AN: Really trying to cut back on the F-Bomb.

Congrats to Ari_Dexel for getting last Chapter's puzzle correct. What's brown and sticky? A stick, duh. Enjoy your cookie and your acknowledgement.

(::)

Puzzle:

I drift forever with the current down these long canals they've made.

Tame, yet wild, I run elusive, multitasking to your aid.

Before I came, the world was darker. Colder, sometimes, rougher, true.

But though I might make living easy, I'm good at killing people too.

Disclaimer: I don't own Minecraft. If I did, I'd add machetes.

WARNING: This Chapter contains lengthy explanations of the finer points of Redstone Engineering. If you read it and your mind starts turning into mush or the words just look like static, promptly shut off whatever device you're using to read this and go play a video game for half-an-hour.

Chapter 101

Jungle

[Floyd]

Sunlight was filtering down from the dense jungle canopy, illuminating the ground packed with so much foliage there was barely any ground to stand on. The adolescent pods of cocoa beans hung from trunks and glistened in the humid climate. Ocelots tentatively peeked out from cover, skittish in their need to prowl in search of food.

One such ocelot perked its ears and tilted its head toward me before suddenly taking off.

I followed, leaving a smoky trail in my wake.

I zigzagged through the trees, my Hacker speed gaining on the small animal as it struggled to keep away. It crawled beneath low-hanging leaves, climbed up small ledges, and even made a few daring jumps.

But I was faster.

In no time, I caught up to the animal and scooped it up into my arms. It hissed and clawed in distress, but I paid it no mind as I sped across the jungle. I darted between trees, kicked up dirt and leaves, and pushed myself faster and faster. The dark smoke swirled around me as if in response to my desire to go faster.

And then it fizzled out.

If only my momentum did the same. Instead, my limp body was treated to the wonderful sensation of hitting every tree in my way and tumbling head-over-heels through dense underbrush. The ocelot got loose in my grip, but managed to save itself by fastening its claws into the back of my head.

Lovely.

After one last spectacular tumble, I face-planted into the dirt, scraping against the ground for a good meter or two, before coming to a stop.

And if that wasn't humiliating enough, the ocelot clinging to the back of my head give a hiss of indignation before flicking my ear with its tail and scampering back into the confines of the jungle.

Unable to move, I was putting my newly self-taught skill of breathing through the ground to good use before a set of footsteps sounded nearby.

"Right at the limit." Lenz spoke as he rolled me onto my side so I could breathe better. "Thirty seconds. Sorry, Floyd."

I let out an irritated groan. Two weeks of practice and still the same result. I couldn't get past thirty seconds.

I glared at the redstone device behind Lenz as if it were to blame, but knew I was just being silly. Lenz had assured, repeatedly, that it was one of the most precisely calibrated timers in all of redstone. Well, he used the term 'clock circuit', but it was basically a fancy way of saying timer.

After the incident at the Origin with Thed, I had asked Lenz for help training my Hack, both as a ways to improve it and to have Lenz grow more used to my 'smoking problem'. I had wanted him to make a timer so I could keep track of exactly how long it lasted and, if possible, increase the duration.

Lenz was thrilled over the prospect of putting his redstone skills to use, and supplied what he described as 'a compact timer that could precisely record time for up to 256 seconds'. He called it an Ethonian Hopper Clock.

Making it wasn't easy. It required sticky pistons (which Lenz was only able to make after Soul brought back two slimeballs from one of his mining ventures) and a second hopper (again, the iron to make it was supplied by Soul's ventures underground).

After that, it was simple for Lenz to rig it up. Notice how I said 'simple for Lenz'? That's because if any of us tried to rig it up, I'm confident the thing would have made our heads explode, it was that complicated.

Where do I begin?

First, the Ethonian Hopper Clock. Why was it called that? Was the guy who invented it named Ethon? Or was he from some place called Ethon? I have no idea. But this is only the first, and least head-exploding, of the multiple head-exploding things about what Lenz called a 'simple clock'.

Second, it depended on hopper technology. What does that mean, you may ask? Well apparently, hoppers worked by drawing items out of things and packing them into something else. Whether it was throwing an item onto the hopper or putting it in an attached chest where it would then get sucked up, that's how hoppers worked. Filling a hopper with items made it output a redstone signal, depending on how many items it had, so long as it was attached to one of the expletives Lenz always spurted out: Comparators. Furthermore, a hopper could be stopped from pulling out items by having a redstone signal next to it.

Have I lost you yet? Don't worry, there's still time.

Third. A hopper could transfer items at a rate of 0.75 seconds for the first item, and then 0.8 seconds for every item after that. This was the basis for the timer. Though, using a well-placed redstone repeater, Lenz was able to smooth out the first 0.75 second irregularity into 0.8 seconds, just like the rest. Pop quiz. Since a hopper has five slots, and each slot could hold sixty-four items, and each item could be transferred from a hopper at a rate of 0.8 spi (seconds per item), how long would the timer last for?

