Shawny worked quickly, sketching out the plans for their defenses—not just walls and moats for the village, but traps for the unsuspecting mobs, areas with overlapping fire from archers, and choke points where one or two warriors could hold back a flood of attackers. This was what Shawny was best at: strategy. He was known to build great castles, their defenses nearly impregnable, and then just abandon them on one server only to construct an even greater work of strategic art somewhere else. And so they built, all through that day and into night. With hands newly freed, the villagers worked with tenacity, driving even the youngest children to build faster, everyone knowing that their lives teetered precariously on the edge of a blade, balanced between survival and destruction.
Oddly enough, few monsters came to the village that first night, Crafter’s prediction that the main attack would come the night after was obviously true. Only a few zombies approached out of the darkness, easily dispatched by Gameknight as he ran about the perimeter, protecting his workers, his village; he was the User-that-is-not-a-user after all. He felt responsible, not just for this battle or this village, but for all the griefing he’d done in the past, all the wrongs he’d committed at the expense of these electronic lives. He would somehow make it right.
And so they built through the night and into the next day, constructing dirt walls, stone archer towers, trenches filled with water, and wooden fences, all placed strategically. They then cut tunnels underneath the village, going from house to house; these were avenues of escape in case a zombie breached the wooden doors. Shawny’s commands were followed to the letter even though sometimes the NPCs didn’t understand why holes were being placed in specific locations, with tunnels brushing up against these holes but not reaching all the way down.
“Murder holes,” Shawny had answered the questioning villagers. “You’ll understand when the time comes.”
As they built the defenses, Crafter sent villagers out through their underground minecart system, relaying the defensive plans to the other villages all across Minecraft. This was not just a battle for this village, but a battle for all villages. It was important in Shawny’s plans that the monsters be denied any victims from now on, their craving for XP heightened and magnified.
“But why make them crave more XP?” the Mayor asked. “It will just make them more violent, more aggressive.”
“That’s true,” Shawny said as he directed the placement of walls, purposely only one block thick at certain locations, “but an angry opponent can be easily manipulated into a position that is favorable to you and deadly to them. We need to be able to herd all of the monsters on this server to one location where they can be trapped. The only way we can do that is to deny them XP from the villages, but offer it to them in a place of our choosing. Then we’ll close our trap and get rid of them all in one stroke. But first, we need to survive tonight.”
The village slowly changed its appearance throughout the day from a peaceful collection of buildings clustered around fields of crops to one of walls and towers ringing the community, some meant to keep monsters out while others were meant to keep them in. Gameknight stood atop the tallest tower, a new addition, with its stone spire stretching up at least forty blocks into the air, giving him a clear view of the surroundings. He could see activity at the edge of the forest. Something was moving in the shadows. It looked like an enderman, but this one was somehow different, colored a dark, dark red, like the color of blood at sunset or the color of a nightmare. It teleported from the edge of the forest to the open plain and stood in plain view, a cloud of purple particles forming a haze around the dark creature.
Moving to the ladder, Gameknight slid down to the ground and sprinted through the open gates that now protected the village, ready to face this menace. Running around obstacles and traps, Gameknight ran outside of the village’s defenses, coming to a stop and stood out in the open, letting the enderman know that he was here, ready. But the enderman didn’t approach. It just watched and then teleported to another location around the village, and then another and another; it watched, surveying their preparations.
Suddenly, a presence moved next to him. Gameknight jumped in surprise, drawing his sword in a single fluid motion, ready for battle as he turned toward the new threat.
“Put down your sword, Gameknight, it is only me,” said an old scratchy voice; it was Crafter.
“You scared me,” he said as he put away his iron sword. He turned away from Crafter and looked back toward the enderman. “Who is that?”
“Ahh, the leader of the endermen,” Crafter said. “He calls himself Erebus.”
“What is he doing?”
Erebus disappeared in a cloud of glowing purple sparks and reappeared on the other side of the village, then flashed to a new position, and then another, looking at the new defenses from every angle.
“He’s likely mapping out our defenses,” Crafter explained, careful to not look directly at the dark monster out of fear of provoking him.
Just then, Shawny joined the two of them.
“Shawny, the enderman, he’s checking out our defenses,” Gameknight said, then turned back to Crafter. “What did you say his name was?”
“Erebus.”
“Yeah, Erebus,” he continued, talking to his friend, “he can see where the walls are thinner, where they are weakly defended. We need to strengthen the defenses at some of those locations around the village.”
“Don’t worry, Gameknight,” Shawny explained. “We want him to see those places.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Nor do I,” Crafter added. “Don’t we want to strengthen all places around the village?”
“A flood is coming, my friends,” Shawny said, a ring of confidence to his voice. “We cannot stand rigid against this flood for it will wash us away. Instead, we will redirect the flow to where we need it and where we are prepared. All is as it should be; we are ready.”
“What of the other villages?” Gameknight asked.
“Word has returned through the minecart network,” Crafter said. “The other villages are as prepared as we are. Tonight, this will either be our greatest victory or it will be the end of this server and all creatures living in it.”
Gameknight put a reassuring hand on the old NPC’s shoulder.
“All will be well, Crafter,” Gameknight said, trying to sound confident. “No matter how this ends, we will put up a fight that will be legendary.”
“And soon,” Shawny added, pointing to the sun.
The square yellow disk of the sun was just starting to kiss the horizon, the sky around it turning a deep red while square boxy clouds glowed white and then faded into the darkness as the sun descended. The sky slowly filled with stars.
“Quick, back behind the defenses,” Shawny commanded.
The three of them sprinted back toward the village, crossing the wooden bridge that spanned the moat that surrounded their village. As they crossed, Shawny broke the wooden blocks, allowing water to fill in. Passing through the gate that was composed of two iron doors, they entered the village, a sea of scared faces looking toward them. The sky darkened, and stars began to show their sparkling faces as the defenders moved to their positions.
“Here they come,” yelled someone from the tallest tower.
Gameknight climbed to the top of their dirt wall. He could see shapes moving amidst the trees: dark shapes, angry shapes. The torches that had been placed out near the edge of the forest allowed him to see the approaching mobs as they moved through the circle of light being cast on the ground. At first, only a few monsters came out of the dark forest, but then their numbers swelled as they rushed forward, a wave of monsters flowing across the landscape like an unstoppable tide.
“Remember, don’t shoot the endermen,” Gameknight yelled to the defenders. “If we don’t provoke them, they can’t join the fight, so archers . . . aim carefully.”
He looked about the village; the NPCs were already looking up at him like he was some kind of hero. What a joke, a hero, Gameknight999. He was anything but a hero; he was a gamer who always played for himself and only himself, his only friend, Shawny, here at his side. The responsibility that had been heaped on him seemed to weigh a million tons; all of these lives were relying on him. This is crazy.
Well, real or not, dream or reality, he was here right now, and for the first time he would try to help someone else: these NPCs—no, these people. He’d fight to save them and die in the process if it was necessary to do so. A shudder snaked down his spine followed by goose bumps that chilled his skin. He was ready.
“Everyone, stand your ground and show no fear,” Gameknight yelled to the villagers. “This is your town and your server. We won’t let these mobs take it from you.” He held his iron sword up high and then stared out at the approaching mobs. “Come on, let’s dance.”