The Complete Elementia Chronicles: Quest for Justice; The New Order; The Dusk of Hope; Herobrine’s Message

CHAPTER 25

THE END

Whereas the travel through the Nether portal had felt as though he were being squeezed through a tube, Stan found that immediately after entering the End portal, he landed feet-first onto a platform of black rock that he recognized as obsidian. And while the Nether had been hot and dry, Stan felt no significant change in the atmosphere of the End other than an apparent dormant static that hung in the air.

Stan looked around and saw that his friends were looking at the room they had spawned in, which appeared to be made of a type of lunar rock similar to the base of the frame of the End portal. They were completely surrounded by it, and Stan felt his stomach drop. Were they underground? Was the task of the End to mine around until they located their goal? He voiced this question to the others, and immediately, the air of the group turned to panic.

“Hey, guys, don’t worry, all right?” said Charlie, taking his pickaxe to one of the stone blocks. “I’ll mine around a little bit. I seriously doubt that the final challenge of Minecraft would be a gigantic mining world.” Charlie angled his aim diagonally and started to tunnel upwards. The others followed him.

The further upwards they tunnelled, the more Stan’s unease grew. As Charlie’s pickaxe broke the surface and struck air, Stan couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something …

“… watching us!” cried Stan as he was charged by a pair of Endermen. He cut the first one on the side with his axe, and it teleported away, while the other one was killed instantly by a lucky shot that took off its head.

“They’re everywhere!” yelled DZ as the wounded mob reappeared behind Stan and DZ ended its life with a stab of the sword. “Look down!”

Without thinking, three players obeyed DZ’s command and stared at the moon-white ground. Stan heard DZ’s calm voice give a command.

“Oob, I need you to look around and tell us how many Endermen are out there.”

“What?” came Oob’s disgruntled voice. “Won’t the large, scary, black things kill me?”

“Don’t worry, you’re an NPC. They won’t notice you.”

“But …”

“Just do it, Oob. I swear you’ll be all right,” came DZ’s voice, a slight edge to it now.

A few moments later came Oob’s response. “They are everywhere. I see their eyes going even far off into the distance. How are we to defeat all of them?”

“Don’t worry, guys,” said DZ, as if sensing the air of panic in the group increase tenfold. “I know how we can kill them. Take these. I found them as we were going through the mountains.” Stan heard DZ fumbling, and a few moments later Stan saw a block land at his feet. It was orange, and it appeared to be some kind of plant, but it was only when Stan picked it up and saw the eerie face carved into it that he realized that it was a pumpkin.

“And what do you expect me to do with this?” came Kat’s irate voice from just to the left of Stan.

“Take off your helmet and put it on your head.”

Stan was struck by a sudden notion that his battle with Mr A may have knocked something loose inside DZ’s head. Charlie said in tones of dripping sarcasm, “Yeah, you first, DZ.”

“Gladly,” said DZ calmly, and Stan sensed that he had stood up. He barely viewed DZ standing upright and looking ridiculous with his head stuck into the bottom of the pumpkin. The carved pumpkin face was where DZ’s own face should have been.

“DZ, you look like an idiot. Where are you going with this?” hissed Kat, as if she were afraid that talking too loudly would provoke the crowds of Endermen roaming ominously among them.

Stan watched DZ walk right up to an Enderman and stare directly into its eyes. Amazingly, the Enderman didn’t begin to shake, teleport behind him, or, for that matter, acknowledge his presence at all. DZ used this to his advantage, and one stab through the chest later, the Enderman was nothing more than an Ender Pearl sitting idly on the ground.

Before any of them could voice their stunned amazement, DZ explained. “You can see out the eyeholes of the pumpkin, and even though you can’t see that great, the obstruction prevents the Endermen from being able to detect you. Seriously, they have no idea that you’re even there. You can just walk up to them and kill them.”

Stan didn’t need any more encouraging. He ripped his diamond helmet off his head and haphazardly shoved it into his inventory. He proceeded to snatch up the pumpkin and jam it awkwardly onto his head. DZ was definitely right about one thing: the pumpkin did considerably obstruct Stan’s vision, and it was only by squinting that he could make out the forms of Kat and Charlie, both adorning pumpkins themselves.

