Herobrine's Message (48 page)

The Mechanist finished talking. He took a deep breath, let it out, and began to walk backward. As he did, the crowd of Noctem soldiers let out sniggers and snide remarks. Leonidas, on the other hand, stared at the Mechanist in amazement as he reached the wall and put his hands back up over the levers that held them up.

Leonidas looked from the Mechanist to the soldiers
elevated on a platform above the crowds. All of them wore a nearly identical expression: pensive and determined. Leonidas knew that the Mechanist's speech had connected with them. They would never forget it—and the Mechanist was right. One day, however far in the future it may be, those players would return to Elementia. And maybe they'd be able to turn it back into the place that Stan and his friends had worked so hard to create and defend.

Leonidas's heart leaped as he realized that the Mechanist had redeemed himself. He very well may have just inspired the future of Elementia for the better.

“That was very touching, Mecha11,” Lord Tenebris replied nonchalantly. He turned to look down the line. “Would anybody else like to say something?”

“I have something to say.”

Leonidas's ears perked up. He recognized that voice. His head turned to the right, along with all the other heads in the congregation, to where the voice had come from. There, entering the plaza from the side street, his clothes tattered and worn, was Stan2012, his hands empty and his face knit into a leer as he stared down Lord Tenebris.

Immediately, the crowd erupted. The Noctem soldiers let loose their loudest, harshest round of jeers yet, which just barely drowned out the cheers and applause that burst out from Stan's allies spread across the two elevated platforms.
As Stan made his way up the stairs of the firing-squad platform, standing directly opposite Lord Tenebris, the noise had gotten so loud that Leonidas could barely hear himself think.

“SILENCE!”
Lord Tenebris boomed. Leonidas recognized the awful sensation of Lord Tenebris seemingly yelling from directly within his head, making his ears ache. Immediately, all noise stopped.

Slowly but surely, all players from both sides looked up to see Stan2012 and Lord Tenebris staring each other down from both ends of the platform. The two rulers held each other's gaze in the dim sunlight that shone from under the gray veil of the Withers. Leonidas stared at Stan in amazement. How was he holding Lord Tenebris's gaze for so long without breaking it?

“You're late,” Lord Tenebris said.

“I apologize,” Stan said with a smirk. “I met an old friend, and we had some catching up to do.”

Lord Tenebris returned the smirk. “Well, I sure hope that your meeting was worth it. I was seconds away from executing your friends, you know.”

“Trust me,” Stan said. “It was well worth my time.”

Suddenly, Leonidas felt something strange wash over him. It was a sensation that he hadn't felt before. It lasted for only a few seconds.

“I assume that you remember the terms of our deal,” Stan said evenly.

“Indeed I do,” Lord Tenebris replied. “The winner of this duel is the rightful ruler of Elementia.”

As the crowd of Noctem soldiers snickered, Leonidas suddenly became aware that his inventory was no longer empty. He checked the contents as inconspicuously as he could and found, to his utter bafflement, that his inventory now contained an unenhanced bow and two stacks of arrows.

Leonidas heard a soft gasp beside him, and as he looked down the line, he saw that all his friends were wearing equal expressions of amazement. Was it possible that
all of them
had mysteriously gotten weapons?

“Well then,” Stan said after the sarcastic laughter died down. “How about we stop wasting time and begin?”

“With pleasure,” Lord Tenebris replied. He took a deep breath, and a diamond sword materialized in his left hand, glimmering with various enchantments.

Stan didn't move. He merely stood there unarmed, as he smiled at Lord Tenebris. “Go ahead,” he taunted. “Make the first move.”

Leonidas stared at Stan with confusion. Why didn't he have a weapon drawn? What was he playing at?

Lord Tenebris stretched out his empty right hand at Stan, took a deep breath, and then grunted. As he did, an arrow
materialized from his fingertips, flying directly at Stan. Stan stood totally still, not even bothering to defend himself. Leonidas's eyes widened, and he flinched right as the arrow was about to enter Stan's chest. . . .

But it didn't. Right as the arrow was upon Stan, it changed trajectory, curving left and flying past Stan's left arm.

