Disclaimer: I do not own Minecraft or anything mentioned in the story.

I: First Assault

-Shell-

The blocky sun was high in the Minecraftian sky. The midday light touched nearly every corner of the hemisphere, giving its life-giving energy to every living creature that roamed under its watchful glow and slaying the few undead that dared to trespass into its territory. Across the wide plains, villages of cobblestone and wood had been established long ago by the current villagers' large-nosed forefathers, the farms passed down generation to generation; this same aspect of life was true in the harsh deserts, were the villages were scarce and the few that were still populated were near barren. Jungles lush with life were flourishing kilometres away from those places, and mountains reaching far into the sky with peaks wreathed in clouds sprung up like the trees of the jungle, only even more massive and made of stone. And of course there were caves, oh, there were a great many of those—especially in the mountains, which were full of so many of them that the tunnels downward were like the burrows of giant moles.

And that is where one would typically find me, in any of the probably dozens of caves that existed in the range of mountains that I called my home. Most of these tunnels had been explored, mainly by myself, but also with the help of my friends, and as such were very well-lit and had many different little alcoves with beds, chests, furnaces and workbenches, and also every few layers of stone one could find a passage leading into a little farm area. And near the very bottom layer, nearing bedrock, is where I was at this time, a torch in hand and a pickaxe strapped to my back as I performed routine checks on the torch sconces and spawner areas, while also making sure that I hadn't missed any ores or tunnel branches.

My name is ShelledAvenger, although everyone simply referred to me as Shell. Personally I liked to think of myself as tall, but really I was more of average height, standing just a little under two blocks high, which was about five feet, ten inches; weight-wise I was on the bulkier side, but there was a good amount of muscle behind it from swinging my pick and working in the forge daily. My skin was a bit paler than natural, but that was simply due to me being down in the caves with little sunlight, except from when I went out to visit my friends; I wore a dark purple hoodie with intermittent stripes of black, black jeans and black shoes. Every now and then I would put on a stocking cap that was blue and had the face of a Blastoise from Pokémon printed on it; under my hoodie I always had on a black tank top. I wore my brown hair short, framing my heart-shaped face; as for my eye colour, most people would differ in their opinions, but as for myself, whenever I would look into the springs that were rather common in my tunnels I would see them as a very vibrant green colour. At my waist I always carried a diamond axe, and on my back was a green backpack that was very much like a shell—hence the Shell part of my name.

But anyways here I was down in my mines, just performing some routine maintenance checks; as I neared the end of Tunnel 3A (I'd taken to naming the tunnels, this being the main tunnel of number 3, so therefore it was 3A) I heard something moving around down there as I got closer to the bedrock. Instinctively I moved my pale hand, the one not holding my torch, toward my axe, getting a grip on the shaft as I stuck close to the wall; the dimly lit maw where all of the caves in the mountain met loomed ominously ahead, gaping. Stalactites hung sharply from the ceiling, dripping with water, just as blood would drip from the mouth of a dragon, and the dim lighting that was provided by the sparse torches dotted throughout the room was like the fire burning in the back of said creature's throat.

Heavy breathing and dragging echoed throughout the cavern, and I could see a limping shadow in the dim light, though I couldn't tell what it was, but I knew it couldn't be any good…

…And boy was I right. I called out to them in my voice that was heavily accented, "Oh, you! You there! Laumast-þjófur! Sneak!" I could not help but speak into my native language, which is Icelandic, when I yelled out—but perhaps I should have simply kept my voice down, looking back on this. The shadow stopped and the dragging stopped with them; they started moving in my direction, finally stepping into the light of a furnace about midway from me.

And I had never been more terrified in my life.

Rotting flesh hung loosely from an emaciated frame, bones exposed here and there with blood streaming from multiple pierce wounds; but what startled me the most were the muscles. They were still present, apparently not yet gone—if anything, the muscles seemed to be larger, more prominent than an average human being; they were male, most likely. They lacked a shirt and their pants may as well have been gone; and their greying face was contorted into a truly gruesome expression, as if a cross between immense pain and a battle-cry. The creature gave off no sound as it moved beside the limp, and the gaping hole in their throat with nothing exposed but the spinal chord, so it may very well have been incapable of anything remotely similar to speech.

