Entwining Lives - A Hermitcraft & The Life series crossover

Chapter 5 - Grian stops a murder.

TW: No major ones (Reminder: Check A/N for general ones)

POV: Hermitcraft!Grian

Grian was pacing. Again.

The Rift puzzled him beyond belief. How did it work? It seemed beyond their powers. Besides, who would make a contract to do this sort of thing... It seemed dumb, to agree to a contract to just make a loophole into a single server...

He turned back to the rift. It flashed, blinding him temporarily. He opened his eyes to see someone walk through, silhouetted against the magenta glow of the rift.

"H- hello?" Grian spoke, flicking through his inventory until he held his sword - Although it likely would be little help if it was them. But it made him feel better either way. Maybe that should be disturbing, but honestly, giving how many enemies he possibly might have, it wasn't all that surprising.

The person looked up at him for a second, and scrambled away to a corner of the quarry in panic. They processed collapse onto their knees, hands hitting the stone hard.

"Oh- oh my!" Grian ran up to them, caution still high, but afraid they might be hurt. The stone on the floor was rough, and might have town whoever that was's skin up. But, as he got closer, he froze.

Standing before him... Was himself. Except for a major fact, they had a few scars across their face, and they didn't have wings. They were crying, tears falling onto the rock under them. They collapsed again, hitting the stone, again. As the stranger coiled into a ball, Grian noticed their hands were bloody. They must have been torn up by a sharp rock. But this stranger didn't seem to react to the blood, even when it smeared across their face.

Grian was about to move to comfort them when the rift flashed again. He blinked a few times, only to see another stranger run out of it, slowing into a walk.

They had Cyan hair, a blue jacket, a white shirt and jeans, with gray crystals circling their head, and a similarly shaded strip on their shirt.

"Oh hello, I wasn't expecting..? Grian? You're alive?" The figure tilted his head. "... And who's behind you?"
"H- How do you know me? And I... Don't know. They came through the thing you did..." Grian was very confused as to what was going on. A bunch of strangers kept coming out of the rift probably made by them, the beings he refused to even think off.

"Oh, well, If you don't know me, I should introduce myself. I'm Scott, or Smajor, or Dangthatsalongname." The figure spoke.
"Oh, Pearl told me about you... You're on Empires SMP, right?" Grian tilted his head.
"...What's Empires?" Scott looked very confused.
"Another SMP..." Grian was almost sure Gem and Pearl had said Empires SMP... But maybe he was misremembering "You know, the one with Pearl and Gem."
Scott blinked cluelessly. "I've only ever been on Last Life, and I don't know a Gem... But I do know a Pearl. We were allies-"

Grian was about to speak, when another flash filled the room. Grian and Scott blinked away the temporary blindness to see a red cloaked figure fly through, smacking on the stone floor, landing on their back with a thud, followed by three wolves, who also hit the ground. Grian winced at the impact, it must have hurt.

Scott jumped on guard at the sight of the figure. "Their outfit is a red name outfit- Be ready, they can attack us."
"Scott, it's fine." Grian spoke, staring at the stranger. "If they did end up killing me, I can just respawn... "
"But you'd lose a life-" Scott said quickly.
"Not how it works here." Grian shook his head a tiny bit, still on guard. The stranger wasn't one of them, they didn't have wings... But that didn't mean they weren't working with them. He still didn't quite trust Scott either, but he felt like he should at least try to not be overly paranoid and threaten a possibly innocent bystander.