PART THREE: UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
I reawakened. Normally, respawning was a painless experience, comparable to waking up from a deep sleep. One would be a little confused and disoriented at first, but otherwise just fine. Not this time. My eyes snapped open and I sat up with a shout, and for a moment my mind was still trapped in that last awful moment when Herobrine's sword was slashing down...
Gasping, I realized that I was away from the battle and safe in one of my bunkers. I tucked my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around myself, still sweating and trembling.
It took a long time for me to calm down. There was still a burning sensation in my chest where I was struck, and when I finally unfolded and examined myself, I discovered that there was a long, jagged tear in my armor where I was hit. I sighed, shaking my head. It was time to face the facts.
It had been a very long season for me. To think that this all began with a perfectly innocent discovery, which we thought would give us a perfectly innocent- if more dangerous- adventure. Instead, we had released the Devil of Minecraft into the Overworld to wreck havoc on all of us. Now Dragon, my oldest and closest friend, was trapped in a place so very far away, going through who knew what pain in the clutches of Herobrine. And for the rest of us, a reign of terror had begun.
I cast off my coverlet and pulled myself out of bed. The command block had sent me to a bleak, strictly functional underground bunker lined with obsidian and lit with redstone lamps. There were only a few rooms- a bedroom, washroom, enchanting room, forge, and storage closet. There was also only one way in or out, by a ladder leading down to an escape tunnel at bedrock level. From there there were several routes to the surface.
Peeling off my armor and clothes, I went into the washroom in my undergarments to clean the sweat from myself and the blood and dust from my armor. I paused at the water cauldron that served as a basin, caught by my reflection. My eyes were rimmed with red, and my skin looked pale and sick over somewhat hollowed cheeks. I looked terrible. On impulse, I dunked my hands into the water and splashed my face, shaking the dark thoughts from my mind.
I cleaned my chain mail in the trough of fresh water running through the washroom. When I finished, I regarded my clothes and armor with distaste. My cloak was in rags, with the re-enforced hood scorched and slashed. The mail shirt had several holes, and my gauntlets and leg armor were dented and deeply scored. Realizing that I had work to do, I pulled back on my plain Steve clothes and took up my things to the forge.
I spent a lot of time down in my bunker, resting, recovering, and repairing my armor. I had a store of iron and diamonds in my storage down there, so I repaired my chain mail, adding diamond reinforcement. My leg armor was refitted. My cloak, I simply threw away. I stitched a new one instead. Everything was enchanted further using the anvil and the few precious enchanted books I kept. When that was done, I took to reading the Chronicles.
The three books of the Chronicles were still in my possession, so after I had finished my armor, I stayed in the bunker to safely read them. To be honest, I didn't stay just for that. I was reluctant to leave my hiding place after my last ordeal. So, when the wall clock said it was evening outside, I sat on the edge of my bed and opened the cover to Chronicle I.
The first pages I was already familiar with. The tale they told was of Notch, and how he had imagined into being a vast empty land, and began shaping it into the universe of Minecraft. Herobrine worked alongside him, filling in many small details while Notch made the bigger picture. Herobrine had a skilled hand and a sharp eye for beauty, and he made beautiful things very well.
The next chapters cited the creation of two races, the Villagers, and the Steves. The next, of different dimensions.
Then there was information on the fall of Herobrine, and an ancient event that we all knew well, the Ender War. I began to read more eagerly when I reached this. But to my surprise, the Chronicle was very brief- In fact, it only vaguely suggested that Herobrine had changed, painting the picture that one day he was good, and the next he vanished, and when he returned, he tried to destroy everything. I knew that there was something missing. A lot missing. So Herobrine fell to evil and madness and was banished to the Nether, but why? He took a hand in the Ender War, but why? The Chronicle did not say.
I felt that what the Chronicles did not mention was exactly what I needed to know. The books spoke of Herobrine falling to madness or some sickness of the mind or heart- they didn't say that he was simply evil. I pondered on this for a while, and then I realized something.
