by Mark Mulle
of good if I tried my best.
I knew what I needed for my army now. I just needed to think of how to get one in my army. I’ll have a meeting with the troops tomorrow to see if they have any ideas. I’ll make sure to write about everything that happens.
Day Twenty-Two: How to get a Blaze
Dear Diary,
Sometimes I sure do feel like I am a no brainer even though I know that I’m an evil genius. I called this whole conference together to figure out how to get a Blaze to join our ranks and the simplest answer that I got turned out to be the best answer. I guess that just goes to show that sometimes you don’t need to think outside of the box to get something done.
I assembled all of the Skeletons together in my lair and told them that I wanted to get some Blazes in my army. I made the point that the Nether army didn’t have any Blazes and that it would definitely give us an advantage against them. After I gave my speech I waited for the rest of the troops to reply. Some of the soldiers didn’t want Blazes in the army, but most of them were in favor of it.
I then asked how we could get Blazes in the army. I knew that trapping them or forcing them to fight wouldn’t be a good idea, but I wasn’t sure what would be a good idea either. I asked my troops what they thought, and that’s when I got a simple, but great answer. “What if we just ask them to join?” Larry suggested. I had to admit, it was a pretty good idea.
I gave my soldiers a mission. They were to look for Blazes and ask them to join. Tomorrow, they will report back with their answers, and some Blazes if they are lucky. I hope this gets me the firepower that I’ve been looking for. I’ll make sure to write all about it no matter what happens tomorrow.
Day Twenty-Three: The Blaze Mission
Dear Diary,
As much as I wanted to get out and recruit Blazes myself, I knew that it would be better if I stayed behind in the lair. Besides, I would be here in case any skeletons came back with Blazes. I would be able to deal with it right away. Honestly, I was still all worried that the Nether army will get suspicious again if I started to hang around with a bunch of Blazes. It was just better this way.
Yesterday I told my troops to get out and recruit Blazes if they could. I have to admit that I don’t know everyone in the army by name yet, but I am confident that I can trust them to complete this mission. If even a few soldiers are able to bring in Blazes, that’ll be great.
I waited in the lair today until some of my soldiers brought me some great news. “Sir, I was able to get a group of Blazes interested, and I was talking to some of the troops, and they seemed to be able to do it easily as well.” I was honestly surprised at this new development. Blazes were big and tough. I thought it would take a lot more convincing to get them to join.
“How’d you do it?” I asked. I wanted to know all of his secrets.
“Well, Sir, I just asked them. They were happy to join our army. Blazes aren’t allowed in the Nether army, and there are a lot of Blazes who are pretty mad at the Nether army for it. A lot of them want to join to get revenge like you do, and some of them just want to defeat the Overworld army, and they don’t care if they need to join our army to do it.”
I was happy that it was so easy. “Tell them to show up to our next meeting, and then we can really get things started.”
“Yes, Sir!” He said and then left.
My army was really starting to come together. I had the numbers, the firepower, and everything else I needed to make this army successful. I’ll write more tomorrow! I’m sure that I’ll have a lot to write updates about.
Day Twenty-Four: A Force to be Reckoned With
Dear Diary,
“I’ve called all of you here today because I have an important message,” I floated behind my podium. I had the speech of a lifetime to give. I looked down at all of the soldiers sitting in front of me. I couldn’t help but feel proud of myself for everything that I had accomplished in the few short weeks that I had been out of the Nether army. “We have finally built an army that can pose a threat to the Nether army. We may not have as many soldiers as the Nether army, but we do have more firepower,” I looked over to the Blazes as I said this, “and more freedom. I am confident that we have what it takes to reclaim glory for the Nether!” I yelled and the army in front of me cheered.
“We do have one problem,” I admitted to my adoring followers. “We need to find a way to infiltrate or otherwise break up the Nether army so that we can get to the Overworld and take the resources that they have failed to take.” I didn’t know how we were going to do this, but I’m pretty sure that all of that was implied by my speech. This time, the army didn’t cheer, but I didn’t really expect them to.
