We decided to stop by the house to get some last minute items and craft some armor sets. While we were packing up everything, I approached Erik and Josh.
"Can you guys do me a favor?" I asked.
"Yeah, sure, what is it?" Erik replied.
"Jamie's going with you guys. Make sure of that."
"What?"
"I don't want her on the frontlines. Make sure she stays safe with you while you guys get the villagers through the ravine."
"O-kay?" Erik replied.
"Look, just make sure she's safe, alright?"
"You got it." Erik answered. "Mission: Protect Mike's crush is a go!"
I let out a loud sigh.
As I went downstairs with Erik and Josh, Walter pulled out the pumpkins.
"We can't carve them here." He said. "We'll carve them once we reach the desert."
"Sounds good." I said, us taking each of the pumpkins.
"How much cactus do you think we'll need?" I asked.
"A lot." Walter replied. "To be safe, we should grab at least half a stack, and we'll need a lot of water as well."
"Where's Jamie?"
"Uh, she's probably upstairs. I'll go check on her." I said, grabbing another one of the pumpkins. Walking back up the stairs, sure enough she was in our room, looking at her iron sword in uncertainty.
"Hey."
"Oh, hi Mike! I'll be down in a sec."
"Here." I tossed her the pumpkin. Collecting it and stuffing it into her inventory, I sat down next to her.
Jamie looked towards me.
"You need the other sword?" I offered.
"No. You keep it, you'll need it more than me."
Jamie hugged me, planting a kiss on my cheek.
"Don't die…" She said.
"You do the same."
Jamie let go of me and headed out the room. Taking one last look at the chest, I noticed that I had forgotten to take out the totem from the other day.
"I suppose I could have this on me just in case." I said, tossing it in my inventory along with the two swords, bone from a while back, and plethora of food. Looking in a different chest, I found a set of iron armor. Taking it, I equipped it and looked at my subtle reflection in the glass, holding both my swords out.
Heading downstairs, I approached Walter with the others.
"Let's stop by the armory on the way out too." He suggested. "We can get our shit enchanted there."
"My swords already are enchanted." I replied.
"You'll need more than just one enchantment." Walter replied, opening the door and heading outside. As we made our way for the armory, we headed in and the person at the counter immediately recognized Walter.
"Ayo wassup homie!" He said, dapping him up. "It's been a minute hasn't it!"
"Yeah, it truly has." Walter replied. "I'm gonna need a favor from you."
"Now you know I always deliver." The guy replied.
"I need enchantments. Lots." Walter requested.
"For your friends?" He said, looking at us. He soon recognized me.
"You're friends with the dude who kicked Reece's ass?" He asked Walter. "Right on!"
He reached behind him and pulled a bunch of enchanted books out of a chest.
"What kinds of enchantments are you all lookin for?"
I set my swords down on the table. "Both of these have unbreaking on them. I need something to help it's attack strength."
"I can hook you up with sharpness III and Knockback I on both of them."
"Great, let's do it." I said, pulling out my iron armor set. "What do you have for these?"
"Ooh, on armor, I only got protection books left." The guy replied, taking the armor.
"That's fine. Do it." I replied.
"And what about these fellows?"
"Just get them all the same thing." Walter suggested. "And I don't need anything, all my stuff is already up to par."
"You got it!" The guy replied. "Y'all take a seat in that waiting room over there while I get this stuff ready for you." He said, pointing to a room with a couch, some chairs, and paintings situated inside it. "I should have this stuff enchanted in a few minutes."
As we entered the room, me and Jamie sat down on the couch while Erik, Josh, and Walter spread across the chairs.
"Damn, I think I need to stock up on food…" Josh said, standing up and heading out the room.
"You got emeralds?" Walter asked.
"Not a single one."
"I better come with you then." Walter replied, getting up and following them out.
"This is boring, I'm gonna go watch the dude enchant our shit." Erik said, heading out as well.
As Erik left the room, Jamie grabbed my hand.
"Huh? What are y–"
"I'm just holding your hand…" Jamie interrupted me.
"Are you scared at all?" I asked.
