As Jamie led us to her house, it was conveniently situated right in front of one of the gardens. Opening the door, she held it open for us.

"Alright, make yourselves at home I guess. All the bedrooms are upstairs." She said as we entered her house.

"May I ask what you used that enchantment book on?" I asked.

"I haven't used it yet." Jamie replied. "It's an unbreaking enchantment book, so I plan on using it on a diamond sword when I have the materials to craft one, to ensure it lasts longer. My last diamond sword didn't even last me 2 weeks."

"You're a hunter or something?" Erik asked. "That seems a little too soon for a diamond sword."

"I've been stuck on this damn server probably longer than both of you two combined." Jamie replied, opening a chest and rummaging through it. "There's a lot of fights that go on around here."

"How long have you been on this server?" I followed up.

"40 days." Jamie replied.

"Holy shit…" both me and Erik said in unison.

"The second I get out of this game, I'm going to find that damn computer scientist behind this and strangle the ever living hell out of him." She said in anger, pulling some apples out of the chest.

"You two must be really exhausted if you walked all the way here. Take some."

Erik thanked her and took some of the apples. Jamie then turned to me.

"I'm good, I stole some pork chops from the storage room." I replied, waving my hand.

"Well, take some anyway. They'll be useful once you find some gold." Jamie said, her hand still outstretched.

"Alright, fine." I said, taking the apples and putting them in my inventory.

"You two know how to PVP, right?" She asked, as Erik was walking up the stairs.

"Do I look like a hypixel bedwars player to you?" I replied, chuckling a bit at my joke.

Jamie took a look at my skin. "Actually… you kind of do." She replied.

"Hey my skin may say so, but I have never touched that shit." I added. "In fact, the last time I went on any PVP related server, I think I was in 6th grade."

"Once a PVPer, always a PVPer." Jamie remarked, as I followed Erik up the stairs.

"Which rooms should we take?" I asked.

"Any room the door is open to you're welcome to stay in." She replied.

As Erik went into the first room on the right, his eyes widened.

"Oh wow… paintings, a double bed, large window, all the necessities in the corner, this is WAY better than my temporary place in that village."

"Yea…' I followed up. "This place is top tier." I decided to take the next room to the right, and dumped my inventory into the chest, plopping on the bed. Looking at the ceiling above me, there was a 2x2 redstone lamp, which I inferred was powered by the switch next to the door, with a painting hanging above it. Getting up to try the switch, the light came to life.

"They really have these houses decked out…" I said to myself. "I wonder how long it took to build all of these."

Jamie came up the stairs. "If you guys are all set, come downstairs please."

As me and Erik made our way downstairs, she stood in the middle of the living room.

"As long as you guys are living here, you gotta be following my rules."

"Okay mom…" Erik replied.

"You're single in real life, aren't you…" I asked.

Jamie held in her laughter. "Anyways. As long as you are living here, you have to contribute to the house. Any food or supplies are not just yours. They are collectively ours."

"That sounds perfectly reasonable. But are there any limits?" I asked.

"Personal stuff like books or diamonds or anything you actually need is yours to keep. That rule mainly applies to food and building supplies, or tools." Jamie responded.

"Gotcha."

"Rule number two, do not stir shit up with the people in this village. If someone gets killed here, then I will get the heat for it and get kicked out. And if that happens, you aren't coming with me." Jamie continued. "And rule four. For now at least, we have each other's backs. We keep each other safe. We look out for each other. That also means that I want to know if you are heading out somewhere so I know where to look for you when I start getting worried"

"Or… you could just come with us." Erik said. "And what about us worrying about you? Want us to tag along?"

"Yea… we can be your entourage…" I laughed.

"I don't need any of you two coming with me when I go out mining, unless you want to help, you stay here. Just don't eat all the food while I'm gone." Jamie replied.

"Sounds good." I added.

"Well, it's going to be getting a little late soon, so I'm going to head to the nearby mine to see if I can get lucky with some iron."

"I can come with you." I suggested. "I have a pickaxe as well as materials to craft a lot more. I can take them if you want."

Jamie was a bit hesitant at my idea for a moment, but caved in.

"Bring the materials." She exclaimed, going near the door. "I'll be waiting for you by the farm."

"I'll bring some extra food as well!" I hollered as I walked up the stairs. As Erik was following me, he asked me a question.

"Are you sure you trust her?"

"She's giving us a place to stay. What reason would I have NOT to trust her?" I answered.

Heading into my room, I opened the chest and took the supplies out, along with plenty of food for the both of us, and walked out the door. Sure enough, Jamie was around the farm harvesting the carrots.

"You ready?" She asked.

"Yea. are you?" I replied.

"Let's go then."

Jamie started walking towards the mountain. "The mine is near the foot of this mountain. It isn't too bad a walk."

"May I ask why you specifically need iron?"

"I'm in charge of finding iron for this village so they can turn it into axes to mine more trees. As of now, we are currently completely out of a reserve and the last of the axes were broken a while ago." Jamie explained. "That's why the forest hasn't been completely mined out yet."

As the two approached the mountain, I saw 2 iron doors at the entrance.