Herobrine himself just might be the one suffering the most from this.
The second Chronicle reviewed many of the same events from a less divine perspective, and then described the evolution of the Villager's society in the world, and then the reconstruction of the Steves'. Again, I felt that there was something missing. Was the Ender War, the time of the attack of the Endermen, so destructive that all of Stevedom had to rebuild? When exactly was our fall? Was it really because of Herobrine, or was it something else entirely? Then I opened the third Chronicle, but it was mostly written in a language I could not read. This was apparently a Chronicle of all the happenings beyond the Overworld. However, there were a few things I could read.
I found all sorts of detailed descriptions of creatures that I hadn't ever seen before, of different places such as the Nether, and a lot of detail on the Aether, Notch's realm. I learned what Netherrack really was, and the other things of the Nether like the use of fireballs as weapons. Now that I was familiar with, after my battle with Herobrine. I flipped through the rest of the pages that were in languages I couldn't read, looking at the pictures. One thing caught my eye.
A sword just like Herobrine's.
At long last, two days later, I decided that I needed to face reality again, and leave the comfort of safety behind for now. Just sitting here would do the Overworld no good.
Since the Chronicles didn't have all that I needed, I decided to go and look for more information first. If I was found by Herobrine, I had a few backup plans to get away. If worst came to worst, I had a last ditch plan of putting down a command block and committing suicide to save myself- and my precious research- from Herobrine.
The clock read morning when I was packed and ready to go. I had my plans all worked out, and this time I would not be running blind. I had the maps in the Chronicles, and a clear purpose in mind. I would stop briefly at the Temple complex first, since there were still things to be found there that I needed. It was a risky spot to go, but I didn't have many options. Afterwards, I would travel across the mountains that housed the temple and go into territory that no Steve had set foot in since the fall of Herobrine.
Tying off the clasp on my cloak, I took my walking stick from the corner and secured it to the straps under my cloak. Switching off the lamps, I descended the ladder in utter darkness.
My chest was aching again. It had started soon after my reawakening in the bunker, these chest pains and nightmares. I could only sleep fitfully these days, and I would often awaken screaming and grasping at a terrible wound that no longer existed. Herobrine haunted my dreams each night, showing me terrible things. I would relive those moments of terror when he had me helpless on the ground, or he would show me the horrors of the Nether, and worse, he would show me Dragon suffering every one.
The Temple of Notch was in view at long last when I was given another terrible fright. I began to see Herobrine out of the corners of my eyes during my waking hours. I tried to ignore them, but then again, I couldn't. Mostly, I knew that they weren't real. But what if they were? I could never tell.
I entered the stone and stained glass and diamond temple with a sense of trepidation. It was a bad idea to re-enter the temple grounds after what had happened, and that I knew, but I didn't know what else to do. There were too many secrets still hiding from me for me not to feel anxious.
Chronicle II had a map of the ancient complexes. I pulled out the book now and flipped to the page I needed. The priest back in the FireForge village had spoken of a great lost library, which I had not yet found. I had instead found the temple of Herobrine, and that didn't leave me in a good situation at all. And that discovery had been sheer luck, anyway. The map I had been given back home just showed me an entrance. This one showed me the whole network of rooms and tunnels. Now I knew where to look.
The passage was surprisingly easy to find. Underneath a set of newer pillars was a loose pile of dirt. I had to break a few blocks, but I was able to uncover a staircase leading down into the original temples. The rest from there was easy. Unlike the area around Herobrine's temple, the corridors where laid out in a grid-like pattern, rather than a labyrinth. According to the Chronicle, the library was at the rear of the temple complex, at the heart of the Temple mountain. I found it within minutes, and reflected on how much easier it was to search with the proper guide.
The library wasn't in fact overly massive, but I still paused in the doorway to take in the sight. The library proper was two stories, three in the middle under where a skylight once was, and there were ladders and catwalks going up to the second-story shelves. The walls were lined with books, and there were lots of lower free-standing shelves laid out in no particular order, making the place seem like a pleasant if simple maze to meander through. The library had a very homely atmosphere, with its red carpets and polished shelves of dark wood.