…

256 seconds.

But there was even more complicated stuff involved in the timer. And Lenz explained it all to me, so you all have to suffer through listening it too. Life's unfair like that.

Fourth was where the sticky pistons came into play. And this part was really tricky. Both hoppers were set to face each other, which meant they would both push items into one another at the rate of 0.8 seconds per item. But since they were both doing it at the same time, neither hopper would get any fuller. So what is an engineer to do?

Put in a redstone signal that could shut off a hopper from pushing items, that's what.

Whenever one hopper was completely empty, the hopper's output to the comparator would turn 'off', which would then retract the sticky piston attached to a block of redstone so that it would stop the empty hopper from pushing items out while at the same time activating the currently filled second hopper so that its ability to push items out would turn 'on'. And when the second hopper ran out of items, the other sticky piston would retract, re-enabling the first hopper to push out items while preventing the second hopper from doing the same. Rinse and repeat.

Basically, it allowed the hoppers to exchange items only when one was empty and the other one was full. A full 256 second transfer.

If your head still hasn't exploded by now, I commend you. If you chose to ignore all these words, I commend you as well.

The point is, the Ethonian Hopper Clock was complicated, but it worked. And it kept telling me that my Hack limit was thirty seconds, even.

Also, I vowed never to become a redstone engineer. It was a fate worse than death, by the sound of it.

But back to my present frustration. Two weeks of practice with my Hack, and I was only ever able to keep it going for thirty seconds. After that, it forcibly shut off whether I wanted it to or not and my whole body became so tired I couldn't move. Which was kind of a problem in the middle of a fight.

Lenz carefully rolled me onto my back and dragged me to the base of one of the jungle trees to rest on while I recovered my strength.

"Even if you can only manage thirty seconds, your control over the Hack has gotten much better." Lenz tried to comfort me. "Before, you were always overshooting where you wanted to stop. But now you can zigzag through the trees with ease. I would say that is a marked improvement."

"But it's only for thirty seconds." I went back to my commonly used argument. "Fighting on a time limit puts on a lot of pressure. What am I supposed to do if there are too many enemies or if, after I go limp, reinforcements show up? I'd be a sitting duck." A blew a strand of blue hair out of my eyes. "Thed could use multiple Hacks, and for a lot longer than thirty seconds. And Cobb said that Alec had his Regen on practically all the time. What am I doing wrong?"

"I do not know." Lenz admitted, leaning his back on the same tree as he watched out for anything threatening. My life was pretty much in his hands at this point. "Only a Hacker would be able to tell you."

"I somehow doubt I'll be able to take lessons from one."

"Perhaps not. But maybe Thed taught you something without you realizing." I tried to look as skeptical as I could without moving. "Is there anything Thed said to you that might help? A hint or clue?"

I tried to think back. Thed had said a lot of things, and it was actually thanks to him that I was even able to draw my Hack out in the first place. I just demanded it to come out. And it responded… for about thirty seconds before crapping out.

He also said Hackers could obtain other Hacks if they had the aptitude. I was already having trouble with one; I hated to think what problems another would bring me.

Then he said… there was a reason Hackers didn't keep their Hacks active all the time.

They were like muscles. And muscles tired.

But muscles could also be built-up. And I had done that while getting better control over my speed. The question was whether I could also increase the duration. So far the prospect was dim. Maybe it was only capable of thirty seconds. Maybe I had simply hit my limit.

I let out a disappointed sigh. "Maybe we should give these practice sessions a rest."

Lenz's head jerked towards me. "What? Why? You are making good progress."

"Better control over my speed is all I got, and I feel like I have that mastered pretty well." I closed my eyes. "There's no sense continuing this if there's nothing left to gain. Besides, with our food situation the way it is, we can't afford to waste time."

"We are almost to Jolin."

"Almost doesn't fill our bellies." I countered, trying to flex my fingers, but to no avail. "I'm probably burning more food with all my running around."

"…How about this." Lenz tried instead. "We keep practicing for another week, and if there is still no visible change, we will stop. Results do not always come readily, after all."

I let out a huff. "Fine. Two whole weeks with nothing to show for it. What's one week more?"

Lenz fidgeted with his hands. "Well… I would not say there is nothing to show for it."

"Yeah, yeah, I know." I rolled my eyes. "My control is better than—"

"That is not what I meant." Lenz interjected, lifting up his glasses to look at me. "Training with you has been alleviating many of my anxieties towards your… 'smoking problem'."

"Really?"

"Of course!" He waved off like it was obvious. "Right now you are practically defenseless. Limp as a newborn kitten. You are completely at my mercy. I could drown you in that small pond over there." He pointed off to the side. "Or I could push you off a chasm. Or I could let Mobs rip your face off."

