Lost in the End Page 2

  Valentino lunged at Julian, as he ordered his soldiers to attack the group. “Destroy them all!”

  The soldiers used all of their weapons to fight the gang, but the group fought back. Jack plunged his sword into a soldier and destroyed him. Toby threw a potion of harming on the soldiers and weakened them. As they stood motionless, Harriet and Veronica destroyed them.

  “My army!” Valentino cried.

  “You’ll never win, Valentino!” Veronica shouted at her old friend.

  “Traitor!” Valentino shouted.

  Veronica rushed toward Valentino and delivered a final blow with her diamond sword. Valentino was destroyed.

  The sky was growing darker. The group stood by the remains of their jungle home. Harriet walked around the charred remains of the house. “What are we going to do?”

  Julian looked up at the sky, it was almost dark and hostile mobs would be spawning soon. “We’re going to rebuild. And we’re going to do it as fast as we can.”

  The group worked quickly to finish the house before dark. Ezra kept an eye for hostile mobs that might be spawning in the jungle as the others worked on the house.

  “What’s this?” Harriet asked.

  “What’s what?” asked Jack.

  Harriet picked up a book that was on the ground. “It’s another journal! William must have broken up this last journal into a bunch of journals!”

  The gang gathered around her. Julian reminded them, “We can read this once we finish the house. But we can’t leave ourselves exposed. We could be attacked at any minute.”

  The group put the roof on the house, and then placed a torch on the front of the home to ward off hostile mobs. They crafted beds and once they were tucked in, Harriet began to read.

  4

  JOURNAL ENTRY: UNDER THE SEA

  Entry 2: The Water

  We swam through the deep blue ocean until we found a large ocean monument. I swam as fast as I could toward the large underwater temple, but I spotted a guardian swimming past me. I tried to avoid contact with the one-eyed fish, but it already had me on its radar. The spiky fish focused its single eye on me and shot a laser in my direction. I was struck.

  “Help!” I cried to Sean. I was fatigued from the strike. Sean swam to my side and gave me some milk.

  I drank the milk while Sean shot an arrow at the guardian and it was destroyed.

  “I see a bunch of guardians heading our way,” Sean warned me. He handed me a potion for night vision and swiftness. “These will help us see and swim faster; it’s our only hope for survival. If we are destroyed under the water, we’ll lose everything and it will make living in the Overworld extremely difficult.”

  I drank the potions and followed Sean to the bottom of the ocean. “Where are we going?” I asked him.

  “We need to get away from the guardians. If they can’t see us, they can’t attack us.”

  “But why are we swimming to the bottom of the ocean? Shouldn’t we just swim to the surface and head back to the Overworld?” I was confused. I wasn’t sure what Sean had in mind for us. I just wanted to get back to the Overworld and defeat Charles and find Oliver and the friends we had lost. I wondered what happened to Molly, Esther, and Thao.

  Sean continued swimming and explained. “If we dig a tunnel on the ocean’s floor, we can access the ocean monument from there.”

  Sean took out a pickaxe and dug a tunnel on the bottom of the ocean floor. I joined him, and we dug a deep tunnel and made our way into the ocean monument. We entered through a room filled with gold blocks in dark prismarine.

  “Gold!” I called out. I was excited. We could fill our inventories with gold and use it to trade in the Overworld.

  Sean grabbed some gold bars and placed them in his inventory and I did the same. But when I looked up, I saw an elder guardian enter the room. “Oh no!” Sean called out. He shot an arrow at the elder guardian, but the arrow missed the fish.

  “I’ve got it.” I shot at the fish, but it swam swiftly away from the floating arrow.

  The Elder Guardian focused its menacing eye on us and began to shoot its laser. We were both struck with Mining Fatigue.

  “We need milk,” Sean said weakly.

  We took milk from our inventories and began to drink. We were tired and knew this battle wasn’t going to be easy. Defeating the elder guardian wasn’t an easy job. I wished our friends were there to help. I wished we were rescuing Oliver from the desert. I wished we were anywhere besides trying to battle this pesky fish that was guarding this temple.

