Minecraft: a Novel

Chapter 3

"First, stay behind me," my father began. "Second, if you see a skeleton, creeper, or anything of the sort, tell me immediately, and I will take care of it."

  I nodded. My dad opened a trap door in the corner of the room and promptly began down. I assumed I was supposed to follow him. As we crawled down the ladder that lead us down, the air became hot an stuffy. Soon it was difficult to breathe.

  It was as if my father had read my mind. "You'll get used to it."

  We reached the bottom of the ladder. I followed my dad as we started to trek through the thick air. 

  I soon found out why it was so bad. In the small three by three tunnel, torches lined the walls. It made me think about trying to make some kind of light source without coal.

  Once we reached the end of the shaft, we began mining. It was slow work. We didn't talk to each other like I'd thought we would. We always did. Instead we simply mined and placed torches, which was fine with me. I was used to being quiet for long hours.

  The process was slow and steady until I felt something shift beneath my feet. What- I slipped and landed on my knees. Above me was the mineshaft. I'd fallen down a patch of gravel.

  I groaned and felt warmth on my face. To my left, lava glowed a few blocks below me. 

  "Gregor?" My father called from above me.

  "Dad?" 

  "Build up!" For whatever reason, he didn't sound terribly concerned. But it wasn't like he didn't care. It was more like he knew I could get up on my own. I wondered how he'd put so much trust in me when I'd just lied about finding that strange stick.

  With cobble, I was soon back up in the mineshaft. My father beamed down at me with a grin. "I knew you'd be okay. You're my son afterall."

  What he said made me happy, but I couldn't help but fail to understand what he meant. I didn't ask anything about it though. My father always had enough on his plate.

  So I was silent as we continued.

...

  Nothing eventful happened until we discovered something else. I was mining a piece of stone, but when it was gone, behind it was something different. It was a block type I'd only ever seen pictures of. It looked like cobble but had moss growing over it.

  "Dad," I called. My father was soon at my side. He only took one look at the block before he grinned.

  "We just hit the jackpot."

  "Meaning?" I asked.

  "This is a dungeon. And in the Minecraftian League of Miners, whatever you find in a dungeon you get to keep." I found myself suddenly caring a lot more. I'd heard of dungeons before, of course. They had a mob spawner guarding them with a chest of loot in the back. 

  I pulled out my wooden sword, and I had to admit that I'd been waiting to use it.

  My dad began to mine away the blocks leading to the dungeon. Eagerly, I waited until there was an opening, and I quickly stuck my sword in, feeling it hit flesh. A groan. A thought. A zombie spawner.

  As I fought off the beasts, my dad dug in and broke the spawner easily. In a few minutes we cleaned up the rest of the zombies.

  I'd just had my first battle. I had to admit that I felt great.

  "Would you like the honors?" My father asked, gesturing to the corner of the musty, mossy room.

  I glanced at the chest and knew I wasn't going to say no. With shakey legs, I hobbled over and flipped the chest open, something I'd done a million times but had never been excited about.

  I knew that dungeon loots normally only had bread or chainmail. Something along those lines. But this one didn't.

  Inside was a diamond sword. But it wasn't an ordinary one. It glowed a bright, electric blue. I lifted it out of the chest, feeling like I was the King of Minecraft and had just slain the Enderdragon.

  Then I noticed the words on the blade. My eyes glanced down and read, "The Magnificent Blade of Herobrine."

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