Either way, I could tell that in no way was this a common, run-of-the-mill zombie that occasionally strayed into these caves. This was an abomination.

As it limped, it picked up speed until it was charging at an alarming rate, so quickly that I had to flee back up toward the entrance of the tunnel. When I studied in one of the larger cities of the continent, I had learned the very basics of concepts such as momentum, which is what this creature had; I knew that with my axe alone, I could not meet something like that expecting to stop it in its tracks.

A faint gargling leapt up from it as it tried to climb up the stairs, losing the power it had gained as it "ran." As it drew near, I quickly whipped my axe out of the holster I had crafted for it and, with a spinning flourish, chopped the creature's head off straight at the neck. The body slumped down and remained stationary, aside from a leg being ripped off and falling, but the head went rolling down the stairs. I ran back down after it and frowned as I picked it up: "Jæja... perhaps Doc will know what this is."

I ran as fast as I possibly could out of the tunnel, flicking the lever and opening the piston-doors (created with the help of Doc) and hopping onto my horse, Sleipnir. Quickly I spurred Sleipnir into action, taking him onto the road that my friends and I had constructed from the mountains to the little territories we all had laid claim to.

Half a day's ride found me tethering my horse to a hitching post outside of a large building made of stone bricks and smooth stone with a large glass dome atop of it—this was Doc's laboratory. A frame of quartz and black hardened clay framed a grand doorway; the doors were polished oak wood and very obviously well-kept as there was no squeak when they opened and they glided smoothly. The lab was filled with bookshelves, enchanting tables, furnaces and alchemy stations with an elevator that went up onto a glass floor which was a garden for ingredients and also went down to a lower floor that was Doc's private home.

"Hæ, Doc! Doc!" I called out, looking for my friend.

"Yes, yes Shell! I'm coming!" came a voice from the other side of the room—the whole laboratory on this floor was a single open room. Soon came a hurried-looking man of about 20, a year younger than myself, wearing a white labcoat, a blue polo shirt underneath and black pants. A pair of safety glasses covered his dark brown eyes; he had rather tan skin (he also did quite a bit of field research and cultivation, despite many of his experiments taking place in his lab) and was actually quite tall, being near as tall as an Enderman, and was on the slimmer side like one also. His black hair was rather long, and as such he kept it tied up in a ponytail when he was in the lab. With him he carried two glass bottles with liquids inside—one a vivid green and the other a toxic-looking purple. "What is it?" he asked briskly.

This busybody of a man was named DoctorCaptain, simply referred to as Doc by the rest of us.

"Hér! Here!" I said, setting my shell-backpack on the ground and withdrawing the head.

Doc took one look at this and said loudly, "Dear Notch! What the actual hell is this thing?"

I shrugged. "Ég veit ekki. I do not know," I said truthfully. "I found it lurking in my mines. It tried to kill me, so it must be some sort of aggressive mob—but I have never seen it before. Was not like a zombie; it was a líkið as well but that is where the… um… si-similarities end. This was fast, and possibly strong. Lacked vocal chords though."

Doc took the head from my hands and looked it over, examining it with keen eyes. After almost three minutes he nodded once. "Hmm, yes! I will look into this. Thank you, Shell—are you going to stay the night?"

"No, I think I should head home, perhaps I will find more." I said politely. "I have nowhere to put Sleipnir up for the night anyway."

"Hmm, perhaps it would be a better idea if you would stay, just until morning; you said it did not hit you, so we do not know the strengths of these creatures, nor their habitats or weaknesses. You can put Sleipnir with Medley if you wish, you know where my stables are," said Doc.

A small smile crossed my face—perhaps Doc was right. I took him up on the offer and rested in his guest room, with Sleipnir in the stables.

When morning came, all that I shall say is that I have never felt so indebted to Doc in my entire life.

-Raptor-

I sat in my cozy little hunting shack by the lake, minding my own business. I had a fire burning in the hearth with a kettle resting atop it, the stew for breakfast—and however further it could last—cooking nicely. I was simply doing a little bit of fletching, improving my arrows and all, waiting for my best friend and neighbour Al—Alphantom to everyone but our friends—to come by for some breakfast before we set out for an early morning hunt.

