Chapter 1: A Journey Begins

Stephan_ gripped a stack of white, pristine snowballs in one hand, and a bright green slimeball in the other. He was back on his favorite server, the Gameknight999 Network. Leaning against the cool, wood plank wall of a church building, His heart raced: He could hear the frantic, quick-paced footsteps of another player trodding on gravel. His grip tightened on the snowballs.

Suddenly, the enemy player, clad in deep blue dyed leather armor, skidded around the corner, snowballs in his hand as well. Stephan jumped out from his hiding place and let loose a barrage of snowballs, hitting the player square in the chest. His assailant’s face barely was able to register shock before he disappeared, sent back to his spawn with one less life. Amongst the other players in chat, Stephan_ fragged ExTra appeared, confirming his kill.

Stephan grinned to himself before typing in chat, Gotcha ExTra! ExTra was Stephan’s friend, and they always competed against eachother. I’ll get you back for that! His friend typed back, then added, Your always doing those sneak attacks, LOL. Stephan laughed, but his face soon changed back the look of grim determination and concentration he had on when he had attacked his enemy, and his mind soon set back in battle mode. He pushed some of his dark brown hair that was poking out from underneath his red leather helmet, and, sprinting forwards, he covered the gravel path past the church as fast as he could. He reached the small wooden bridge that spanned the wide river that split the large paintball arena in half. Stopping, he threw the slimeball he had on him up and over the bridge on the other side, checking to make sure an enemy player wasn’t about to snipe him from the large cobblestone tower on the other side of the bridge.

BOOM! The grenade-slimeball detonated, and a cloud of smoke appeared behind the bridge. Stephan grinned again as two more kills registered in chat, but his celebration was quick. On the other side of the arena, an enemy player he did not see sent a snowball hurtling at him from the large cobblestone watch tower he had checked earlier.

Stephan respawned back at his home base, surprised. He had eyed that tower before he threw the grenade. How could a player get up there so fast??? He wondered. Hey, did you see that player in the tower? ExTra typed in chat. I eyed that tower before I threw my grenade, Stephan replied, and nobody was in it, He added. I hope it wasn’t a hacker. Stephan was nervous; hackers could ruin your life in Minecraft.
I think it was, I watched him teleport up there! ExTra proved. Let’s just go to another game. KitPvP? He suggested. Sure! Stephan typed back. Utilizing the /hub command, his screen filled with black for a split second, and he appeared in the main hub of the server. Right clicking on the compass which appeared his hotbar, it opened up a menu of all the different minigames.. He moused over the icon for KitPvP, and clicked. Again, he was treated to the split-second blackness, and he appeared in the KitPvP lobby. Multiple stone brick paths led off to different Nether portals, with holographic white font hovering over the entrance to each. They displayed what type of map was, and how many players were on it. In the chat, he could see his friend ExTra had joined the game just after he had. Lets go to the Factory map! Stephan said to his friend. ExTra obliged, and they both picked kits by clicking on one of the signs that sat before them. ExTra chose the Digger kit, and Stephan chose the Crafter kit. They both sprinted towards the purple Nether portal that was to teleport them to the map. It loomed ominously over them, making strange, scary noises. Purple teleportation particles danced around the pulsating, swirling field of teleportation that was encased in a ring of dark purple obsidian. The pair reached the Nether portal, and, Stephan gripping his sword tight, Extra pulling out his pickaxe, they jumped into the portal. However, instead of the regular dizzying teleportation sequence, Stephan’s screen filled with black and strange letters of code danced across his screen. He couldn’t move or scream, but he caught a few words from ExTra before he was tugged into unconsciousness: The portal was rigged!

Chapter 2: A Deadly Surprise

Instead of the gray, monotone colors and tall, looming buildings of the Factory map, Stephan was treated with pitch black darkness. He wasn’t dead, or in the void; he could feel his body, and he was lying face down. Something was wrong.

Standing up, Stephan felt as if he had been delivered a blow to the face. His whole body swayed, and his vision began to clear. He wasn’t in the Factory map; instead, he was on the edge of a large forest, a large grassy plains biome stretching out into the render distance, flowers dotting its surface. He shook his head as he thought, This can’t be happening. His mind was the next to clear, and he remembered what ExTra had said to him. The hacker he saw must’ve rigged the portal to teleport them to… wherever here was.

Wait a minute… where is ExTra? He thought, concerned. He slowly began to walk, his rectangular limbs stiff-he must’ve layed there for a while. Searching the ground, he saw his friend, laying down as well, the bright green jacket on his skin giving him away. For some reason, he noted, everything was more vivid and real. The leaves on the trees actually seemed to have branches and sway, and the grass bent under his feet. He tapped his friend with his foot.

