(Heroes can come from unlikely beginnings... and broken friendships can lead to dark rivalries...)
(When the world is in danger, fate calls on the ordinary, to do extraordinary deeds...)
(and go on journeys they only had dreamed of...)
(Our heroes, thrown together by fate... must now seek help from a legendary inventor...)
(But the question remains: will it be enough to save the world?)
[Jesse's POV]
Olivia: "This is so cool! The amount of engineering it must've taken to do this... Automated train tracks running all through the Nether? Connecting all the different order members? And imagine the scaffolding you'd need to make all this!"
Jesse: "When you put it like that, this IS impressive! Thanks to these rails, we'll be there in no time!"
(As we speak, the minecarts rumble as we continue.)
(After leaving Lukas, Axel, and Reuben behind back at the temple, we went back to the portal, back to that hub area.)
(From there, we are where we are now.)
Olivia: "Who'd have thought it, huh? A bunch of small-towners like us, wrapped up in an adventure like this."
Jesse: "Yeah, it is pretty insane. I just hope we all come out the other side in one piece."
Olivia: "Uh... JESSE!"
(Olivia suddenly diverts my attention to the thing in front of us.)
(A ghast suddenly appears and fires.)
(We didn't even have enough time to react; it hit us and we were sent flying to the ground around us.)
(Huff! At least it didn't hit us when the track was above the lava sea.)
Jesse: "GREAT. MORE GHASTS."
(While we took cover behind some netherrack.)
(the minecarts who flew with us were on the edge of the cliff waiting to be dropped to the lava below.)
Jesse: "THE MINECARTS!"
Olivia: "Do something about the ghast!"
Jesse: "Okay, okay! Just gimme a moment!"
(I jump over our cover with my sword in hand.)
(I prepare myself for the Ghast to fire again, to launch its own fireball back.)
(The Ghast opens its mouth and fires its load, and just as planned, I launch it back, killing the ghast quickly.)
Jesse: "Huff, at least it ended quickly."
(During this, Olivia stopped the minecarts before they could fall and picked them back up and onto the tracks again.)
Olivia: "Okay, we're all set to go again! Hitting the powered tracks... now!"
(We hop into the carts and continue our journey once again.)
Olivia: "By the way, I wanted to bring it up earlier but I couldn't because of what just happened."
Jesse: "What is it?"
(Olivia suddenly has a smirk on her face.)
Olivia: "Nothing really, I just noticed that you've been getting quite friendly with Lukas lately."
Jesse: "I am? Well, wasn't it a natural thing to do? Don't get the wrong idea, okay?!"
Olivia: "I was just observing the little things. You guys never really talked before this."
Jesse: "So? This is the first time I truly got to know him. I didn't want to make him feel left out or anything."
Olivia: "Mhm..."
(Jeez, what's up with her getting these kinds of ideas?)
(Though I do have to admit that he does look attractive, but that doesn't mean I'm having other thoughts! That's not the case, is it?)
Jesse: "Hm... If you insist."
(I shrug off that conversation for the time being.)
Olivia: "Look! There's the sign!"
(Before entering a cave, a sign beside it displays our destination.)
Jesse: "Redstonia, here we come!"
(The track ends in front of another portal.)
(I can only guess where that leads to.)
Jesse: "You're about to meet the greatest Redstone Builders in the world."
Olivia: "Wow. Who would've thought that someday I'd really get to visit Redstonia? Ellegaard's Capital City of Engineering. Incredible! Do you think Ellegaard will be willing... to help us?"
Jesse: "I didn't come all the way here for her to NOT help us. She's a hero after all. She'll understand what is at stake here."
Olivia: "I hope so."
(We enter through the portal to Redstonia.)
(The scenery expanded around us, and we could see a large dome building in the distance on an island.)
(You can almost see some of the redstone machines from here.)
(Right, the city is built on an island.)
(We were on a suspended platform above the water, a fair distance from the island.)
(As we admire the view, a bridge from underwater starts rising up, creating a path to the city.)
Olivia: "Wow!"
(On the island, we arrive at a courtyard with a fountain in the middle, just in front of the dome.)
(There were machines scattered throughout the place.)
(Our attention is diverted to the dome, however, when we spot a large crowd of people looking up at it.)
(On top, on some sort of balcony, was Ellegaard, looking down, making some sort of announcement.)
Ellegaard: "Builders of Redstonia! I want you to know how much I value and adore each and every one of you! Your hard work inspires me every day!"
Olivia: "Jesse. There she is!"
