Chapter 15: Constiere, Failed Soldier
Being yelled at for simply expressing concern wasn't a great feeling, but Steve assumed that he could live with it for the time being until he had another chance to interact with Herobrine once again. For now, he was stuck with Constiere, and they had some clues to find. What clues exactly, neither knew, but they were happy about the fact that they were making progress with every step. At least, Steve hoped that they were, and that they wouldn't get completely lost despite the sun rising high enough to let them see and examine their surroundings with only a small amount of shadow interference.
The silence was killing him. Though he didn't like the other's tendency to belittle him, anything was better than the awkward silence that had carried over from just moments before they initially departed.
"...How long do you think it's gonna take for him to get over himself?" Steve asked quietly, his words hesitant as he glanced over at the other.
Constiere shrugged.
"Herobrine, you mean? Beats me. Never seen him get upset by someone using a nickname for him before, actually. Well, by a human, at least. Normally, he doesn't even care." Constiere finished with a small laugh.
"...I'm the first?"
"Pretty much. Kinda funny that you just...y'know, said it so casually."
Steve looked down at his feet as he continued to walk.
"...I didn't mean to. Got frustrated, and didn't think it through. Didn't think that he'd mind so much."
Constiere nodded in understanding.
"Me either. Well, I mean, I've never tried it, but that's because I never thought of it. I like 'Brine' a bit, but for me, calling him 'master' or 'sir' fits waaaaay better."
Looking back at the other, Steve rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, because you work for him. I got dragged into this mess."
"I think that you agreed to work with him though, so you technically work for him too!"
"...Yeah, I guess." Steve directed his attention back forward, looking through the trees as he attempted to spot anything out of the ordinary. Finding nothing, he let out a small groan.
"...Got any idea of what clues we're supposed to be looking for?" Steve asked.
"...Remnants of stuff? Tree carvings? Smoke signals in the sky? Something? Anything? I dunno!" Constiere threw his hands in the air, moving to walk backward in front of the miner in order to face him.
Silence followed his words for a moment before the boy pointed towards Steve with a strong gaze and furrowed brows.
"If you didn't make the master mad, we'd know what exactly to be looking for!"
Steve glared at him.
"We do kinda know what we're looking for, though! Stuff relating to the drawings in the temple! We just don't know what stuff exactly, right?"
Constiere huffed, moving to turn around and fall back by the other's side once again as he crossed his arms in front of his chest.
"Why'd you ask a question you already knew the answer to?"
Silence briefly followed the boy's words, before Steve shrugged.
"...I dunno. I just wanted confirmation, I guess."
More silence followed their words for a bit, leaving only the sounds of gently rustling leaves and footsteps between them. As Steve directed his attention solely towards the trees, he was halted in his step as he felt a tug from his bag, leading to him whipping his head around to catch a glimpse of Constiere sticking his hand within his pack. The boy was digging around carelessly.
"Hey! What're you-"
"Looking for helpful stuff! There's no way you packed for an adventure and didn't bring anything having to do with navigation, at least."
After a few moments, Constiere's eyes lit up as he pulled out a circular object, which Steve fully turned around and found that what the other was holding was his compass. The boy opened his mouth to speak, but his words never came out, fading away as his expression became one of confusion as he stared closer at the device in his hand.
"...What's wrong?" Steve asked, approaching the other as he stared at the compass as well.
"...Was your compass always broken?"
Confused, Steve looked up at the other.
"It...It's broken?"
Constiere nodded.
"It's wonky, and it's pointing like, south. Kinda. I don't think it should do that, especially since I doubt that you have a magic one."
"...There are magic ones?..." Steve's words trailed off in slight shock at the information. The moment that he paused in order to go over the other's words again within his mind, a look of realization flashed upon his face.
His compass had been broken this entire time.
Had the Elder given him a bad one, or had he broken it while attempting to set it? Did it break recently and he didn't even notice it, or what? Did he set his bag down too harshly and it broke under the weight of his other belongings, or had he tossed it around too much? If he'd been left alone, would he have gotten completely lost from his village? Would he have never had the chance to make it back home safely, if he didn't perish on his own in the wild?
Without noticing it, Steve looked back down to find Constiere already moving to mess around with the compass, flipping it around in his hands as he examined its features. With a swift motion, he popped the protective glass covering the needle and brought the device up to his face to look at it even more closely.
