by Dr. Block
The second form of anger happened to me then.
I suddenly remembered the strange old man’s poem:
Herobrine says he can control your fate,
but there is a story I must relate,
to defeat the one with glowing eyes,
requires one to look to the skies.
One must think outside the box,
in a world that is filled with them,
so when your life is upside-down,
find a way to go over the ground.
I looked over at the trebuchet which was still aimed at the wall of the castle and had not been redirected towards the golem. Herobrine was standing just to the right of where all the boulders had been impacting.
Over the ground it is, I thought.
I picked up my diamond sword and walked slowly to the trebuchet. It had been reset to launch other projectile, but nothing had been placed in its launch basket.
I looked to my left and right. The Ender soldiers were all focused on the Ender general and Herobrine.
I had to do this. It was the only way.
I quickly jumped into the launch basket and tossed a rock from my inventory at the launch lever.
The force of the trebuchet launching me into the air was unlike anything I’d ever felt before. I was pressed back against the launch basket so violently, I thought I might be pushed through the basket. This feeling only lasted momentarily. Once the trebuchet got to its release point, I began to fly through the air with such velocity, I thought some of my flesh might be ripped from my body.
I looked ahead and saw Herobrine staring at me with surprise and shock. He just stood there unmoving.
I took my sword and held it in front of me, lining up the point with Herobrine’s chest. It was like those jousting competitions I’d heard about during the medieval past of Minecraft, when dragons still roamed the Overworld and had not been relegated to the End.
I was beginning my descent now. I held my sword steady. Herobrine still had not moved.
I was worried he would step to the side at the last moment and I would splatter into the side of the castle and it would be the end of me.
I didn’t care. I had to do this. It was the only way.
I was within a few feet of Herobrine, the point of my sword aimed at the center of his chest, when he suddenly ducked to the side.
Oh no, I thought, I’m going to miss.
But then at the very last moment, the Ender general shoved Herobrine into my path.
I saw the point of my diamond sword impact Herobrine’s chest and then…
My life was engulfed by a blinding white light.
Chapter 28
I don’t know how much time passed before I regained consciousness.
I had assumed I would die and would respawn somewhere else. But, as I came to, I still had all my memories. In fact, for some reason I cannot explain, it did not feel like I had died.
I blinked my eyes open and found myself in a white room. There were white walls, a white ceiling, a white floor, and a white table with white chairs.
And, I was not alone.
I was seated on one side of the square white table. Sitting across from me was the Ender King while on the opposite sides of the square table sat Herobrine and … Notch!
“Am I in the afterlife?” I asked.
Notch laughed. It was a kindly laugh. “No, you are in my home.”
“Your home?!? Where is your home?”
“I don’t think I’d better tell you, or else I’ll have too many unannounced visitors. Groupies, you see. Let’s just say it’s in a hidden location that no one knows about yet.”
That was suitably mysterious and strange for me. Typical Notch, I suppose.
Then I looked over at Herobrine, pointed an angry finger at him and said, “What’s he doing here?”
This time the Ender King responded. “When you sacrificed yourself to kill Herobrine and save me –.”
“Wait. What? Save you?”
“I had disguised myself as the Ender general in order to get close to Herobrine and stop his plan, but he was able to see through my disguise,” explained the Ender King.
“Yeah, and I would have succeeded too, if it weren’t for that meddling baby zombie,” pouted Herobrine.
“Enough,” said Notch. “It is over. King, please continue.”
“Zeke, you remember all that talk about the balance Zeb explained to you? The protector, the destroyer, and the creator?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Well,” continued the Ender King, “it has long been believed by scholars that there was a fourth component to the balance. A component that would make the square the symbol of balance and no longer the triangle. You are the fourth part of the balance. You are … the warrior.”
This came as quite a shock to me. I just did some crazy stuff by launching myself in the trebuchet. I should be dead, not some part of a mystical four-sided balance. And, certainly not the warrior component of that balance.
“I think you’ll need to explain that to me a little better,” I said, my mind reeling.
To my surprise, Herobrine began to speak. “It’s like this, the world needs to have symbols to admire and to revile. Without them, nothing makes any sense. We basically run by immutable rules. You know, gravity, physics, chemistry, mathematics, that sort of thing. There needs to be something beyond that to make life worth living. To give life meaning.”
Notch took over. “Yes, the mobs, NPCs, and players of Minecraft must have symbols and things to believe in. They believe in me because I created it all. They believe in Herobrine because he represents pure evil and destruction. They love the Ender King because of his selflessness in trying to prevent evil. And now, they will admire you for your undying devotion to your friends and your willingness to put your life at risk against the greatest of all odds.”
I was stunned. This made absolutely no sense. I must’ve hit my head after flying through the air and now was trapped inside some bizarre hallucination as my body was in the throes of death. Soon I’m sure it would end.