Torch held carefully aloft, I followed the diagram in Chronicle II of the library and came to its central point, where all the high tales and histories were kept. There were books displayed here on pedestals and podiums, rather than on shelves. I slowly examined each, admiring the beautiful tooling on the leather covers, when I saw something that I couldn't help but take notice to...
Placing my torch in an empty bracket, I came to three empty pedestals, Chronicle II in hand. Slowly, I placed the book into the carefully made wooden frame, and sure enough, it fit perfectly. Clearly, the Chronicles were meant to be here in the library, and had been here up until recently, as I noticed that the frames were dusty save for where the books once sat.
"So why were these in Herobrine's temple?" I whispered to the darkness around me, confused.
"Because I had them put there for you," said Herobrine. I started violently and whirled around, almost knocking over the pedestal holding Chronicle II. Herobrine was only an arm-span away from me. How did he get so close without me noticing?! Immediately, I drew my sword.
Herobrine chuckled- a notably different laugh from before, much less diabolical- and held up his hands, taking a few steps backwards... passing right through a pedestal. I lowered Firefall, realizing that he wasn't actually here, but I was still shaken and suspicious. Was I hallucinating again? Wary, I reclaimed the Chronicle.
"How did you know I was here?" I asked softly, looking around in case the real Herobrine was anywhere nearby, ready to pounce. Ghost-Herobrine smiled humorlessly and strode forward until he stood face-to-face with me. He tapped an immaterial finger to the point where he'd stabbed me back at the village.
"That wound," he said, "was inflicted by a sword imbued with properties of the End. It is a curse sword." I backed up, accidentally bumping against a bookshelf.
"Exactly what does that mean?" I asked, worried that Herobrine might be able to track me.
"Unfortunately, it only allows me access to your mind. While useful, so that I may converse with you when we are in the same dimension, it has limitations. And a few symptoms you may already be aware of." he said. He caught my scowl and took it as confirmation.
After a long pause, I cautiously asked,
"Why did you want me to find the Chronicles?" My voice betrayed my suspicion.
"So you could find what you needed. You wished for information on the threat to you and your friends, and that would be me- and my condition. Now that we have the time, I will give you another hint." Herobrine waved his hand towards a book off to his right, and it was highlighted with purple light.
The Book of Herobrine.
"I don't trust you," I muttered darkly. Why was my enemy being so helpful, anyway?
"Smart girl," said Herobrine. I glared at him. "It is wise not to trust me. Instead, trust him." He highlighted another book and vanished. I took a look at the title of this one, right next to the Book of Herobrine.
The Book of Notch.
I wondered what Herobrine wanted with me.
I huddled close to the small campfire burning in the back of a cave that I used as my camp. I was in the hills on the other side of the Temple Mountain, taking shelter while a thunderstorm raged outside. The Book of Notch was clasped in my hands, and I struggled to see the markings clearly in the dim firelight.
The Book of Herobrine, to my dismay, had turned out to be written in a language I was unable to read. So was The Book of Notch. Frustrated, I kept staring at the pages, hoping that just looking at the foreign letters would bring me answers. With a sigh, I finally put it away and brought out Chronicle II, and studied the maps of where I was going instead, to try to calm my mind. Then I gave up, falling to my bedroll with a huff. At least my nightmares had stopped since my conversation with Herobrine.
The storm cleared early the next morning. I trekked on, with my cloak wrapped around me tight against the damp, and my boots sinking deep in mud. Miles went by, and when the sun began to sink on the second day, I saw my destination in the distance.
I took out Chronicle II just to be sure, and sure enough, the rubble I saw in the distance matched what I saw pictured in the book. I checked against the sun, and my positioning was correct. Stowing the Chronicle, I decided to take a look at the ruins while I still had a few hours of daylight left.