"You… uh… seem to have thought this out a bit." I chuckled nervously, trying to regain feeling in my fingers with added desperation.

"Or I could take your sword and stab you in the throat." Lenz continued, oblivious to what his hypothetical threats were doing to me. "Even with my noodle-armed strength, I could probably choke the life out of you or crush you between two pistons or smother you with gravel or—"

"Okay, I get it!" I called out, wanting him to stop already.

"Ah, right, sorry." He scratched his cheek sheepishly. "What I mean is, I could do any of those things… to a Hacker." He gave a small shrug. "I suppose knowing I am the only thing between you and death makes me more at ease around you. Usually it is the other way around when Hackers are concerned."

"So you're saying you want to continue these Hack practices, because it makes you less afraid of me?"

Lenz smiled. "I am saying that just because you think these practices are meaningless, does not mean everyone else does."

Were we… having a bro moment?

"Plus, building and dismantling that Ethonian Hopper Clock over and over is thrilling!" Lenz suddenly shouted with stars in his eyes. "It is my pleasure to recreate a machination of such superior design! It paved the future of redstone clock circuits!"

Never mind, bro moment over.

I looked off into the middle distance as Lenz treated me to another one of his redstone monologues. I made a silent whine of distress, wishing I could move. Or at least for a Creeper to show up and end it all.

No such luck. But at least when he was earnestly talking about redstone he forgot how nervous he was of me. That was something.

It was late afternoon when I finally got back to normal. Lenz tidied up his redstone clock and the two of us went to reconvene with Cobb and Soul.

Lenz had been right about the maps being useful. Now we didn't have to stick together all the time. With each of us holding a synced-up map, we could see where we were at all times. It got to the point where we split up to train, look for food, mine resources, and do our own things with the promise that we would all meet back up at a certain spot later.

This was particularly helpful when we were looking for food, of which we were currently out of. All of Erin's food had lasted us two weeks before finally running out. To make matters worse, we discovered that food was hard to find in the jungle. The green melons melded too well with the dense foliage, and when we actually found one, it was barely enough to split four ways. And forget about animals. We kept hearing them moo and cluck and oink all day, but failed to find them amongst all the trees and leaves. It drove us mad. A frustrated Soul snatched Lenz's flint and steel and attempted to burn the tasty animals out of hiding, but we managed to restrain and convince him otherwise. Cara would have been proud, but he didn't need another forest fire to his name.

We got so hungry that Lenz had combined the pumpkins he and Cobb had been carrying for Notch knows how long with sugar and eggs to make pumpkin pies. They devoured them greedily, but they remained unsatisfied, as did the rest of us.

We had to resort to eating rotten flesh at times, which Cobb was perfectly fine with, the sicko. When our food stores started to run low, he had started to fill up on rotten flesh only to cap it off with something edible so that it would last longer. But even then, we ran out of food.

For the first time in weeks, we remembered what it was like to be hungry. We needed to search all over for food and then reconvene to pool and split it four ways. It was disheartening when one of us came back with nothing, and we all experienced that at one point or another.

When we finally reached the meeting spot we had agreed upon, Lenz and I started to keel over from hunger. My stomach growled loudly and I felt lightheaded as I crawled along the ground.

"Ugh… Cobb… where are you with the food?" I moaned. It had been Cobb and Soul's turn to scavenge, and we desperately needed something to fill our emptying Hunger Meters.

I stared at my map, searching for the white blips, only to see the same strange sight I had been seeing for the past two weeks. The white blips on the map. There were…

"Guys! Guys!" The voice of Cobb suddenly sounded from the nearby copse. He burst from the trees, triumphantly holding something in his hands.

Our eyes lit up with hope, taking in the bounty of food that would surely save us from starvation. The spider eyes were like a glimmering beacon, that…

…

"Noooooooo…" Lenz started to cry into the ground when Cobb brought up a handful of spider eyes. Like they were a feast. God, they were nasty. Starvation was starting to sound pretty good.

Cobb rolled his eyes before taking out a handful of something that wasn't downright disgusting. "Relax, I got you all fish."

Blessed be the fisherman, for he hath provided food that won't poison or make us puke our guts out. Seven fish. Thank God.

I hurriedly set my furnace and Cobb popped in a few hunks of coal. It roared to life and got to work roasting those fishes, nice and tender.

Lenz was starting to take starvation damage, so I gave him the first and second fish. Then I took the next two. But Cobb turned down the fish we offered in favor of rotten flesh and spider eyes.

"Cobbert, why do you continue to eat that… that…" Lenz worked his mouth for a suitable word, but fell short with "slop!"

"Slop or not, we don't have a lot of options when it comes to food." Cobb explained while puking uncontrollably and taking poison damage. "Besides I'm fine. The picture of health."

"You are literally eating the remains of monsters that tried to kill you."

Cobb shrugged. "Meh, it's starting to taste like chicken…" He said unconvincingly before helping himself to another rancid bite.

