Prologue

“If it wasn’t for Carlos, I would’ve been early for school today,” I thought. Hi, my name’s Chantelle and I’m 12. I’m a gamer, a Minecrafter to be exact. I have a friend named Carlos and he may be quite annoying but he’s always there when I need him. You might be wondering, what did Carlos do that made me late for school today? Well, he asked me to wait for him because he was “feeding his kittens”, and I knew he was lying because he’s allergic to one!

I know Carlos too much to know that he DEFINITELY 100% was texting with his girlfriend, Samantha. So, yeah, basically this is my life. We go to Harfield Prep School and I’m in the Writing Club. Sometimes… I wish life would get more exciting, you know?

Looks like my wish might just get granted…

Chapter 1

I peeked through the glass door. Everyone was seated and Mr. Wilson was already discussing tomorrow’s project. “Dang it, I’ll be lucky if I get away with this,” I thought nervously. I opened the class door, and I felt everyone’s eyes on me instantly. “Chantelle Anderson, you are late,” Mr. Wilson said. “Lucky for you, I don’t have time to deal with you right now,” “Wow…” I mumbled as I sat down at my table. He was… different today. He didn’t even notice when Mark, the class clown, threw a paper ball at him! All I knew was that I couldn’t wait ’til after school to finally get back home and play Minecraft.

-time skip-

As the bell rang indicating that school was over, I grabbed my bag and rushed out if class, eager to continue my mining expedition. I saw Carlos sitting on a bench, Samantha next to him. I chuckled slightly, then I called out to him. He didn’t seem to notice. So I walked home by myself. Then I felt someone beside me. It was Monica, a friend of mine. “Lemme guess, you’re off on another Minecraft adventure?” She asked me. “Yeah,” I answered her. “I found this really cool cave system and I found lots of ores in it!” Then I realized she was just staring at me blankly. No, she wasn’t much of a gamer. She was more of a… jock. She plays all kinds of sports and sometimes I play floorball with her.

“Well, here I am,” I said. “See ya next week!” Monica waved goodbye. I opened the door to my house, only to be greeted by a jumpscare from Freddy Fazbear. “Ahh!!” I screamed. I looked around frantically, wondering who could’ve did it. Then I laid my eyes on Chris, my little brother. He was laughing hysterically. “HOW COULD YOU?! YOU KNOW I HATE FREDDY!” I shouted, throwing a cushion at him. In the end though, we collapsed out of laughter and ended up having a pillow fight.

I went upstairs and entered my room. It was full of blue, orange and white, my favorite colors. I put my bag down and turned my computer on. I logged into Minecraft, clicked on my Survival world, and started playing. 5 minutes later, my head started feeling dizzy. I thought it was just a usual symptom which means my body’s sleepy, so I got out of my seat and walked over to my bed. Once I stood up, the world around me was spinning around, and the distinctive fragrance of my fuzzy dark blue carpeting was the last thing I remembered before blacking out.

Chapter 2

I felt grass underneath me as I woke up. I saw blocks everywhere, like Minecraft. “Wait…” I thought. This looks way too much like it. Then I felt pain course through my body. I turned around to see a skeleton seeking shelter underneath a tree. Apparently, it had been the one to shoot an arrow at me. I pulled the arrow out, which made the pain worse. Out of rage, I ran to the skeleton and before it got a chance to  fire another arrow, I shoved the arrow into its skull, leaving the bony mob dead. It dropped a bow and 2 arrows.

At least I have a weapon now. I started walking, not knowing where. A million questions were blowing in my head like TNT, though. What happened? How did I get here? Why am I all of a sudden inside Minecraft? Who did this?

Then I saw Carlos in his blocky, Minecraft skin. This just confused me even more. He saw me and called out to me. “Chantelle?” He wore the same look of confusion as well. “How? What? Where? Why?” He bombarded me. “Whoa, whoa, hold your horses. Okay, what happened to you?” I asked him. “Well, I was playing Minecraft, then I felt dizzy, then I woke up with grass underneath me,” “That’s exactly what happened to me!” I didn’t like this one bit. Something was wrong.

“Well, we’re just sitting ducks here, so why don’t we gather resources?” I suggested. He said okay, and we got to gathering materials. I had the job of gathering wood, and Carlos had the job of hunting. It wasn’t so bad, I guess. Though we really needed to find a way out of here.

