The Never-Ending Pain (DISCONTINUED)

A Warm Welcome

Grian <Hey, Xisuma, where are you?>

Xisuma <I'm at my base! Why?>

Grian <I just need to talk to you. It's important>

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Grian led Ivory through the outskirts of the jungle and travelled all the way to Xisuma's base - another jungle. The towers of his base appeared over the horizon as they approached half an hour of walking.

Xisuma's base was quite a walk from Grian's so when they approached the skyscraper skyline of a base,

Grian directly messaged Xisuma to ask whereabout he was in his base.

Grian <Where in your base are you?>

Xisuma <The storage tower>

Grian <Ok, I'll be right there!>

Xisuma's storage tower had an emergency access tunnel around the back which Grian and Ivory used as
Ivory couldn't exactly use an elytra.

Lights hidden behind large clumps of honey lit up the staircase up to
the top floor as they walked up it.

Grian led the way, wanting to confront Xisuma first. Iviry followed closely
behind, not wanting to be alone.
The tunnel opened up to a large geometrically shaped room with barrels lining the wall and wide openings leading to the outside world cut out on the walls. Xisuma stood on the opposite side of the room, looking out of one of the holes.

He looked as if he were waiting for someone, which he was, but for them to appear from the sky. He was so used to people flying here that he didn't notice Grian and Ivory enter the room from
the emergency access tunnel.

"Hey Xisuma!" Grian said, grabbing Xisuma's attention.

"Oh, hey Grian! Didn't expect you to come up through the tunnel, what changed?" Xisuma said, startled by
their sudden appearance.

"Umm.. we'll, you know how someone managed to get onto the server? Yeah. I found her but she's not a bad person. I promise." Grian explained.

Ivory peeked out from behind Grian and looked up at Xisuma.

Xisuma was wearing full-on, body armour decorated with splashes of purple against the grey of the armour.

He had a helmet that covered his face with the only visible part being through a purple visor which was his eyes.

The way it looked like he hid his face reminded Ivory of himself but the armour reminded him of far worse.

The way it almost glowed purple looked similar to the armour that all the wardens wore.

Ivory backed up a bit as he came to this realisation, almost visioning Awesamdude standing before him right now.

"Oh! 'K." He told Grian, excited to talk to the mysterious figure.

"You're IvoryCello, right?" Xisuma directed at Ivory in a gentle tone.

Ivory nodded meekly, afraid of the man.

"She's a little shy." Grian said.

"And she's gone through a lot. Like when I first met you." He added.

Xisuma nodded understandingly as Ivory got some more confidence and walked out into plain view of the
armoured man.

Ivory spoke in a barely audible whisper: "You call me Ivory. Do I need to explain why I'm here?"

"Only if you feel comfortable doing so." Xisuma responded.

Ivory decided to do so and so she gave Xisuma a quick run-down of the past few years in a simplified version of what she had told Grian. Xisuma nodded understandingly at the end of the story, taking into account that she did not purposefully commit the murder and the prison escapes were out of self-defence.

"That's... harsh. But, you're safe now.

They can't reach you here." Xisuma said.

He pulled up his communicator and accessed the internal server system so he could whitelist Ivory properly.

"Anyway, I've just whitelisted you so you are officially a part of this server and its small, yet caring community. I do have a few questions for you first, though."

"What are the questions?" Ivory replied, slightly concerned.

"First, how old are you? Second, do you want to stay here? And third, if you do want to stay, do you wanna meet the others?" Xisuma questioned.

"One, eighteen. Two, yes, I would love to stay. And three, I would like to meet the others as long as I only meet them in small groups but you can tell the entire server that I'm a part of this now though." Ivory answered genuinely.

"And I've got 75 lives." Ivory added, thinking it was probably important.

"That doesn't matter here - on this server you don't lose lives when you die, your counter just pauses and
then when you exit the server you can lose them again except for if you go onto another server with the
infinite lives system." Grian explained.

"That's... interesting. I've never seen that before, let alone heard of it." Ivory said.

"Well then.
Welcome to Hermitcraft!"

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A/N It might be possible to get an upload schedule again! 1 chapter every 2 days if the writer of this book can write the chapters at this pace.

Also, sorry for the extremely different styles of art. 2 people draw for this book, and we both have different styles. Mine is more realistic, while the other person's is more cartoony.

If you want to, guess who drew this chapter's art!