MINECRAFT: Enders

Chapter One - The Dragon's Rule

The hilt of the Stone Sword was heavy in her hands as she slashed through the training grounds outside of Cobrose's walls. One by one, swing after swing, the Leather Armored Armor Stands fell over and broke.

From the day she was old enough to understand the tale of the Ender Dragon's rule was the day she decided she would be the one to put an end to it. She honed her skills, believing so deeply that she'd have the chance to strike the scaly flesh of the creature that took her father when she was only a baby still being carried in her mother's arms.

Her mother was strongly against Alex's dream of becoming a warrior, stating that it was too dangerous for a girl like her, much less any warrior before her. No Crafter should ever have to face the Dragon unless it was for the annual Honorary Feasting. Something that Alex's mother also was strongly against, and rightfully so.

But Alex had other ideas in mind. With the Dragon gone, it meant that the people of Cobrose would have nothing to fear and wouldn't spend half of their annual resources feeding a twenty-ton creature. What her mother didn't see was that Alex didn't want to slay the Dragon for glory and a title, she wanted to slay the Dragon to make the lives of those Hopeless Souls living in Cobrose a little better. Restore the freedoms that their first Crafter ancestors had without the Dragon looming over their heads.

Gary the Testificate ran the training grounds for the nearby Villager town of Emaldore. He trained the town's guard, along with each Iron Golem that walked Emaldore's paths, and he even trained some of the guards of other cities near Emaldore. So when he took Alex under his wing, he would be teaching her the ways he knew best.

The Sticks used to build the Armor Stand shattered when Alex's Stone Sword clashed into them. It broke into parts and items on the ground and Gary looked at her with something of pride across his face.

"Fifteen Armor Stands in under sixty-ticks, that's your best record so far, Alex!" Gary said as he walked over to where Alex stood in the field of broken Armor Stands and began picking up the pieces that fell.

"But it still isn't where I want to be," Alex replied, then began helping Gary with the Armor Stand parts. "And DragonFest ends in a week."

"Is DragonFest the reason you've been pushing yourself so much lately?" Gary asked, then shook his head at it. "Your skills know no deadline."

"But Gary--the townspeople will have to choose a Crafter to send the food with to Ender Peak," Alex remarked, standing up straight with her arms full with Sticks and bits. "I wanted to be ready for the Ender Dragon before now."

Gary stood upright and looked at Alex with not much on his face.

"There's always next year," Gary stated.

"I told myself that the year before, and the year before that..." Alex explained as she walked over to a Chest and dropped the Sticks in her arms into it. "And I've always been so close to being good enough to fight the Dragon, I don't want to wait another year for it."

Alex sat down on top of a stone bench next to the Chest in a huff and set her Stone Sword down next to her. Gary walked near her as he put away the Sticks he collected, then he picked up the Stone Sword on the bench and set it into a weapon rack.

"Alex," Gary said softly and sighed. "You're young, the Dragon is old. It's been here for longer than you've been alive and we've all learned to live with it."

Alex looked over at him, just listening to his words as he spoke.

"We realized that when we tried to solve the problem the first time, it was better to just leave it to fester. It's the only Dragon in the world and if we wait long enough, we won't have to deal with it anymore," Gary continued. "How would it make your mother feel to find out that her only daughter died trying to solve something we already have a solution for?"