"...This thing is poorly made, but it shouldn't be too hard to fix. Just need to look at the needle and make sure the bearing on this thing isn't too crappy."
Steve's eyes widened in surprise at the other's words, which were spoken in such a casual manner.
"I didn't think that you'd know how to fix a compass."
Constiere flashed him a grin.
"Course you didn't!"
Looking back at the compass, Constiere began working on it with careful fingers.
"They teach you this stuff when you join local army factions. I remember learning how to work with stuff like this during my first few weeks of training and whatever."
"You were a soldier?!" Steve looked at the other in shock.
Constiere laughed.
"Yeah! I know I don't look or sound it, but I got in. Wasn't supposed to, but I did it anyway."
The boy paused for a moment, working on the compass quietly before letting out a quiet sigh.
"I was too young to join, but when you know the right people, you can get away with almost anything."
Curious, yet all the more thankful that he was getting a chance to learn a bit more about one of his new companions, Steve looked back up at the other, intrigued.
"...How old were you when you joined?"
"Sixteen. I was part of a smaller group of the army that belonged to the kingdom of Forfall. They didn't let me in initially, but I went to the right people and crawled my way in."
Constiere paused, letting out a little laugh before continuing.
"They gave us all compasses and stuff like that, taught us how to use them, fix 'em, and get by without them. Taught us how to fight too. I loved it there! Way better than the boring stuff I was doing before."
Almost laughing at the image of Constiere of all people in a more strict, professional setting given his nature, Steve found the boy's words fascinating.
"...What did you do before?..."
"I helped to make clothes. My mom was a seamstress, and a pretty busy one, at that."
After adjusting the compass, Constiere looked it over briefly before nodding to himself in satisfaction, placing the protective glass back in its place, and handing the device back over to Steve. Standing proudly with his hands on his hips, the boy puffed his chest out.
"There! Now we won't get stupidly lost, at least! Just regular lost!"
Steve laughed at the other's remark.
"Great! Thanks, dirt boy."
Watching the other's eyes light up in a playful manner, Steve didn't even mind as the other went to punch his shoulder gently.
"Anytime, bright-eyes!"
Holding the compass in his hand, Steve watched as the needle now directed itself upward, pointing to what he assumed was north. Beginning to walk again, the miner led the two as they continued their search through the forest.
After a couple of minutes that contained nothing but aimless wandering, Steve let out a small groan, which gained the attention of the boy beside him.
"...You think we should head back to the desert on our own and search there? I don't think we'll find anything new, here."
Constiere shrugged.
"I dunno. I mean, we looked pretty much through everything that was interesting enough, and I think that the silverfish would've told us if anything was off or if we needed to check anything else, really."
Moving to peer around a nearby tree, Constiere sighed.
"Your eyes haven't changed and I don't think master's felt anything since we saw that idiot back in the forest. There just might not be anything here that would lead us straight to that ancient civilization except the portal itself, if that's what the drawings were showing."
Steve tilted his head in a bit of confusion at the other's words.
"I get that we may be walking around for nothing right now, but...what do you mean by the rest of that?"
"...I was gonna bring it up before you made master mad, but there could be a possibility that the drawings were just showing that you humans were happy about the fact that the gods used those portals to make their way directly down to you guys. Might not even be a specific portal, just...a portal."
Thinking over the other's words for a bit, Steve realized that the other had brought up a valid point.
The people within the drawings were clearly surrounding the portal for a reason. A direct connection with the gods through these portals would provide enough reason for them to be immortalized through paint. There could be a chance that this new "lead" wasn't even a lead at all. They were already disadvantaged enough as they were, so it wouldn't surprise him necessarily to find out that there were even more obstacles, such as misinterpreted information, that could be placed in their way.
"...So we might be looking for clues that don't even exist? For certain?"
"Maybe? Hopefully not?"
Continuing walking, Steve shook his head.
"...I think we're dealing with another situation where Herobrine made us do something in order to make a distraction for himself. Maybe he just wanted to be alone."
As Constiere mulled over the miner's words, he began to nod slowly.
"...I think that makes more sense! Master likes to talk to Andi a lot, so maybe he just sent us away and left Malgun behind to sort stuff out with him."
Giving Steve a smirk, the boy nudged him a bit.
"You're pretty good at sleuthing, aren't you?"