Maybe he was taking one for the team… or maybe he just developed a taste for it, who knows. I was more open to the idea of eating it if it meant filling my belly, but Lenz outright refused to partake in any of it. I think if it came down to either starving or eating one piece of rotten flesh, he would rather starve.

"No Soul yet?" Cobb asked as he double-checked his map. He frowned as he looked at one section in particular, and I knew he was looking at the same strange thing I had noted on several occasions.

"He's nearby." I assured, leaning my back against a tree and polishing off the rest of the fish. Lenz licked his hands clean he was so hungry. We all were. "Hopefully he'll have something for us."

"Yeah, sorry, I would have had more, but…" Cobb pulled out his fishing rod, Backlash, and waved it around. "It turns out the Luck of the Sea Enchantment I put on this thing… makes it more likely to fish out treasure than fish. Funny, huh?"

"…You mean we could have had more to eat if we used a different fishing rod?" Lenz asked listlessly before groaning into the ground. "Oh food… why do you elude us so?"

"Yeah, I miss Erin and her delicious cooking." Cobb reminisced, his eyes gazing to the canopy dreamily. "Baked potatoes, cooked mutton, mushroom stew, steak, cooked chicken… sooooo good."

All our mouths watered, remembering Erin's skill in the kitchen.

"She would have made a great Beginner." Lenz spoke, thought it was clear he was still thinking about food. "We should have brought her with us."

"Yeah, I bet she could have whipped us up a feast in no time." Cobb agreed with a sigh. "I wish she were here, too."

It was actually a good thing Erin wasn't here to hear that, otherwise the lovesick housekeeper would have exploded in ecstasy, splattering the forest floor in the shape of a heart.

It was then that Soul tromped through the trees to join us, his pack heavy with resources.

"What's up, losers." He greeted in usual Soul fashion. "Find any food?"

"Just some fish." Cobb waved offhandedly. "We just finished it. But it looks like you brought in some good stuff too."

"Oh, yeah." Soul smiled, pulling stuff out of his pack. "I got iron ore, some gold, coal, loads of cobblestone. The mine I found was pretty good. I found a mineshaft down there too, and I—"

"Soul…" Lenz looked at all the stuff he was throwing out before narrowing his eyes. "This is all ores and minerals. Where is the food?"

"Oh, I didn't find any food."

"WHAT!?"

"Let me finish." Soul held up a hand calmingly. "I found some loaves of bread in the mineshaft in a chest, but I ate it to keep my strength up while I mined." He held out his hands with a big smile, as if expecting praise.

We all glared balefully at him, our stomachs growling.

"No, Stomach. We can't kill him. He's a friend." Cobb muttered to himself.

We were all more than a little upset. This was the fifth time Soul had prioritized mining over finding food. And while his efforts did net us a sizable chunk of iron, coal, and cobblestone—allowing us to cover ourselves with iron armor and arm ourselves with iron tools—we were still starving.

He was putting all his efforts into mining. And then acting like it was no big deal we were hungry. It wasn't like him at all.

"Soul, we can't eat iron." I grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him for emphasis. "Cobb, help me shake some sense into him." Cobb stood up and grabbed his shoulders from behind before helping me shake. "We. Need. Food. Or. We. Are. Going. To. Staaaaaarve!"

"Alright, alright. Sorry. I just figured you'd all want some more durable gear." He scowled with folded arms. "I still can't find stupid diamonds."

Honestly, what was up with him?

"Oh, hey." Soul suddenly said as he held out his map. "Did you guys notice the white blip got closer today?"

Cobb and I nodded, prompting all of us to pull out our maps to check.

Ever since we separated from the newbs back at the Origin, there were a total of six white blips, one for each map. We had four, and the newbs had two. But only one of the newbs' maps encompassed all of Minecraftia, and would therefore be able to track our blips.

We had advised them to travel to the closest Kingdom, Ringwood. And one of the white blips had certainly gotten that far.

But the other white blip had been following us for the past two weeks.

Currently, the white blip was a little further southeast than us. It wasn't too close to our location, but it wasn't too far either. And it had been like that since the Origin. We had tried a few times to make contact with the white blip tracking us, but every time we moved closer, it moved further away. Then when we backed off, it would close the distance. Meaning the white blip wanted to follow us without being followed in turn.

"You think it's one of the fresh spawns?" I asked, bringing up the same point we had argued whenever we looked at our maps.

"How can it? We scared them off." Soul reasoned with a frown. "We told them we were criminals, and that was real fear in their eyes. Not to mention, we told them to go to Ringwood since it was the safest route. Chasing after us is too dangerous for it to be those newbs."

"Fresh spawns." Cobb corrected testily. "And Soul's right, I don't think this is them. If we're having trouble finding food in this jungle, I doubt those fresh spawns would be doing much better. This is someone else."