A collective gasp rose from the crowd on both sides as Lord Tenebris raised an eyebrow. He lifted his hand again, and sent three more arrows flying directly at Stan. All three times, the same thing happened—right as the arrows were about to hit Stan, they suddenly changed course, flying in three different directions.

The crowd was now totally silent, and Leonidas's jaw was dropped. What was he watching?

Lord Tenebris's mouth opened slightly, and his eyes grew wider as he tried to comprehend what was going on. He raised his right hand again, throwing a punch that produced a fireball. The fireball flew just as fast as the arrows had, directly at Stan.

Without even batting an eye, Stan raised his right hand. As the fireball made contact with his hand, he caught it, stopping it dead in its tracks. Lord Tenebris watched in bewilderment as Stan held the fireball up, then proceeded to clench his fist, crushing it. When he opened his hand again, nothing was left but a few light gray wisps of smoke, which
were quickly carried away by the wind.

Lord Tenebris didn't look confused anymore—he looked angry. He drew back his fist, took a deep breath, and launched it as hard as he could at Stan. It appeared that nothing had left Lord Tenebris's hand, but Stan knew better, as he sensed the pulse of explosive energy heading toward him. Stan reached out his right hand and caught the pulse of energy, using the force to spin around and release it, sending it flying right back at Lord Tenebris.

The Noctem leader let out a faint shout of surprise as he sensed the blast coming, and he crossed his arms over his face as the blast hit. The explosion knocked Lord Tenebris backward toward the edge of the platform. He lowered his arms, still smoking from the explosion, and stared at Stan, who was standing perfectly still. Disbelief was etched on every pixel of the Noctem ruler's face.

“What did you . . . how did you . . . ,” Lord Tenebris managed to get out. “What are you doing?”

Stan stared at him for a moment, total confidence on his face, and taking in every moment of Lord Tenebris's shock before responding.

“Taking back my country,” he said with a determined grin, before shouting, “Armies of Elementia!
Charge!
”

Immediately, Leonidas raced forward and attacked the Noctem soldiers on the ground. He allowed his instincts to
carry him forward, rushing past Stan, off the platform and into the crowd, drawing his bow as he did so. He looked at the other commanders of Stan's army in amazement. On one side of him Jayden was pulling out a diamond axe, while on the other side Bob drew out a bow and charged on Ivanhoe over the side of the platform and into the crowd of stupefied Noctem soldiers.

Lord Tenebris looked around wildly, trying to figure out what was happening. His eyes landed on the platform where the imprisoned republic fighters were stationed. To his utter surprise and dismay, these players, too, were pouring over the sides of the platforms, diamond weapons drawn.
How is this possible?
he thought to himself.
Their inventories were empty! Well, I suppose it doesn't matter . . . they're all about to die anyway!

“DETONATE THE PLATFORM!” Lord Tenebris cried out, desperately hoping that his soldier manning the lever that detonated the platform would pull it. And yet the soldiers still continued to pour over the edges, into the crowd of baffled troops.

Lord Tenebris repeated his shout two more times, but to no avail. The platform remained solid and intact. By now, nearly half the players on the platform had jumped off and were engaging the Noctem Forces, who were totally caught off guard, in battle. Lord Tenebris was beside himself with
fury.
Why isn't anyone pulling that lever?

“Looking for this?”

Slowly, Lord Tenebris turned around to face Stan. He was still standing calmly at the far end of the platform, and in his outstretched hand was a lever, the redstone dust falling to the ground indicating that it had been freshly yanked off a circuit. Stan released the lever, and it dropped to the ground with a clang.

For a moment, Lord Tenebris just stared at Stan. He was totally unable to process what had happened.
How had Stan suddenly gained these miraculous abilities?
Stan didn't let him ponder it for long, though. He jumped into the air and began to float just above the ground as a glowing diamond axe materialized in his hand. Lord Tenebris's mouth opened slightly, but then he closed it as a savage sneer crossed his face.

Fine,
he thought to himself,
have it your way, Stan.

He switched his enchanted diamond sword to his right hand, held it in front of him, and leaped into the air, rocketing at top speed toward Stan, who mirrored him and flew directly at Lord Tenebris. It was only a matter of seconds before the two players, flying directly at each other, met in the center of the wood plank–block platform. Their blades clashed together, sending a shower of sparks down to the ground below them as the two operators teleported away.