Ellegaard: "I am about to enter my Dome of Concentration, where I will be unreachable for the foreseeable future, but I will emerge when I complete my latest and greatest creation: the Command Block!"
Jesse: "That's a block I've never heard of..."
Ellegaard: "So please! Continue working! Continue building! And whichever person most impresses me... They shall be my protege! Ready to help me usher in a new era of innovation and creativity! Calvin, throw the switch!"
(Ellegaard signals to a man beside the crowd.)
(That man, whose name apparently is Calvin, starts flicking multiple switches on what seems to be like a control panel.)
(The door she walks through starts closing down, as well as the roof of the dome.)
Olivia: "Jesse! We need to get there before she totally locks herself in!"
Jesse: "Right!"
(We start running up the stairs on the side of the wall to reach the closing door.)
(but the stairs retract into the wall, and we comically fall down back onto the courtyard.)
Jesse: "Ah, crap."
(The crowd had already dispersed and were now back at work with their machines.)
Olivia: "Let's ask that guy, Calvin, or what was his name?"
(He seemed to have a connection with her, so we naturally started with him.)
Jesse: "Excuse me, Mr... Calvin, was it? We need to speak to Ellegaard. It's urgent."
Calvin: "Ohhh, I'm afraid that's quite impossible. Did you hear the speech? She's on lockdown until she completes her next great invention. But lucky for you, I'm here! How can I help you?"
Olivia: "Yes, could you take us TO her?"
Calvin: "Mmmm, no. I'm afraid not. We don't do tours this time of year, I must tell you."
(Great.)
Calvin: "Look, I can tell you're not from around here. Level with me. Who are you? Why do you need to see Ellegaard?"
Jesse: "We're here to reassemble the Order, all right? You know, 'The Order'? Ellegaard's old gang?"
(Calvin readjusts his glasses.)
(I don't think we're winning this guy over.)
Calvin: "Hmmm. You must admit that this all sounds a little outlandish."
Olivia: "Jesse! Show him the amulet!"
(I pull it out in hopes that he'll finally somewhat understand the situation.)
Jesse: "Look. This is Gabriel's amulet. It's how I got here. It's how I found Ellegaard in the first place."
(Calvin takes an interest in the now red-glowing amulet.)
Calvin: "Oh my. Well, that is interesting. If you'd like, I could send that to Ellegaard. Maybe that would help your mission?"
Jesse: "No, I'm not taking the chance of losing it."
Calvin: "Well fine then. I don't have time for this."
(He's starting to get on my nerves.)
Calvin: "I'm afraid I have many more things to attend to than answering all of your questions. I must go. Better just take this repeater and disable the stair
controls. We don't want any troublemakers disturbing Ellegaard."
(Calvin takes the redstone repeater that was connecting the control panel with the dome away.)
Olivia: "*sigh* Guess we'll need to get another repeater."
(*sigh* It's a shame taking Calvin by force isn't an option.)
(I guess we better start looking around.)
[Olivia's POV]
(I walk up to a person with an Auto-farmer.)
(but as soon as I do so, a cow suddenly launches towards us and lands in a puddle beside the machine, splashing us with water.)
Auto-farmer: "That stupid cow-launching... grgh."
(She tries to calm herself down.)
Auto-farmer: "Ahem... You must be here to see my incredible auto-farmer!
(*SPLASH* Why waste time planting sugar cane when it could be- *SPLASH*)
Auto-farmer: "AH!!! She is driving me nuts with that!"
Olivia: "Yeah... I can see that..."
Auto-farmer: "Listen, if you could do something about that whole... situation, I'll hook you up with some primo crafting stuff. Deal?"
Olivia: "Okay then. I'll see what I can do."
(The cow-pult owner looked like a crazy person.)
(That's just great. Let's hope she's sane enough to have a conversation.)
Olivia: "Hello-"
Mabel: "WELCOME TO MAAAAAABEL'S MIGHTY COWAPULT! MAKE YOUR COWS SOAR THROUGH THE AIR WITH A WIDE-EYED STARE!!!!!!!"
(As she says that, a cow gets capulted up with a slime block and gets shot away by another slime block all the way to that puddle over there.)
Olivia: "Ummm... hey, that farmer over there sent me. The one with all the sugarcane?"
Mabel: "Yeah, I've seen her."
Olivia: "Well, all of the cow-a-pulting is really bothering her. Do you think you could... stop?"
Mabel: "Ohoho, well she's just gonna have to suck it up. No way."
Olivia: "C'mon. Isn't this beneath you? You've already perfected the cow-a- pult. Clearly, shouldn't you start turning your attention to new pursuits?"
