Those fressons were still on my mind as I woke up the next morning, loaded my gear, armed and armored myself, and nibbled a cookie on the way to meet Summer in the main chamber.

“Morning, partner,” she said.

Partner! We were partners now!

“You all kitted out?” She looked me over. “Food, arrows, tools, extra spider silk to repair your bow?”

“Everything I’ll need,” I answered, “except…”

“Potions galore.” Summer passed me a dozen shimmering bottles. “All enhanced and extended,” she said, and handed over a few bottles of plain water. “You don’t technically ‘need’ these, per se, but in that kind of heat, a good drink of water does wonders for your spirits.”

“It’s hot down there?” My spirits were already lifting. “That’ll be a welcome change from the cold.”

Summer laughed. “You might not think so after the first second or two.” She led me to a pair of steel doors, the only steel doors in the entire mountain, and said, “I have to keep this one locked, just in case the odd baddie tries following me back.”

“Baddie?” I asked, but got only the flicking lever for an answer.

As the iron door swung open, I followed Summer into a plain, gray stone room that held the strangest object I’d ever seen by far. A giant frame, four by four of nothing but obsidian blocks. But instead of a picture, this frame encased a curtain of energy. At least, that’s the best way I can describe it. Swirling, purplish pink eddies attracted glowing violet flakes that seemed to appear out of nowhere. And the sound: a high, echoing rasp. Was it breathing? Was it alive?

“The portal?”

“The portal.”

Even at this range, a half-dozen blocks away, I could feel the pulsing power. Vibrating my teeth, tingling the roots of my hair.

And my nose, wrinkling at the subtle stink.

“Netherrack?”

Summer nodded. “The portal is always open. Which is why you feel the heat as well.”

Which I could. Radiating from the gate. Hot and dry like a desert breeze.

“It won’t be pleasant,” warned Summer, taking a step closer to the gate, “especially if you’re prone to motion sickness.”

Was I? I couldn’t remember from my old life. Did I get sick in cars? Planes? I hadn’t felt anything on minecarts or boats—which I suspect don’t count because the ocean is tabletop- smooth.

“You might feel the urge to move,” continued Summer. “Don’t. It will break the transfer. Stay absolutely still, and know that it’ll all be over in just a few seconds.”

“Got it,” I said with way more certainty than I felt.

“Together then,” declared Summer, “on my mark.”

I stood next to her, ready for that first, last step.

“Three,” she counted, “Two…”

Oh why won’t this world let us hold hands when we’re scared?!

“One!”

I stepped into the vortex. Vision swimming, skin prickling, stomach contents rising up through my vibrating chest.

I tried to breathe, but the air was hot and stifling, with that horrible stench blasting up my nose.

The rasp in my ears. Loud. Deafening. I fought the urge to move. Forced my body to freeze.

The wavy, sickening image of Summer’s portal room blinked into solid purple. Then, suddenly another image, dark and rusty with vertical orange lines.

“Move now!” I heard Summer call, and took a couple wobbly steps forward.

“Stop!”

I halted.

“Look down.”

I did. I was standing at the edge of a cliff, high above an ocean, an actual ocean…of lava! I backed up hurriedly, crashing into Summer.

“Mind the gate,” she barked, but I was far too dazed to respond.

“I can’t…” I started to say, but lost the thought in coughing.

“Just take a moment to orient yourself,” said Summer, stepping in front of my face. “The heat, the smell—you’ll get used to it, I promise.”

“What about my eyes?” I asked, looking past her into the permanent twilight.

“They’re fine,” she answered calmly. “It’s this world.”

I realized, a second later, what she meant. Up close, I could see Summer perfectly. It was the land around us that threw me.

Netherrack. Spreading out into what looked like a giant cavern.

And the heat! She wasn’t kidding. An oven under my armor, against my skin, in my lungs. An arid fierceness that pulled the moisture from my body, drying my eyes, my throat. I tried to swallow. Another cough.

“Here.” Summer offered me a bottle of water. “Told you it would help.”

She was right. I’d never been thirsty before, never craved liquid like I did at that moment. “Pity our bodies can’t just sip,” mused Summer as I gulped down every welcome drop. “Since quenching our thirst doesn’t do anything more than lift our spirits. Wouldn’t it be nice to ration that kind of mental tonic?” Packing away the empty bottle, I saw that she now held a bow, and that her eyes were darting past me in all directions.

“What are you looking for?” I asked, reaching for my own arrow launcher.

“I’ll tell you if it shows up,” she said, swapping her bow for a potion. “But right now, let’s have a proper look-see.”

That was the potion she was drinking now.

Night vision.