ExTra groaned, and with great effort, got to his feet. Shocked, he asked; “Where are we?” His voice was bordering medium and high pitched, and was full of concern. He paused, realizing he could talk. Stephan couldn’t speak. He’d never heard his friend actually talk before either. “Ex, dude, how are we speaking to each other?” He stuttered. His own voice sounded a bit deeper than ExTra’s, as if he was slightly older. ExTra stood up and took in the scenery, as amazed as Stephan was at the graphics. “We don’t have any mics, so I don’t understand how we’re communi-“. He was cut off by ExTra. “Shhh, someone is coming!” His friend whispered.  The pair ran into the forest and ducked behind a tree, fighting for space. They both soon quieted down, however, as they heard voices and the crunch of grass against feet.

“I swear, Slasher, I saw two players, right here!” a player yelled, his voice deep and angry. “Listen, you were wrong Stixy,” Another player said, his voice not as deep, and he sounded as if he were trying to control the situation. “Just get over it. Weill move on and find a place to make a base. That is our goal right now.” The mystery player said. Suddenly, Stephan felt eyes on him. “Well, I guess you were right Stixy” came the voice of the player. The duo spun around, and were face to face with an iron sword pointed at their necks.

Chapter 3: Taken Prisoner

“What do we have here,” The attacker cackled evilly. “No tools, not a smidge of armor on them… Looks like we got two newbies!” He chuckled, putting his sword down overconfidently.

ExTra and Stephan took this split-second chance and were about to book it, but they had nowhere to go. The player Stixy was on their right, smiling deviously, and another player whose name he glimpsed as iWreckedScience2_ was on the left-his face was a bit sullen and confused.

He must be new to their group, Stephan thought curiously.

The prisoners’ frantic, helpless eyes soon gave up searching for possible exits, and rested on their main captor. Eyeing him, Stephan could see the holographic font above his head bore the name Slasher_22. He had black hair and emerald green eyes that shone beautifully, but definitely did not match his attitude. His skin was a slightly dark tan, as if he had been in the sun for a while. He wore a black jacket that had the pixelated texture of which Stephen assumed leather, worn open to expose a paper-white shirt. He wore blue jeans with a belt. Completing the look, he had a pair of brown boots on. He looked almost like he was from the classic movie Grease.

And he must be the leader, Stephan predicted.

“Should we take ‘em to Boss, Slasher?” Stixy questioned. “They wouldn’t be worth much” He added, prodding ExTra with a damaged stone sword. The prisoner winced.

Stephan stepped to the side slightly, shielding his friend. I’ll always be there for you, Ex! Stephan thought bravely. He scowled at each one of their wardens, daring them to step forwards.

Slasher just grunted.

Stixy’s skin was that of oak wood texture, a log stump exposed where his feet and hands were. His eyes were a glossy black, and his oak wood plank textured eyebrows furrowed in distaste at Stephan and Extra.

A long silence came, as Slasher considered taking the convicts to their boss. Stephan prayed silently that they would let them go.

“Anything helps. It’s a diamond each prisoner… this would be enough to make a diamond sword for me, and I’ll give you my iron sword Stixy. You can give your stone sword to Science” Slasher said out of the blue.

Stephan froze. “No!” he yelled. Oh no, did I just say that aloud-

He wasn’t able to finish his thought, though, as he was met with a cut from Slasher’s iron sword. He stumbled backwards against ExTra, who caught him. He felt pain radiate from his chest, His HP decreased significantly at the biting edge of Slasher’s blade. He groaned.

“You don’t have a word in this… Let’s get on the road” Slasher growled.

Prodding ExTra and Stephan with their swords, the players forced them out of the woods and onto the edge of the forest. They paused for a moment to rearrange their position. The duo were forced side by side, Stixy on Stephan’s side, and Science on ExTra’s. Slasher was in front, leading them.

“ExTra” Stephan whispered, “They don’t have a rear guard. We might have a chance at escaping-“

His words were cut off as Stixy slashed at him with his stone sword. “Silence!” He yelled at him, seeming to give no concern to the wellbeing of the captives. Pain radiated through Stephan’s body as he clutched his left arm, trying not to yell. It came out more as a long, drawn out groan. He was already weak, despite his HP regenerating slowly. ExTra turned around and mouthed quietly to him,

I understand.

Stephan grimaced as a slight jolt of pain came from his wounded arm, but a smile broke through, like rays of sun on a cloudy day.