“Alrighty boys … and Kat,” said DZ, and Stan was sure from his tone that a manic grin had spread on his face beneath the pumpkin. “Let the Great Enderman Massacre begin!”

Massacre truly was the appropriate word for it, for without being able to detect the players’ lines of sight, the Endermen were powerless to stop the players from ambling right up to them and felling them one after another. Even with Oob not helping (his stone hoe was not strong enough to destroy an Enderman in one hit, and the villager certainly was not capable of beating one), all the Endermen that they could see were dead within the space of three minutes.

“Dude, that was awesome!” Charlie called out to Stan as he pulled the axe out of the monster he had just beheaded after throwing the weapon during a back flip.

“Thanks. Frankly, this was so easy, what are you to do but make up trick shots to keep things interesting?” Stan smirked and he pulled the pumpkin from his head and wiped the sweat off his brow. Though he had exerted almost no effort, it was very hot inside the pumpkin head. The others followed suit.

Now that they had their pumpkins off and no Endermen to deal with, the four players plus Oob took their first real look at the End. The entirety of the ground seemed to be made of the moon-rock-like material, and the sky was a dark static pattern that didn’t seem to move and was almost completely black. It was hard to make out the tall, looming pillars that were set against the black sky on first sight. These pillars were a wide square at the base, and extended various distances into the sky. There was a light source illuminating the top of each of the pillars, but Stan was not close enough to see what it was.

The most interesting part was that, as far as Stan could see, the End was not an infinite dimension like the Overworld or the Nether. They were on a moon-rock island, floating in space, with around ten of the tall obsidian pillars protruding from the ground into the static heavens.

Immediately, something about this setup sat wrong with Stan. He looked at the others and saw from her face that Kat had realized it, too, although DZ and Charlie hadn’t. They were still pondering their surroundings, while Oob was wandering off yet again.

“Guys, the End isn’t infinite. It’s like an island,” said Kat slowly as Stan dragged their villager friend back by the collar, Oob’s eyes still unfocused and clueless.

“Yeah, we’ve noticed,” said Charlie, shrugging. “So what? Easier work for us – fewer places to look.”

“That’s just it,” said Stan, dropping Oob and letting him fall to the ground like a sack of potatoes. “Fewer places to look. So why would the King move his stash here, when there are literally unlimited places to hide it in the Overworld or the Nether?”

“I don’t know, maybe because there are Endermen everywhere?” stated DZ with the air of someone explaining that Earth revolves around the sun.

“DZ, you four players easily defeated all the Endermen by doing nothing more than putting pumpkins on your heads. Clearly, there is something more dangerous here that will prevent us from searching for the King’s possessions,” said Oob.

“He’s right, DZ,” said Charlie, realizing that Stan, Kat and Oob must be correct. “There’s definitely something else going on here that’s going to stop us from looking for the treasure.”

“And what do you suppose that will be?” asked DZ indignantly, ruffled by Oob having made a more intelligent comment than himself.

Then they heard it. A long, piercing roar cut through the otherwise quiet End environment. It sounded like the scream of an Enderman magnified by a thousand, with elements of tyrannosaurus and elephant noises mixed in to form one ultimate, blood-curdling roar.

“What … was … that?” whispered Charlie feebly.

“Oh … my … God,” whispered Stan, as he spotted something in the sky that made his stomach implode with terror.

A pair of purple slits were present in the sky at first glance, but they grew larger, and larger, and larger, and before very long, the eyes of all four players plus Oob were locked in terror as the shape of a massive, black-and-silver winged beast with glowing purple eyes rocketed through the sky and straight towards them.

Not thinking much about it but just acting through a hidden instinct unlocked by fear, Kat, Stan and DZ simultaneously drew their bows and launched their arrows into the giant monster’s face. Stan’s and DZ’s bounced off the monster’s silver scaly forehead, but Kat’s arrow sunk straight into the monster’s left eye. Right as the monster was about to barrel into them, it gave a roar and thrashed its head in agony before changing course to fly back up into the black sky.