Steve rolled his eyes with a smile.
"I just...thought it made sense given the fact that he just did it, like, only a few minutes before."
Constiere laughed.
"At least we can come back earlier! He doesn't take too long to talk to Andi, so I bet that we'll see him when we get back to the meeting point."
As Steve joined in with the laughter, he looked up ahead towards the forest, thoughts relaxing a bit.
So, he'd be taking a walk with Constiere while waiting for Herobrine to be calmed down by Andvari. Sure, they could still look for "clues," but if they used all that effort and still turned up empty, they would be better off not looking at all. Instead of becoming more interested in these so-called potential "clues," the miner's gaze fell once again upon his current sole companion.
His curiosity about the other's past hadn't quite been satiated yet. Constiere was seemingly quite young, though not apparently that much younger than he was, yet he seemed to already have quite the interesting history. The boy had previous personal involvement with a kingdom's army, knowledge about survival that he could definitely take tips from, and possibly even more? Not to mention, the other had died, so maybe he could ask about that as well?
Steve decided to see what he could get from the other.
"So...going back to before, how long did you work for that army?"
Constiere's gaze fell on him, intrigued by the return of the topic of his past.
"...A few months, actually. All the way up until…" The boy trailed off as his tone became quite quiet, and his expression fell as he turned his gaze towards the ground. "...I died."
Silence followed his words for a moment before Steve broke it with an apologetic, quiet voice.
"...I'm sorry for prying."
Maybe he shouldn't have pressed the other for details.
His momentary regret was diminished significantly, however, as Constiere's expression lit back up again as he turned his head toward Steve.
"Don't be! I had a lot of fun as a soldier, and I'm alive now, so it's no big deal! Just kinda suckish what happened. I kinda died while enrolled, and stuff."
Hopping onto and beginning to walk on a nearby fallen tree, Constiere balanced himself carefully, leaving the other in silence. The boy thought to himself for a moment as he walked, clearly debating whether or not to continue on with the topic. Letting out a sigh, he began to speak again.
"...Training was pretty short, actually. We weren't a big group in general, but we were smart enough to get stuff memorized and done quickly. I was part of a group of nine that were kinda close, actually."
Looking back at the miner, Constiere put on a slightly more dramatic tone.
"Me and the rest of my squad were sent out to investigate and deal with a set pattern of attacks coming from what we assumed was the kingdom's enemy, on our first-ever mission. The first couple of nights were quiet, so the rest of my team was pretty on edge, but I was so excited about finally being able to head out and do something. Before that, I was just treated like the rowdy teenager I was. In the day, we went on patrols and stuff to scope out the areas and look around for anything suspicious. At night, we took shifts watching over our campsite base, resting up and relaxing as best as we could."
Jumping off of the tree once it came to an end, Constiere hopped a bit as he got accustomed to the ground once again, falling into place beside Steve.
"Around the fourth or fifth night, I got up at like, near dawn to use the restroom, and saw that our commander, the guy who insisted he take us specifically, was placing around traps and stuff to set up a 'disappearance' or whatever, for us. He was planning on killing us all."
Steve could only stare in utter shock at the other's words, so the boy continued.
"I didn't know what to do at first, but I decided that I'd go back to my bed and report what I saw to the big guys back home the next day. I ran back, and ended up running into my commander, who had seen me before, and he...he set off one of his traps for me. Not like, one of the ones that shot arrows, or whatever, he rigged a small set of explosives, and I was blown into pieces. Pretty sure I flew like a bird! Guess he didn't want any witnesses."
Giving Steve a shrug, Constiere directed his attention back toward the path before them, resting his arms back behind his head as they walked.
"I dunno what happened in between me dying and my commander attempting to wipe himself clean of the crime, y'know, cause I was dead, but low and behold, I woke up behind a rock waaaaay far away from the camp I was staying in to a pair of white eyes right in front of me and a pair of purple eyes behind them."
Constiere smiled at the memory.
"...I remember it so clearly, I just...I couldn't believe it. I was shocked and confused when I woke up, but all of that was replaced by sheer anger and thoughts of revenge at the commander for what he did to me, and for what he wanted to do next...Herobrine was just as pissed as I was. Master told me that I could 'right the wrongs that were made' and 'to place him in the grave he even failed to dig for you,' so I...I did just that.'"