(Mabel thinks it through for a second.)
Mabel: "Hmmmm... you actually make a lot of sense, friend. Maybe it IS time to find my next masterpiece-to-be... huh. Thanks for helping me get my head right! Maybe a Tree-moo-chet next..."
(Mabel walks away, already full of ideas. What a weird person, but it did the job.)
Auto-farmer: "Hey, thanks for taking care of that cow-launching nutjob over there. The constant splashing and mooing was driving me insane. Here."
(She gives me 2 redstone torches.)
Auto-farmer: "Take these as a token of my gratitude. That's some primo crafting material right there."
Olivia: "Thank you!"
(Okay, got some redstone torches.)
(I still need some stone and redstone powder...)
(Meanwhile back at [Jesse's POV])
Disco-Weirdo: "Heyyy how's it goin' how ya doin'? Here to see the next great revolution in entertainment? It's preeeeeeeetty amazing!"
Jesse: "What am I looking at exactly?"
Disco-Weirdo: "This, friend-o-mine, is a Bovine Lava Disco!"
(While dancing on his stage, the funny-looking dude activates his 'machine.')
(Behind a stage was a lavafall, which slowly began to fall down, revealing the backstage where a dozen cows were dancing in pure terror.)
Disco-Weirdo: "The perfect fusion of my two loves: cows and Moo-sic! Ellegaard's gonna see it and make me her protege for sure!"
Jesse: "Isn't this animal abuse?"
Disco-Weirdo: "What?! Don't ask such a silly question. Everyone's already asked me. THE COWS ARE FINE."
(A quick glance at the poor cows, which definitely DO NOT LOOK FINE.)
Jesse: "Umm... ok... I was just asking if you had a spare repeater?"
Disco-Weirdo: "Oooh, sorry friend. I actually just used my last one on this puppy. One of the key components that helps the cows dance, ha ha!"
(Sure enough, on the side of the stage, was the repeater powering this torture device.)
Jesse: "Ok... I'm gonna go now."
Lava Disco Creator: "Enjoy the dancing cows! Just stay away from that little schoolboy over there, all right?"
(He aggressively points to that boy over by a weird-looking robot machine.)
Lava Disco Creator: "He's never had an original idea in his life!"
(What a weird man.)
(But at least I have someone to 'get' the repeater from.)
(and by stealing that, I might even stop the cows from getting tortured to death.)
(It's the best course of action.)
(And it seems he's not very friendly with that guy over there.)
(Yeah... I can definitely create some sort of distraction.)
(I approach the youngster.)
Schoolboy: "Heyy, what's up? Here to see the... best. machine... that's ever graced Redstonia's shores?"
Jesse: "Any spare repeaters?"
Schoolboy: "I mean... yes I do... But will I share it with you? Mmmm, No. 'Fraid not. I might need it. So sorry. But why am I telling you all this? You're probably all in cahoots with that disco-weirdo over there. I'm pretty sure he just enjoys torturing cows. Been real chatty with that disco-friend of yours. What's he been telling you about me, huh?"
(Oh, this is easy.)
Jesse: "Is this idea yours? Cuz he says you're unoriginal and you steal people's ideas. All of them."
(Oh, that turned him really angry.)
Schoolboy: "That... no good... dirty little... ARGH. DISCO-FREAK! I'VE GOT A BONE TO PICK WITH YOU!"
(And so the argument starts.)
(While they're distracted, I can perfectly steal the repeater without any resistance.)
(As soon as I steal it, however, the cows in the machine suddenly start catching fire.)
Disco-Weirdo: What--?! No! My machine! My cows! Something's gone wrong with the clock circuit! The lava isn't switching with the water! My poor cows!!!"
Schoolboy: "Oh nooo, your AMAZING invention."
(Okay, I did not think they would just outright burn to death.)
(I'm just gonna walk back to Olivia now and forget this.)
Jesse: "Hey Olivia, did you find anything?"
Olivia: "I have some redstone torches... aaaaand I just witnessed 2 people flying into space."
Jesse: "Well I just accidentally burned a dozen cows. I guess you weren't having a normal time either."
Olivia: "Ok... I'm not going to ask about that cow part."
Jesse: "Anyway, I already have a repeater, so you can stop looking."
Olivia: "Aw, man. You beat me to it."
Jesse: "Well, those torches might still be useful. You should hold on to them."
Olivia: "I guess... let's get to Ellegaard already."
(Right. I place the repeater down and flick the switches, which, one by one, activate what was deactivated before.)
Olivia: "Calvin doesn't seem to be around."
