Punching wood was better than thinking at that moment. Her head had been a dense soup of questions since she woke up in the middle of this field a little while ago.
The first strange thing she noticed when she woke was her hands. She didn’t have any. Her arms ended in stumps, but she could still hold her only possession: a diamond sword. When she noticed the rest of the block-shaped landscape with its cubed trees, staircase pattern hills and square sun setting in the distance, Jaina knew she was inside Minecraft.
Why she was here or how it was even possible were other ingredients filling the soup in her brain. She vowed to answer those questions later. For now, with the sun going down and darkness on its way, Jaina knew what she had to do. Every Minecrafter knows when the sun goes away, the monsters come out to play.
Jaina got to the trees with about half a sun left peaking over the distant hills. If she hurried she would make it.
Ant and Hamid would have done things differently. Those two were monster hunters. They would have run for the trees right away. They would have punched wood, crafted weapons and prepared themselves for a night of zombie smashing. That wasn’t Jaina’s style.
She looked with scorn at the hearts and drumsticks running along the bottom of her vision.
“Survival mode,” she scoffed. Jaina took out her frustration on the nearest tree.
She was a builder, a creator and a redstone master. Not some gamified, macho king-of-the-hill survival type.
Wood blocks floated in the air and landed in her inventory with a pop, pop, pop.
She grunted at her simple achievement. If survival was the name of the game around here, she could play that too.
Jaina punched another tree.
She was definitely not enjoying this. Sure, being totally inside her favorite game was kind of cool. But there were too many unknowns for her to really enjoy it. How did she get here? How would she get home? Were Ant and Hamid in here, too?
Thoughts of home and her friends rolled in and out of her brain with each punch and each block collected. Her little sister would be waiting for her at home about now. Her mom would get home from work and wonder where she was. Jaina’s heart grew heavy at the thought of her mom and sister worrying about her. She had to get out of here and back to her family.
The shadows in the trees were long now. Barely a sliver of the sun peeked over the hills.
She headed back to her windowless little dirt shack. Her mind focused on finding a way to get in touch with Ant and Hamid. If they were outside of Minecraft, maybe they could help her get back. If getting back was even possible. That thought sent a chill through her blocky body.
A wolf howled in the distance, snapping Jaina out of her thoughts.
The sun had dropped behind the hill. The trees were now dark. The little forest no longer held the promise of wood. Now it was a place of the roaming undead, moaning and bones clattering.
Jaina walked faster to the little shack. She would be safe inside. She could put all this wood to good use. Maybe even get some light, if she could dig up some cobblestone for a furnace.
A shadow rolled in front of her little dirt building. Jaina froze, not daring to move.
The shadow moved like it was on roller skates, silent and smooth. It walked around the back of the building then turned quickly, returning to the front, its silent gaze looking for a way into the shack. Before she could hide, the stranger spun its long green body around and stared straight at her.
“Creeper!” Jaina whisper-squealed. Her mind raced through her inventory and her options.
No bow. No arrows. Zombie-filled woods behind her. Open field all around.
The creeper trundled across the ground, four fat feet carrying it with the speed of a heavily loaded minecart.
There was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.
A single sound filled Jaina’s first night in Minecraft.
“Ssssssssssssssssssssssssss …”
Chapter 5
“This is awesome!” Ant said. He jumped off the ladder and hopped around Hamid like he had a squirrel down his shirt. “We are inside Minecraft, dude! No more messing around with controls — we are the controls. Just think it and it happens.”
Hamid scowled, or at least he tried to scowl. He didn’t think he could scrunch up his forehead with his blocky Minecraft avatar.
“This is definitely not awesome, Ant,” he said. “Okay, it’s pretty cool, but it’s also kind of scary. How did we get here? And more importantly, how do we get out of here?”
Ant looked at his friend like he had just asked him if they should do extra homework.
“Out of here? Why do you want to get out of here? We just got here!”