I reached in my belt for an identical, pink-shimmering bottle. It didn’t taste too bad—like fizzy, metallic carrot juice.

I gulped it down quickly, then caught my breath as the entire world lit up around me.

The rusty haze melted away into a misty pink. It was a cavern. An underground world! I could see that the sparse, glowing, vertical lines were actually streams of lava, pouring from the netherrack ceiling into the molten ocean below.

Netherrack mountains—more like giant stalagmites—rose from the burning sea to connect with the roof above. And connecting them all was a central, broken plain. That’s where we stood now, at the mid-level on a small scrap of land no bigger than half a dozen cubes.

“Can’t blame me for our landing site,” said Summer. “The world just happened to place the portal atop this floating island. You don’t get to choose where you end up.”

Island? Floating island?

I looked up to spot other patches of suspended netherrack, just hanging in midair, like the first time I punched out the bottom of a tree. And we were standing on one! A dust speck above an ocean of fire.

“Whoa, boy,” I groaned dizzily. As if the heat and smell weren’t bad enough, this new night vision made me feel like a tightrope walker who didn’t realize he was on a tightrope till someone turned on the lights.

“Not to worry,” Summer said, pointing to something behind me, “we’re still firmly connected to the mainland.”

By “firmly connected,” she meant a very long, very thin, very terrifying strip of double netherrack that ran from our speck to the edge of the main plain.

You gotta be kidding me, I thought, stomach rebelling worse than after a lunch of zombie flesh.

“Let’s be off,” chirped my partner, striding confidently toward what immediately struck me as “Death-trap Bridge.”

“Uh, Summer,” I said, looking past her at the precarious walkway. “I have this thing…a phobia, you see…well…I guess it’s not technically a phobia if phobias are things you fear that can’t really hurt you, you know, like those little spiders back home with creepy long legs but jaws that are actually too small to—”

“Guy!” Summer cut me off. “What are you going on about?”

I stammered, realizing that I was facing two challenges at once. Not just crossing the bridge, but admitting I might be too afraid to do it!

I’d never been in this situation before. There’d been no one around to see my weakness. What would she think of me if I totally wimped out?

“There was”—I fought through a shaking, drying throat—“there was this lava, a lake of it…under my island, and…”—stinging nose, evaporating tears—“and…”

“You fell in,” said Summer, stepping right up next to me. “Join the club. I’ve had more than my share of burn baths.” She laughed, that wonderful, comforting laugh. “The first time was on the surface, right into a lava pond while I was gathering it for my first hot tub.” I could feel her breath on my face, cooler than the air. “And you best believe, the memories of that first sizzle are always on my mind down here.”

“So…you’re afraid too?”

Another symphonic laugh. “Of course! Who wouldn’t be down here? And if we don’t admit our fears to each other, how can we help each other?”

More tears, but this time, they were tears of relief.

Fresson eight: Friends shouldn’t be afraid to admit their fears.

Summer pivoted to stand next to me, pressing her armored shoulder against mine. “You’ll be all right,” she said in a reassuring tone. “If I thought otherwise, I’d give you one of our fireproof potions.”

“Maybe,” I said, reaching into my belt, “just in case…”

“You can do this.” Her voice solid, confident. “Just keep breathing, keep your eyes on me, and I’ll get us across safely.”

“Promise?” I squeaked.

“Promise.” She handed me another bottle of water.

It helped. Both the water and her conviction. How did I ever make it so long by myself? “I’m ready,” I declared with all the real and fake courage I could muster. “Let’s do this.”

“Onward then.” Summer turned for the bridge as I tried not to look down.

Lava everywhere!

I could feel the heat blasting up around us. It was like walking over a giant hair dryer.

How many steps?

A couple dozen? An eternity.

So high!

Even if it hadn’t been lava, the fall alone would have been enough to…to what? What does death look like for block people like us? Would I have been smashed into pulp or just poofed into smoke like everything else? And would there be anything left behind? Some of my gear, or just an empty space, as if I’d never been?

“Courage is a full-time job,” I whispered, reciting one of my hardest-learned lessons over and over again to bolster myself. “Courage is a full-time job.”

“What’s that?” Summer asked over her shoulder.

“Nothing!” I gulped as the lava popped below me. “Just one of my lessons.”

“Hm,” she responded over her shoulder, “like the one I think comes from my home.”

“What’s that?”

“Who dares, wins.”

“Hey,” I said, about to compliment her on such a witty phrase, then yelled another “Hey!” as I realized that we’d crossed over onto wide, safe ground.

“See”—Summer turned to face me—“I knew you could do it. I believe in you.”

She believed in me!

“We won’t be going far today,” she said, heading for what looked like a solid wall. “What we’re after is just on the other side.”