  I hid behind gold bricks and shot another arrow at the elder guardian. It struck him. Sean shot another arrow, which pierced the side of the fish.

  Sean said, “It’s weakened. We have to keep shooting arrows.”

  I listened and shot as many arrows as I could. I was glad when the elder guardian was destroyed.

  “Now we’re safe to explore the ocean monument,” Sean told me, and we made our way through the massive underwater temple.

  “Aren’t there three elder guardians in each ocean monument?” I asked.

  “Yes, but we’ve defeated one. If we keep an eye out for the others, we’ll be fine.”

  I carefully looked around for guardians. I didn’t believe we were truly safe. We had lived under the water before, and although Sean was more familiar with the landscape and a lot more confident beneath the sea, I knew there were many dangers there.

  We swam through the prismarine monument lit by sea lanterns, and while I kept an eye out for fish, I asked Sean, “How long should we stay here? We have our gold and are away from Charles. We don’t need to live here though, right?”

  Sean took out his potion for underwater breathing and handed me some. “We don’t want to run low on this.”

  I drank the potion. “You didn’t answer my question. How long do you want to stay here? I want to swim to the surface and leave.”

  “I think we should finish looting this ocean monument, and then we can head back to the Overworld. How does that sound?”

  I told him that was okay, and swam as fast as I could through the ocean monument. I wanted to get out of there.

  I was distracted, caught up in my thoughts, when Sean shouted, “Watch out!”

  The second elder guardian had spotted us and staged an attack. Sean was already struck by the laser and had Mining Fatigue. I swam to his side and gave him some milk.

  “Thanks,” Sean said as he grabbed his bow and arrow and struck the elder guardian.

  We both shot arrows at the second elder guardian. When the fish was finally destroyed, I shouted at Sean, “I want to leave. I don’t want to battle another fish. We already have gold. I don’t want to loot this place; I want to swim back to the Overworld.”

  I was shocked when a familiar voice said, “Are you two fighting?”

  It was Charles, and he let out a sinister laugh.

  We didn’t have to battle another fish. We had to battle our worst enemy.

  5

  THE ATTACK OF THE ELDER GUARDIANS

  We will travel to the ocean tomorrow morning,” Harriet said as she put the journal down and got ready for bed.

  “Don’t you think it’s odd that we found the journal after we fought Valentino? I was thinking this journal might be a hoax,” Julian told the group. “It could be leading us on a wild goose chase and further from where William is living, if William is still alive.”

  “Don’t say that!” Oliver was upset. “Don’t say that William isn’t alive. That’s awful. I know we will find him, just like you guys found me. I know I’ll be reunited with my old friend.”

  “Tomorrow we’ll travel beneath the sea. Even if we don’t find William, it will be an adventure. And maybe we can find some gold blocks,” Veronica told the group.

  They all fell asleep dreaming of finding William. Harriet dreamt that they discovered William in the ocean monument and they threw a huge party in the Overworld. She imagined the cake at the party. They were all excited to find William
. When they woke up, they ate breakfast and prepared for their trip to the shore.

  “Do we have enough potions for underwater breathing?” Jack asked the group.

  Everyone checked their inventories and determined that they had enough supplies. “I also have a lot of potions for swiftness and night vision, which could come in handy,” said Harriet.

  “That’s good to know,” said Jack as they walked closer to the shore.

  Harriet looked at the blue water. It seemed as if the sea was endless. She stopped on the shore. “Wow. He could be anywhere in this ocean.”

  “We have to start somewhere,” Ezra said. He was the first to take a drink of the potion of underwater breathing. He jumped into the deep blue water.

  The others followed. Ezra swam and they followed him further into the ocean.

  “There’s a guardian,” shouted Veronica.

  The group sipped the potion of swiftness and quickly got out of the guardian’s path.