"If that is the case," Lenz chimed in, "perhaps it is our greatest fear. That someone ambushed those fresh spawns for the map that would lead them straight to us." He adjusted his glasses with a frown. "The map is synced to us, meaning anyone that grabbed it would have a literal treasure map. Cobbert and Floyd's bounties are too good to pass up."

"That can't be it, either." Soul countered before tapping the other white blip in Ringwood. "If they got their map stolen, how come the other white blip made it to Ringwood? The newb—fresh spawns—would be too scared to separate. They would stick together. One of the blips is in Ringwood. That means at least one map holder made it."

"Yes, and the blip tracking us knows when we try and approach it." Lenz added. "That means the person following us has the larger map covering Minecraftia, rather than the smaller map covering the Ringwood Region. There are no other white blips, so there are no other map copies."

"And if someone had suddenly jumped the fresh spawns for their map, there would be no way of knowing which one had the big one and which the small one."

"Unless they killed them all." Soul filled in grimly.

Cobb shook his head. "If they all got killed, there wouldn't be a blip in Ringwood. That's where they were heading. They wouldn't have made it there if they were dead."

"So then who's following us?" I asked. "A bounty hunter would just confront us for the emeralds, right?"

"Not necessarily." Said Lenz while rubbing his chin. "The bounty is only good if you are captured alive. Perhaps our shadow is simply keeping tabs on us. Or else waiting for the right moment to strike. When we are at our most vulnerable."

"We're starving in the jungle. We can't get more vulnerable than this."

"You know what I mean." Lenz shot back testily. "We could have them outnumbered. Or maybe they are just being cautious. At the very least, we can agree that the fresh spawns are not the ones following us."

"Yeah, there's not enough information to claim anything else." I agreed. I was just about to stow my map away before a thought crossed my mind. "Why don't we burn it?"

"The jungle? I'm down. Those jungle critters have been asking for their homes to be burnt after taunting me for so long."

"No, Soul, not that. The maps." I rubbed the bridge of my nose in exhaustion. "If we burn the maps, then our stalker will have no way of tracking us."

"But then neither will we!" Lenz spoke up urgently. "We cannot burn the maps now. They are our only way of finding one another. It will take so much paper to make replacements."

"I'm with Lenz on this one." Cobb said supportively. "The maps might be a risk, but if we pay attention to them, we can spot that stalker approaching us from miles away. Know when and where they'll come at us. Plus, it'll help us identify whoever it is. Knowing an enemy is better than guessing one, after all."

"What… what does that even mean?"

"It means we're keeping the maps." He deadpanned.

"Sounds good to me." Soul smirked, swinging his axe. "If they try and attack us, I'll happily show them the business end of my axe."

"That's theeeeeeee pointy end, right?" Cobb joked, to which Soul bonked him on the head with the flat of his axe. "Owww! Are you trying to hurt my brain?"

"Can't hurt what was never there." Soul remarked before resting the axe on his shoulder.

I turned away from them to see Lenz pouring over a book. "Studying up on Airship Piloting 101 again?"

"Hm? No, I already memorized that." Lenz commented offhandedly before looking up with his tinted glasses lifted. Magenta eyes bore into Cobb's. "We are getting an airship, right?"

"Yes, Lenz." Cobb let out an exasperated huff. "How many times do I have to assure you?"

"A few hundred more times would not hurt."

"Yes! We're getting an airship!"

"You are certain?"

"Yes!"

"And I can pilot it to my heart's content?"

"YES."

"And you will all call me Captain Lenz?"

"There's only one person I respect enough to call Captain, and even then I don't do it often. How about Skipper Lenz?" Cobb suggested.

"…Skipper Lenz approves." Lenz nodded before concealing magenta orbs behind tinted glasses once more. "Anyway, to answer your question, Floyd, I am not re-reading Airship Piloting 101." Lenz held up the cover, revealing it to be Advanced Mob-Slaying.

"Studying up on the Mobs. Smart." I praised.

It made sense for the engineer to look up ways to handle the Mobs better since he only had a handful of arrows to his name. Just as we had run low on food, Lenz had run low on ammo. It was a combination of constantly fighting Mobs and helping me improve my archery that led to his dearth of arrows. And with no chickens for feathers, he couldn't make more.

However, when I got a closer look at which entry he was studying, I found him skimming the very back of the book: The pages with all the garbled text.

"I thought you'd be reading actual dialogue." I said with clear confusion. The rest of us had agreed that the back pages of both Herobrine's books were just nonsense.

Lenz frowned as he flipped through the pages, scrutinizing them closely.

"I… I do not think this is mere gobbledygook."

"What makes you think that?" Cobb asked with interest, his head peeking over Lenz's other shoulder.

"Well just look." Lenz spread out the book and pointed to certain lines that he had obviously taken note of. "If it was just gibberish, there would not be this same combination of letters." He pointed to a three-letter word that read as 'GSV'.

