I was annoyed at Oliver. He didn’t have to tell them everything. “Do you have names?” I asked them.
“Yes, I’m Roger,” said the blue soldier with the sword.
Before the others could reply, I said, “If you want to work with us, you need to change your skins.”
Roger dismissed my demand. “If we change our skins, they’ll know we aren’t in their army and will destroy us. If we keep our blue skins, it will be easier for us to stage an inside attack.”
I was still a little wary, but I liked the idea of an inside attack and a secret army. I also knew we had to get far away from the ice biome or we’d be vulnerable to an attack ourselves.
The sky grew dark, and Oliver and I needed a place to stay. The blue soldiers walked us over to a patch of snow. They took out shovels and began to dig.
Before we could ask what they were doing, Roger said, “Look,” and pointed into the large hole they’d created in the snow.
We looked down the hole and saw a door.
“This is where you’ll stay. It’s a secret room we built. We’ve been plotting to destroy Charles and Thao, and this room is where we have our meetings. It’s quiet and it’s safe.”
Oliver immediately jumped into the hole and opened the door. I stopped for a moment. I wasn’t sure if this was a trap.
The blue soldiers looked at me. “Aren’t you going to join us?” asked Roger.
“You first,” I said. The three blue men made their way down the hole ahead of me.
I had to take a chance. I climbed in after them and walked down the stairs. The room was surprisingly large and there was a second smaller room off of it full of beds.
“We should all get some sleep, so if we get destroyed, we know we’ll respawn here.” Roger climbed into a bed.
I took out my journal and tried to write beneath the covers. I didn’t want anyone to see me writing—this journal must stay a secret. As the night set in, we all went to sleep. When we awoke, Roger and his friends were in the room debating ways to overthrow Charles and Thao.
Roger stood by a large chest. I walked over and peeked into it. It was filled with blue helmets.
“What are these for?” I asked.
“We took these from Charles and Thao. We were trying to see if we could find others to join our cause and be a part of this secret army,” explained Roger.
At that moment, I considered putting on a blue skin and helmet and joining the secret army. But something in my heart told me that something wasn’t right.
“Should we help you come up with a plan of attack?” asked Oliver.
I continued to explore the room, peeking into the two other chests that were on the floor.
Roger looked alarmed. “What are you doing? Those are our private chests. Don’t open them!”
The other two soldiers aimed their bows and arrows at us.
“What did we do wrong?” Oliver asked the soldiers.
“Nothing!” I shouted.
“I disagree,” said Roger. Now he was pointing his diamond sword at us, too.
I looked in the direction of the exit and tried to figure out a way to escape. I looked over at Oliver and whispered, “Use your potions.”
7
CLIMBING A MOUNTAIN
They were interrupted when a familiar voice called out.
“Julian?” called back Harriet.
“Hi,” said Julian. “I’m sorry—I followed you.”
“Why?” Harriet looked down at the open door. She wanted to hide their discovery from him, but it was too late. “What happened? Why did you disappear?”
“I got scared. But I have no home. When I saw you guys walking by my farm, I called out to you, but you didn’t turn around. So I decided to follow you.”
“We didn’t hear you,” Harriet replied. She didn’t remember hearing anyone call out their name and she didn’t recall seeing Julian when they climbed up the mountain. She was skeptical, but couldn’t help but be a little impressed that he had made the journey on his own.
Julian peeked down the hole. “What’s that?”
“It’s a stronghold. We think it’s a secret room where an army used to be housed,” said Jack.
Harriet was annoyed at Jack. She didn’t want Julian to know about the room. He was too trusting—just like Oliver.
“What makes you think that?” asked Julian.
Jack paused. He saw Harriet shoot him a dirty look, and he knew he had said too much. “I don’t know. A wild guess.”
“That’s a pretty wild guess,” Julian said.
Night began to set in. The group crawled into the hole, and Julian followed them.
“Excuse me,” Harriet called back. “Who said you could come with us?”
Julian paused. “I think you should be nicer to me—you might find me helpful.”
Harriet didn’t know what that meant. But she decided to leave it alone and let him follow them. Together they entered the secret room that was once used by the blue army. It was just as William had described in his journal. Harriet was in awe. She felt as if she was walking into the pages of a storybook as she inspected the room.
Before they could explore the room, Jack suggested they get some sleep. “We want to get rest and avoid hostile mobs.” They walked into the smaller room and quickly fell asleep in the beds. When they awoke, they were ready to explore.
“I found a chest!” Toby shouted.
“What’s in it?” Jack asked.
The group joined Toby and watched as he slowly opened the chest. It was filled with blue helmets. Toby sifted through them. “I think there’s something hidden in the bottom.”
“What?” Jack helped Toby remove the helmets to search the chest more carefully.
“It looks like it’s a book.” Toby pushed the helmets out of the way and grabbed the book from the bottom.
Harriet leaned over Toby and read the cover. “It’s another of William’s journals!”
Julian looked upset. “How do you know William?”
“Everyone knows William the Explorer. He was a famed explorer who went missing.”
“Are you looking for him?” asked Julian.