“That sounds interesting, but wouldn’t someone like Otis be a better symbol for the warrior?”
The Ender King laughed so hard I thought he might choke. “Otis is a brawler, that’s for sure. But he lets his rage get in the way. You only fight when you have to. That is the true way of the warrior.”
“Let’s say I believe you about all this warrior business, and the balance, and all that stuff,” I said. “What does this all mean for me? Can I still be friends with Otis and Zeb and Harold and Bob? Or, do I need to live some sort of lonely existence on the top of a mountain or something?”
“You can live whatever life you choose, Zeke,” said Notch. “You just have a bigger role to play now. No one is going to announce to the world that you are the warrior, but the story of your life is inspirational and needs to be shared. Whether you choose to tell people you are the warrior or not does not matter. It is the example of your life that matters.”
I was beginning to feel a little better about this warrior business. If it meant I could hang out with Notch and the Ender King from time to time, I was totally okay with that. If Herobrine happened to be there, I guess I would put up with it.
“So, now that I’m the fourth element of the balance, does that mean Herobrine cannot attack me anymore?”
Herobrine tapped the table with his fingers. “Apparently, it does. It also means that Notch has taken away all my TNT and told me that I’m not allowed to try to blow up the world again for at least ten years. I think Notch is being stupid, but he’s Notch and he always gets his way. Some balance.” Herobrine rolled his eyes.
“Now, now, Herobrine,” said Notch, as if he were speaking to a three-year-old villager. “You know the balance is a symbolic balance of the world and not how things really are. You know I’m the creator and what I say goes. But, you know I don’t intervene very often. I let everyone do what they want because free will is important. Y
ou can do whatever you want, short of destroying my creation. That is a bright line I will not allow you or anyone else to cross.”
Herobrine crossed his arms over his chest. “I never get to have any fun.”
I looked at Herobrine. He amused me and disgusted me at the same time. “Man, you’re like a little baby, aren’t you? You’re always pulling pranks on people and stealing things and even killing mobs and players and forcing them to respawn. Isn’t that enough for you?”
“I don’t know. I like to try new things. I was getting bored.”
“Why don’t you try not killing people, not pranking people, and not making leaves fall off of trees,” I said.
“What? You think I should just sit around and eat mushroom stew?”
“It might do you some good. You are looking a little thin,” said the Ender King.
“You are calling me thin? Look at yourself. You are like the tallest, skinniest freak I’ve ever seen in my life,” said Herobrine.
The Ender King laughed. “Well, I think this is all settled now. Maybe we should get Zeke back to his friends.”
“So my friends are still alive? And Herobrine isn’t going to try to kill them anymore?”
Herobrine was shaking his head “no,” but Notch said, “Yes. Herobrine will leave you and your friends alone ... forever.”
“Thanks, Notch. If I had known risking my life by launching myself in a trebuchet to attack Herobrine would have obtained that result, I would have done it a lot earlier,” I said sarcastically.
Notch ignored my bitter words and said, “There is just one more thing.”
By the way he said “one more thing,” I knew that this one thing was going to be something tedious.
I sighed. “What?”
“I need you to write your autobiography so that we can put it in the Great Library of Minecraft.”
“That’s going to take forever,” I whined.
Notch shook his head. “Not forever, just a long time. After you reunite with your friends, I want you to find a nice house and write down your life’s story from the time you first spawned until now. Okay?”
It was Notch.
What could I say except, “Okay.”
The End
Please leave a review
Hi, everyone! I hope you liked this collected edition of the Baby Zeke series.
Could you spare a moment and leave a review on Amazon? It would really help me out and it will let me know what you think about the book.
Reviews mean a lot to independent authors like me. The more reviews I get, the more books I can write.
Thank you!
Want to know more about Otis?
Then, be sure to read Otis: Diary of a Baby Zombie Pigman.
Book 1 of Otis’s diary can be found at all Amazon stores, including these popular links:
Amazon USA: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01I0SEHTI
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01I0SEHTI
Amazon Canada: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B01I0SEHTI
Amazon India: https://www.amazon.in/dp/B01I0SEHTI
Amazon Australia: https://www.amazon.com.au/dp/B01I0SEHTI
Author’s Note
I, Dr. Block, believe that Minecraft is the greatest game ever created, mainly because it has the most awesome characters and mobs ever created.
I want to think everyone who read and reviewed the Baby Zeke series as it was coming out in individual books. Your ideas helped me craft this series into what it became, a nearly 85,000-word epic.
You are awesome!
Please be sure to check out my other books. You can find them all on my Amazon author page at https://www.amazon.com/Dr.-Block/e/B00WHDXJGK/.
And, be sure to like my Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/drblockbooks) and sign up for my email list at http://www.drblockbooks.com/ (just scroll down to the bottom of the page) so you will be the first to know when new books come out.
Thank you!