  “That was close,” Veronica said to the group.

  The gang swam for a while, but they didn’t spot an ocean monument. They were losing hope that they would find one and even more so that they would ever discover William in this vast ocean.

  “Oliver, do you have a map for the ocean?” asked Harriet.

  “No. I wish I did. William and I never explored the ocean as much as we wanted to, so I don’t have any detailed maps.”

  Jack told everyone they should drink the potion for night vision. “I think that will help us spot ocean monuments.”

  They drank the potion and swam deeper into the blue ocean, but they still couldn’t find an ocean monument.

  “Maybe we should just swim back to the Overworld?” suggested Toby.

  “No, we’ve come too far. We have to give it a little more time,” said Jack as he swam through the ocean biome.

  “I think I see something.” Veronica’s voice was shaky.

  “An ocean monument?” asked Harriet.

  “No! Look!” Veronica shouted as a swarm of guardians raced toward them.

  “That’s unusual; they don’t usually travel in large schools,” said Oliver, watching the mobs approach.

  “I bet Valentino or Charles summoned them,” said Jack as he grabbed his bow and arrow and began to shoot at the fish.

  “Do you think we can hide?” asked Harriet.

  “We don’t have time to hide,” shouted Toby, “we have to fight.”

  The group used their strength to battle the one-eyed fish with deadly laser beams.

  “I have Mining Fatigue,” Harriet called out. “Help! I don’t have any milk.”

  Jack swam toward Harriet and gave her some milk, but was struck by a guardian’s laser and also grew extremely tired. He sipped some of the milk himself to regain his energy.

  The gang dodged blasts from the guardians as they shot arrows at the fish. They had destroyed several of the guardians, but there were still many left to battle. They were all losing energy and had depleted health bars.

  “We can’t keep this up too much longer,” Jack said as he destroyed another guardian.

  “And we haven’t even found an ocean monument,” Harriet cried out as she was struck from another guardian laser.

  They were about to give up. Toby suggested they each drink a potion of swiftness and swim as fast as they could toward the surface. They had all agreed that was a great idea, when Harriet called out, “Wait! I see something!”

  Through the swarm of one-eyed guardians, Harriet saw a prismarine ocean monument. The group had a second burst of energy. They were ready to defeat the remaining fish and to swim toward the monument. With their last bit of energy, the gang shot arrows at the guardians and destroyed them.

  “We did it!” Harriet called out. She was relieved the battle was over and she was excited to explore the ocean monument. She hoped that William was in the monument, but knew that was a long shot.

  The gang swam toward the entrance, but an elder guardian emerged from the underwater temple and attacked them.

  “We can defeat one elder guardian,” Harriet said quite confidently, “after we just defeated a neverending supply of guardians.”

  The battle of the sole elder guardian wasn’t as easy as Harriet had imagined. The powerful fish had great strength and the group had to use many arrows to defeat it. When it was finally gone, they made their way into the temple.

  “We should look for gold,” said Veronica.

  “We have to look for William,” interrupted Oliver.

  “We have to look for more elder guardians if we plan on surviving,” Harriet reminded them both.

  The group swam into the room where the gold bars were kept in dark prismarine, but the room had been emptied.

  “It looks like this place has already been looted.” They were all disappointed.

  Oliver looked down on the ground and picked up a book. “This can’t be.”

  The gang gathered around Oliver.

  Harriet asked, “What did you find?”

  “It’s another journal.” Oliver looked through the book.

  “Read it, Oliver,” Veronica instructed.

  They all took sips from their potions of underwater breathing and Oliver began to read the book.

  6

  JOURNAL ENTRY: OLD ENEMIES AND FRIENDS

  Entry 3: Reunions

  I knew we were running low on underwater breathing potions and I didn’t want to battle Charles beneath the sea. But Sean took out his sword and struck Charles, and we had to finish the battle. I worried Charles wasn’t alone and we’d be forced to fight his army.

  “How did you find us?” I shouted at Charles as Sean attacked him with his diamond sword.

