Minecraft Monarchies #29

It had been a busy day, and so Dean and Dad finally went to sleep, dreaming of the treasures promised them by the volcano quest. And when they woke up in the morning, they set off to claim them.

“Bet I’ll get there first!” Dean said. Dad laughed and smiled, then took off running as fast as he could.

“No fair,” Dean yelled, laughing and running behind him.

Up the mountain they went, back to where the volcano had once shot out its orange-red lava. And when they got to the old cone and looked inside, they both gasped at the same time.

It was full of copper. And they thought they could see the glint of other elements as well.

And best of all, there were no monsters in sight.

“I’ll go to the bottom and mine up. How about you go to the top and mine down?” Dad said.

Dean nodded. “And I’ll make a chest too so that we cna put in any extra stuff that we don’t want to collect right now. Becuase I don’t know about you, but my inventory is full.”

The two started to work, digging through the copper, and finding gold, diamond, and even netherite. And Dad found veins of coal in the bottom of the old volcanic cone — he tore through the rock and took in the dusty black nuggets, visions of torch-crafting dancing in his head.

As they dug, the pair of librarians who ahd asked them to make their home in the city appeared beside the lip of the volcano top and peeked down at them.

“Such tremendous reqards for such tremendous work, heroes! Our city is happy and healthy, all thanks to you.”

Dad waved. “Thanks, guys. But, let me guess, you need us to do something for you?”

“Like . . . a quest?” Dean asked, his eyes shining with delight.

“Not exactly?” said the one.

“Precisely,” said the other.

The two glared at each other.

“We wish to offer you a rank within the kingdom. The old pillager outpost has slowly been filling out with villagers, and a community has formed,” said the first of them. “But the place is dangerous. They need fortifications, and a palace in which their new knight can stay when he sees over their works.”

“It will take some exotic minerals. Netherite, diamond, gold . . .” the second librarian said, staring at our mined minerals meaningfully.

Dad dug out a staircase in the side of the wall, coming back up out of the volcano. “Are you offering us the rank of knight?” he asked.

“Just noting that if someone were to find such minerals, well, the position would be open to them.”

Dean hopped up the stairs I had made. “We’re becoming Minecraft Monarchs!” he yelled, slapping Dad a high five.

“On the road to there, anyways,” Dad said. “Alright, librarians, you have yourselves a deal. We will leave as soon as we have all of this mined and ready to go.”

They bowed. “Thank you heroes. Or should I say knights?” he asked. Then the two of them turned and walked away. Words appeared in the clouds above us.

QUEST – A PATH TO KINGSHIP

“Sounds like things are about to get a little buit more involved,” Dad said, staring at them and watching them bob along in the sunny cloudless sky.

“Yeah,” Dean added. “This is going ot be great!”

With that the two of them finished their mining, loaded up their most important items, and stowed the rest of it in Dean’s chest. And then they were off.

But the weather changed quickly in the valley lands of Sky City, and by the time they had come back out, dark clouds had moved in and rain was pouring down from the sky. It was a hard, cold sleet and Dad and Dean staggered through it, losing their bearings.

And, as luck would have it, finding a new village.

Rosetown, the sign called it. A village of 12 people and a stable with a horse.

“I want that horse,” Dad said, staring at it. Dean sighed.

“Dad, we got skeleton horses a long time ago from one of our first quests.”

Dad growled. “But they aren’t here and I’m tired of just walking around everywhere. I am going to go in and see if I can’t tame that horse.”

Dad walked into the pen. A villager stood there next to one of the stable’s two horses.

“Now what can I do for you?” he asked.

Dad smiled and handed him two emeralds. “That horse and a saddle please,” he said. As Dean watched, open-mouthed with surprise, the horse was handed over, the transaction completed, and Dad rode out of the town on a fully bought, not at all earned, riding friend.

“Neigh,” the horse said, laughing at Dean’s dumbstruck face.

“That, well, what?” he asked. “This mod is amazing!”

“Yeah,” Dad said. “But for it to be super amazing, it is going to have to let me ride an elephant.”

“Or a dragon,” Dean added.

The storm ended and night fell, but the two of them decided to push on. With the weather out of their faces they had a good idea as to where they needed to go.

And neither of them could wait to become knights.

They rode and ran through the roads of the kingdom, fighting a couple of zombies and narrowly missing a creeper. And when his horse was hit by an arrow, Dad left him in Port City to be cared for in his absense.

They made the rest of their way to the Villager Outpost, spotting the gift-shaped treasure chest in whcih they had to deposit their rare minerals. And they shared a look.

“On the count of three. Ready?” asked Dean.

“1 . . . 2 . . . 3”

They placed the special elements into the chest and the whole world shot up in swirls of magical sparkles, their new knightly lands appearing before them.

“Well done, Sir Dean,” Sir Dad said, striking a heroic pose. Dean did the same as, off in the distance, the sun began to rise over the horizon.

Minecraft Monarchies – Table of Contents