The place I had been traveling towards was a city once belonging to the Steve race. It was the greatest of the cities, with not one but dozens of Steves behind its building. Legend had it that Herobrine himself had helped them. Legend also had it that this was the site of the start of the Ender war.
The 'Ender War' was a catastrophic event in history that all of the Steves today knew something or other about. Our village priests had all told us. Supposedly, it began at the time of the Fall of Herobrine, when he turned on his brother. The tales were gruesome. Endermen and their Strongholds began appearing everywhere, and Endermen would attack by the hundreds. Herobrine would turn loose every power he had on us, creating terrible monsters that roamed both night and day, and destroying that which we had built with the earthshaking might he had.
Winded from my travels, I stepped onto the remains of a paved street and rested for a while, looking around me. The outskirts of the city were still in many ways intact where I found them, with the streets still mostly smooth, and many of the buildings still standing. There were many towers about- I thought they were beacon towers or something, but upon climbing one, I found a collection of note blocks.
A bell tower.
I climbed back down and kept traveling.
The center of the city, as I quickly discovered, was just one giant torque-shaped crater, with the island in the middle holding an intact structure of gold. That design was familiar- I had seen this in the Temple complex back home. A solid gold structure, sitting atop a dais of blue lapis stone on a floor checked with obsidian and cracked white quartz...
Herobrine's temple. Huh.
So Herobrine was part of this city.
The sun was setting, so I decided to pick a point to explore and then hole up for the night. On the other side of the crater, there was a very large palace-like structure made of graceful curves of stone brick and glass. It looked much like several of the other buildings, but it caught my attention because not only was much of it demolished, but parts of it had been transformed into obsidian and a pale splotchy stone in the same way that parts of Diamond City had been transformed into Netherrack and Soul Sand.
Inside, the palace was simply breathtaking. Diamond and glass, lapis, gold, stone brick and plaster. Chandeliers hung from every arch. Huge windows of stained glass stood across every corridor and hall. With a pang of heartache, I thought of how such magnificent structures had once graced Diamond City as well.
An echoing sound of an impact made me jump and then freeze in my tracks. Was the place collapsing? No rubble or dust was falling...
Voices. I could hear voices speaking in the language of the End.
Sliding to the wall, I slowly made my way to the corner from which I had heard the sounds and peeked inside. A group of five Endermen were in a circle around a kneeling figure holding himself up by his sword. His gleaming black sword. The Endermen appeared to be taunting him, and I watched as one of the things struck him. Not daring to breath, I concealed myself and made a face. What the heck?
A masculine cry of genuine pain made my curiosity too much to bear. I looked out again, to see Herobrine's face tight with pain as he regarded one of the Endermen with a hateful look. A bright weal on his arm was quickly fading. The Endermen...They were torturing him? I thought back to the end of Chronicle II and the Ender War, and slowly, the pieces came together.
The Chronicles painted a vague picture at best for the reasons for Herobrine's fall. But they did say that something happened to shake Herobrine's unfailing love for us. We were his creation, after all, and he loved us most. It was implied that at one point, the Steves had grown selfish and denied Herobrine as their god. The Endermen also changed as well, going from stoic observers to hostile stalkers. Resenting the Steves, they convinced Herobrine to punish us. Herobrine lost his sanity.
Probably because the Endermen's form of 'convincing' was through intense pain. From the things I was hearing, the Endermen probably intended to keep it as it was, with Herobrine out to kill us. I wondered if they had found out about how he had spoken to me in the library.
The awful sounds of torture continued behind me, and I heard Herobrine cry out again, and then speak to the Endermen, panting.
"I -have not forgotten the oath!" he said in a strained voice. Another shout of pain and a cloud of Ender language flew by my ears.
"I will!" Herobrine exclaimed, then after a burst of Ender tongue, shouted, "I WILL!" This was followed by the sound of a whip and a cry of both pain and frustration.