“Yes,” replied Toby. Harriet glared at him.
“Well, you’re not going to find him,” Julian said with a shaky voice.
“How do you know?” Harriet reached for her diamond sword. She didn’t trust Julian.
“He was trapped a long time ago,” explained Julian. “I don’t even know if he still exists. He used to have this friend who always traveled with him. He was the first one they captured.”
“Who captured them?” Harriet took out her sword and aimed it at Julian. “How do you know all of this?”
“I used to be a part of William’s secret army,” Julian confessed. “It was run by my friend Roger.”
“You must be one of the blue soldiers from the journal,” Toby let slip. Harriet stomped her foot. He wasn’t taking a hint!
Julian was shocked. “You have another journal?”
“Yes, we do. But since you were there, you could probably tell us more than the journal,” said Toby. “Can you tell us why your army turned against William and Oliver in this very room?”
“We were following orders from Roger. After that happened, I was scared and ran off to live on the wheat farm. It’s hard to explain my past. I’ve been trying to forget it.”
Harriet looked at Julian. “You acted as if you never left your town.” She put down her sword. “Why did you really follow us here? How can you help us? Do you know where Charles and Thao are now?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know much, but I’d like to help you find out more. This has been bothering me for a very long time. I want to find William and his friend.”
Harriet looked around the room. “I think we have to search for clues. This is the best place to start. And we have to keep reading the journal. It’s the only way we can get answers. Obviously, William was able to leave his first journal in an abandoned minesh
aft after he was here, so we know he had to escape from here at some point.”
“That’s not true,” said Toby. “Someone could have found it here and brought it to the mineshaft.”
Everyone had a theory, but nobody knew where William was hiding. Or being hidden. Julian interrupted. “We’ll find him. It’s been my mission to help him, ever since I left him. I failed him when I left.”
The group searched the two rooms. Harriet looked at the bed where William had slept and secretly written in his journal. She spotted another chest by the bed, and opened it.
“Guys, come quick,” she called out.
Jack shouted, “Diamond armor!”
“I wonder if this belonged to William and Oliver,” Harriet said. “Julian, do you know?” She turned to Julian, but he was no longer in the room.
“Julian?” Toby called out.
There was no response.
“He’s gone,” replied Jack. “Again.”
“Seriously?” asked Harriet. They searched the rooms.
“And the door is closed!” Jack said, as he stood on the stairs. He banged on the door. “It’s blocked!”
Toby rushed to the chest that contained the second journal. “He took William’s journal!”
“I knew he wasn’t to be trusted!” Harriet cried.
“What are we going to do?” Jack banged on the door with his pickaxe, but it stuck. “We’re trapped!”
Toby took out William’s original journal from his inventory. “We’re going to read.”
8
JOURNAL ENTRY: POTENT POTIONS
Trip 4: Journey to the Nether
Oliver had froze.
“Oliver,” I whispered again, “use your potions.”
Oliver grabbed a potion of weakness and splashed it onto Roger and his minions.
“Another!” I cried out.
Oliver splashed a potion of harming on them.
“Run!” I shouted.
We sprinted up the stairs. When we were almost out of the ice biome, Oliver stopped and said, “I think we should grab some snowballs. I have some bad news.”
“What?” I asked as I started to craft snowballs and placed them in my inventory.
“We are running low on resources. I need to travel to the Nether.”
My heart sunk. I’m a warrior, but I don’t like being in the Nether. It’s the one place where I feel really vulnerable. More than anything, I’m afraid of fire.
“I know you’re afraid of fire,” said Oliver, “but I do have some fire-resistant potions that we can use.” He stepped back and crafted a portal.
Purple mist rose through the sky. As I passed through the portal and stood next to Oliver, I could see Roger and the blue soldiers running toward us. We disappeared into the Nether before they could reach us.
“Destroy it!” I ordered Oliver.
Oliver broke the portal quickly. “Now we don’t have to worry about Roger and the blue men.”
Two ghasts flew toward us, and I began to shake as one shot a fireball in my direction.
“Use the snowball,” Oliver shouted.
I threw the snowball at the fiery beast and destroyed it. Oliver threw snowballs at the second ghast, obliterating it.
“This is going to be harder than we thought.” I looked over at Oliver. He was trying to craft a map of the Nether. “We don’t have time to craft maps—this is a matter of survival. Any minute now we’ll be confronted by Roger and his army of two, and they are going to be mad.”
Oliver told me to calm down. “We’ll be fine. I think making this map will help us, too. We’ll want to know where we’ve traveled.”
“Where can you find the supplies for brewing?”
Oliver smiled. “The Nether fortress—I see one up ahead.”
I looked out into the distance. Although I dislike fire, there was something beautiful about the Nether. The netherrack ground seemed to omit a glow, and the lava waterfalls mesmerized me. The Nether fortress was very large and stood out from the landscape.
“It doesn’t look that far. I think we should run,” I suggested to Oliver.
Oliver reminded me that we were running low on energy. “This will help us.” He handed me a potion and I took a sip.
Oliver was right. I felt strong again and I sprinted toward the Nether fortress. However, once we reached the entrance, I let out a loud gasp. Three blazes flew above the entrance. The yellow beasts with menacing black eyes shot fireballs at us.