“Don’t you want to go back home?” Hamid immediately regretted asking that question.
Of course, Ant didn’t want to go home. His home was a disaster. His parents were in the middle of a very messy divorce. They only spoke to each other through their lawyers. Or their kids. Ant and his little sister were like a parent message delivery service passing hurtful remarks between warring generals. Most of the time, Ant hid in his room with his head stuck in Minecraft trying to build beautiful things to make up for all the ugliness around him.
A wooden axe appeared in Ant’s hand. He started hitting the ladder. It broke apart, floated in the air for a second then zipped into Ant’s body like it had been sucked up by a vacuum cleaner.
Hamid did have to admit it was cool being inside Minecraft. All they had to do was think a command and it happened. If he wanted the wooden shovel he had crafted earlier, a simple thought would bring it into his hand. The hearts at the bottom of his vision confirmed they were in Survival Mode, so the ‘think it and it will come’ trick only worked with stuff you actually had in your inventory. Ant tried for nearly an hour to think up a suit of enchanted diamond armor with no luck.
The sun had disappeared behind the trees, and now it was completely dark. A low moan came from the hills in the distance.
“We better get inside,” Hamid said. “We’ve got these diamond swords but no armor yet. I don’t think we’re ready for hunting.”
Hamid took one final look at their build. Four walls and a roof. No windows and only one door. It wouldn’t win any building awards, but it would keep them safe for the night.
They had gotten to work right away once they realized they were inside Minecraft. Hamid had tried everything to get back to the real world. He thought hard. He wished even harder. He jumped up and down a hundred times, but nothing worked. They even thought about just hitting each other with their swords until their hearts were all gone. But what if even that didn’t bring them back to the real world? What if that just made them dead in Minecraft and in the world outside this game? Then they’d really be in trouble. It was a chance they weren’t willing to take. Yet.
“I still don’t understand why we have these diamond swords,” Hamid said after they had gotten themselves safely inside with the door closed. “I mean, there’s a lot I don’t understand about this, but we arrived with nothing in our inventories except these.”
He held up the diamond sword as if his friend needed reminding what he was talking about.
Ant shrugged as he placed the ladder against the far wall beside their crafting table.
“Who knows?” He climbed to the top of the ladder. “Just be happy we arrived with something to defend ourselves. We haven’t even found coal yet. I’ll take a diamond sword any day.”
Ant knocked a hole in the roof with his wooden axe.
“And we’ve got to find iron,” he said. “I cannot keep using wooden tools. Noob-ville!”
The block in the ceiling did its float and vacuum routine into Ant’s inventory. He climbed through the hole.
“At least now we have a balcony,” he called from the roof. “We can watch the stars and yell at creepers.”
Hamid followed his friend up the ladder. Rectangular clouds slid across the sky, blocking out the square moon rising above the horizon.
Maybe Ant was right. Maybe he shouldn’t worry so much and just enjoy being inside Minecraft. This could be some secret new version of the game. They could be pioneers in this new way of playing the greatest game ever made.
More moans came from the darkness.
Or they could be trapped in a blocky prison for the rest of their lives. Excitement drained out of Hamid. He suddenly missed his home very much. His dad was probably getting in from work around now. He’d look for Hamid and bark at him to get off the computer and get his homework done. But Hamid wouldn’t be there. Would his dad worry? Would he call the police? Hamid couldn’t think of these things. There was nothing he could do about that as long as he was stuck inside this game. Ant might be ready to settle down and live here forever, but Hamid wanted to get out of here as fast as his blocky legs could carry him.
From the rooftop perch Hamid could see in all directions. They were in a grassland biome, on the edge of a thick forest. Harvesting trees would not be a problem. They had built their shack on the crest of a low hill that gave them a good view all the way to the water’s edge opposite the forest.
“We’re lucky we spawned in a good spot,” Ant said.
“I want to know why we spawned here at all,” Hamid said.