It was then that Stan got his first full look at the monster. What he saw was absolutely horrifying. They had just shot arrows into a gigantic, black dragon. Its mighty wings were flapping through the air, creating rushes of wind like a jet plane, and a silver-armour exoskeleton ran the length of its body, creating a web of protection extending over its almost-equally-tough-looking black hide.

Stan watched in wonder and foreboding as the wounded dragon circled the black obsidian pillars. Glowing orbs of white energy flew from atop the pillar and onto the dragon’s face. The dragon roared again and flew on, and a moment later, Kat’s arrow fell to the ground beside the players, having popped out of the dragon’s eye.

“Guys, I think whatever’s up there is healing him!” exclaimed DZ, his sword drawn and his eyes intensely focused on the dragon.

“Then we’ve got to destroy it,” said Stan, already formulating a plan in his mind.

“OK, here’s what we do,” said Kat, her brow knitted in determination. “Stan, DZ, you go destroy whatever’s on top of that pillar. Charlie, Oob, you two distract the dragon, and don’t let it notice Stan and DZ. I don’t think the dragon will like us destroying whatever it is up there.”

“What about you?” Stan asked.

“I have a feeling that we’re gonna be seeing some more Endermen soon,” said Kat firmly, already pulling the pumpkin back into place on her head. “I’ll take care of them. Now go!” she screeched, for she had just noticed the dragon speeding towards them for another attack. Charlie drew his pickaxe and Oob his hoe, and the two weapons plus Kat’s sword simultaneously cut into the dragon’s snout, sending it away for the time being.

“DZ! Start grabbing Ender Pearls!” cried Stan, picking up the orbs from the sea of Enderman corpses they had left in their wake.

“What? Why would we do that?” asked DZ incredulously.

“When I was fighting Mr A, he threw one of these things at me and appeared right next to me with purple smoke all around him,” said Stan, snatching a group of three from the ground. “I think that you can use these things to teleport! Watch this!”

Before DZ could interject, Stan had hummed the Ender Pearl with all his might into the sky, aiming for the top of the black obsidian pillar closest to him. His aim was spot on, and the pearl flew towards the top of the pillar. Stan closed his eyes, and moments later he felt a surge of pain in his knees that caused him to stumble, a sure indicator that something had happened. Once he had regained his footing, Stan opened his eyes.

His plan had worked. Stan was now standing atop one of the looming obsidian pillars. In the centre stood a cubic crystal rotating slowly within a pillar of fire erupting from a block of bedrock. The crystal flashed shades of light blue and pink, and on each side, strange red symbols flashed.

“Stan! Where are you?” came DZ’s anxious cry from dozens of blocks below him. Stan looked down and saw DZ looking desperately around. He could also see the dragon flying away from Charlie and Oob, indicating that they had scored a hit, and Kat sneaking up behind an Enderman.

“I’m up here!” called Stan. He saw DZ look towards his voice and their eyes locked. “The plan worked! There’s some sort of psychic crystal thingy up here. I’m pretty sure that’s what’s healing the dragon!”

“That’s great, Stan! Quick, figure out how to destroy the thing!” came DZ’s seemingly quiet yell across the landscape and up to Stan.

Stan decided to go for the most obvious method of destroying it first. He backed up to the very edge of the pillar, wanting to be as far away from the crystal as possible when he tried his method. He notched an arrow and sent it directly into the centre of the crystal. There was a superheated flash that made Stan’s vision go white for a minute, but when it cleared he saw that the only thing left of the crystal was a block of bedrock that was set on fire.

“Just shoot the crystals, DZ!” Stan called down to his friend. “That makes them blow up!”

“I’ll tell you what, Stan!” came DZ’s voice from down below. “You destroy the crystals by teleporting around up there, and I’ll shoot them down from down here!”

“Sounds like a plan!” Stan yelled back. He looked around and saw that, indeed, each of the pillars did seem to have a crystal rotating on top of it. He knew that they would not be able to properly fight the dragon until all those crystals were destroyed. As scared as he was, he had to give credit to the King. This truly was the ideal hiding place for anything valuable.