"Gsv?" Cobb tried to pronounce it, sounding like he was suffering a mild stroke.

"Yes, and it shows up several other times. Both in this book," Lenz pulled out the other book, How to Kill Stuff for Numb Nuts, and flipped to the back, "and here too. Not to mention the format and spacing. The punctuation." He looked up. "I think this text is actually coded."

"You sure?" Cobb said while holding one of the books sideways as if to discern the hidden text. He turned it this way and that, but was just as stumped as before. "I mean, it's a cool theory if you're right—secret spy codes and whatnot—but who would bother encoding this text into some jumbled mess?"

"The author, I suppose." I filled in, turning the book to Herobrine's signed name.

"Yeah, but why? He wrote most of the book normally. Why write the end in code?"

"Perhaps there was knowledge he thought forbidden for the common Crafter?" Lenz suggested before pouring over the books once more. I couldn't tell because of the tinted glasses, but I think I saw a gleam in his eye. "Only intelligent Crafters would be able to crack the secrets…"

"You think you can crack the code?"

"There is a method to it." Lenz admitted, pointing to the same three-letter gibberish we had started at. "The first step is finding common collections of letters and translating them into common words we use all the time. Three letters could make it 'and' or 'the'. And single letter words can only be either 'I' or 'A'. With each correct letter association, the text becomes easier to decipher. Almost like a puzzle."

"So you can crack it?" Cobb asked with a bit of excitement. He loved the Herobrine books almost as much as Helena. And the idea of hidden knowledge seemed to entice him.

"With time." Lenz nodded with a smile. "Spare time." He added with a look to me, no doubt remembering his prior commitment to my Hacker training. "I will let you know when I have both books translated."

"Well, at least you'll be busy." Cobb slapped a fist into his open palm in realization. "Speaking of books, I fished out something interesting with Backlash." He rummaged in his backpack before taking out a book with a glowing purple-pink glow. It was tied closed by a red leather cord. "It says it's an Enchanted Book, but I don't recognize the Enchantment. Ever hear of 'Mending I'?"

"Mending? No, I… I have never heard of that." Lenz gazed at the glowing book oddly.

"Doesn't ring any bells." Soul shook his head. "What do you think it does?"

"I'll go out on a limb and say it mends."

"Well, send your butt to college cuz we got a smartass on our hands."

"There's only one way to be sure about what it does." Cobb held the book under his arm. "We enchant with it."

There was a pause.

"Sooooo…" Cobb leaned on the heels of his sneakers, glancing around. "Anyone got an anvil?" He asked hopefully, only to receive a round of No's. "Well, shoot. Guess we'll just have to wait until Jolin to enchant it."

"Or…" Soul raised a finger, his red eyes lighting up, "we can use the iron I so painstakingly mined to make our own. We can do this right now."

Cobb looked to be considering it. "You know how to make an anvil."

"No, but we're four smart guys."

"That is debatable." Lenz spoke up, causing Soul to growl at him. The engineer wisely chose to look away and whistle until Soul moved on.

"We're four smart guys." Soul repeated with a shrug. "How hard can it be to make one, right?"

Two days later, we made an anvil.

"HA! YES!" Soul raised his fists triumphantly. "I knew we needed blocks of iron! Suck it, egghead!"

"But why would they be on top?" Lenz asked madly, his gray hair more unkempt than usual after nights of fruitless combinations. "Surely the structural integrity of the anvil would favor the iron blocks on the bottom!"

"Forget who said what!" Cobb waved his hands, his hair equally frazzled and his eye twitching slightly at his efforts to make the anvil. "We got this stupid thing done, so we might as well use it."

He practically slammed the Enchanted Book onto the anvil before taking a moment to consider what he would want the mysterious Enchantment to be on. He looked into his Inventory for something suitable and pulled out his super fishing rod, Backlash. As he held it in his hands, I was sure he would choose it.

But instead, with a conflicted whine, Cobb stowed the tool away before peeling off his tattered, green-dyed leather tunic and laying it on the anvil.

"Of all the things, you chose that?" Soul asked incredulously.

"It's on its last legs anyway." He patted the green tunic fondly. "And I'd rather fix it than get a new one."

"But… it's leather." Soul spoke as if trying to explain it to a newb. "Why not get iron gear instead? It's stronger."

"Maybe." Cobb smiled knowingly. "But I prefer my tunic. I guess you could call it sentimental value. Plus, green matches my eyes."

Soul shrugged, feeling indifferent on the matter, but Lenz and I knew why Cobb valued that tunic. Wynn had given it to him as a symbol of Ringwood's camaraderie. To him, the green leather was worth more than diamond.

And luckily, it seemed compatible with the mysterious Mending Enchantment. Cobb held out his arm and watched the tattooed green bar that represented his EXP Meter empty of levels. The glowing number '23' on his arm soon diminished to '19' and the green orbs of EXP escaped flew from Cobb's fingertips before swirling around the book and leather tunic. Finally, with a green flash of light, only the tunic remained.