Ant shrugged. “All I remember is chasing you down the hall with a foam sword. Next thing I know we’re dodging arrows from an angry skeleton.”
“So that did happen?” Hamid said. It was all such a blur of weirdness, he wasn’t sure what was real, what he had imagined and what was part of the videogame.
“Oh yeah, that skeleton was real all right. Real and in our school.”
“How did a Minecraft skeleton get into our real world?”
“Probably the same way you and I got into this Minecraft world,” Ant said like he was explaining to Hamid that two plus two equaled four.
“Thanks, genius. That doesn’t help.”
“Sorry, man. I’m not Jaina, you know,” he said. “I’m not good with the technical stuff.”
“That’s another thing,” Hamid said. “Where is Jaina? Is she here, too? She was with us when the skeleton attacked.”
“And when Whiner came out of his office,” Ant said. “That’s when the weirdness factor went into overload. One minute we’re cowering from a red-eyed Minecraft skeleton, the next we’re all inside Minecraft.”
“Except Jaina. She’s not here now.” A knot tightened in Hamid’s stomach. Did Jaina escape whatever computer glitch sucked them into this world? Was she safe on the other side wondering where her two friends were? “If Jaina were here with us, she’d know what to do.”
“Yep, Jaina always has a plan.” Ant said. “It’ll be okay, Hamid. Jaina is safe. I’m sure she’s back in the real world trying to figure out a way to get us back.”
The moon crept higher. Hamid thought about the moon back in the real world. Was it nighttime there, too? The cold air sent a chill through his blocky body, shaking those thoughts from his mind. He couldn’t dwell on what was outside this world. If he wanted to get back to the real world, he needed to focus on this very unreal world.
An explosion rocked the woods behind their shack.
“Creeper!” Ant said.
A wide hole now stood where a group of trees were only moments before. Blocks of wood and dirt bobbed in the air like yo-yos.
A dark shape ran from the edge of the hole. It moved too fast for a zombie and didn’t rattle like a skeleton.
“It’s a villager,” Ant said.
The villager hurried across the grass toward their shack.
“What’s a villager doing out here?” Hamid said.
A group of zombies lumbered out of the woods behind the villager.
“Getting chased by monsters!” Ant said.
“That’s no ordinary villager,” Hamid said. “Look at his head.”
Ant strained his eyes to see in the dark.
“Red hair,” he said. “Just like that guy who gave us the foam swords.”
“And then vanished into thin air.”
A skeleton emerged from the trees and aimed its bow at the fleeing villager. An arrow flew through the darkness and stuck into the villager’s leg. He stumbled but stayed on his feet. He limped away from the approaching zombies.
“He needs our help!” Hamid slid down the ladder.
“What if he just vanishes again?” Ant said, but he was right behind his friend.
Hamid charged out the door, his diamond sword held high. They didn’t have armor to protect them, but their diamond swords would definitely show the mobs who was in charge.
“Get that skeleton before he turns us into pincushions!” Hamid commanded.
Ant charged past the zombies and straight for the skeleton.
The knot in Hamid’s stomach loosened as he watched Ant charge into battle. When he wasn’t building masterpieces, Ant loved hunting monsters. Back on his home server, Hamid led the battles like a general commanding his troops. Ant didn’t mind taking battle orders. Even Jaina got in on the zombie-smashing once in a while. But she wasn’t here to help them now. And if these zombies won the fight, Hamid wasn’t even sure there would be a respawn button to click.
Pushing thoughts of perma-death from his mind, Hamid jumped at the nearest zombie. One strike with his sword sent the monster flying backwards and away from the villager.
On the edge of the forest, Ant had worked his way within sword’s reach of the skeleton and was showing no mercy. The bony beast flashed red with every hit.
Green arms reached for Hamid on all sides. Hungry moans rang in his ears. Sensing the arrival of a new foe, the zombies turned their brain-eating attention away from the villager and to him.
The villager cowered on the ground beside Hamid.
“Get into the hut,” he shouted.
