"Last I checked, it was the guy with the fishing rod." You say out loud and Axel immediately snaps away from you, locking onto Nohr like a firework. As he charges away, you realize you're incredibly out of your depth.
Really, Axel was the griefer guy. If anyone was to be sent after the thief, it should have been him. Petra's words echo in your head for a moment. The spirit of a warrior and all that. But how far does that go in griefer turf?
If you weren't focusing all of your brain power onto locking onto the griefer, you'd be wondering if Petra was out there still. As you run for him, to grab him, to take what's yours, you think of her running as well. Looking for people who survived.
But here you are. Vaulting from building to building. Pursuing so hard you can feel your lungs burn but you don't stop. It's the one thing you have to find Magnus. There's no guarantee he'll hang in the spire. There's nothing saying he hasn't left in some grand explosion.
Nohr said everyone here wanted to find him. There was no way he was going to just stay.
The thief seems confident at first, but as you leap closer and closer, continuing even as the leaps become farther and farther, you watch fear take hold in his eyes. Was it within a warrior's arsenal to chase someone to the end of the Overworld?
It's horrific to realize Axel is right. There's something about this that makes you feel terribly alive. As you chase him down, the man throws things at you. He starts with snowballs originally and scrambles desperately to chicken eggs in the end. But you dodge, you keep going, even when your breaths ache terribly.
"Alright, maybe you're not as much of a noob as we thought." You hear him breathe out as he ducks through a narrow structure. An angered hiss crawls through your teeth and you slow. It takes so much to not heave and sputter at the first chance to catch your breath.
Instead, you do your best to quiet, even if it feels like holding fire down in your throat. Your eyes peer for him, holding your position long enough to perhaps trick him into a false sense of security. When he reemerges from a window ten blocks away from your position, the way he looks from side to side reminds you of a rabbit.
You pounce on him, nearly throwing the two of you off the building. Fear echoes in his eyes and when you meet his gaze, you feel like a monster.
"Give it back!" You roar.
"Hold on!" You can hear Nohr's voice echo from somewhere before her yelp is cut off. The man under you squirms desperately for something. For a projectile, maybe? It'd be suicide for him to pull out a block of TNT here.
As you hold him down you feel his hands press against your chest. That's when it hits you. You're stronger than him.
It makes you wonder how much prowess you've gained over the years. You were never a fighter by choice. Are you running on pure adrenaline? Have you been subtly improving? Why of all times to find this out, why now? Why when someone's looking at you like you're about to kill them?
"Dusty---dammit, let go!" You hear an explosion echo out. You're not sure of its direction.
"Axel!" You shout. His voice doesn't pierce the world. The man under you takes your loosened grip as an opportunity to slam his entire weight onto you.
You slide.
You feel part of your body hit open air. The man's eyes widen in a sort of horror even before you reach for him in a desperate attempt to find purchase. Fingers digging into him, he kicks and squirms, and the two of you feel the open air.
It takes you a millisecond to catch the drop. Dread grabs your heart. On instinct you reach out your hands, barely managing to catch the wall. You feel your skin burn as it scrapes against the harsh brick.
A scream echoes out behind you. Then a wail.
You forgot you weren't the only one falling.
When you stumble to the ground, shuddering like a cold wolf pup, you catch Axel running up behind Nohr. She's scooped the man up and pulled him in close. You barely catch the ragged, slow movements of his chest. Your eyes are too busy running down the blood pooling from his head.
Voices echo across Boomtown. Horror and anguish. You didn't expect this. They'd lived their lives on the edge. You look to Axel, noticing only the ends of his hair are singed.
You heave. "The potions! Axel!"
He holds them haphazardly in his arms. Nohr looks at the two of you look you can't be serious. She huddles close to the man as you look desperately through the potions. You try to remember if you caught a glimpse of what Petra put on your shoulder.
"It has to be pink." You peer through hurried memories of medical huts at Endercon. Every so often, someone tumbled off a build, got too cocky near lava, something. Most of the time they were lucky.
Axel holds out a dark pink potion and you take it, pouring it on the man's wounds. Nohr watches you, gaze too exhausted to be read. As you do, there's the scurrying of feet. You realize then that the other griefers have fallen silent.
"What happened?" There are two of them donned in red eye masks. Nohr clutches the man as his breathing suddenly rushes back into a normal tempo. He gasps like he's just been drowning.
"Alright, we'll take him--" The one closest to Nohr speaks and the man holds out one desperate hand.
"I'm fine!"