The parade moved out on to the grassy plains, and immediately Stephan noticed their guards became alert. They moved in a stealth position, swords held as if about to bring them down upon an unsuspecting victim. Slasher, being incredibly too confident with himself, stayed relaxed, his sword hanging at his side. Stephan noted this careless behavior. He understood why the guards on either side of them were so alert. On the near-flat plains, you were incredibly exposed with nothing but a few blades of tall grass to hide you. Creepers blended in perfectly with their sporadic grass-like camouflage, and the occasional spider could always sneak up on you. A dark matte black with piercing red eyes, they stood out heavily against bright colors-but their 1-block tall height gave them a serious advantage. Stephan shuddered at the thought.

As they crested the flat peak of one of the slight rolling hills, he spotted a roofed forest biome. Large, squat trees with flat, bright leafy canopies crowded together, their beautifully dark wood blending in with the shade their created. Mixed with the light colors of birch and oak wood, they made a great contrast material when building a house.

Home… Stephan thought. Oh, how he longed to be there now.

Here and there, Stephan saw the top of a red or tan mushroom, standing out in bright contrast to the regular green and brown. It appeared that they were heading right for the biome.

The procession reached the edge of the roofed forest biome, the leaning, swooping leaves of the dark trees looking as if to greet them… or swallow them awhole. Stephan could feel ExTra shudder in front of him, but couldn’t give him comfort, lest he be given another ‘friendly’ reminder from Stixy.

“Look! There!” Slasher yelled. “Stop, wait up guys, I think I see a cave!”

Chapter 4: The Escape

Indeed, Slasher was correct. A small slope inside the forest sat in a clearing. Scanning its pristine, round edge with his vision, Stephan noticed nothing-until his eyes met the giant, ugly gaping hole in the ground. It looked roughly 7 or 8 blocks wide, but of course it had a rounded-like shape to it, not completely square. He licked his lips nervously… a cave without armor or tools was where he didn’t want to be.

“Oh, you two aren’t going in there with us. You can stay outside. Just call if any mobs come… We will help. If you’re still alive…” Slasher trailed off, laughing evilly upon seeing Stephan’s discomfort.

The group now formed singled file, and ran quickly into the clearing. Stephan and ExTra were directed to stand right next to the cave. Both of them were weary from the long journey and sat down immediately. Stixy threw two pieces of steak to each of them, then turned and pulled out some blocks of dirt. Stephan wondered what he was doing… Surely not building a house. Jumping, Stixy placed one block beneath him while he was in the air, then repeated the process until he had a tower two blocks tall. Walking, he placed the dirt blocks, forming a wall. He created an uneven rectangle, a sort of prison yard to keep ExTra and Stephan in. Finished, he jumped off.

“Let’s go guys, I’m ready” he said, pulling out his pickaxe eagerly. Science followed him as he walked towards the cave, but Slasher stayed back.

“I’ll be with you in a minute… I have business to take care of,” He laughed.

Stephan and Extra shrunk back-as far as they could shrink back, which wasn’t much with the crunchy but firm blocks of grass beneath them. However, Slasher just took a step forwards and pulled out a map.

“See this?” Slasher said, unrolling it. “This map is precious to me-I have traveled as far as it can render, showing each and every place in this world near us” He pointed to a bottom corner of it with a rectangular finger, where Stephan could see multiple arrows-each was a different color.

Stephen looked at the middle of the map and swore he saw a few more arrows-but then they disappeared. I must be imagining things, he thought.

“That’s us, isn’t it?” ExTra said, pointing to the arrows that represented them. Stephan turned to him, surprised, as he hadn’t spoken in a while. ExTra was the better ‘educated’ of the two-he knew a lot more about Minecraft than Stephan.

“Yes. You are correct!” Slasher said sarcastically, as if this was a game show. “I can track you with this. Your every move. Don’t even think about running… You wouldn’t make it anywhere anyways.”

Stephan remembered how Stixy had only given them two pieces of steak. They’re quite intelligent… he thought, smirking randomly.

“Wipe that smirk off your face, kid” Slasher grunted. “I wouldn’t be making any plans…”

But oh, Stephan was making plans… not to run away, but something else. Something that required toughness… and incredible bravery. Not to mention slight stupidity.

“See you in-“-Slasher paused, checking an imaginary watch-“30 minutes” he hypothesized.

Turning around, he walked towards the hole, pulling out an iron pickaxe-It looked unused, without any chips, scratches or dents in its shiny surface. It glinted in the sunlight marvelously. A set of dirt steps ran around the walls of the hole in a spiral, likely something that Stixy had created. He jumped down the first step, which made a noise that sounded like something in between a crunch and a squelch. He jumped down the second step, and the third… and the fourth… until his footsteps became echoes, then faded out.