-time skip-

I have no idea how much time has passed, but we were sheltering in our little house. It wasn’t much, but it was enough. I heard the thunder go off again. Night had fallen, and the moans of zombies were loud and clear to keep us awake all night. Then we heard a knocking at the door. “Be careful,” I warned Carlos. Sometimes he was too trusting, and I’ve been playing Minecraft for long enough to know that not everything can be trusted. He opened the door, a wooden sword in his hand that I crafted for him a while ago. A figure clad in a yellow cloak framed the doorway. “Can I come in?” came a female voice. “Okay, but try any funny business and you’re dealing with me,” I said cautiously. She took her hood off, revealing platinum hair and violet eyes. “By the way, my name’s Peony. Don’t worry, I’m just seeking shelter for the night, I’ll leave tomorrow the second the Sun goes up,” she said. Great, now I feel guilty. With nothing else to do and the zombie sounds fading, I decided to sleep in my cerulean bed.

Chapter 3

I couldn’t believe our luck. Peony was one of the citizens of Drecalor, a city not far from here. She said that it was full of markets and there’s always people looking to trade. With the amount of resources we have on our hands, we should have enough to trade with them. So off we went to Drecalor.

-time skip-

I was not expecting what I was looking at. The tall skyscrapers, the crowded streets, the bright lights, everything was so… modern. But there was one thing disturbing me. People kept staring at me, and when I was out of their sight, I heard them whisper things like, “Do you know her?” and “Who’s the new girl?” Was it what I was wearing? I wore a white jacket over a blue  crop top, blue shorts, and blue boots. Was my hair messy? I touched my blue hair and straightened the white ribbon, then brushed some of the hair so that it didn’t cover my blue eyes. Nope, everything seems fine to me. So why were they staring at me like that?

I decided not to bother about that, since we were approaching a nice looking house. “Home sweet home,” Peony said. “You live here?” Carlos asked her. “Yeah, come in,” Peony entered the house, and we followed her in. “Liam!” She shouted. Then a guy with green hair entered the room. “Peony! You’re back!” Liam said, embracing her. “How was the trip?” “Not bad,” she answered. “If it wasn’t for these two, I never would’ve made it back here.”

“Really? Thanks guys! Y’all are the best!” he high-fived both me and Carlos, to my surprise. Both Peony and Liam look like the shy, quiet type, but once they start talking they can get loud and confident. “So, these guys said that they’re gonna stay here for a couple of days. They need to trade their resources for other valuables,” Peony explained to him. “Well, you came to the right place!” he said. I just hoped he was right.

After we introduced ourselves and ate dinner (which Carlos and I discovered to our delight, was cake), we went to bed in the guest room. “What a day,” I thought. This place looked like it had a lot to offer, and even though finding our way home was still on our priority list, I have a feeling we’ll enjoy our time here.

Chapter 4

Instead of waking up to my usual alarm clock, I woke up to the sound of bleating sheep. I opened my eyes, only to find the face of a sheep staring back at me. “Ahh!” Out of shock, I fell of my bed and landed with a thud. The sheep ran out of the room. “Oh yeah,” I thought bitterly. “Still in Minecraft,” Truth to be told, I was kind of missing home. Mom’s cooking, Chris’ pranks, Monica’s sports games, YouTube…

“Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty!” I glanced at the doorway. Peony had been the one shouting.

Carlos wasn’t in the room anymore. “C’mon! There’s an assembly at the City Park,” “Yeah, I’ll be right over,” I said, and with that she left.  I sighed and walked out of the room.

-time skip-

“I, Andrew, mayor of Drecalor and also one of this server’s operators, have passed a new law where this server is now on Hardcore Mode, meaning that players who die can never come back,” I was shocked. We were in a worse condition than ever! We were stuck on this server, with no idea how to get out and what happens if we die. Now, the mayor if Drecalor put this server on Hardcore Mode! This is bad, really bad. If one of us dies, then what’ll happen? I’m not sure I want to find out.

Then, I heard Carlos shout, “But why? Why put this server on Hardcore Mode?” “That is a brilliant question,” Andrew said. “The older players have come to me and said that it has been too easy, so I suggested that I put this server on Hardcore Mode, and they agreed with me,” “What about the newer players? They deserve to have their opinions heard too!” Peony shouted. The crowd of players murmured their agreement. “I am sure that we older players know what is best for this server,” Andrew answered. Most of the crowd cheered, while the others booed. I assumed that most of the people here in Drecalor are older players.

This wasn’t right. It’s… it’s not fair! Rage began to boil in me, and I felt myself reaching for my stone sword in my inventory. Then I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Liam. “Chantelle, don’t. It’s not worth it,” It calmed me a bit. Then I thought better of it. I shrugged his hand off and threw my stone sword at Andrew.