“Is this a whole new planet,” I asked, “or another land under the first one?”

“Probably the latter,” she answered, “but I wouldn’t try digging up to the surface from here.”

“How come?”

My question got a pausing turn. “My second burn bath,” she said, pointing to a lava fall that rolled down a distant hill. “Shower, actually. My first time digging for glowstone I picked one block above me too many.”

“Yikes!” I shivered in the heat. “Do you think there’s another ocean of lava above us?”

“I’m in no great hurry to find out,” answered Summer, continuing a few more steps before she announced, “Here we are then.” We were standing at the edge of the wall, next to a single doorway I hadn’t seen.

“Stay behind me,” she said, reaching for her bow. “And be ready to run if I tell you.”

Run from what?

I followed her down the narrow, suffocating tunnel and to an exit that caused a pause with raised arrow. Was something waiting for us out there?

“Stay here,” she commanded, then stepped out into the open. I thought I heard something—faint footsteps and a strangled, quick snort. It didn’t seem to bother Summer, though. She looked right, then left, then let out an audible sigh. “Right then,” she chirped, stowing her weapons, “all clear.”

I sighed in response, exited the tunnel, turned left to follow her, and nearly crashed right into the most hideous creature I’d ever seen!

A zombie! A pig zombie! No, seriously! This thing, this…abominable abomination, for lack of a better term, looked like somebody had mixed ghoul and swine with a healthy dose of nightmare for good measure. Rotten, pink flesh. Gray bones under open, green-bordered wounds.

And the smell! Rotting bacon.

“Uuugh,” it groaned, turning its crossed, dead eyes toward me.

A gold sword flashed in the dull pink haze.

I jumped back, reaching for my own blade.

“Wait!” shouted Summer, jumping in between me and the creature. “Don’t do it!”

“Are you crazy?!” I yelled. “You’re gonna get—”

“It won’t attack!” Summer nudged me gently away. “And if you did, you’d bring the lot of them down on us!”

“I don’t under—” I started to say, but shut up when Summer moved out of my way. There were more of them, five roaming “pork of the living deads,” all wearing pieces of golden armor, all carrying golden swords.

“The first time I came down here,” explained Summer, “I did exactly what you were about to do. I killed one, attracted its mates, and led them all right back through the portal into my mountain.” She shook her head at the strange creatures before us. “I learned too late that they’re harmless if left alone.” She turned to face me. “But now you understand why I’ve got iron doors blocking the portal room. Just in case one of them decides to take a stroll. Even an accident can provoke them. A stray arrow, or a blow meant for something else…”

“Something else?” I asked, feeling my nausea return. “What else is—” My question abruptly halted in the face of a new one.

I pointed my fist at the zombie pigman’s feet. “Is it the heat or the potion making me see something?”

“Neither,” answered Summer. “Its gold boots are, in fact, glowing.”

“Glowing with what?”

“Can’t say. Some sort of magic, I guess.” She motioned to the other zombie pigmen. Some of their armor and swords also had a luminous sheen.

“Magic?” I asked.

“Must be.” My partner was surprisingly nonchalant about the whole thing.

“Aren’t you curious about what kind?”

“Somewhat”—Summer shrugged—“but unless you know how to politely ask for a quick borrow, I don’t see as we have any other safe options.”

“I guess not,” I conceded as the glowing-booted beast blundered away.

Magic! First potions and now items!

“Have you ever found others?” I asked Summer. “Tools and weapons, I mean? Other enchanted stuff up on the surface?”

“Not yet,” said Summer flatly, “and, sadly, no way yet to make them.”

All the more reason to keep going, I thought, watching the glowing boots recede into the mist. There have to be more magic items up there, and ways to make them if they weren’t just freely floating about. It just wouldn’t be fair if they only exist in this h…

I couldn’t finish the word, even in my own head. It was a rude word, especially among those of my people who believed a place like this existed as punishment after death.

At least I’m pretty sure that’s what some folks believed. I don’t know if I ever did myself, but I could see why others did. I mean, if someone spent their life choosing to hurt others, wouldn’t it be kinda just if they spent their afterlife in a dark, hot, monster-filled pain-cave like this? In fact, I think, back home, there was even an expression where an experience is so bad they describe it as being welcomed to a place just like this.

If I’d discovered the Nether on my own, I probably would have avoided it like surface mobs avoid the sun.

But I wasn’t on my own and I’d made a promise to help Summer. Fresson four: Friends keep their promises. In fact, don’t people say in my world that the very expression of friendship is following someone into a place exactly like this?

So, while my guts were shouting “Check, please!” all I could do was catch my breath, straighten my back, and ask Summer, “So where do we go from here?”