Stephan tensed up. His eyes still on the hole, he stood up, quickly stepping backwards. “Come here, ExTra. Quiet.” He whispered. ExTra gave him a questioning look, but obliged, sneaking after his comrade. Turning around, Stephan pounded his fists, in a boxing motion, at the dirt wall. He dug out two blocks, creating an opening. A few cubes of sweat ran down his square shoulders.

“Surely you aren’t thinking of escaping?” ExTra said, amused.

“No… my plan is something incredibly stupid… but I have a feeling we can do it” Stephan said, turning around to his friend. “Follow me!”

As soon as he stepped out of the claustrophobic confinements of the dirt walls, he inhaled what felt like fresh air, and smiled, his eyes closed.

“Don’t just stand there like an idiot, tell me what we’re going to do!” ExTra chided, tapping his foot on the crunchy grass.

“Okay… get some wood. Enough to make a crafting bench and sticks. Leave enough wooden planks to make a sword. Got it?” Stephen asked.

ExTra didn’t reply, just gave his partner a curious look and moved towards a tree. A sword… what is he thinking of??? ExTra thought.

Stephan readied his fists again, and walked towards a tree. Punching, he rapidly hit at the tree, again and again, pixelated chunks of wood flying off its grainy surface. Cracks began to appear in the surface of the block, getting larger and larger…. Until, with a deep cracking noise, the block broke in a shower of more pixelated chunks. A smaller counterpart of the block floated on the ground, spinning around and around. With a pop, it floated towards him-then disappeared inside him, into his inventory. He repeated this process until he had enough wood. Closing his eyes quickly, he thought of his inventory-and it appeared in his mind. It showed his main inventory, his hotbar below. A four-block crafting square sat to the right of a full body image of himself, armor slots right next to it. He had never really thought about his skin… It was a ninja skin, with the classic black outfit, but blue on the edges for decoration and contrast. He had no mask, exposing his face. He had baby blue eyes that fogged like the sky, and brown hair-with splashes of darker brown here and there. His skin was tan, but not as tan as Slasher’s. He could not see it due to the portrait only showing his front, but Stephan had a painted-on ‘ninja’ sword attached to his back. He snapped out of his admiring stupor, and created wooden planks by placing the wood blocks into the crafting square. Then, he crafted a crafting bench… then a stick-well, 4 sticks, and that was all he needed. He placed them all in his hotbar, the crafting bench in his selected hand. His fingers glitched out for a mere millisecond to accommodate the item-and suddenly he felt the miniature crafting bench block appear in his hand. Getting out of his inventory and back into the world of Minecraft, he placed the bench down at the base-of what was left-of the tree. He looked at it, his mind filled with the intent to craft-and suddenly he was in the crafting screen. It showed his inventory and hotbar-but without the portrait and armor slots. Instead, a six-by-six crafting square dominated the middle, with an arrow pointing to a square off to the right-this was where the crafted item appeared. He made a sword, two wood blocks on top of a stick, and it appeared in the resulting item square. He put the sword in his hand, then exited the crafting screen.

ExTra was sitting on top of his crafting bench, kicking his legs in boredom, sword drooping down at his side. Clearly, he was a quicker crafter than him. “Finished yet?” He mused.

“Yeah,” Stephen replied, rolling his eyes. He swung his dull brown wooden blade through the air. It creaked slightly, but made a violent swoosh nonetheless. It was a weak weapon, but with him and ExTra’s swords combined, they might have a chance…

His plan was to fight.

Turning to ExTra, he finally explained his plan. ExTra’s eyes grew wide, and Stephan paused mid-sentence… Would my friend really agree to this insane idea? He worried.

“You know what? Let’s do this!” ExTra suddenly shouted, after a long thought. The duo ran towards each other and smashed their swords together in a high five. Stephan smiled. He really is my true best friend after all, Stephan thought.

“Come on… let’s hide. I have a trap for Slasher and his friends” Stephan directed. He ran towards their hole in the dirt wall, and position himself on one side of it. He motioned to ExTra, and his friend understood. He positioned himself on the other side of the opening. “When they come out, you jump on one, and I’ll hack away at the other, okay?” Stephan whispered.

ExTra nodded his approval.

After a while, Stephan heard voices approaching… and footsteps. “Here they come!” He whispered to his friend. Sweat began to pour down his face nervously, his fingers shaking on the hilt of his sword. The voices paused, and the footsteps began to come towards the open hole. Strangely, he didn’t seem to recognize them.

A brown booted foot stuck through the opening.

And then, Stephan attacked.

(Chapters 5 and 6 are on the way!!! Hope you enjoyed it so far)