My hunting dogs, each with snow-white fur and strong legs, bred high up in the mountains (thank you Shell) each sat faithfully beside my chair, the only light coming from my fire playing of of their coats. There were three of them—Lammoth, Manda, and Noldor; Lammoth was the first-born of their litter, and was largest and most powerful, able to take down large deer and other creatures with ease. Manda was the slyest, able to sneak around and take someone by the throat easily. And Noldor, well… Noldor was Noldor—neither powerful nor stealthy, but damn faithful and brave.

But Noldor was shaking; he never shook. Lammoth and Manda both shook as well, so it was obvious that something bad had to be going on.

The wind howled loudly outside, and as I opened a window, I smelled something riding with it—the smell of something burning. I slammed the window shut and ran for the door, shoving it open and stepping out onto the grassy plains upon which I had built my home; about ten kilometres straight north was the little village that my friends and I had gathered together to build up, and dead east was the mountains where my dogs had come from, where Shell had built his home.

And the mountains were burning like torches. Light leapt up from the flames that licked the mountainside and turned the once-dark sky an evil orange. There was no way that this could be a simple mine-fire that could've sprung from any of the caverns, and I know that Shell wouldn't set fire to anything that he so meticulously carved out, especially since he was asleep about thirty kilometres east at Doc's house—and nothing could wake Shell up but an alarm.

"What the fuck…?" said a voice coming closer to me; it was Al. His dark hair was covered in a camouflaged leather helmet (crafted by the forgemaster himself, Shell) although a few strands fell down into his pale face, his bright grey eyes—nearly white—reflecting the flames. He was near as tall as I, still shorter though, and slim as well; he wore all leather armour, camouflaged although with "skel" imprinted on the left pectoral-plate—the mark of Shell. On his back he had a shorter bow than mine, more compact and firm-looking, and he carried a quiver of arrows; at his belt were two diamond daggers. "Is Shell alright?"

"Yeah, he's at Doc's…"

"FRIGGA!" roared a voice as a man on a horse went galloping by, hooves thundering against the ground as the stallion galloped as quickly as he possibly could. Shell and Sleipnir were on the move. Al staggered a little and nearly fell as the horse thundered past, but quickly steadied himself and looked to me.

"Let's go," we said simultaneously.

"Hop on, boys!" came Doc's voice as he pulled up in a horse-drawn carriage. His two horses were both small but fast; one was black with white spots and the other was exactly the opposite. Al and I climbed into the carriage next to our other friend, Chef; he was dressed in an iron chestplate, but what else he wore was mere clothes—black pants and a white apron fell under the plate, and his black hair was all dishevelled as if he had just gotten out of bed. He wasn't even wearing his trademark chef's hat, which sat beside him as he struggled to stay awake.

"What happened, Doc?" I asked as Doc spurred the horses into movement, carrying us along quickly.

"Not sure," he said in a distinctly Welsh accent, "sometime around 3, Shell woke me up saying something was wrong. We saw that the mountain was burning, and he shouted something about his cow and hopped onto Sleipnir."

"You alright there, Chef?" Al interrupted.

"Fuck off," said Chef. "Move faster, damn it!"

"So what are we going to do when we get there? Does he think that he can put out the fire?" Al asked.

"I gave him a few Fire Resistance potions, he's going to go in and get his cow, if she's still alive," said Doc, "and he might poke around to see what started the fire, try and salvage a few of his resources and such."

-Chef-

Did I expect to be woken up by Doc pounding at my door in the middle of the night? Hell no. Did I expect to be told that the mountains were on fire? Hell no. Did I expect to hear that my best friend Shell was going to run into the fire to save a cow? Can you guess the answer?

That's right—fuck no!

Either way, I took a moment to grab my armour and throw it on, as well as grab a few golden apples from my stores and headed out to the cart.

The road along the mountain was treacherous for a carriage, and I have to admit that I was actually rather scared of the fall should we break a wheel or one of the horses slip—which was actually more likely than I would have hoped for, considering Shell had yet to expand the paths as he had so long said he would. However, at the time it wasn't very important.

