The Minecraft Story: The Beginning: Chapter 38
The mobs marched as a nightmarish army. Their faces were dead, but their eyes stared right into Marcus's soul. They could hear the hissing of the spiders. The skeletons cracked and creaked as they walked. The creepers made no sound, they were silent suicide bombers. The zombies were the opposite, their moans rang through the night.
Marcus tried not to look at the zombies, the other monsters never knew what it was like to be human. However, the zombies wore the clothes of everyday people. People who they'd failed to protect. Marcus wondered if any of these zombies were from Morzen. The droves of undead men, women, and children nearly drove him to tears. But he had a job to do. Even if he couldn't save these people, there were still many more he still had to fight for.
He wanted to call for the attack, but he still had to wait. As they got closer, the smell overcame him and he puked a little in his mouth. Not yet. He thought. Just a little bit longer. The mobs were practically a stone's throw away. They were beginning to climb the corpse wall. This was it, it was time for the attack.
"Archers, fire!" Marcus yelled. A barrage of arrows flew above Marcus. They arched in the sky over the corpse wall like a graceful dancer. The arrows landed true and took out the first section of mobs. They fell atop the corpse wall. Many slid down, but some managed to stay atop the wall, just like they'd planned.
Franz and the remaining archers were perched on top of the deepslate huts. Inside the huts were the knights and carrier slaves who were injured from the blast and couldn't fight.
"Reload!" Franz yelled. It was a good plan. Marcus had made the suggestion to let the mobs make it to the corpse wall. Franz had thought he was crazy letting the mobs get that close, but he had an idea. If they killed the mobs on the corpse wall, they would add to the bodies which created a larger and more effective barrier between them and the horde.
Franz was confident in his brother. However, looking out at the massive horde appearing out of the forest made him worried. There was possibly hundreds of mobs, but only about twenty good archers left. There was no room for error. If one missed, then that was a chance for a breach. They did have a plan for a breach, in front of the deepslate huts were forty knights and ten carrier slaves ready to fight, including Marcus and Notch.
They hoped it wouldn't come down to close quarters combat, but Franz wasn't sure with the massive number of mobs moving in. They would have to fight all night with limited arrows. There might not be enough of us. Franz thought. I'm not sure we can do this. There's so many. Franz looked down to his little brother. But I'm fighting for him. As long as he's alive, I'll fight until my dying breath.
"Archers, fire!" Marcus yelled again.
…
Thomas felt useless sitting behind a barricade of bookshelves, tables, and chairs. Zacharius and a few other southerners stood guard at the entrance. Thomas was huddled in a corner of the deesplate hut along with the rest of the injured. This damn leg. He thought. I should be out there fighting with the rest of them. I have to watch out for the other southerners. What if the knights attack them and use the battle as a cover up? Thomas began to resent the knights even more. If it wasn't for that bastard knight, Anthony, we could've slipped away. But, at the same time, would we have found a place to hold up for the night? Would we have been caught out in the open?
Thomas looked over at the injured and found Carlo laying there. It was the knight that Anthony had brought to them, the knight they saved. He's here? I thought Anthony would've taken him with him. I wonder how those knights who left are doing anyway. Did they get caught out in the open? Maybe they're being slaughtered right now? A slight smirk formed on his face.
…
The archers maintained a steady stream of arrows. One after another, they shot and increased the size of the corpse wall. There were some close calls. A skeleton managed to shoot over the wall and hit one of the knights. Luckily, his iron armor protected him. A zombie had also been able to climb over the wall on the far end. Nobody noticed it until it was on top of the knights, but it was killed quickly.
They had been shooting for hours and the methodical nature of it began to wear the archers down. Their muscles began to ache from the constant shooting. Franz began to notice he was shaking every time he shot an arrow. At first, he thought it was nerves, but he realized he was simply tired. With exhaustion started to sweep through the archers, their aim began to hinder.
Arrows were completely missing the mobs and they began to scale over the corpse wall. This was where the knights stepped in. Some knights, including Marcus and Notch, had perched near the top. They were just out of the way enough to allow the archers to fire and close enough to watch for any mobs that made it over.
When a mob made it over, they were to quickly put it down as it was climbing over the hump. At first, it was only the occasional zombie or skeleton. Spiders were better at climbing, but they were made a priority target along with creepers, so they didn't appear often. On top of that, the creepers couldn't climb as well as spiders could, so they'd only had to kill two. However, as the hours passed, more mobs began to climb over.
Marcus was surprised when a zombie burst from over the top. It was an old man wearing farming attire. He leaped over and quickly slid down the bodies toward Marcus. He put his sword up in defense and the zombie slammed into him. He could keep his balance and fell onto his back. The lumps of bodies passed by him and slid upside down toward the bottom of the wall. The zombie was on top of him, trying to bite, but the sword protected him. It bit down onto the sword and blood shot from its gums. This was his chance. He angled the sword upward and pushed with all his strength and he tore through the weak, green flesh. The sword came out at the top of the head near the back. Marcus then pushed the zombie's chest and sent it flying off of him. Just as the zombie flew off, he hit the bottom of the wall. It hurt, but he didn't suffer any neck or spinal injury.
"Hey, are you okay?" Notch called from the top of the corpse wall.
"I'm alright!" Marcus answered.
It took Marcus a second to process what had happened, but when he did, he couldn't help but laugh. He imagined himself sliding down the wall with a zombie on top of him and for whatever reason, he found the situation comical and began to laugh. As a result, Notch began to laugh with him. That's when the spider jumped from the top of the wall toward Notch.
"Behind you!" Marcus screamed as he pointed behind Notch.
Without even blinking, Notch pulled out his sword. It was a beautiful golden sword, crafted to perfection. However, something was off about the sword. It appeared to glow in the night. It appeared to have a purplish outline around it that caused its intoxicating glow that would make even the shiniest diamonds jealous. Notch swung the sword behind him and sliced the spider in half whilst it was still in the air. Suddenly, the two halves burst into flames and they were sent flying into the horde. Marcus had never seen anything like it. His mouth fell agape as he still lay at the bottom of the wall. Notch gracefully slid the sword back into its holster.
All the knights and archers had been so distracted by Notch, that they didn't notice the creeper.
BOOM!