Constiere waited for a response before letting out a chuckle.
"Course, I ended up killing everybody there anyways and died again, but that's only cuz I didn't know what I was doing! Master didn't exactly tell me that I woke up part creeper, he just said to use my new abilities to do whatever I pleased!"
Steve's eyes widened at the other's admission, slightly backing away subconsciously as he realized what exactly the other was.
"You...you're actually-?!"
Constiere smiled proudly.
"Yup. Don't know if I'm even allowed to tell you this, but since we're alone, and Andi isn't here to rat me out, I'll tell you. Master took a few parts from dead creepers, used them to replace whatever got destroyed on my body, then brought me back to life. Kinda morbid, but I'm wearing the parts that weren't used for me as a cloak, see?" Constiere pointed to his hood, leading to Steve grimacing at the revelation."My leg was completely gone, but I think you've noticed the fur sticking out, right? Most of me got replaced." Displaying his left leg for the other to see, Constiere watched as Steve nodded hesitantly in response to his question.
"I thought...I just thought that was an extra layer of clothes, that's actually you?!"
"Yes! Like I said, I'm part creeper now! I went and set myself off near the commander, but I didn't know my range at the time, so...it ended up setting off a couple of the traps he made, which killed everybody else, basically. Sucks, but at least he's dead! After that, I ended up following master for good once he brought me back again. I didn't have anywhere to go, so I went with him."
Taking the information as best as he could, Steve found that a whole array of questions came to the forefront of his mind, attacking him from all fronts as he looked over the other with newfound curiosity.
Constiere was actually part creeper, and Herobrine made him that way? He didn't just use some magic nonsense to raise him from the dead, and nothing else? The man he knew as a human-hating mystery willingly helped one cheat death? Constiere seemed to take the whole 'being dead' thing pretty well, was it time that helped him cope, or was it just something he didn't care much about due to the circumstances?
Steve decided to ask questions as they came to him.
"...Wait, so he can just...do that? Make people mobs?"
Constiere shrugged.
"I dunno. He doesn't make people mobs regularly, or make them separately, but all I know is that I was kinda a test for him. Like, he hadn't fixed somebody before like he fixed me. I dunno how to explain it, but...it's kinda like he can stitch two things together and make a sorta new thing." Constiere paused, gesturing around as he spoke. "Like, if he got a dead cow, and fixed the missing parts of it by attaching stuff from a fish, that cow would end up becoming part fish, and would have to move underwater. It kinda...creeps up on you."
Nodding, Steve looked at the other worriedly.
If he were to die, would Herobrine do the same with him? Would he lose his humanity that way, rather than by emotional manipulation or becoming so accustomed to fighting other beings that he learns not to hesitate in doing so anymore? What would become of his corpse?
"So...I've always been wondering, how did it feel? How does it feel? Dying and knowing that you're dead, I mean." Steve quietly asked, his voice a bit shaky due to his previous thoughts.
Constiere shrugged again.
"It's...weird, at first, feeling the pain that I did only to feel nothing the next moment, then everything again afterward. Because I wasn't entirely me, I felt like most of my body didn't belong to me, and that was an experience all on its own, but after a while, you just...I dunno, learn to deal with it, I guess. I'm dead. So what? I got stuff to do."
Listening to the other's words didn't make him feel much different about death, but Steve nevertheless kept the boy's thoughts about the matter in mind.
"...Did you feel horrible about what happened?"
"Of course I did! At first."
Constiere looked up at the other with a slightly serious gaze.
"...After a while, I realized and came to terms with the fact that had I not done anything, things would've probably played out the same in the end. Except that the bastard who set everything up would've gotten away with it. I had to do what I did, and I'm okay with that. Not thinking too much about it helps me sleep at night."
"...Yeah. I kinda get that. I just...I personally wouldn't be able to get over it like that." Steve spoke quietly, earning a roll of the eyes from the other, accompanied by a quick laugh.
"I can tell. But hey, those guys died a while ago, and they're still dead, so I like to think that they're sleeping peacefully in the afterlife knowing that I kicked ass for them."
"...Herobrine didn't bring them back?"
Constiere shook his head.
"Nope...Only me. Don't know why, but...I'm the only one from that squad who got to move on."
Steve hummed solemnly, directing his attention back on the world around them as Constiere finished his piece.