When we finally got to the spot where the flames were sprouting up, we saw Sleipnir shifting nervously outside of a burning cavern. Immediately I wolfed down a golden apple, feeling the Fire Resistance coursing through me as the heat faded away. I leapt off the cart and took off into the cave after my friend. A ways in I passed Al, who had somehow gotten ahead of me, possibly by one of the branch-tunnels (he was more active in mapping them than I was) carrying a bunch of iron ingots and some materials for chainmail back towards the mouth of the tunnel; I found Raptor with a large chest in his arms, slowly making his way back.

Finally I came upon Shell trying to force-feed the cow a potion, but the golden beast (yes, it was gold) would not open its mouth. "Fjandinn þú opinn! Open up, damn you!" he roared, grabbing the creature at the mouth but it still would not move.

"Shell!" I said, walking over to him. I dug my hand into the pocket of my apron and withdrew a golden apple, glinting off of the fires that danced in the doorways. "Give her this."

I tossed the apple to him and he caught it quickly, kneeling to eye-level and offering it to the cow. "Here, Frigga," he said gently, and the cow took it. He grinned and said, "YAH! Let us go! Áfram! Forward!" he turned his eyes to me. "You too, Chef. Run!"

Minutes after we had gotten out of the cave and gotten the cart rolling once more, the fire belched out of that very cave and slid down the mountain into a canyon. Shell, who was walking along with his horse and cow, looked rather upset—after all, he had just lost almost a full years' work in the crafting alone! I couldn't imagine how much metals it would take to replace all the anvils alone, and I knew there couldn't be remotely enough in the chest that Raptor had carried.

"I saw him, you know."

"What was that?" said Al, as he held the bag of ores and ingots.

"I saw him," repeated Shell. "Hvit-augu. White-eye."

I frowned as I looked back at him; "White-eye? You mean…"

"Aye, Herobrine," he confirmed, "he was running around in the lower chambers, where Doc and I placed the industrial furnaces."

"Those must have been what produced that fireball," said Doc, "it certainly couldn't have been the lava pools, not since they are so far down." He spurred the horses to go faster as our road leveled out and was fairly safe.

"But I thought Herobrine wasn't real," said Raptor, "just a ghost story that the villagers make up to tell their children so they'll behave."

Shell snorted bitterly. "Hardly; nobody could've survived in that blaze, where I saw him. Even with the potion I would have died if I went down there," he said. "And nobody has eyes like that—when he looked back at me… they were glowing, lads. Glowing." He took a long swig from a bottle of water. "I do not care what you say—there is no natural explanation. Nobody has glowing eyes; nobody could have lived in that heat, near the forges."

Now, I wasn't sure about Herobrine. I thought for sure that my friend was seeing things in the burning heat; Herobrine couldn't be real—it was as Raptor said, Herobrine was just a ghost story, right? I mean, I hadn't seen him, and relatively few people actually have claimed to see him within the past decade or so—and it was as I had learned at the University out in Shenouvre (really as we had learned, as that is where the five of us, aside from Shell and I, had first met), on the edge of the Sun-lands: believe nothing without proof.

But I won't lie—there was a part of me that was curious, for sure. That was the scientific part of me, the one that was usually concerned with cooking up new concoctions to protect people, improve their strengths, etc.

Then there was the part of me that, despite all my logical thinking and worldly concerns…

...that was the part that was genuinely afraid, fearing what may be out there, not something that is certainly there.

And trust me when I say, that in all my life, my fears that were placed in what might not even exist have often turned out to become the most justified.

And that is a wrap folks. This story kinda struck me all at once so I just had to write non-stop, you ever have that? Now in this first chapter we explored three different points of view, Shell, Raptor and Chef, and I've done my best to keep consistencies between all of them. We saw the first assault of the enemy, destroying the largest cave system the dudes had in their possession—I'm sure you can figure out why that was important.

I'll also be adding up a character database as well as an OC sheet along with this chapter, because I would actually like to have some of your OCs in here as well.

Anyways I'm tired and don't have much else to say, so feel free to leave a review if you want, follow/favourite if you care to, but either way, take care, brush yo hair, see ya when I see ya…

Peace~

—Chase