As Jayden looked around, he realized that most of the Noctem soldiers had managed to get over their shock and were beginning to fight back. Indeed, Jayden still had absolutely no idea how a diamond axe had appeared in his inventory, nor how the same thing had happened to all his friends and allies.

All he knew was that, whatever was happening, it was because of Stan, whom Jayden had seen fly toward Lord Tenebris and warp into the sky. Stan had clearly gotten operating powers somehow, and was now using them to fight Lord Tenebris. As soon as that fight finished, Jayden was sure that Stan would help them subdue the Noctem armies. Until then, though, Jayden knew that they had to buy Stan as much time as they could.

“Well, well, well . . . look who we have here,” a voice with a Welsh accent spoke from behind him.

Jayden spun around and saw three players staring at him with contempt. He realized with a jolt that one of them was Zingster, the harsh corporal who had overseen Jayden's training in Nocturia. The other was LemonKipper, who had the skin of a mermaid and was a stuck-up member of Jayden's class. He didn't recognize the third player, who had no face. His or her skin (Jayden couldn't tell) was totally black, except for a giant number 4 that stretched from the player's head to their toes.

“Hey guys,” Jayden said, raising his axe and dropping
into a fighting stance, “long time no see.” He had seen Zingster and Kipper fight, and he knew that he could take both of them.

“Don't sound so chipper,” Kipper snarled at him. “We're gonna make you pay for what you did to Nocturia, Councilman Jayden.”

“Wait . . . that's right,” Jayden said, realizing that Kipper and Zingster should probably be dead. “How did you three escape Nocturia?”

“I got caught swiping some QPo,” Kipper said, no hint of guilt in his voice, “and Zingster decided to take me out into the tundra to teach me a lesson. When the bomb went off, we decided to head over here.”

“I let him get away with the theft,” Zingster grunted. “Because we've got bigger fish to fry!”

Zingster drew out his pickaxe and rushed into Jayden as Kipper did the same with his sword. Jayden knocked the pickaxe out of the way and locked the blade of his axe into the sword. The two players struggled to overpower each other for a moment before Zingster recovered and attacked again, forcing Jayden to feint away from Kipper and dodge.

Well, they've both gotten better,
Jayden thought to himself as he swung his axe at Zingster's hand. The Noctem corporal dodged and used the opening to body check Jayden, sending him to the ground with a thud. Immediately, he rolled to
the side to avoid a stab of Kipper's sword, and rolled several more times to avoid the sword that repeatedly plunged into the gravel. All of a sudden, Jayden felt his axe fly out of his hand, and looked up in time to see Zingster raising his pickaxe for another strike, just as Kipper did the same.

Jayden rolled to the side while swinging his feet around, dodging the sword strike while sweeping his legs behind Zingster's knees, sending him tumbling down, his pickaxe flying into the air. Jayden used the momentum to leap to his feet, catching Zingster's pickaxe while using it to counter Kipper's sword strike. Once again, the two players pressed into each other's blades, sending sparks flying, until Jayden finally started to win. He came closer and closer to overpowering Kipper, and was about to overtake him when he sensed something flying at him from the corner of his eye.

Instinctively, Jayden ducked, and the flying potion hit Kipper squarely in the face. The impact knocked him to the ground, right on top of the recovering Zingster. The cloud of gray smoke from the bottle wafted to the ground, surrounding the two players and knocking them unconscious.

Jayden had gotten slightly sprayed by the gas, too, and he felt a little woozy. He turned to face the thrower, and found the player skinned with the 4. Without another word, the player produced another potion bottle from nowhere, and tossed it at Jayden with a grunt.

The good news was that, from the grunt, Jayden could tell that this player was female. The bad news was the barrage of Potions of Slowness flying from her hands directly at him. Still armed with Zingster's pickaxe, Jayden didn't have enough reach to block the potions without getting hit, so he was forced to dodge, duck, and weave between the bottles. The fumes of the potions began to rise, and Jayden felt himself becoming more and more affected by the vapors.