Kai wakes up with the light of the Sun shining on her eyes. She gets out of her sleeping bag and goes outside to take in a breath of fresh air. There's work to do and tasks. There's an unrealistic goal for a short deadline, but who cares? Kai looks through the book she got and reads anything that can help them get to the dragon faster or end it with ease.A nice smell fades into the air, Kai gets distracted for a couple of seconds then goes back to work.
Food, weapons, potions, armor, monsters, beds? Bow, arrow, walking, enderman, gold, coal, wood… Map, potions, nether warts?
Efe wakes up and breaks Kai's damaged train of thought.
E: Don't tell me you stayed awake.
K: No, I just got up a couple of minutes ago.
E: So, you decided if we're gonna go do the dragon thing?
K: Yeah… To be honest, I don't want to do it. I'm going because Alex is going and I kinda owe this to her. Do you think we can find any good weapons in time?
E: Hmm, I worked as a miner with my uncle and learned a bit of forgery. Alex might know a thing or two about weapons too.
K: Nice! You know, we will totally take advantage of you for the mining stuff.
E: I can do whatever.
K: By the way, can we go look for some obsidian today? Just a test trip if it's too hard.
E: Oh, we can– What's that smell, by the way?
Just as Efe finishes her question, Ari comes out of her house, the smell of freshly baked goods comes out with her.
Ar: Oh, you're awake! Come on in, breakfast is ready!
E: Oh, let's–
Ar: Alex just finished bathing, we just need you!
K: Wa… Alex was awake this whole time!? And I didn't notice!?
E: Let's go, we got a dragon to take down.
Kai, Efe and Ari go inside, an entire banquet is set on the table in the dining room.
E: This isn't a banquet, but if you told me it was I wouldn't have any doubts about it.
K: Ari and Alex, you're both culinary artists.
Al: Oh, I didn't– Ari refused to receive any help.
Ar: Well, don't be scared of some food, go for it! We got a lot of work to do for just… How many days?
K: Oh, uh, ten.
The girls fill their plates up and start eating.
Al: Okay, how's the dragon thing going?
K: I have a bit of a plan, I expect to make some progress today.
E: By the way, what will the obsidian be for?
K: Oh, yeah. I need to explain a lot here. First I just listed things that will be necessary on our journey, but I never explained anything properly. Let me make things clear. To get to the dragon, we will need eyes of ender to guide us to the stronghold where the closest portal to the end dimension is kept. The eyes also serve as a catalyst to open the portal. The eyes are just ender pearls covered in blaze powder. A portal to the nether will be opened using the obsidian, then we will have to look for a nether fortress, which is where we will find the blaze; the endermen can be found in abundance in twisted forests. Efe, do you know how to make armor?
E: Uhhh huh, I know.
K: Alex and I will go to the nether collect ender pearls, while you stay and make armor and Ari prepares supplies for the next step. That's all we have for now.
Al: Wow, that's kinda complicated.
Ar: I'm sure it can even be underwhelming if we take one step at a time.
E: I'm not sure… 1, 2, 3, 4 sets of armor can be made in just a couple of days.
K: We won't be able to get full sets, and that's okay, try to be as efficient as you can with the resources and time. Make equal parts for everyone.
Ar: I can complement the armor with some leather pieces. Not the best material there is, but I can assure you: It's the best leather around!
K: Awesome! Just don't overwork yourself, Ari. Your well-being comes in first place, then the supplies, then the armor.
Al: We finished our meals and didn't even notice, hahah.
The girls wash the dishes and put away what remained to save it for later. Kai And Efe prepare for the first step. They borrow a pickaxe from Ari and go look for a cave entrance.
Not far from Ari's farm there is a taiga, Efe and Kai unexpectedly hit the jackpot by finding a massive crevice with at least twenty meters of distance across. Efe starts looking around for a way in.
E: We're going in.
K: Sister, we're NOT going in.
E: Look! There's even a little bit of lava falling into the hole, this is the place.
Efe guides Kai around the hole towards a stone wall that goes straight down. She ties a lead around a tree and begins to rappel down into the cave.
K: Are you sure this is safe?
E: What? The rope made to be tied round cows and horses holding my weight while being tied around a tree? I think so.
K: I'm not coming back from this alive.
Kai goes down the hole.