The forest was vibrantly green now, with the sun fully coming up in order to signal the new day. Now that the light was quite plentiful, more so than before, he guessed that they'd spent enough time on their own, looking for "clues" as much as they possibly could. Not wanting to think about death much more, he attempted to direct the boy back toward the path they initially came from.
"...You think we should head back now? Think Herobrine has things sorted out?"
Constiere shrugged.
"Hopefully. If not, we can just bug Malgun until he gets back."
Steve let out a small laugh.
"True, I guess."
"...Just in case, let's make it look like we didn't just turn around just cuz."
Stopping, the boy next to the miner looked around briefly, before bringing a hand up to his head in a dramatic fashion.
"Oh no! We've come up with absolutely nothing that helps us with our plans! Whatever shall we do, noble bright-eyes?" Constiere said, deliberately stressing his words out as he nudged the miner with his elbow.
Steve laughed and cleared his throat, shrugging in an exaggerated fashion as he joined the performance being made in front of an invisible audience.
"I guess we just have to give up, and turn around!" Steve said in a stilted fashion, acting rather poorly as he began to turn back towards the path they just came from.
Spinning around, Constiere began to lead the way back this time.
"Let's head back, and work on our acting skills, yeah?"
Steve nodded enthusiastically.
"Yeah."
Upon returning to Malgun, who was still quietly taking refuge beneath the shade of a tree, they found that he was still alone. With a curious expression, Steve approached the other, though not as quickly as Constiere had.
"Hey, sir? Has the master returned yet?" The boy asked, stepping close before Steve even had the chance to speak.
Lifting his head slightly, Malgun shook it.
"Nope. Hasn't come back yet."
Letting out a quick groan, Constiere cast a smirk over to Steve.
"You reaaaaally must've pissed him off."
"I didn't exactly mean to!" Steve held his hands up in defense.
Constiere pointed a finger at him.
"Well, you did. Now we gotta wait."
Malgun looked directly toward Steve.
"Did you two find anything interesting, at least?"
Noticing his gaze, Steve shook his head.
"We kinda learned as much as you could've just by staying here. I don't know what clues he expected us to find, but...there was nothing."
Constiere came to his side.
"Yeah, sir. We couldn't find anything but trees."
Malgun thought to himself for a moment before nodding slowly.
"...I suppose that we're at a standstill, again."
Letting out a groan and dropping his arms to his sides, Constiere tilted his head up toward the sky in an exaggerated show of exasperation.
"Again?! We can't keep getting choked up like this!"
"I know it's stupid, but it's what we have to deal with right now. If Lord Herobrine brings back nothing as well, we'll just have to keep moving until we find another portal and another lead. The gods are after us, so we can't-"
"-Remain in the same place for long, I know sir." Constiere finished. "...Are you gonna be fine with that though?"
"...I've managed so far, haven't I?"
Watching briefly as the skeleton pulled his cloak around him a little tighter, Steve then cast a look upward, peeking past the leaves a bit to find that the sky was a bit bluer now. Though they weren't under the same amount of cover that the roofed forest had given them, the trees were still gracious enough to grant them the shade and protection of their luscious and plentiful leaves, only leaving a few open spaces for the sunlight to peek through. As long as Malgun avoided those openings, he would be relatively fine, especially since the leather cloak he had was durable enough to protect him well. The only threat that really presented itself to them at the moment was the possibility of being caught by anybody who happened to be in the area.
Shifting his weight a bit, Steve looked back at Constiere.
"...I don't think I asked before, are you guys at all worried about the fact that more people in charge are coming after us?"
Both individuals shook their heads.
"If anything, Herobrine's more 'in charge' than they are. They can make whatever rules and whatever patrol groups they like, doesn't make it any easier to fight him." Constiere stated matter-of-factly.
"Agreed. You should be more worried about respecting him, than anything else. Larger groups mean nothing if they're looking in the same, wrong places." Malgun added.
"But you keep saying that they're dangerous. You have to be some type of worried about finding them." Steve raised a brow, slightly.
Constiere laughed.
"Of course we are! But hey, a little confidence never hurt anybody. If we keep on doing what we were already doing, they shouldn't find us that quickly. At least, we hope."
Nodding, Steve allowed the silence to set in as they continued to wait for the previously-mentioned demigod and his assistant to return.