  “You weren’t hard to find.” Charles let out a boisterous laugh and lunged at Sean with his diamond sword.

  “Where’s your army?” I asked as I shot an arrow at him.

  “They’re here. I’m not going to battle you alone. So, there’s no point in destroying me, when they are just going to annihilate you when I’m gone.” He laughed even louder.

  I could see an elder guardian swimming toward us. I shouted, “Sean, watch out!”

  Sean swam toward me and we watched the elder guardian attack Charles. We used this as an opportunity to escape from the ocean biome. We both drank more potion of swiftness and swam to the surface. It took a while and I was exhausted. I was nervous that more guardians would attack us, and my heart was racing. When we finally reached the surface of the water, I was relieved.

  “Air,” I called out to Sean. “Fresh air.”

  Sean looked around. “But I don’t see land. We’re in the middle of the ocean. We need to find a shore.”

  We floated and swam for a while, but there was still no land. Then Sean called out, “I see two boats in the water.”

  As we grew closer, we could see that the boats were empty. I was excited and surprised by our find. We swam to the boats and hopped aboard.

  “This is fantastic,” I said as I relaxed on the boat and ate some apples I had in my inventory.

  Sean agreed. He ate a potato and looked at the sun. “It’s still daylight and this is very peaceful. But we need to make our way to the shore before nightfall.”

  I looked ahead. I could see a small island in the distance.“I think I see a Mushroom Island.”

  “You’re right, that is a Mushroom Island!” Sean was happy to see land.

  We steered the boats toward Mushroom Island and docked on the peaceful, picturesque shore. I spotted a mooshroom grazing peacefully on the grassy biome. Sean sprinted toward it.

  “If we milk it, we can get mooshroom stew,” he shouted back.

  As he milked the mooshroom, I looked at the large red mushrooms that grew around the island. It was very scenic land. I had explored this island before with Oliver and we had both enjoyed our visit very much. We loved that hostile mobs didn’t spawn there. It was a place where we could relax and regroup without fear of being attacked.

 
I looked over at Sean. “Maybe we should stay here awhile and try to come up with a plan to defeat Charles and find Oliver.”

  Sean handed me some mooshroom stew, and I thanked him. It was very tasty and I was beginning to feel hopeful.

  “Yes,” he agreed, “that sounds like a good idea. We can construct a house out of a mushroom! I’ve always wanted to live in a mushroom house.”

  Having both agreed that we should stay on Mushroom Island, we sipped our soup and relaxed. But I heard voices in the distance.

  “There’s someone else here. We’re not alone,” I warned Sean. “We have to go see who else is on the island.”

  “We don’t know if these people want to attack us, so we have to be nice,” Sean said.

  Sean reminded me of Oliver. He was also a little too trusting. I assumed everyone was our enemy. I clutched my diamond sword as we searched for the sources of the voices. I wanted to be ready in case they attacked us. Sean didn’t have a weapon in his hand; he trusted that they wouldn’t attack.

  “Esther!” Sean called out and sprinted toward the voices.

  “Esther? Really?” I asked. I was shocked. I couldn’t believe we were going to be reunited with our old friends.

  Esther sprinted toward Sean. “Sean! I’m here with Molly and Thao.”

  Sean asked, “How did you guys wind up here?”

  “We respawned here and decided to stay because it was peaceful. We thought it would be impossible to find you guys, so we built homes here and have been here ever since we lost you in the End.”

  Then Molly saw me. “Oh, it’s William! I thought you guys were destroyed in the End. I was convinced that Charles put you both on Hardcore mode. I am so happy to see you. We must have a feast tonight.”

  Thao asked, “How did you guys get here?”

  We told them about our adventures and the multiple trips to the End, our jungle house, and battling Charles under the sea. I felt like my old self, when Oliver and I would show up in various towns in the Overworld and tell people about our explorations. The group was excited to hear about how Sean and I had survived after we had parted from them.