They were suddenly interrupted by arrows being shot at them, a group of five skeletons stood at a distance, lined up like a firing squad.
"Do your lightning thing again!" Ambigious said.
"I don't know how!" freeZe replied as three arrows impacted her chestplate and got stuck in the wood.
Unchosen commanded: "Surround them!"
Nobody questioned why he suddenly was calling the shots, they spread out. More and more arrows got stuck in their armor, it was only a question of time for one of the skeletons to hit an unprotected head.
Ambigious charged into the group of skeletons, smashing one skeleton's spine in half, separating torso and legs. He knocked another one to the ground with his weight. With him being very close to the other skeletons he was an easy target, all three had their bows pulled back, ready to shoot him. Ambigious dropped to the ground just in time to dodge the arrows. TehLulz and freeZe had already beheaded two of the skeletons by the time he was back on his feet.
The skeleton Ambigious had knocked to the ground had ran away at a speed unusual for skeletons and put another arrow on the string as the other remaining skeleton got crushed between Unchosen's and Ambigious' swords. The last skeleton shot its arrow just before freeZe cut off its arms with two slashes and then put an end to its un-life. The arrow however hit its target, or more accurately, a target. The target was Ambigious' right arm.
He screamed in pain and dropped his sword as the tip of the arrow pierced the vines around his upper arm and the flesh below it, it stopped as it hit Ambigious' upper arm bone. Ambigious stopped screaming but stomped on the ground to give the pain another exit. With tears blurring his vision he reached over with his left arm, grabbed the shaft of the arrow and pulled it out of his arm, which sent another wave of pain through his body. His knees felt weak but he managed to stay upright, blood was leaking from the wound and ran down his arm, dripping onto the ground. His sister was the first to get to him, Unchosen and TehLulz followed. The steelwood vines grew back together, stopping the blood from flowing but not the pain.
"Damn, that hurts!" Ambigious pressed out between his teeth.
"Can you keep walking?" freeZe asked.
"Yeah but I won't be able to fight anymore. Let's get out of this damned place." He answered.
freeZe pulled the arrows out of Ambigious' armor and more out of her own, Unchosen collected the arrows and put them into his inventory. Unchosen also took a bow from one of the shattered skeletons.
Without further words they started walking again, Ambigious with his right arm hanging down. They could already see the exit, their hopes went up again. Then they saw what was in front of the exit. A horde of about a dozen and a half zombies, none had armor or weapons but their numbers were deadly enough.
"What now?" TehLulz asked "We can't run past them, they are too close to the exit."
"You are right." Ambigious agreed.
"Does anybody have something that could be useful?" TehLulz asked.
"I have… a diamond pickaxe." freeZe said "Couldn't we just dig below them?"
"Oalrhm wouldn't like us digging through his roots." Unchosen warned and then said: "But I have some gunpowder from those creepers we killed. If we had some sand we could make TNT."
Ambigious looked into his inventory and said: "I don't have sand but I still have a ton of this sandbasalt, why did I even take that with me…?"
"That could work, I have the crafting table we used." TehLulz said and put it down.
"Give me the sandbasalt please." Unchosen said.
He laid his hands on the crafting table and opened the crafting screen. He put the gunpowder in a cross shape and sandbasalt into the remaining slots.
"Wow, it even gives me two!" He said and held up a block of TNT. "Does anybody still have flint and steel?" He asked.
freeZe gave him her flint and steel and asked: "How will you ignite it without being lunged at?"
"Stand back, you will see." He said in a mysterious voice.
Ambigious, TehLulz and freeZe backed up a few meters. Unchosen placed the TNT on the ground and took some wood strips from his inventory, he tied them to a stick that he crafted from a log. He put one end of the stick into the ground and lit the other end on fire, then drove the unlit end into the ground. He then tied more wood strips to one of the arrows he had on him.
Unchosen ran up to the horde and placed down both blocks of TNT. He then sprinted back to the burning stick, the horde slowly starting to walk his way. He put the prepared arrow on the string of the bow he had taken from one of the skeletons, used the burning stick to light it on fire and shot at the block of TNT. A few seconds later, the lit explosives were in the middle of the horde and a moment later another loud bang echoed through the valley, rotting body parts were flung through the air. Not a single zombie had survived.
"Gross…" freeZe said as a rotten eyeball landed in front of her feet.
"But effective." Unchosen said with pride in his voice, he added: "Now let's get out of here!"
They were halfway through the tunnel as they saw light on the other end, they didn't know how long they had been in the valley, but it had felt like an entire day to them.
"Look, light!" freeZe said, noticeably relieved.
"Now, that we are out of danger, let's get a move on." TehLulz said.
A few minutes later, they were at the exit of the tunnel, which was mostly grown over by vines. TehLulz cut a hole into the plant wall using his sword and went through first. The light blinded them at first but then they could see where they were.
In front of them was a large flat area. Shallow, brown water streams were flowing in the lower areas, sometimes interrupted by deep, black ponds. Tall, dark green grass and sugar cane were growing all over the parts that were above the water. Huge willow trees were growing here and there, casting shadows where they were standing, in the distance they could see a witch hut, dramatically illuminated by the setting sun.
"Let's go there and hope that witches are not hostile by default here." freeZe suggested.
"It's the best idea we have right now I guess. I also really need to take this armor off…" TehLulz said.
"Mind helping me out with my armor?" Ambigious asked.
The moment freeZe tried pulling her arms out of the vines, it seemed like they were growing backwards, disappearing into the chestplate again, so did the vines at her legs.
"Well, that is handy…" she muttered.
After pulling the chestplate over her head and storing it in her inventory she helped her brother out of his armor. Ambigious tried not to show that his arm was hurting but the look on his face changed a little as freeZe put her brother's arm through the side of the armor.
Unchosen looked at the gaping wound, it at least had stopped bleeding. He said: "Let's also hope that this witch us willing to give us some regen potions or at least some bandages…"