"These doors are hooked to a daylight sensor with a delay, so we have to be in and out before they close or we'll be stuck here the whole night." Jamie explained.

"Why was that even put in?" I asked.

"Because this cave is known for becoming extremely dangerous at night with the mob spawns. We want them to stay in the cave. Not bombard the village. There are also observers underneath the doors so if they are broken, a light above the entrance will start to flash."

"So basically the door turns into a fire exit…" I inferred, as we passed through the opening.

"Yes." Jamie replied. "If we do get trapped in here though, there's some rooms down this staircase you can spend the night in, but they only have wooden doors so it's kind of a last resort."

Me and Jamie began to walk down the stairs to the mine, as the lights grew more and more dim.

"Lead the way, you know this cave more than I do." I said, letting her go ahead of me.

"Let's head down here." Jamie veered to the left. "I don't think the others have mined this far yet."

I got my pickaxe out at the ready, while Jamie only had a torch out.

"Do you need my sword?" I asked. "The way we're walking right now, if something comes out of the dark, you'll be the first player it attacks."

"I have one if I feel the need." Jamie replied, pulling a clock out for a second. "We don't have much time so let's get through this quickly." She sped up a bit. Looking around, the cave was somewhat massive. As we progressed, the torches became more and more scarce.

"You take that iron chunk, I'll get the one over here." Jamie mentioned, heading to the corner.

Approaching the iron, I started to hit it repeatedly with the pickaxe. Sure enough, cracks formed around the iron and it soon broke into a small floating block, just like with the tree.

"How long have you two been on this server for?" Jamie sparked up a conversation.

"This is my second day. I think Erik has been here for like 2 weeks." I answered.

"Well, you have a lot to learn." Jamie explained. "First of all, pain in this virtual world feels extremely real, so I'd avoid taking damage at all costs."

"Yea, I know." I replied.

"I learned about that the hard way. Jumped from a cliff because I was too lazy to build my way down. Hurt like a motherfucker…" Jamie said as she swung at the iron.

"You've heard about the whole "if you die here you die in real life" thing right?"

"Yes." Jamie replied. "To be really honest, I don't really care."

"How could you say that?" I asked, picking up the iron. "Don't you want to live long enough to be able to return back to your normal life?"

"Because I can commit mass arson and get away with it." Jamie answered.

I laughed a bit.

"Nah, I'm joking. I prefer this server." Jamie responded. "There's no rules. You can do whatever you want."

"Hmm…" I thought a bit. "I guess I didn't take the time to think of it that way."

"But now that I look at it…" Jamie continued. "This whole freedom concept of this server will cave in on itself eventually, and I don't want to be around to see how that plays out."

Jamie started walking further into the mine. "For now, I'm just going with the flow."

Walking further down the mine, we came across a huge chunk of iron.

"Jackpot!" I called out, pointing towards it.

"Oh yea… that's a jackpot indeed…" Jamie said, coming over to the chunk and beginning to mine. I did the same.

It took quite a while to mine the entire chunk, it seemed to never end. Jamie seemed overly excited.

"When I sell all this iron, I may be able to pay you back for the 10 diamonds you gave me earlier!" She exclaimed.

"Once again, I don't care about the diamonds." I replied. "Just keep them for yourself."

"I don't like people chipping in for stuff like that." Jamie explained.

"Well, I'm not going to take any diamonds from you, and you can't force me to." I replied. "The place to stay is good enough for me."

Jamie opened her inventory.

"Oh wow, 25 iron ore. That's not bad. How much were you able to get?" She asked.

"Ummmm…" I sifted through my inventory, pulling out my iron. "16." I replied. "Wow that iron chunk was big…"

"Yeah… I think this is enough, we can head back now, unless you want to continue…" Jamie said.

"Actually, I'm running a little low on coal," I started. "Is it okay if we get some on the way out?" I asked.

"There should be some coal chunks further down, it's more likely to spawn down at this level." Jamie explained.

"You sure we'll have time to?" I asked.

Pulling out her clock, she sighed a bit.

"A little." She replied.

Following Jamie down the cave, I spotted a coal chunk and began swinging.

"I'm going to go down further and see if I can find you some more." Jamie stated, going further down.

I placed a crafting table down and crafted some extra torches. Placing one on the wall, I continued mining some of the stone to get more cobblestone, as I noticed my pickaxe beginning to get a little flimsy.

Sure enough, it broke just as I was mining my 5th block of cobblestone out of the wall. I quickly crafted another one, but just as I took it off the crafting table, I heard something coming from down the cave. A crossbow loading.

Jamie was in trouble.

I looked in my inventory for the bow and arrows Erik gave me earlier as I cautiously walked further into the darkness.

"Shit…" I whispered to myself, realizing I had left the bow back at the house. I pulled out one of my stone swords, and slowly walked deeper into the abyss.

As I walked further, I could hear a voice I did not recognize.

"Hand over the iron, and you won't get hurt."

"Hey, put the sword down." I heard another voice.

"PUT THE SWORD DOWN!"

My cautious walking turned into sprinting.