Everything happened as if in slow motion. The stone sword entered Andrew’s head, and he fell to the ground, dead. The crowd gasped. They all looked at who threw the sword: me.

The guards who saw the tragedy gave a savage cry and rushed at me. Weaponless, I ran as fast as my legs could go out of the city. I didn’t stop running. I didn’t stop until I reached a clearing. Only then did I stop to catch my breath.

“CHANTELLE? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!” I heard Carlos’s voice. I couldn’t answer him. I didn’t even know how and why I did it. “You… you just… you just killed THE MAYOR OF DRECALOR!” Liam screamed. “He had it coming,” I replied shortly. “Guys, we can focus on this and that later. Right now, we need shelter,” Peony said, observing the surroundings. It was sundown, and mobs were starting to spawn. “I agree,” Carlos said, and with that we gathered enough resources and built a little house just big enough for the 4 of us. I couldn’t sleep. I was thinking about what I just did. I killed one of the server’s most powerful people. After some tossing and turning, I eventually fell asleep.

Chapter 5

Waking up, I found myself being… watched. Observed. Looked at. Feels like people staring at me. And I saw why. Guards surrounded our little shelter, swords pointed at us. With so little space to move and so little time to plan an escape, we had no choice but to surrender ourselves. But this can’t be defeat! There’s got to be another way! They escorted us back, to my dismay, Drecalor. The citizens there gave me a digusted look, and I didn’t blame them. I did kill their leader, which got me wondering whether or not will there be an election to choose a new mayor. We continued to walk until we reached… a prison? “You’ll be staying here. For the rest of your lives… I think…” said one guard. “What do you mean, you think? Did you not hear what Commander Shareen said?” said the other. “Uhmm… heheh… well, we’ll just have to ask her again,” Yes!  We should be able to think of an escape plan while they ask their commander.

They threw us into a little cell. I heard Peony mutter something about them not having to throw us, and I agreed. “So what’s the plan?” Carlos whispered. “Well, for one, let’s just say that we’re lucky the guards put us in a cell together and that they have to leave us. As of now, we think of an escape plan,” I said. After a few ideas got crossed out of my head, a great plan came into mind. Not sure if it’ll work, but if it doesn’t work, I’ll be even more surprised.

“Okay, I got a plan,” I said to the others. When I told them what it was, Liam screamed, “That’s not a plan! That’s a suicide mission!”

“Do you have any other ideas?” Peony retorted. Liam seemed to be lost in thought, then he shrugged. Seeing as that’s our only hope of escaping, and that the guards footsteps got louder, I said to the group that it’s now or never.

Chapter 6

“1, 2, 3,” I whispered. We saw the guards opening our cell door (because they had to put us in  different cells.) “CHARGE!!!” The second the door opened, we jumped at them. We knocked then unconscious – which weirdly felt really food to me. We stole their weapons and a bunch of other valuable loot. Carlos, for whatever reason, found a raw floppy fish in one of the guard’s pocket, and he took it. I asked him what it was for, and he said, “In case we need to slap someone,” I just rolled my eyes. “I think that’s all we need, so if we get attacked, we have a better chance of protecting ourselves,” said Liam. We walked out, and (luckily) no one saw us yet for they were too busy trading. We found some horses, and I fell in love with a black one.

I took a saddle and some gold horse armor from a nearby chest and quickly put it on my mount. I saw the others doing the same already.

We got on our horses and we took off. I heard a LOT of people screaming, and instead of heading outside the city, I turned my horse – I should really stop addresing my mount by “my horse”, but what should I name it? Meh, Carla’s good – correction, I turned Carla around and headed my way deeper into Drecalor. Something about that scream, I can tell immediately that that scream wasn’t about us escaping, it was because they witnessed something very, VERY horrible happen.

I eventually reached the city fountain. This must be the park, I thought. I didn’t notice that Liam, Peony and Carlos followed me here. “What’s going on?” Liam asked. I got off Carla, pushed my way through the crowd, and saw what the commotion was about. I saw a body shivering in a pool of blood, quite possibly theirs. People were staring at it instead of getting help. Is this really how the people here treat their own citizens? Everyone was staring at us. Did they forget we were fugitives? It was then did someone actually shout, “Hey! Those are the people who killed the mayor!” “Yeah! If it wasn’t for them, our beloved mayor would’ve been here and helped fix this mess!” Someone else shouted. “Oh please, your mayor was never the right man for the job!” Carlos screamed. “GET THEM!!!” Someone shouted at the top of their lungs. I backed away and got on Carla. She seemed to understand the situation and sped off, Liam, Peony and Carlos’s horses following.