Efe then leads her deeper into the crevice, her experience is shown through the confidence in her gait. Kai and Efe light up their torches as they get deeper into a dripstone cave.
E: Here, do you know about this trick?
Efe uses a piece of charcoal to draw an arrow on the floor, pointing into the cave.
E: We will need this to guide us out. If the cave gets narrower, we can just make a straight line on the wall to our right. That way, we will know we're going towards the exit if we keep the lines to our left.
K: That's actually really interesting.
They keep going deeper and eventually get to an aquifer with a hole beside it, a bit of the water is coming out and making a waterfall which goes into the hole. Efe examines the environment, looking for the easiest way down. The hole in front of her goes to more caves, it looks like there are more cave entrances under the ground below her feet too
E: We will have to… Stick to the wall on our right.
Efe goes in ahead, Kai goes behind her. To their right, the ground beneath their feet eases into the layer below. As the light-gray stone fades into deepslate, they find themselves in an open area leading to a couple of cave entrances. The light from the lava bounces off the ores, lighting up everything around them.
E: We're going… Ahead to the left.
K: How do you know?
E: To the right, we have a ravine. Very narrow and will 100% lead us to some claustrophobic mess of lava and rock. That diamond on that wall is not worth it.
K: Diamond.
E: In the entrance to the left we have a little waterfall, but there is a huge vein of iron going into it.
Efe calculates her every step on her way towards the iron vein, as every bit of caution in this situation might not be enough. She proceeds to mine the iron ore and give it to Kai in a large bag.
E: Okay, I forgot something important. Kai, what you are about to do is of utmost importance.
K: Yes…?
E: I need a llama and a horse from Ari. I forgot to ask her that. I need you to go back up with this bag and leave it at the bottom of the rope we came down in.
K: Right.
E: Then I need you to go back up and ask Ari for a horse, or a donkey, or a mule, and a llama with chests.
K: I'm… Not sure I can… I will be back as soon as possible.
E: You know what? Leave the bag here, we can carry it up later. Be careful and take your time.
Kai goes back up the way she came in from, going the opposite way the charcoal arrows point. She gets to Ari's farm after a while.
Alex and Ari are harvesting the leather from a couple of animals.
K: Ew… This–
Al: Hey, you're back!
K: Yeah, Ari, we kind of need a bit of force to carry the ores that Efe is collecting right now, is there a llama we can use? Oh, and also a horse. Or a donkey. Or a mule.
Ar: Oh, yeah, let me just– Alex, keep going, I'll be right back. Just like I taught you.
Ari takes a llama on a lead, the other seven in the pen start following it and she lets two of them get out. She gives the lead to Kai and puts chests on both llamas. Ari then goes to her stables and takes a mule out. The mule carries a chest.
Ar: These are my strongest llamas, I spent an entire afternoon selecting them, And this is Climb, this baby's lineage is composed of the most strict selective breeding. The fastest, strongest, jumps the highest. Take care of him.
K: I will. Nothing's more valuable to me than other people's stuff.
Ar: Oh, his chest has a bit of wheat for a snack, feed him and the llamas before they have to carry any weight.
K: Yes ma'am.
Kai leads the animals towards the cave.
Ar: Good luck on your little expedition!
K: Thank you! We'll be back in a while!
The sky gets significantly darker as Kai approaches the cave. She lights up her torch and ties the animals' leads to trees. Kai goes down into the cave to check on Efe.
K: I'm back!
E: Nice! We can get to the next part now.
K: It's almost night time, don't you think we should rest a bit?
E: You can… Here.
Efe opens her backpack and takes a sleeping bag out of it.
E: Go back up and watch over the animals. By the way, which did you bring?
K: Uh, a mule and two llamas.
E: Nice. I'll go collect some more iron and gold and go to sleep. I'll need you tomorrow for the obsidian.
K: Okay, I'm going. Don't overwork yourself.
Kai stumbles up the cave, climbs up the wall and stays the night beside the animals.
Ari wakes up the next day and goes through her usual morning routine. It's time for the next step in the project. Ari prepares breakfast and leaves it on the table for when the girls arrive, she goes outside and encounters Alex
Ar: Good morning! You're training already?
Al: Y'know, I'm gonna do most of the fighting. I might as well try to be the best at it.
Ar: Alright. Breakfast is ready, don't take too long to eat it.