Oliver grabbed a snowball and threw it at a blaze, while I shot an arrow. We destroyed one of them almost immediately. “William, pick up the glowstone dust,” shouted Oliver. “I need it for my supplies. The dust helps make my potions stronger.”
I nervously picked up the dust as I tried to avoid being struck by one of the fireballs the remaining blazes were shooting at us. Oliver struck another with a snowball, and the weakened mob was destroyed. I picked up the glowstone dust it dropped as Oliver annihilated the final blaze.
“Thanks for getting the glowstone dust,” said Oliver. “It’ll definitely come in handy.”
We walked under a bridge made of Nether bricks, and were about to enter the fortress when lightning lit up the Nether sky.
“Lightning! There is never lightning in the Nether. This must be Roger’s work. He must be summoning it.” I knew this was going to be a hard battle to win. I hated being in the Nether.
“Yes! He also summoned creepers!” Oliver shouted.
Two creepers silently moved through the Nether landscape and were struck by the lightning. The charged creepers crept toward us and entered the fortress. Oliver and I aimed our bows and arrows at the creepers, but we put our weapons down when we noticed two wither skeletons spawn in the fortress.
Kaboom!
The charged creepers exploded and destroyed the wither skeletons. The black skeletons’ skulls dropped to the ground. Oliver rushed to pick them up. “These are very valuable,” he noted.
“We need to make this quick,” I told him. I was worried Roger would summon more mobs and lightning.
We entered the main room of the fortress. Oliver walked over to a patch of soul sand and gathered Nether wart.
“I have everything we need. We can leave now,” he said.
“Shh!” I whispered. “I hear voices.”
As we stood in silence, two more wither skeletons spawned in front of us. I grabbed my sword and struck one. Oliver shot an arrow at the other skeleton. The powerful skeletons struck us, and we lost hearts.
“What’s going on here?” Roger joined our battle with the wither skeletons. “I thought the creepers would have destroyed you by now.”
I delivered a final blow to one of the skeletons and it was destroyed. Oliver was weakening the other skeleton, but not quickly enough. Roger was shooting arrows at us, too, now. My energy was almost entirely depleted. I used the last bit I had to run at the skeleton and plunged my sword into the beast of the Nether, obliterating it for once and for all.
Oliver splashed a potion of harming on Roger and the two blue soldiers to slow them down, and we sprinted out of the Nether fortress.
“We have to make a portal.” I could barely get the words out, I was breathing so fast.
“I know, but we have to get away from Roger and the others first,” Oliver said.
I looked back. Two ghasts were flying toward Roger and his friends. They shot fireballs at them. I stopped.
“Why are you stopping?” Oliver asked.
“Look—the ghast just hit Roger with a fireball,” I pointed out. We watched the two soldiers attempt to battle the ghasts. They threw snowballs, but they lost to the fiery mobs. Within seconds Roger’s two-person army was destroyed.
“Now we are safe to build the portal,” I said. Oliver began to craft the portal back to the Overworld.
As the purple mist rose through the air, I stepped through the portal, but heard a voice call out in the distance, “Wait for me!”
9
BREWING
Who was calling to them? Keep reading!” said Harriet.
“No, this isn’t helping. I thought reading the journal was going to help us figure a way out of here, but it’s done nothing for us. I truly believe this book has cursed us.” Jack paced around the small room.
“I told you, there is no such thing as being cursed.” Toby looked through his inventory. “Does anyone have TNT? We’re going to have to blow up the door.”
“We can’t blow up the door! We’ll be destroyed,” cried Jack.
“We’re trapped. How did we let this happen?” asked Harriet.
“I’m sure we can find a way to blow up this door with TNT and not get destroyed in the process. Go into the other room.” Toby grabbed a brick of TNT from Jack and placed it by the door. He ignited the TNT and then sprinted back toward the room with the beds.
Kaboom!
The door was blown apart and the trio made their escape out of the ice biome and toward the mountain.
“I don’t think we should retrace their steps to the Nether,” Jack called out as they climbed up the side of the mountain.
“I agree with you.” Harriet disliked the Nether almost as much as William. “They were in a rush to get out of there anyway. They probably didn’t leave any clues there.”
When they climbed down the other side of the mountain, they reached a grassy biome.
“It’s so peaceful here,” Harriet said, but the minute those words fell from her mouth, the sky grew dark and it began to rain.
The group looked for a place to get shelter from the rain, but there was nowhere to hide.
Skeletons began to spawn in the fields. The gang prepared to battle the bony beasts until the rain stopped.
“We are cursed,” Harriet said sadly.
“We can’t give up. We’re going to save William and Oliver.” Toby shot an arrow at a skeleton.
Jack ran toward the skeletons and struck as many as he could with his diamond sword.
“More are spawning,” Toby shouted as he splashed potions on them.
Harriet struck a skeleton with her sword and destroyed it. As she reached over to pick up the bone the skeleton had dropped, another skeleton struck her, and she was destroyed.
Discoveries in the Overworld Page 3