Hi Mal! I know this is probably a touchy subject, but what motivated you to 'do repeated time travel' in the first place?
“..W-well, that’s a bit.. personal, don’t you think?
..but I suppose I can answer, it’s not like I can keep all of my secrets forever.
All that I ask of you is that you do not tell the others.
..with that out of the way, I suppose it’s best to start at.. hm.. let’s say..
Well, aaaages ago, in what you’ll remeber as season 7, Mumbo came across a strange portal on the outskirts of the jungle.”
“When he mentioned it in chat, of course Iskall was intrigued- but Grian was the first to respond, in almost a panicked fashion, and proceeded to freak out the instant they had all gathered at the portal.
None of them were sure what to do. Xisuma was afk, so they didn’t have any other options. Naturally, Mumbo wanted to go through the portal- but Grian insisted he not go alone, and right before they headed through together, he also told Iskall to make sure nobody came through after they left.
They were logged off the server the instant they went though. About 6 hours after the two entered the portal, the gateway closed unexpectedly. Iskall messaged Xisuma right away, as he had just gotten back from being afk, and he made his way over.”
“It was day by now, and it wasn’t long before the portal reopened and two new figures stepped out, looking similar to Grian. A few of the other hermits who had been attracted to whatever was going on began to greet them, welcoming them to the server.
Now, Grian never exactly told Iskall what to do if someone did come through, he didn’t think it would actually happen. He was gravely unprepared for what would happen next.
Stress had decided to give the two new guys a tour of the server, while a few others stayed behind to figure out what was going on.
But it was too late. The trap had already been set.”
“That’s when they came through. ‘The watchers’, I’ve heard them called. While their weapons were not made of diamond, they were made of some new material, that could hold far more enchantments than any other item we knew- and even had enchantments we had never seen before.
We may not have been outnumbered, but we were overpowered the instant they were able to take out Xisuma.”
“They had done something to the server’s code. Any time someone died, they automatically left the game- never to return- and removed from the whitelist. The instant they got rid of X, i knew the others had no chance.
They moved incredibly fast- everyone who didn’t try to fight back had scattered in the chaos. I could tell when someone was about to die; any time they found someone trying to run or hide, the sky would turn purple. I guess that’s a side effect of disabling respawn.”
“It was only about 2 days, but very quickly the numbers on both sides diminished, until there were only two people left in the server. And no matter how hard Iskall tried to run, hide, or try to find a way to fix respawn- nothing worked. The server was properly broken. And with all the time he spent trying to fix things, it wasn’t long until watcher 1 found him.”
“Oddly enough, she didn’t attack right away. At first, she asked a question.
“Do you want to see your friends again?”
Too angry to listen, he readied himself for a fight. Though, the watcher was certainly surprised. Every other time, he had ran away while trying to fix things.
“I’ll assume that’s a no. But Instead of running away, you’re coming right to me? I’m impressed.”
“I can’t kill you without getting closer.”
And while he would try his hardest to kill her- try his hardest to avenge the fallen hermits, all was in vain, and he quickly lost. Not just the fight, but just robotic eye was lost as well.
Once more, she tried to reason with him. She refused to land the final blow.
“Now that you’ve tired yourself out, I’ll ask again. Do you want to see your friends?”
But her words fell on deaf ears, as he had passed out due to blood loss and exhaustion.”
“Willing to give him another chance, another portal was opened, and the watcher dragged him through. The watchers had agreed to let at least one hermit live after all- for reasons that would go unknown for what felt like decades.”
“I-I know probably none of this makes any sense, but I think I might explode if I go into any more detail right now.
B-But basically, the reason why I kept going back in time was to prevent that whole mess. It never worked, really.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need a moment.”