Ari goes around the farm, collecting materials and feeding the animals. Getting ingredients, and fixing a couple of things.
Meanwhile, Kai gets up and goes down into the cave. She stumbles around carefully so as to not get impaled by a piece of stalagmite. She finally gets to Efe.
K: Hey, good morning, how is it going?
E: Perfect, all ready to get transported to the surface. Come with me, we will have to get some obsidian now.
Efe goes to the open area where all the caves connect and looks around.
E: We're going under the way we came in through. The other hole just has a lot of lava, but I'm sure that entrance is a way to go deeper.
Efe and Kai grab their lit torches and go into the entrance. A very wide tunnel with a relatively short ceiling. They walk for a couple of minutes before getting to a great opening, an enormous cave with pillars made of deepslate, waterfalls and lava lakes at the bottom. There is an abandoned mineshaft with suspended platforms, wooden pillars and chains dangling from the ceiling.
K: This is actually insane.
E: And we got lucky with the mine. I don't think any ropes we have would be able to reach down there. Follow my every step and be careful.
Efe gets on one platform, Kai follows her. They carefully walk and jump from one platform to another, going deeper into the earth each minute. They eventually make it to the floor and can perform the next step.
Efe looks around with her torch, finds a diamond and mines it and the one below it. She walks around more and finds a third diamond. Kai finds a minecart with a chest and decides to check if there is anything interesting in it, she finds a couple of glow berries, which she decides to keep for research.
Efe comes back with a diamond pickaxe.
K: Woah, this is– woah.
E: Just a little makeshift thingie, but it does the work.
Efe and Kai redirect a waterfall into a lava lake, turning the lava into obsidian. Efe gets into the water and starts hitting the obsidian with the pickaxe.
E: How much do we need?
K: Fourteen blocks.
E: Alright, look around and make sure there aren't any monsters trying anything funny, this will take a while.
After a couple of minutes, Efe finishes collecting the obsidian.
E: We're done here, fourteen blocks.
The obsidian is placed in a bag and carried up on the platforms.
Back at the farm, Ari just finished her farm chores and is now outside. She and Alex are coming back from a fishing trip.
Al: So… How much food do you think we will need?
Ar: I think I'll be done preparing all the food today. I already had some preserved food at home, I just need a wider variety of food for the trip. We will just leave the fish to smoke overnight. Then I can work a bit on the leather armor.
Al: You… Are– how do you know how to do so much? How are you so efficient?
Ar: My family owns the biggest livestock and agriculture business in the world. While a lot of my relatives tried to master different areas, I did my best to learn a bit of everything and perfect the techniques. Now I'm overflowing with resources.
Al: Wow. I could have become a scientist if I wanted to take on the family business. But I got my principles, there isn't really time to become a scientist. Oh, they're back!
Efe and Kai appear in the distance coming out of the forest. Climb and the llamas carrying a lot of weight on their backs. Efe and Kai unload all the ores.
K: Do you need help with the second trip?
E: Oh, not a lot.
K: 'Cause I feel like it will take a while for me to open the portal, I want to start trying now.
E: Oh, no, it's fine. I can take care of the ores, I think we just got done with the heaviest load.
Efe goes back to the cave with the animals, while Kai organizes the ores and looks for the obsidian.
Alex comes out of the house after leaving the fish with Ari.
Al: You two got so much!
K: Yeah, we made some progress. I think we'll be ready for the next part pretty soon.
Ari asks Alex for help carrying the obsidian. They go over to a nearby cliff and make a ring of obsidian on the wall.
K: I hope this works. We can go to the nether tomorrow. For now, let's help Efe unload the ores when she gets here.
After a couple of minutes, Efe arrives, Kai and Alex help her unload the ores and put them in Ari's workshop. They eat dinner and go to bed.
The next day, Ari prepares breakfast, Kai has plans to execute. After breakfast, Kai tells Efe to smelt a bit of gold and asks Ari for a couple of watermelons. She goes to open the portal with Alex. The purple wall appears as the fire hits the obsidian ring, as it should happen. Kai makes glistering melons and puts them away to use later.
Kai tells Ari and Efe that she and Alex will go on a small mission in the nether and tells Ari not to make too much food for dinner. Alex takes her weapons, Kai takes food, suspicious stew and other supplies. They walk into the portal.