Cobb quickly picked it up and examined it. The leather was still in tatters, barely holding together. It made the fisherman frown sadly.

"I thought it would fix it right away." He sighed before tugging it back on. "Maybe Mending works in a different way?"

"Give it some time." I calmed him down. "It's a first tiered Enchantment, so it'll probably take some time to mend."

"If that's even what the Enchantment does." I smacked Soul's head. "I mean, yeah, don't worry. It'll work. Believe in your tattered tunic."

Hardly the most comforting words, but Cobb accepted them nonetheless. While Soul volunteered to carry our new, heavy anvil, I turned to the engineer who was spending some time looking between his custom notebook and the Herobrine books. He nibbled on the quill in his hands, deep in thought as he tried to decipher the cryptic language.

I wanted him to check if we were any closer to Jolin yet. But since he was busy, I took it upon myself. I looked at the surrounding jungle trees and found one with vines clinging to the thick bark.

Perfect.

I walked to it, digging my hands deeply into the vines, before I began to climb. The vines were sturdy handholds as they trailed down from the canopy above, making it easier for me to make my way up. Higher and higher I climbed, the sounds of the others growing fainter and fainter as I neared the leaves.

I didn't have the Lenz's shears, but a sword was basically a machete anyway. I held it in my free hand while clinging to the vines with the other and began violently hacking away at the dense canopy. Jungle logs were broken in favor of footholds and jungle saplings fell from the thrashed leaves.

"Look out below!" I called down in warning before I heard the soft thunk of a sapling hitting Lenz's leather cap. "Sorry…"

With a suitable foothold finally made, I hoisted myself up into the leaves and thrashed more easily, making a staircase higher into the canopy. Bits of leaves nicked my face, but I kept thrashing and climbing and thrashing and climbing…

Until, with a final swipe of my sword, I struck clear blue sky.

I pulled myself up and let out a sigh of relief as cool wind replaced the humidity below the ceiling of foliage. No wonder Lenz had always been the one to scale the trees. It was so much cooler up… here…

My eyes widened as I looked over an uneven sea of foliage that stretched out for miles... or it would have if there wasn't a colossal tree standing in the way.

The thing was monumental. The other trees looked like toothpicks compared to it. And it stretched to the sky, branching out into… well… branches! Supporting billions of leaves that spanned out like an umbrella. There were also smaller big trees. Or rather, they were trees bigger than the toothpick trees, but smaller than the mother of all trees. They were connected to the colossal tree via a network of crisscrossing wooden bridges, and had similar spanning branches and canopies. What's more, there looked to be some type of structures hanging from the branches like cocoons or bagworms.

"Leeeeenz!" I called down without taking my eyes off what I could only describe as a tree on steroids.

"Yes, Floyd!?"

"Is Jolin famous for its trees?"

"Yes, my pen pal mentioned something like that! It is known famously as the Gift Tree! Do you think you can see it from there? I know your eyesight is not as good as mine!"

"Yeah… uh…" I looked at the tree currently blocking out the sun. "It's pretty hard to miss!"

"Wonderful! We are nearly there!" Lenz cheered. "Come back down and point us in the right direction!"

"Sure thing." I held up my map, memorizing Jolin's exact position from where I was facing. We'd get there by nightfall if my estimation was right… though then again, the proportions of the tree could've thrown me off.

As I looked at the map one last time, I noticed the stalking white blip passing us a ways out… and heading in the direction of Jolin.

My eyes narrowed. Whoever that was, it looked like he or she had the same idea as us. Not for the last time, I debated throwing my map away and doing the same with the others. I didn't want to risk any type of confrontation with whoever was tracking us.

But, with a sigh, I chickened out, stowing the map back into my backpack and getting ready to climb down to my guild.

If worse came to worse, I'd use my thirty seconds of Speed to take down the stalker once and for all.

[Soul]

I kept my eyes on the mysterious white blip as it passed us and headed in the direction Floyd had said was Jolin.

I didn't want to throw away the maps because I wanted a confrontation with this stalker. If he or she was an enemy (and I hoped he or she was), then I would get to try out my new armor and prove just how strong I was. After weeks of fighting nothing but Mobs, I relished a chance to flex my muscles at something smarter.

I had even busied myself with mining in an effort to improve my strength. A pickaxe wasn't so different from an axe. Heck, the name was right in there, plain as day. I may not have found any diamonds to upgrade my gear, but iron would have to suffice for now.

That's what I needed to win. That's what I had been missing all this time. Diamond gear and powerful Enchantments. And Strength Potions. Any advantage I could get my hands on. I needed them all. And Jolin's markets would supply.