"You were dying on the ground just a moment ago." Nohr hisses. The two strangers look at the man and you notice how fast his blood is drying.
"You've got one iris bigger than the other, Dustin!" One of them reach for him and he swats them back.
"Y'gotta remember a griefer's at their best when they're not dead! Just let us look you over."
"We're close now." Dustin hisses and you remember. You didn't get the amulet from him.
"Are you seeing double?" Nohr cringes.
"Who cares! It doesn't matter if there are fifty Magnuses, I'm gonna win against 'em all!"
"Well, you kinda owe us the amulet for what we just did." Axel interrupts their weird little charade.
"I did beat you." You say. Nohr shakes her head.
"We had you where we wanted you! Besides, Dusty threw you off the building. You just got lucky enough to grab him." Nohr crosses her arms as Dustin sits up. He glares at her.
"Dusty is a stupid nickname." He snaps. "'TNT Dustin' is better."
"Ugh. You're definitely concussed. That doesn't even rhyme! Why not Demolition Dustin, huh?"
"...What is going on right now?" You ask as the two presumed medics finally shove their way past you. "Hey! Don't take him until I get that amulet!"
"I'm not getting taken anyway! Go away! Get!" Dustin seems to be swatting them away meekly. The two medics exchange glances before shrugging and leaving. "That's right, you better run!"
"Isn't a concussion kinda bad?" You grimace as Dustin steps to his feet. He slugs you playfully before smirking so hard his mustache looks like it'll fly off.
"Oh, I've had much worse! And won!" He smirks with glee as Nohr rolls her eyes. It's easy to forget she'd had him in her arms earlier. "Butttt, I wouldn't mind some more of those potions of yours."
"You already have our amulet!" Axel snaps. You nod along to that. The two of you steel yourselves for a fight. Nohr just rolls her eyes.
"Okay, something's wrong here." She looks the two of you over. "No griefers here carry potions, fresh blood or not. Unless they're to damage someone."
"...Why?" Axel tilts his head. You feel your shoulders unclench. Nohr shrugs.
"Supposed to differentiate the guys who fix us up versus another opponent. You get your fix if you mess up too bad."
"Assuming you live!" Dustin adds with a thumbs up.
"Man, your eyes are freaky." Axel comments. "But kinda cool."
"It's not gonna stick." Dustin sighs and shakes his head.
"Which is a good thing, ugh!" Nohr holds up two fingers. "How many fingers am I holding up?"
Dustin groans. "I've got a headache."
"I'm telling you!" Nohr snaps and Dustin suddenly keels over and hurls. You and Axel stumble away, eyes wide. It seems Axel is reconsidering the whole griefer life now. Nohr just sighs.
"One day you're gonna end up empty headed."
"...Empty headed?" You parrot, a terrible feeling in your stomach.
"A lot of stupid griefers end up with nothing in their skulls. They just sit and starve." Nohr points to the side of her head. Axel pales and you hold back nausea. You didn't consider that there were ways to die before your body did.
"That's awful." Axel groans.
"That's why I need this idiot to go with the doctors!"
"Just gimme one of your potions, it'll fix me up!"
Nohr looks back at you. "Right. Why do you have those?"
"Just lemme have one!"
"You need to SLEEP!" Nohr snaps at him. "I am not going to fish up your inventory one day because you refused to sleep off a concussion!"
"Whatever. Hogs." Dustin crosses his arms. That's when you realize you didn't see Reuben with Axel. You look to him.
"Where's Reuben!?"
"Judging us all." He points to the top of his head and Reuben pops his head over the top of his hair. Nohr scampers back in shock, like she's seen it all now.
"I thought the pig was just a distraction! Why the hell did you bring that here?!" Her words are enough to get an annoyed grumble out of Reuben. "Is he your pet? Why would you bring your pet here?!"
"He's very insistent on coming along. Aren't you buddy?" You reach over Axel's head to scritch Reuben on the chin.
"Just as he was super insistent to crawl down my shirt." Axel snaps and you hear Reuben squeal in delight. "Bastard pig."
"Alright, that confirms it. You're weird." Nohr paces a circle around you.
"I could've told you that." Dustin nods and Nohr bops him on the shoulder. "But really, am I super concussed or are they actually odd?"
"You don't seem like griefers! Not even fresh Boomtowners. What is your deal? Why do you have this tracker if you're not?" Nohr paces around you. "I thought it was a gimmick or you built something. Dustin! Gimme it."
"But--"
"I said gimme!" Nohr lunges and he hands her the amulet. She examines it, holding it in the air. "Is this yours? Or did someone give it... to you..." You watch her eyes widen as she traces the artifact with them. Dustin peers over.