“Does anyone have any ideas?” I asked the crowd. I was hoping that many soldiers would raise their hands and provide me with suggestions like they had when I wanted Blazes for my army, but this didn’t happen this time. It was like radio silence in the lair.
“Come to me if you think of anything,” I said sadly as I floated away from the podium. We may have an army, but what good is it if we don’t know what to do with it? I’m going to sleep now. Maybe I can dream up a solution...someone has to.
Day Twenty-Five: A Surprising Turn of Events
Dear Diary,
I called off all meetings for the army today. I needed some time to think, and I needed the lair to be quiet to be able to do that. I sent the soldiers away, hoping that they would be able to think of something in their own homes as well. I didn’t expect anyone to bother me today, which is why I was surprised to hear a knock on my door in the middle of the afternoon.
I floated over to the door and answered it. I expected to see a soldier who had forgotten that he had the day off, instead I was face to face with an officer from the Nether army. I was worried that the army had caught on to me, after all, that I had done to make sure that they didn’t. I was ready to zap the guy, but then he said something that I would never have expected him to say. “I’m here on behalf of the Nether army to apologize for kicking you out.”
I decided not to zap him. I wanted to hear more. “What?” was all that I could think to ask.
“The army kicked you out unjustly. You were one of the best sergeants that the Nether army had. It’s not the same with you gone. The Nether army would like you to come back.”
For a second I wanted to laugh. I hated the Nether army. It took them way too long to realize how important I was. They should be begging for me back, not just sending one guy with a crummy apology. I didn’t laugh, though because I realized that I could play this thing out to my advantage. “Let me think about it,” I told the officer before sending him away.
If I got back into the army it would be a perfect way to sneak in my troops. I would have the power to ruin the Nether army literally from the inside out. This would be a big change of plans, though. I will talk to the troops about it tomorrow. This could be our golden ticket into the Overworld...
Day Twenty-Six: Join Me?
Dear Diary,
The Nether army had personally invited me to rejoin. It was the perfect way to ambush the army from the inside. I was ready to do it. I just needed to see if my troops were ready for it too. I called another meeting for all of the troops and told them about what had happened the other day. The crowd was filled with mixed reactions until I told them about my great plan.
When I was done telling them about everything that had happened and that I had planned yesterday, I asked the group, “So, will you join me?” There was a lot of mumbling throughout the audience, and it was hard to know what they were thinking. “Well?” I asked again. This time, there was a cheer from most of the Skeletons, but the Blazes seemed unhappy.
“What about us?” One of the Blazes asked, “or the Skeletons who got kicked out of the army? You might have been invited back, but we weren’t.”
Luckily, I had already put some thought into this. I knew just what to say. “I have a plan for that too,” I said. “You might not be able to take down the
Nether army from the inside, but you can still help to ruin it from the outside. The plans that we have already made will remain the same for anyone who does not want to join the Nether army.” This answer seemed to work for the crowd.
There were no further questions, other than a few Skeletons wondering how they could sign up for the Nether army. I couldn’t believe all of this. I could have hardly been luckier than I was now. The Nether army was inviting their downfall to them and they didn’t even know it. They were going down, and it was all because of me and what I had created. I told them that they hadn’t seen the last of me, and now I was going to show them what I was really made of.
Day Twenty-Seven: An Unexpected Visitor
Dear Diary,
I called my army together. We knew that we would be joining up with the Nether army in a few short days, so we really needed to get serious about training. I had many stations set up so that the soldiers would be able to learn how to do the things that would be able to help them the most in the war.
The Skeletons who were allowed to join the Nether army were training on how to be sneaky. No doubt, they would need to do some dangerous spy work while we were with the Nether army. A lot of the Skeletons did poorly in this section when I was testing them. They needed to learn these skills quickly or else it could mean that we would be discovered.
The Skeletons and Blazes who