Jesse: "That's good. This way we can go in undetected."
(Olivia nods.)
(We climb up the unretracted stairs again up the dome wall and go through the door into the dome.)
(Meanwhile back at the Temple.)
[Lukas' POV]
Lukas: "Okay, I think everything's secure."
(Over the course of the day, we managed to light every corner of the building as well as block any potential entrances for unwanted guests.)
(We aren't redstone engineers, so we couldn't do anything outstanding with the dispensers downstairs other than deactivate them.)
Axel: "Good, about time I can finally take a break from this."
(Axel walks upstairs with an exhausted face.)
(Before Jesse and Olivia left, he gave me his bow, because with his skills, it wouldn't have much use.)
(Since we're going to be stuck here for a while, I decided to take some time to practice my bow skills.)
(There was a lone zombie underneath a tree a small distance away from the entrance.)
(Good. I climbed onto the balcony above the entrance I constructed and aimed at the undead mob.)
(The arrow flew towards it and hit it in the chest.)
Lukas: " *sigh* At least it killed it."
(I originally intended it to hit the head, but oh well, I guess that's good enough.)
(I climbed back down to get the loot, and to my surprise, the zombie dropped a carrot.)
(You don't see that every day.)
(I just realized that this could be the perfect gift for Reuben! He's still injured, so I wanted to make sure he can stay healthy.)
(I went back to the others upstairs.)
Lukas: "Come here, Reuben!"
(Reuben, who was sleeping, wakes up to curiously look at me
Lukas: "I brought you something to eat. I hope it's enough for now."
(He jumps over to me to pick it up.)
(As he began munching on it, I looked at his injury.)
(It was already mostly repaired.)
(I'm glad. Heh. Who knew that pigs can be so cute?)
(It was the opposite of what Aiden once told me.)
("sigh". Aiden, Gill, and Maya. The last time I saw any of them was back at EnderCon when we all decided to split up.)
(because everyone wanted to go somewhere different.)
(I hope they were able to run somewhere safe.)
(So much was happening back then, I didn't even get the chance to save them.)
(It makes me feel guilty as the leader of the group.)
(*sigh*. The best thing we can do now is to eliminate that storm.)
(For some reason, before Jesse and Olivia left, we were able to see it approaching on the horizon.)
(but for some reason, it began drifting away from the temple after they left.)
(Could it be that it began following those two specifically?)
(That makes me worry about them.)
(It hasn't even been a day, but a lot could happen.)
(I hope everything is going according to plan.)
(Meanwhile, I noticed that Axel had been staring at the giant map for a while now.)
Lukas: "What are you looking at?"
(Axel suddenly jumps, not expecting my approach.)
Axel: "Nothing! Whatever!"
(Axel turns his head away with a slightly red face.)
Lukas: "Axel?"
(He had difficulties answering.)
(He looked worried.)
Axel: "I was just trying to figure out where Petra might be..."
Lukas: "She's going to come back; just stay strong, okay?"
Axel: "That's easy for you to say, I feel like we're not doing anything when we're staying here."
Lukas: "It could be dangerous out there. Petra knows where we went. She's probably doing everything she can to get to this place. If she comes, we must ensure that she arrives safely. It's the best we can do for now."
(Axel doesn't look satisfied with the way things currently are.)
Axel: "What if she DOESN'T make it!? I don't like this at all! I have to do something! Even if it only slightly raises her chances of returning!"
Lukas: "What are you planning to do?"
Axel: "I'm..!"
(Axel pauses for a moment.)
Axel: "I'm going to get Magnus myself!"
Lukas: "What?"
Axel: "With two members of the Stone, we have better chances of saving everyone! It's the best course of action right now! And even if Jesse, which I hope doesn't happen, fails at getting Ellegaard, at least we would have Magnus in our aid!"
Lukas: "Axel! Going alone could be dangerous! We don't know what might happen. You could end up killed!"
Axel: "I'm taking the risk! I'm done with us losing more people!"
Lukas: "Axel, let's think about this. We just have to wait for Jesse to return. We have greater chances if we can go after Magnus then!"
Axel: "Everyday, that Wither Storm is out there raging, we would have LESSER chances at winning every time we wait! I'm GOING!"
(I tried to stop him, but in his state, it didn't look like he would listen, and I don't think he'll appreciate it if I get in his way.)
(*sigh". There really was nothing I could do.)
(Axel started packing up to leave and walked back to the portal, saying goodbye to Reuben on the way.)
(He exits the temple, and starts walking back towards the portal to get Magnus.)
[To be continued...]