Eventually, the sound of approaching footsteps grew louder, and the group found that Andvari and Herobrine had joined them once again. Without even sending a glance towards the miner for their previous altercation, Herobrine began to speak.
"...Our path was fruitless. There was nothing we could find on our end. Constiere, was this the case as well?"
The boy in question nodded.
"Yeah. Nothing but trees and empty promises."
Letting out a quiet sigh, Herobrine continued.
"...I guessed that would be the case. If there was a big enough civilization nearby that had such a large portal, I would've felt it, and we would've seen signs of it already. I believe that we'll simply have to press forward blindly, then."
Casting a glance up to the sky, Herobrine paused, before looking back down toward Malgun.
"We'll have to move during the day in order to place more distance between ourselves and any potential danger behind us. Caraway might bring back a team in order to investigate the temples to see what intrigued us enough to stop by, so we need to get as far away from the area as possible."
Malgun nodded in understanding.
"...It shouldn't be too much to handle for me."
Herobrine shook his head.
"This forest is dense and it has enough cover for you to safely travel. You won't have to play catchup this time around."
"...Good."
Beginning to pace a bit, Herobrine continued to address the others.
"We have to get moving immediately. It doesn't matter which direction we go in, as long as it's as far away from here as possible. If this forest isn't too big and we lose cover, we'll stop until daylight falls, but until then, we cannot afford to stick around."
Walking away, the demigod didn't even wait to see if the others were starting to follow in his footsteps. Not soon after he began to leave, the others began to move, with Malgun in particular tightening his cloak around his form a bit tighter as he grew warier of where the growing sunlight hit the ground.
There wasn't much conversation as the group trekked through the forest, with at most Andvari and Constiere erupting into a quick bickering match as they debated on which Aetheren divine would possibly come after the group next. Steve eavesdropped on them, growing rather intrigued by the names mentioned as the vast majority were unfamiliar to him, though he perked up briefly as they spoke about both Minos and Caraway. As he focused on their conversation, he found that his interest in how they even learned about these individuals grew substantially, though he suspected the answer was one of two things: either they had personal encounters with these higher beings, or Herobrine directly told them about those beings.
While Steve distracted himself with the conversation taking place, the individual leading them was silently moving to the side, slowing his pace ever-so-slightly so as to not alarm the others. As the group slowly began to catch up with him, they then soon after passed him entirely, not even noticing in their conversation that he was no longer leading them actively. Falling back to place himself near the miner, Herobrine allowed the generals in front of him to gain more ground before completely joining Steve where he was. Without warning, he lightly clasped a hand on the other's shoulder, causing Steve to flinch as he was slowed down significantly, though the miner didn't let out a sound. The two fell even further back away from the others.
Without even so much as a glance in his direction, the demigod began to speak in a quieter tone, releasing Steve from his grip.
"...My words were harsh. Earlier."
Noting that the other was trying to apologize, Steve looked toward him, a bit nervous as he rose up a hand in order to rub his tense shoulder where the demigod had touched it.
"O-oh! That's fine. You're okay, I didn't really-"
"-You fail to understand. My words were unwarranted and spat out in a fit of immature rage. I caused a...distraction to our main goal, and we wasted time on a futile effort. We could've well been underway toward another portal and a safer place for Malgun, but my actions cost us precious time that we cannot take back, which hurts us as a whole and diminishes our chances of making it out of this predicament alive."
"No, I understand that, it's just...wait, you admit it was a distraction?"
Herobrine's gaze finally landed upon him with a glare.
"Yes. Stop there before I make another one before I even realize it."
Looking back forward, Herobrine let out a quiet sigh.
"...I don't appreciate your informality, but I suppose that it's something that just comes naturally with your presence. I just wish that you wouldn't ever refer to me as 'Brine' again."
Nodding slowly, Steve gave the other a small smile.
"Noted. I won't do that again. Can't have any more distractions, can we?" He finished with a laugh.
With a quick look in the miner's direction, Herobrine thought to himself in silence for a moment, continuing to walk with the other in silence. After a few more seconds, however, the demigod let out a sigh again, crossing his arms in front of his chest.
"...I...I'm having second thoughts."
Steve looked at him with a curious gaze.
"...About what?"
Herobrine refused to look at him.
"...I guess there's the possibility of you never ceasing to bug me until the terms of our partnership end, so I'll have to adapt accordingly to at least make it reasonable."