"Why do you doubt that?" Herobrine gasped. "I will finish what I began!" I cringed. His tone had changed- going from that of a desperate man to the monster I battled at the Temple village. Things were going downhill. And as much as I hated Herobrine, it shook me that something like the Endermen had enough power to bring someone as strong as Herobrine so low. He was, after all, a god, being the younger brother of Notch.
Herobrine cried out again, in a totally different tone and volume. I had to act quickly, or else Herobrine the Monster would reawaken. Water buckets in hand, I flew around the corner and cast them high in the air, praying that my aim was good. More importantly, that I had made the right choice.
The water landed right where I needed it to. One bucket landed just behind the group, the other just before. Water flowed, and five Endermen screamed in unison and vanished.
Herobrine was left alone, on his knees in a now-receding pool of water, leaning on his sword with both hands and with his forehead resting against the pommel. He was breathing hard, and seemingly unable to fight just yet.
I unfroze my limbs and stepped out into the open. Cautiously, I began to approach the kneeling figure.
Suddenly, I was floating in the air, suspended by my wrists and ankles, which were held by glowing bands of purple fire. Another band was wrapped tightly around my throat. The neckband choked my gasp of surprise, and I struggled against the magic, eyes bulging. Herobrine stood up, and was suddenly floating in the air before me, eyes glowering dangerously with malice, like coals on a fire.
I glared back at those eyes, unfazed. I had just saved the lamebrain fool from the Endermen, thank you! I would not cower in front of him now, not when he had just turned on his rescuer.
"Would you like to see the tale of this city?" Herobrine asked softly. Held tight by the magical bonds, and with barely enough air as it was, I did not answer. Instead, I focused on breathing as much as I could to ease the dizziness that was taking my head.
Suddenly, Herobrine raised his arm and I shot up into the air through a gap in the ceiling, hovering high over the city. Unable to turn my head, I strained my eyes downwards at the fast-receding ground in terror.
The angle of my body changed so that I faced the ground. The sky had gone dark already. Herobrine flew up to rest next to me, and the landscape below shimmered and changed. The ruins were replaced by a small settlement populated by a handful of Steves, who were building roads and marking the foundations for the things they would build. Herobrine was right there with them.
The view changed again, this time to show me a massive megalopolis that took my breath away. Not that I had much to begin with. There seemed to be a celebration going on, with many, many Steves roaming the streets and crowding the main square. Herobrine stood atop his temple, waving and casting fireballs off into the night to land on prepared bonfires or to light bundles of fireworks. Music was playing from the bell towers.
The scene changed again. But this time, the crowd around the temple was an angry mob, not a joyful, celebrating crowd.
From there, I saw a series of changes, each more destructive than the last. But each time, it was the Steves that were attacking Herobrine, not the other way around. And the Steves fighting each other. I frowned.
"Surprised?" Herobrine asked from my side. I kept watching the scene below. "This was the real beginning of the conflict you know as the Ender War." I thought of all the things I had been told about the war and compared it with this. I had to admit, there was contrast, and a lot of it, but then I remembered the Chronicles. They supported this story, and they were penned by Steves.
"See how your people destroyed what was built for them," Herobrine said, scowling. "See how they rebelled against their creator."
"My brother would not help me then!" he snarled. "Not in my darkest hour, when I needed him most! I had to take matters into my own hands. I unleashed your punishment upon you! I did what was justified! But what did I earn for it? What did I earn for delivering discipline when it is due? Exile" He spat the last word.
Herobrine began lowering us both to the ground.
"The fault for this tragedy is not mine," Herobrine said darkly. "I am not the one to blame. How I curse the day my brother gave you free will. It is your fault this is all destroyed, and my brother's for making you able to do such things!" My eyes widened as a Nether portal appeared and activated below my feet. I looked at Herobrine, eyes wide.
"I swore an oath to make you pay," said Herobrine, activating the portal.
"And I will make every one of you pay."
Unable to make the slightest sound under the choking neckband, I was dropped through the portal.