Jamie sighed. "A little…"
I gently squeezed Jamie's hand. "Don't worry, we have this in the bag."
"How can you be so sure…"
"We were winning at first when they were first invading us. All of the players were uncoordinated." I explained. "All we have to do is make sure they don't get the chance to use any command blocks."
"And how are you going to do that?" Jamie asked.
"By breaking them." I answered.
"You dumbass…" Jamie said. "You can't break command blocks in survival mode."
"Well, assuming everyone in this server is in survival mode, there has to be some way to at least disable it in survival mode, which brings me to think, how were they even accessed in the first place…"
"What?"
"The people that set up the command blocks were taking damage as well." I replied. "That implies that they're on the same gamemode as everyone else."
"So you're trying to say…"
"That the command blocks can be used in survival mode." I finished Jamie's sentence.
"Let's not talk about that shit for now, just try and relax." I suggested, looking around at the paintings. They looked a lot less pixelated than usual.
"Huh, these paintings are higher resolution…" I pointed out. Jamie rested her head on my shoulder as she took a look across the different ones on the wall.
"You aren't wrong." She replied.
"Yo, our stuff is done!" I heard Erik holler, approaching us in the room. Jamie quickly let go of my hand and stood up, as Erik walked through the door.
As I got up, I left the waiting room and approached the guy at the counter, who gave me my two swords and armor set back.
"Thanks." I said.
"No problem, come back any time." The player responded, spreading out the stuff for the other players. Jamie approached the counter and grabbed her now enchanted iron sword and armor set, and stuffed it into her inventory. Just then, Walter and Josh came back into the room to pick their stuff up.
"Thanks again man, see you around." Walter waved at the guy as we all left and made our way towards the gate.
"Everyone's ready?"
"Yeah." I replied.
"Absolutely." Jamie added, catching up to walk besides me. I could already tell she wasn't going to enjoy the idea of splitting up.
"Ready to go." Erik added.
"Me too." Josh replied.
As we approached the gate, the gatekeeper quickly opened it for us to step through.
As we walked through the gate, it closed quickly behind us, as we continued our walk back towards the village. The sun was high in the sky, beating down on us.
"If we keep up the pace, we'll get there around sundown." I mentioned. As we walked, we came across a lake. Approaching it with a bucket, I scooped up some water.
"We should all have some water on us just in case." I explained. "Not just for the minecarts but for the ravine as well."
Everyone approached the lake and collected some water in their buckets. I took a look at the sun, and it was still in the middle of the sky.
"Let's keep going." I said. "Hopefully we can find the lake we all emerged from on the way."
"I doubt you will…" Jamie said. "It's a one block wide hole way down at the bottom."
"We can look for landmarks. Does anyone remember what the lake looked like?" I asked.
"I remember it was in a forest, that's about it." Erik replied.
"Was it dense?" Walter asked.
"Pretty much, yes." Erik answered.
"That forest is probably directly behind my desert temple." Walter replied. "That'll be a great escape spot."
"Okay." I responded.
"I still suggest we all go in together." Jamie added.
I let out a sigh. "Fine. we'll all go into the village, but you, Erik, and Josh are going to be in charge of getting people through that ravine." Jamie looked at me with confusion in her eyes.
"What about you and Walter?" Erik asked.
"Me and him are going to fend off the pumpkin peeps. Speaking of pumpkins…"
I took out my uncarved pumpkin.
"How do we carve these?"
"Shears. I have some, you can pass them around."
As we all passed the pumpkins around, Walter carved two eyes and a mouth into them, then handed them back to us. Sticking the freshly carved pumpkin on my head, I was able to see, but my vision was significantly more narrow.
"How is it?" Walter asked, trying his on.
"Not that bad." I replied. "I can barely see to my left or right, but I can see what's in front of me with no problems at all."
Taking the mask off and sticking it into my inventory, I looked at all the others. Josh somehow managed to put his mask on backwards.
"Man, I can't see shit!" He said. We all laughed at him, as I approached him to turn the pumpkin around.
"OOOOOH… Thank you…" Josh said, as we started laughing even harder.