Stan saw DZ taking aim at the obelisk immediately to the left of him, so Stan turned to the right and drew another Ender Pearl from his inventory. He threw it with all his might, and once again he squeezed his eyes shut. Within a few seconds, there was considerable pain in his leg again. When he opened his eyes, he was standing on a different pillar, with yet another crystal ominously revolving before him. And again, with one arrow, the crystal exploded in a burst of fire.

Relieved, Stan gave a quick glance to his left just in time to see DZ’s crystal explode, having been struck in the centre by a land-to-air arrow. However, out of the corner of his eye, Stan saw something that made his stomach drop out: a flash of purple light, followed by the sound of the rush of beating wings. Stan barely had enough time to whip around and pull out his axe to drive it between the dragon’s eyes. The axe only left a slight dent in the dragon’s hide, which was quickly repaired by the nearest remaining crystal. Nonetheless, it had the desired effect, and the dragon changed its trajectory and fled.

“Sorry, Stan!” came Charlie’s yell from back down on the ground. “It flew away from us and came at you. I tried to shoot it but I missed.”

“Well, aim better next time!” snapped Stan irritably. They were in the middle of an extremely dangerous fight, and there was no way that he could afford to fight a dragon on these pillars. One head butt and the dragon would knock him down to his death.

Stan busied himself again with destroying the crystals. He saw DZ blow up another of the crystals, so he teleported to the next pillar over, destroying this crystal with another arrow. With DZ shooting from the ground and Stan using his teleport-and-shoot strategy to great effect, it wasn’t long before Stan sank one last arrow into the solitary remaining crystal. The accompanying explosion marked the end of the dragon’s healing capabilities.

When DZ saw the last burst of fire come from the last obsidian obelisk, he let out a yell of wild excitement. For now, the dragon would be possible to fight. Moments later, Stan appeared next to DZ in a burst of purple smoke.

“That’s the last of ’em,” said Stan with a sigh.

“Awesome,” replied DZ. “How’d those Ender Pearls work out for you?”

“Great,” answered Stan. “My knees are killing me, but other than that I’m great. Wanna go kill a dragon now?”

“Let’s do this!” cried DZ, and their sense of excitement building, they ran to join Oob and Charlie.

“Hey guys!” exclaimed Charlie as he drew back his pickaxe after striking the now-fleeing dragon. “Are the crystals all gone?”

“Yep, Stan just destroyed the last one,” said DZ. “Have you guys figured out anything about how the dragon attacks?”

“Well, from what I’ve seen, the only thing that the dragon does is just keep flying towards us and trying to head-butt us, but if we keep on hitting it in the face when it gets close enough, we should manage to kill it pretty quickly.”

“Really?” asked Stan, raising an eyebrow. “That’s all you guys have been doing? Just hitting it when it gets near you? And that’s been hurting it?”

“Yes,” replied Oob. “There has been a surprising lack of difficulty in fighting the dragon. The dragon has not come close to hurting either of us using its current attack pattern.”

“Well,” said Stan, looking around, “I guess the difficulty of this place isn’t supposed to be fighting the dragon itself, but destroying the crystals, fighting the dragon, and avoiding the Endermen all at the same time.”

“Yeah,” said DZ, nodding. “That sounds right. I guess we were right to come here as a team. The King seems to have picked this place as a good defence against just one or two people, not five.”

“And I gotta say,” added Charlie as he looked around. “Kat’s been doing a really good job fighting off the Endermen. I haven’t seen any since we first – Oh my God!”

Stan looked at what had made Charlie scream, and his jaw dropped. For he had been looking at Kat as she pulled her sword out of the back of an Enderman she had just killed, completely oblivious to the dragon as it set its sights on her, swooping down upon her. It never got there, though, for just as Kat sensed the impending force about to slam into her, she spun around in time to see Charlie hurl himself in front of the dragon.