"Oh, I have to be seeing things."
"This is the Order's logo. Their---" She looks to you. "Okay. Why are you looking for Magnus? You clearly don't want to be King here, do you?"
"What are you talking about? King?" Axel looks at you and tilts his head again.
"Okay. Why are you here then? You're looking for him for some weird reason." Nohr returns to pacing, as if she'll find an opening. Reuben hops down and squeals defensively. Nohr just looks him over like he's a weird creature.
"That's a weird cat you have." Dustin says and Nohr's palm meets her face. She returns to eying you up and Reuben follows her, ree-ing every once in a while.
"Well, we're clearly not trying to hurt each other anymore." Axel comments.
"I'm willing to agree on a truce if you explain." Nohr steps in front of the two of you. Reuben circles her feet. She stares at him solemnly for a few moments before breaking into a small bit of laughter. It's enough for him to snag the amulet out of her hands and bring it to you. Somehow, you feel she let you do that. "Alright, call off the attack pig. I just want to know."
"If she was awful she'd be blowing up Endercon." Axel states and you sigh. Can't blame a griefer acting like a griefer in their playground. You run your finger across the diamond blue part of the amulet and Nohr flinches.
"You know the story of the Order, right?" You ask and Nohr rolls her eyes before nodding.
"Of course. Everyone here knows Magnus is the King of all griefers. Him and Ellegaard worked together on contraptions that would knock out the End Crystals. Everyone here knows that part."
"Don't tell anyone, but I think Magnus knows a little redstone." Dustin snickers like he's learned a dirty little secret.
"There's a monster ravaging the entire Overworld. We have no idea how long it's going to take to get here but we need to get Magnus. He's going to help us destroy it."
"A monster?" Nohr parrots and you suddenly see the red part of the amulet flash. You look closely at it. It doesn't do that again. "What kind of monster needs the mighty Magnus to slay it?"
"A Wither with the power of a Command Block. You've gotta believe me, Gabriel gave me this." You flick the diamond colored part and it suddenly glows softly for a few seconds. It's sustained longer than the red glow and seems to, instead of shattering like the red glow, seems to crackle erratically like lightning.
"Gabriel's alive!?" Axel grabs the amulet out of your hands. "Gabriel! Where are you!? We're here!" Nohr tackles him and he stops talking. He looks at her strangely.
"He's muttering incoherently again!" Nohr shouts to the sea of curious, crawling griefers. They turn away. She eyes up the amulet. "Alright. If you're telling the truth, I want in on it."
"Magnus is more likely to believe his own people, too." Dustin adds. How is he so coherent for someone with a concussion? You flick the red part of the amulet and don't catch the signal again.
"Let's be honest, he's probably going to assume you're a scumbag who snatched it under Gabriel's nose." Nohr comments.
"Really? I thought he'd have more faith in Gabriel."
"Kinda hard to when you're holding part of his inventory!" Nohr fires back. "Now c'mon, I wanna get involved. You want to slay a big monster, yeah? The more the merrier!" You can see a dangerous gleam in her eye. Would she really be willing to give up the title of King for the ability to slay a massive, never before seen monster?
"Can we trust this?" You lean close to Axel. "I mean, it's two of us against her and her wounded buddy if it goes bad, yeah?"
"Have you looked at yourself?" Axel grimaces and you're suddenly aware of the burns on your skin. A hiss crawls out of your throat as you run your hands across your torn up sleeves. You hear Axel murmur something about enough wool to repair your sleeves.
"C'mon, let's get going!" Nohr leaps around you. "I wanna tell Magnus we've got a monster to slay already!"
Is this really true? Sure, you'd had a diplomatic conversation and all, but Nohr's a wildcard. Ultimately, she wants to win, doesn't she? And is she in it for the right reasons?
What do you do next?
Okay, let us lead the way.
Why should we trust you? You tried to kill us.
Shouldn't you stay behind with your injured buddy?
It has been 12 days since I fainted and got the mild concussion.
I haven't had any adverse affects except for the hour after directly hitting my head, and I have been doing regular things like commuting to and from work every day without issue. The bump on my head is much smaller. It's now more lumpy than round and egg-like, and it's not nearly as numb in areas (where there was fluid buildup). It still hurts, which makes it hard to sleep because I unwittingly turn over and put pressure on it, waking myself up.
I suspect that my blood pressure medicine is too strong now, so I need to make an appointment with my doctor to see about it.