I took a look at Jamie and Erik with their pumpkin heads. They were barely recognizable.
"Alright, I think this disguise trick will do the job!" I said. "To maximize it, let's make sure we're wearing armor so they can't see our playermodels either."
"Sounds good." Walter said, equipping his iron armor suit.
As we continued walking, the forest became more and more dense, the trees providing enough shade for zombies and skeletons to camp out underneath them, waiting for the unexpecting player to pass at just the right moment.
"Careful." I said. "This place is prone to mob attacks."
As we walked cautiously past the trees, I could hear footsteps that weren't ours. I stopped us in our tracks. Looking around, I saw…
"Another fucking creeper…" I sighed, looking at the creeper silently approaching us in the distance. Pulling out my bow, I took a poison arrow and aimed for it, firing my shot. As the arrow pierced the creeper's skin, it glowed red and started to run around in a panic, as the poison arrow took effect, depleting its health slowly. As I got ready for another shot, the creeper tipped over, then disappeared.
"Well, that was anticlimactic…" Erik stated.
"Let's keep going."
As we walked across the forest, I took a look at the sky and the sun was starting to go down towards the horizon.
"We need to hurry." I said, pointing to the sun. "If we want to hit them directly at sundown…"
"It doesn't have to be right as the sun sets, you know…" Jamie interrupted me. "It just has to be at night time."
"I actually recommend we wait a bit after the sun goes down. That way some of the people would have already fallen asleep." Walter suggested.
"You know what, that's good thinking." I replied. "And it will also give us time to snoop on what they're doing at the village."
"How do we even know they're still there?" Erik asked.
"The pumpkin heads usually stay at the places they take over for a few days before moving on." Walter explained. "Bizarre decision, but that's what they do."
I began to see blocks of sand in the distance.
"We're getting close." I said pointing towards the sand nearby.
"Great, sand means cactus." Walter said.
As we went into the desert biome, we mined up some nearby cactus. By the time we had as much as we wanted, the sun was already at the horizon.
"Damn, that sun sets fast…" I commented.
"Minecraft days go by quickly." Walter said. "So do the nights, so we need to be quick with whatever plan we're going to do."
"Well, how bout this, Walter, you can make sure the coast is clear while I mess with any command blocks I find."
"Sounds good." Walter answered.
"And what if you can't do anything with them?" Erik asked.
"As long as the griefers don't get the chance to use them, we'll win." I said. "They all suck at combat."
"What about the leader?" Josh asked.
"The herobrine dude?"
"Yeah, him."
"Eh, he'd put up a fight, but I could probably beat him."
"Do you need a golden apple?" Erik asked, taking his out.
"The hell, I thought I told you two to throw away all that shit…"
"Why would you throw away a golden apple?" Walter asked.
"Uh… it's a long story." Jamie responded.
"We uh… wandered into an abandoned pumpkin head base." I explained.
"Y-you… what?" Walter said in shock. "HOW THE FUCK ARE YOU FOUR STILL ALIVE?"
"Technically, it was three, we met Josh just as we were escaping the house." Jamie explained.
"No, I'm being serious now. How are you all not targeted by the griefers yet…?" Walter asked.
"Your guess is as good as mine." I replied. "I guess we got luck–"
"Oh shit, that reminds me…"
"What?" Walter said.
"When we were in the base, I found two books in it, but they were written in enchantment table language so I couldn't understand any of them." I explained. Walter stopped in his tracks.
"So, you're telling me, not only did you wander into a pumpkin head base, and survive, but you also stole their shit too?"
"Unbelievably, yes."
"Oh, those books are going to be the headline of the server if they were to get out…" Walter said.
"Yeah… and then the pumpkin heads would immediately find out who was snooping around." I stated. "I ain't going to just give those books away."
"Not even sell them?"
"What?"
"I'm sure you could get like 5 stacks of diamonds for those books, assuming they're real." Walter said.
"No. I ain't selling them." I said. "If anything, I want someone to translate them."
"Well, I know someone that can translate those books. You will have to wait though." Walter said.
"Great." I replied.
Just as the sun set across the horizon, we could see the village in the distance.
"Bingo."