Charlie’s pickaxe came down a little too late. Kat didn’t see where it hit, but the dragon thrashed around in agony, its front left claw wildly cutting a dent through the centre of Charlie’s chestplate. As the dragon flew up into the black sky, Charlie tumbled across the white ground for a few blocks. Kat’s confusion and fear of the dragon condensed into an immediate desire to help her friend, now lying lifeless near the base of the nearby obsidian pillar.

Kat’s heart pounded in her chest as she ran over and knelt down to examine Charlie. She rolled him over and to her immense relief, discovered that he was not dead, though his face was contorted in intense pain.

“Charlie! Thank God. Are you OK?” asked Kat as she pulled off his chestplate to examine his wound.

“Don’t worry, I’m fine,” grunted Charlie, wincing as the removal of the chestplate revealed a slash through his shirt and across his chest and stomach. “It’s not deep,” he added, seeing the sceptical look on Kat’s face. “I’ll be fine. Have you seen my pickaxe, though?”

“Hey, DZ, what’s that on the dragon’s face?” asked Stan, as he noticed something glinting on the dragon’s snout. He was determined not to let the dragon find its way over to Kat and Charlie or to Oob, who was off wandering. Stan stood with his axe at the ready as the dragon swooped in for another attack.

It didn’t matter that DZ had not responded. The dragon came into close range, and Stan had to bite his lip to keep from laughing. Charlie’s pickaxe was still attached to the dragon’s face, lodged deeply into its right nostril. It looked ridiculous, but Stan still waited to bring his axe down into the dragon’s nose before he let the laugh out.

“Oh, God, that’s great. That is priceless, don’t you think, DZ?” Stan got out between laughs, but when he looked to DZ for a response, what he saw made him immediately forget about how the dragon looked. DZ’s arm traced an arc through the air, a clear testament to the perfect trajectory of the Ender Pearl he had just thrown directly at the dragon.

“What are you doing?” shouted Stan. DZ turned around and looked Stan in the eye.

“Ending this,” DZ replied simply before disappearing in a burst of purple smoke.

Stan looked around, bewildered, finally realizing that DZ must have landed on the actual dragon by the way the dragon was now thrashing around in midair. Now sure beyond a doubt that something had been knocked loose in DZ’s head, it was all Stan could do to watch the scene in horrific anticipation. He didn’t risk sending an arrow up at the dragon for fear that he might hit DZ. Stan looked over at the others and saw that Kat and Charlie were now apprehensively transfixed by the dragon, too. Even Oob had stopped wandering to watch the spectacle unfolding in the air.

Stan thought he could see the unclear form of a figure moving up and down in a rhythmic pattern, and the dragon was thrashing its head side-to-side, spitting in agony. Stan realized that DZ was straddling the dragon’s long neck, driving his sword again and again into the thick black hide. Stan then watched in disbelief as the figure atop the dragon ran along its neck and leaped off its head and into the air, spun around, and fired an arrow directly into the dragon’s face. The dragon froze in midair, and Stan noticed an Ender Pearl fall down to the ground next to him, followed in a burst of purple smoke by DZ.

Stan’s mouth opened to say one of ten thousand things on his mind to DZ, but DZ simply put his hand to Stan’s mouth, gestured to the sky, and said, “Just watch.”

And there was something to watch indeed. Rays of white light seemed to be breaking through the black hide of the dragon’s skin like sunrays through morning mist. The dragon seemed to be in suspended animation as it rose higher and higher in the sky, more and more rays of light breaking through the skin until, finally, the dragon exploded in a rapid series of bright starbursts. When the smoke cleared, the sky was a peaceful black once more, and the dragon had ceased to exist.

Kat, Charlie and Oob had all walked over to DZ by now. Their eyes simultaneously shifted from the place the dragon had been to DZ. All four of them were staring at DZ as if he was some king of the gods, descended from above with the sole purpose of ridding the world of the dragon.

“That,” Kat got out after nearly a full minute of stunned silence, “was literally the single most impressive thing I have ever seen in my life.”

“Very good job, DZ,” Oob added kindly.

“Yeah, no words to describe how awesome that was,” agreed Charlie, while Stan still stood there stunned.