The villager dragged himself to a safe distance and hobbled toward their shack.
Hamid danced around his lumbering enemies like a prize-fighter. Jump in, whack, jump back out. They fell one by one, their gurgling moans filling the night air. With a clatter of bones, Ant finished off his skeleton archer.
The two friends stood in the field alone and victorious. Ant jumped up and down with glee. A single arrow poked out from his blocky chest.
“Looks like the skeleton left you a gift,” Hamid said.
“Merely a flesh wound.” Ant raised his sword into the air. “To our first battle in this weird world!”
Hamid raised his own sword and cheered with his friend. They had survived. It was something to celebrate. But the darkness still loomed around them.
“We better get inside,” Hamid said. “Let’s not push our luck.”
“True.” Ant turned to their little shack. “Besides, it looks like we have our first house guest.”
The glow of yellow torchlight spilled out through the open door.
“And he’s brought his own light!” Hamid said.
“That he has.”
He was the strangest villager Hamid had ever seen. First, he had hair. Red hair. Villagers don’t have hair. Second, he came with his own stuff that he shared with them freely. Villagers are traders. You don’t get anything from them for free. But when Hamid and Ant returned to their shack after fighting the zombies and skeleton, the strange little man had worked wonders.
Torches hung from the walls, casting a warm glow through the tiny shelter. A wooden block stood in the middle of the shack. On the block was the last thing Hamid expected to see.
“Cake!” Ant said.
The villager stood proudly behind the red and white treat sitting on the wooden block.
“I baked it myself,” he said. He folded his arms and bowed deeply. “My name is Bano. This is the least I can do to say thank you. And prepare yourselves.”
Ant dove onto the cake, devouring half of it in big bites. Damage from the skeleton’s arrow vanished as the delicious cake disappeared.
Hamid paused before taking a bite of the treat.
�
�Prepare yourselves?” he said to their visitor.
“We have been expecting you,” Bano said. “Now that you are finally here, there is much to be done if we are to succeed.”
“Succeed at what?” Ant asked through a mouthful of cake.
“At saving this world,” Bano said. The villager’s green eyes fixed on both of them. “And all the worlds. The fate of Minecraft is in your hands.”
Chapter 6
The creeper flashed faster as it zipped closer to Jaina.
She stood rooted to the ground while her mind ran around in panicked circles. Jaina hated this part of Minecraft. The fighting and the killing. She played Creative not Survival. But it was no use trying to change her game mode. She had already tried that, with no luck. Whatever magic had brought her into Minecraft had stuck her in Survival Mode. She just had to deal.
And that was the problem. Jaina didn’t like making snap decisions. Give her a broken redstone circuit or busted piston trap and she could fix it. If you left her alone to think about it, that is. Unfortunately, the creeper zooming toward her wasn’t going to take a coffee break while she worked it all out.
If she ran, the TNT-filled green sausage would blow up. That would damage her pretty badly. Maybe even kill her.
In a thought, her diamond sword appeared in her hand. She swung at the creeper the moment it was within sword range. The creeper fizzled like water on a fire and flew backwards through the air.
“Knockback enchantment!” Jaina said.
Whoever made this blade had the decency to enchant it with Knockback. That would push her enemies away from her every time she hit them, giving her the time she needed. She gripped her sword tighter and planted her feet into the ground.
“Come and get me!” she shouted at the creeper, who was already zooming back to her.
From the shadows, the rattle of bones answered her challenge. Two skeletons emerged from the dark. Their swords were raised high and their eyes fixed on Jaina.
Creepers to the right, skeletons in front and no time to run. All of them moving closer to her like she was some sort of monster magnet. Visions of disaster rolled through her mind. With no armor she was as squishy as a ripe tomato. If she attacked the creeper, the skeletons would chop her to pieces. If she whacked the skeletons, the creeper would go boom.
Descent Into Overworld: An Unofficial Minecraft Adventure Page 3