Before Steve could even ask what the other meant by his words, Herobrine held up a finger.
"...I will allow you to call me by the nickname 'Brine' on only one condition."
Surprised that the other was even allowing him to continue referring to him by the accidental shortened name given his previous reaction to it, Steve blinked.
"...What's that?"
"...You land a sure hit on me during our next training session. Not a near miss, not a scrape. I want you to hit me, and draw blood. Only then will I allow you to refer to me with such...carelessness."
This had to have been a setup.
Either Herobrine was toying with him, or he was dead serious, and Steve honestly couldn't tell which was the more likely situation. Did he really expect for him, at his current fighting pace, to actually be able to land a hit upon the demigod? Was he mocking him, knowing that a human wouldn't be able to ever do such a thing without Herobrine himself allowing them to do so?
"...You...you sure?"
"I say this with absolute certainty. If you can make me bleed, you can call me 'Brine' freely."
He wasn't joking. Herobrine really was going to give him that opportunity.
Expression lighting up, Steve nodded enthusiastically.
"...Deal. Don't know how you expect me to do that, but I'll get you eventually, then."
Letting out a small chuckle, Herobrine gave the other a smirk.
"For your benefit, I'd recommend you get to it sooner rather than later. Who knows, maybe I might...forget our agreement?"
Steve rolled his eyes at the other's suggestion.
"...Yeah right. When we get a good chance, I'll fight you."
Turning his attention back forward, Herobrine began to quicken his pace ever slightly.
"...Do not mention our conversation to the others for the time being."
Nodding even though the other wasn't watching him, Steve smiled.
"I won't."
As Herobrine moved back to the front of the group, Steve silently allowed himself to feel waves of confusion as they finally came upon him, though they were quickly followed by slight splashes of joy.
Herobrine had actually apologized to him about something? He'd forgiven him so easily? What in the world did Andvari do and say during their hunt for "clues" to convince Herobrine to do such a thing?
Herobrine was giving him a chance to make their partnership a bit more casual. He'd actually felt bad enough about his words from earlier to go up to the miner and apologize formally. Herobrine was more open to adapting himself in order to better accommodate Steve, whether he realized it or not.
Slightly satisfied with how the day went, Steve pulled himself away from his thoughts, and allowed himself to instead tune back into the conversation that was happening before him.
YEEEEEEEE I get to expand on Constiere's backstory! Idk how early I wanted to do this originally, but while brainstorming around for this fic, I was initially gonna have like, a campfire-story sort of deal with the mob generals and Steve, where they all explain how they met Herobrine and got involved with him one right after the other. They were gonna have a little competition to see who has the most interesting backstory, or something like that. I decided to change that bc it seemed a bit too rushed, and Constiere's dialogue there was like, too much in too little time lmao. Instead, they'll all get their own individual little moments when it comes time for it.
I tend to write ideas down in this brainstorming document I have for this fic, which includes the first three chapters that I posted here. A lot of later scenes that I want to include, potential storylines, and other stuff are all in there. Gives me good motivation so that I can work on the fic in order to eventually include them lol
Anyways, time for fun facts!
1.) Constiere bribed his way into the Forfall army, lmao. They don't accept new recruits until they turn roughly 19-20ish. He wanted to join so badly though, so he got a lot of strings pulled in order to get in (mainly thanks to his mother).
2.) To clear up things, Constiere both joined the army and died at age sixteen. He isn't that much older, here.
3.) Constiere's loyalty shifted to Herobrine almost immediately after his revival. Seeing him as his new "commander", he simply just did whatever the guy said to do in a near-blind haze, mostly because he was still getting used to his new body.
4.) Constiere practically stalked Herobrine for days after he got revived by him a second time. The reason why Herobrine took so long to officially "recruit" him was because he was testing him to see how loyal he'd remain. After enough time, Herobrine said "aight, you can stay" and Constiere was officially made a part of the group! It wasn't until later that he got promoted to the status of being a mob general, tho.
5.) Magic compasses do exist! With the right magical knowledge, one can place a spell in a certain location (for example, a house), connect it with a compass, and the compass will point towards it no matter what. That's how I'm explaining the whole "compasses point towards spawn" thing lmao
That's it for now! Leave a review if you have any thoughts! See y'all next week!
