[✔] A Forgotten's Uprise (Sequel to TWD)

Chapter 8. The Hell of Minecraft

(so i know this story is boring in general and isnt as exciting as TWD, but itll build up. i hope.)

(also, i dont watch keralis or bdubs. i dont know how they act at all. sorry if they are ooc.)

POV: Third Person
Location: The Nether

The fortress the Hermits were infiltrating looked like a normal fortress, but more decorated, larger, and had more inhabitants. The nether bricks were the same, and red nether bricks were mixed in. There was more depth and detail to it, and it didn't look like a naturally generated structure. It looked like a castle in the middle too, but the path to get to the center was like a maze. It wasn't randomly placed either; it was sitting over a huge pool of lava, but the entrances were on land.

Xisuma, Xanthus, Keralis, and Bdubs walked in silence down the hall of the fortress. It was a comfortable silence to the twins, but an awkward silence to Keralis and Bdubs. Bdubs turned to EX with a confused look on his face.

"So how are you here? I... uh, I was told you were dead." He said, rubbing the back of his neck. Keralis looked relieved that he didn't have to ask. Since Bdubs and Keralis joined in the middle of the season, they were only told Xanthus had a perma-death. Seeing the dead Hermit made them greatly confused.

Xanthus chuckled at their actions, obviously amused.

"First of all, I'm not alive." He said, causing Xisuma to roll his eyes.

"Then how are you here?" Keralis asked.

"The original Nether is the Hell of Minecraft. There is a 'Heaven', but I don't go there or know what it's called. I don't fit in there. I stayed here. This Nether and the 'Heaven' is a home or a place to stay if you had a perma-death." Xanthus shrugged, leading them through another corridor. There were three demons, but Xanthus shot all of them with his bow before they could react.

"Won't they respawn?" Xisuma asked, picking up a healing potion.

"No. Here, it takes longer to respawn, and they respawn farther away. Like... five-hundred blocks away. In the overworld, it would be four thousand blocks." Xanthus picked up the valuables, dropping the random items like leather, buttons, or potatoes. Keralis and Bdubs picked up a couple items, but didn't say anything.

"Here, since I'm dead, I can't feel pain or die again. I'm essentially a moving shield."

"Earlier, you said that this is a place to stay if you had a perma-death. Why aren't there other people here?"

"Three things. Perma-death isn't a common thing to happen, they don't live around here and never travel here, and/or they moved on."

"Moved on?" Xisuma looked at his brother, who was slightly shorter than him. EX looked back, pushing the hair out of his face. He had left his helmet at his place as he didn't need it. Xisuma had just noticed something: Xanthus' eyes were a dull gray color, not their normal blood red. Weird.

"Like... I don't know how to describe it. Finally resting?" Xanthus replied, turning another corner.

"Oh. It seems boring here. Is there anything to do?" Bdubs asked. Xanthus grinned as he pushed another door open. It led to more halls and looked more confusing, but Xanthus seems to know where he was going.

Xanthus was about to answer when Keralis was knocked in the back with a sword. He turned around and stabbed the demon that tried to attack him. Blazes sounded in the distance, and wither skeletons' bones rattled. Keralis picked up another diamond sword, safely storing it in his inventory.

"You good?" Xanthus asked. Keralis nodded.

"Alright. Anyway, here we are free to walk around and do whatever we want. There are activities to do, a lot of them, but I won't go into detail." He pushed another door open, seeing blazes flying around. They looked at him, then looked at the Hermits. They shot fireballs at them. The Hermits ducked, causing the fireballs to hit the fortress' walls. It caught fire, and some blocks got displaced. Xanthus used his bow and shot them down, while the Hermits used their tridents. They were careful to not throw them out the windows of the fort, because lava was no doubt waiting for something to fall into it.

All the blazes were gone, but they'd respawn soon. Xanthus urged the Hermits to hurry up, as their presence was already known in the fort.

"What are we even looking for?" Keralis asked, out of breath from sprinting for a few minutes straight.

"You didn't tell them...?" Xisuma shook his head at his brother's question.

"Well, you'll find out soon enough. We're almost there. Xisuma, I can't open the lock. I'm just an inhabitant."

"I'll send Grian out location. He can teleport there, I think."

"Why can't he just teleport all of us there now?"

"It takes energy to teleport more people. He also has to know where and what the area looks like."

"Of course." Xanthus sighed. Xanthus kicked another door open. Unlike the level halls they have been traveling through, this led to a lower place by the use of stairs. After Xanthus closed the door behind them, they quickly went down the stairs and ran through the place. There were many rusty iron bars, holding dangerous mobs and players. They begged for the Hermits to let them go, but they ignored them. Xisuma shivered, remembering his own time in a cell much like these.

Xanthus led them to the end of another hall. Instead of the usual rusty bars, the door was like a vault door. It was made of gold, iron, diamond, and obsidian. The lock was a keypad, and the answer was five digits long. Xisuma tried blasting it with his admin magic, but it bounced off the keypad and back at him. Because he wasn't expecting it and was closer to the pad, it hit him and blasted him back down the hall. He slid for a few blocks on his back.

"Ow." He grunted. He stood up, taking note of the scrapes on his right elbow. He walked back towards his group, ignoring his brother's laughter. He enjoyed it though, as he hadn't heard it in what felt like forever.

"Now what? If Xisuma can't get it open, what can we do now?" Bdubs asked over EX's laughter.

"Wait for Grian." Xisuma answered, taking his communicator out. Keralis leaned against the wall, observing the group. Bdubs anxiously stood when he's been, shifting his weight from foot to foot. EX stopped laughing, but he was still snickering. Still looking at his communicator, Xisuma slapped his brother upside the head, messing Xanthus' hair up. X smirked, stepping away from his brother's attempt to push him. His communicator rang.

"He's coming. Apparently my extremely vague description of how we got here was enough for him to know where to go." Xisuma explained, putting the communicator in his pocket. Xanthus nodded, still chuckling.

"Alright. Let's just hope they don't know we are down here." He said, looking down the hall from where they came from.

(1162 words)