dream, whatever he imagined, happened. As he flew across the conflict, Tommy was able to look at different aspects of the battle, rather than staying tethered to his body as it moved through the historic struggle.
He turned and watched as his digital self, Gameknight999, battled with Herobrine in a PVP contest that would decide the future of Minecraft. Herobrine attacked and Gameknight parried, his two swords meeting the unpredictable teleportation powers that the evil virus possessed. And then, suddenly, Gameknight999, the User-that-is-not-a-user, was on his back, Herobrine standing over him, the final blow in motion, when a shining iron sword flew through the air and smashed into Herobrine, forcing his retreat.
Something important was here … but what was it?
Now, howls filled his dream as a wave of wolves descended upon the monsters, their white fur standing out in stark contrast to the rusty red landscape. Tommy watched as the monsters were routed, the wolves adding the extra bit of strength that was needed to tip the battle in their favor.
As the fight progressed, Tommy floated through the battlefield. He saw Weaver fighting with some skeletons, slashing at their pale white bones with the expertise of a seasoned warrior, his skill far beyond his young age.
A pang of guilt stabbed at Tommy. He didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to his friend before getting taken back into the physical world. In the last seconds, before the Digitizer had pulled him back to his own world, he’d looked for Weaver, but couldn’t find him. Was that what he was missing? Was it Weaver?
“I wonder what happened to Weaver at the end of the battle,” his subconscious mind said.
In his dream, Tommy reversed the battle, then moved it forward again. It showed Weaver using his skill with TNT, placing the red and white cubes in traps to catch the unwary monsters in their explosive embrace. He could remember seeing Weaver destroy countless monsters with his TNT during the battle. After all, Weaver was known for his experience with TNT and fireworks, and he would go on to teach his skills to many in Minecraft’s more recent history, including Tommy’s friend, Crafter.
The battle sped forward, then slowed and played at normal speed as Tommy altered the rate of the dream with his mind. He saw the monsters in retreat, the villagers charging after the horde, destroying those they could catch and chasing away those they could not. It was a complete victory, even though they didn’t catch Herobrine.
Now, the conflict paused in Tommy’s mind as he floated across the dreamy battle scene. Near the shore of the Great Lava Ocean, Tommy found Weaver standing alone, his iron sword in his hand. The light from the molten stone made his iron armor glow with an orange hue. Farther down the shoreline was another warrior, dressed in some kind of green-dyed armor. Tommy didn’t remember seeing that soldier before, but there were a lot of villagers in the NPC army, so this person could have easily gone unnoticed until now.
Turning back to the center of the netherrack plain, he watched as a blindingly white shaft of light struck the ground. The intensity of the event had momentarily blinded most of them, Gameknight included. Even now, Tommy had trouble viewing the scene, as the bright bolt of lightning, or whatever it was, obscured his view.
He turned to look for Weaver. The last time Gameknight had seen the young boy was on the shore of the lava ocean.
Oh no—what if he fell in, he thought. No, Weaver would never be that careless.
He moved through the dreamscape, heading toward the edge of the bubbling mass of lava. But as he flew across the battlefield and neared the shore, he saw a diamond portal standing next to the boiling ocean, a silvery membrane stretching across the shimmering blue rectangle of the passageway. And there, again, was that strange soldier. He was wearing some kind of green armor. It looked as if it were made from leaves somehow … that’s strange, thought Tommy. And then he saw Weaver. The stranger dragged him to his feet, a rope tied around the young boy’s body. Then, the strange soldier pulled him toward the undulating silver membrane of the portal, which was pulsing and writhing as if it were alive. The green-clad soldier smiled and pushed Weaver through the portal, then stepped through himself and was gone.
He took Weaver! Tommy’s mind screamed.
Suddenly, he sat up in bed, instantly awake. Beads of sweat dripped off his forehead and down his arms and back, yet somehow he was freezing cold at the same time.
That dream had felt so real, and for Tommy it had been … in the past. Everything that had happened in that dream had actually happened during the battle. Tommy knew it—he could feel it. He had watched himself, as Gameknight999, battling against Herobrine, and had seen all the events from the battle play out again. That wasn’t just a dream; it was an exact replay of history. And every time he’d lived out that dream and watched the battle repeat itself, there had been something that felt wrong. Now he knew what it was.
“That stranger kidnapped Weaver,” Tommy said to himself as he sat in the darkness.
Bark! his dog added from the floor. Suddenly, the animal jumped up onto his bed and licked his face. Barky the Physics Dog was just an ordinary mutt of no special talent, other than the fact that he could always tell when Tommy was worried, and right now he was terrified.
“What happened to Weaver, Barky?” Tommy said. He’d learned long ago that talking through a problem always helped him figure it out. Of course, it also got him in trouble at school sometimes. “And why would someone want to kidnap him? He was just a kid.”
He threw off the covers and stood, his feet making a slapping sound on the cold hardwood floor as he paced back and forth, thinking.
“Weaver wasn’t critical to the battle at that point,” Tommy said, glancing at Barky. The spotted dog laid his head on his front paws and listened, his shaggy tail beating rhythmically on the bed. “The battle was already won. Taking Weaver wouldn’t affect the outcome of the Great Zombie Invasion, unless …”
An icy chill moved down his spine, and Tommy stopped and shivered for an instant as waves of fear crashed down upon him.
“If that stranger takes Weaver, then he can’t teach the other villagers about TNT,” Tommy said. “And that means Crafter will never know anything about TNT or fireworks. TNT has always been our main weapon against Herobrine, and if Weaver is removed from the past, and we don’t know how to utilize TNT, then who knows how the rest of Minecraft’s history will have unfolded.”
He looked down at Barky and patted the dog nervously on the head. His tail thumped a renewed rhythm on the bed. Barky, a
t least, was calm.
“I know I haven’t been back into Minecraft since finishing that battle at the end of the Great Zombie Invasion, but I just assumed everything would be okay.” He sighed. “I should have checked and made sure … I’m an idiot.
“Without Weaver teaching all the villagers about TNT, then the whole war with Herobrine—and not just the battles in the distant past, but also in the recent wars with his monster kings: Erebus, Malacoda, Xa-Tul and all the others—could come out completely differently. Maybe Herobrine would have won those wars and hurt my friends, or even…” He had trouble saying the words. Tommy looked down at Barky and scratched a floppy ear. “If the villagers weren’t able to stop Herobrine, he might have escaped from the server.”
Tommy’s breathing came in short, rapid gasps as he imagined that terrible virus getting out of Minecraft and invading the whole Internet. Herobrine would destroy everything if left unchecked, and without Weaver, who knows what would happen, or had already happened, in Minecraft.
“Barky, I have to get back into Minecraft, now! I have to see what’s happened to my friends,” Tommy exclaimed. “It may not be too late to help make things right.”
Pulling on clothes, he darted out of his bedroom and to the basement with Barky the Physics Dog following close behind, his tail wagging excitedly as if this were some kind of game. But Tommy knew it was not a game; Minecraft had stopped being just a game a long time ago. Now, it was turning into a nightmare.
CHAPTER 2
INTO MINECRAFT
Tommy adjusted his office chair to the correct height, then locked the wheels so it couldn’t move while he was in the world of Minecraft. The basement was musty and damp, and it smelled of old magazines and decomposing cardboard boxes. They’d gotten a little flooded after the last rainstorm, and many of the failed inventions on the floor had been completely ruined. No great loss there; after all, they didn’t really work as planned, except for the Digitizer. It was the one thing Tommy’s father had made that actually worked. His dad had mentioned that a company had bought one of the Digitizers, but he wouldn’t say who it had been … something about an NDA, whatever that meant.
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