Cobb was crazy wasting EXP on some flimsy tunic and a fishing rid. And Lenz? His only armor was a leather cap—the same color as Cobb's tunic—because other armor was 'too heavy' for him. And Floyd? Well, he didn't need any fancy armor with his Hacker power helping him along. But not me! What better way to make myself stronger than with stronger gear?

I'm never losing to anyone again! I thought harshly as I followed the others towards the Kingdom that would change me.

Never again!

Inventory (Cobb): 1 Fishing Rod {Backlash} [Knockback II, Luck of the Sea III, Unbreaking III], 1 Iron Pickaxe, 1 Iron Sword, 1 Golden Shovel [Silk Touch I, Unbreaking III], 54 Cobblestone, 19 Grass Blocks, 2 Ender Pearls, 28 Torches, 37 Coal, 62 Jungle Wood Planks, 1 Crafting Table, 1 Clock, 1 Water Bucket, 3 String, 1 Iron Helmet, 1 Leather Tunic [Dyed Green, Mending I, Unbreaking I] {Weak}, 1 Iron Leggings, 1 Iron Boots, 40 Emeralds, 10 Rotten Flesh, 1 Map {Minecraftia}, 1 Book {How to Kill Stuff for Numb Nuts}, 1 Book {Advanced Mob-Slaying}, 1 Book {Citizenship Information}, 1 Paper {Ringwood Entry Pass}

[EXP: 23]

Inventory (Floyd): 1 Iron Pickaxe, 1 Iron Sword, 30 Iron Ingots, 1 Fishing Rod, 2 Ender Pearls, 1 Furnace, 1 Crafting Table, 1 Minecart, 1 Bed, 1 Boat, 1 Potion of Fire Resistance {8:00}, 17 Gunpowder, 1 Iron Helmet, 1 Iron Chestplate, 1 Iron Leggings, 1 Iron Boots, 1 Map {Minecraftia}, 1 Book {Citizenship Information}, 1 Paper {Entry Pass}, 8 Emeralds

[EXP: 29]

Inventory (Lenz): 1 Bow, 1 Shears, 2 Levers, 1 Flint and Steel, 1 Stone Button, 5 Redstone Torches, 9 Redstone Repeaters, 3 Redstone Comparators, 28 Redstone, 18 Blocks of Redstone, 2 Hoppers, 3 Pistons, 2 Sticky Pistons, 21 Cobblestone, 25 Dirt, 1 Minecart, 1 Compass, 25 Gunpowder, 1 Leather Cap [Dyed Green], 2 Arrows, 18 Jungle Wood Planks, 1 Crafting Table, 16 Sugar Cane, 11 Paper, 6 Ink Sacs, 4 Leather, 64 Emeralds, 14 Emeralds, 1 Map {Minecraftia}, 1 Book {Airship Piloting 101}, 1 Book {Notebook}, 1 Book {How to Kill Stuff for Numb Nuts}, 1 Book {Advanced Mob-Slaying}, 1 Book {Citizenship Information}, 1 Paper {Daymonte Entry Pass}, 1 Paper {Ringwood Entry Pass}

[EXP: 12]

Inventory (Soul): 1 Iron Axe, 1 Iron Pickaxe, 64 Iron Ingots, 57 Iron Ingots, 12 Gold Ingots, 5 Ender Pearls, 1 Potion of Invisibility {8:00}, 1 Milk, 1 Iron Helmet, 1 Iron Chestplate, 1 Iron Leggings, 1 Iron Boots, 1 Crafting Table, 1 Anvil, 1 Bed, 1 Furnace, 35 Torches, 37 Dirt, 64 Cobblestone, 34 Cobblestone, 50 Coal, 38 Jungle Wood Planks, 9 Emeralds, 1 Book {Citizenship Information}, 1 Map {Minecraftia}, 1 Paper {Ringwood Entry Pass}

[EXP: 40]

AN: Ruh-Roh. Soul's being angsty. Must be a day ending in a 'y'.

Ethonian Hopper Clock. Look it up. It's really interesting. I've made one before when I was designing a boss-fight for an Adventure Map... don't ask which one. A lot of my experience with how redstone works is because I worked on the mechanics of an Adventure Map. It's probably why I conceived a character like Lenz in the first place.

This Chapter was just meant as a two week time skip to speed things along. The Beginners ran out of food, Soul mined up a ton of Iron, Floyd's Hack practicing (Hackticing?), Lenz is decoding Herobrine's books, and some mysterious Crafter is following the group.

But who could it be? Hmmmmmm?

(You can probably guess who. It's not that hard.)

Tiny glimpse of Jolin. More on what it looks like next Chapter. This is like the... fifth Kingdom visited? Ringwood, Daymonte, Dover Plains, Nitebane, Jolin. Yep, the fifth.

I really wish I could make a Minecraftia world server. Or, better yet, I wish I could just snap my fingers, and it'll be there. Completely to scale and anyone can visit it.

Anyway, leave a review, fav, or follow.