Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The sky stretched endlessly before Wemmbu, a pale blue expanse brushed with threads of cloud that thinned toward the horizon and dissolved into nothing.

From this height, perched upon the edge of the Far Lands, Wemmbu could believe the Unstable SMP belonged to him alone.

The wind came in gentle increments, carrying the mineral scent of ancient stone and the distant sweetness of oak sap. It caught the ends of his braid and made them dance; the violet strands woven into a plait that fell to the small of his back, shorter now than when left loose, when the ends would brush against the backs of his knees.

A ribbon the color of morning sky held it in place, its trailing ends fluttering against the fabric of his shirt. His best friend had tied it there this morning, working through Wemmbu's hair with the quiet concentration he often reserved for his research.

He hadn’t asked if Wemmbu wanted it braided. He simply appeared behind him after breakfast, comb in hand, and begun parting violet hair. Wemmbu had sat cross-legged on the floor before the armchair, listening to the rustle of feathers each time the Seraphim shifted, and hadn’t minded. His best friend’s hands were always gentle. His fingers never pulled or caused the small pains that Wemmbu associated with his own clumsy attempts at braiding.

It was easier to let him do it; it was always easier.

Now that same blue ribbon caught the fading light as Wemmbu tilted his head, watching the world far below arrange itself into a microcosm.

The oak forest ended in an abrupt line, a border drawn by nature and something older than nature, where the trees simply stopped to exist and the Far Lands began. From this vantage, Wemmbu could trace the contours of his entire known world. The forest where his cottage hid among the dark trees. The winding paths he had memorized years ago, their twists and turns as familiar as the silver ridges of his own horns.

And there, a far smudge of yellow against the dark forest, the distant shapes of Farville catching the amber glow of the afternoon sun.

The townsfolk would be finishing their work by now. Wemmbu had visited the town only five times in the years he had lived here, but each visit had been carefully negotiated, a privilege earned through days of good behavior and promises to return before dark.

Farville was a place he had slowly began to like. The townspeople didn’t stare too long at the sight of his horns, sharp gray with silver scales. They didn’t flinch at the scaled length of his tail, peeking underneath his cloak. Instead, they laughed at his jokes, pressed fresh bread into his hands, and asked when he would come again.

And every time Wemmbu returned home with the taste of their kindness still warm on his tongue, his best friend would ask him to recount the visit in full: who he had spoken to, what they had said, whether anyone had looked at him too long or asked too many questions. Wemmbu always told him the whole story. There was no reason not to.

Eggchan was only concerned for his safety, and concern was simply another word for care.

His mother had used to warn him, in the deep and echoing dark of the End, that players were creatures of greed and cruelty. His best friend had confirmed this, his voice soft but certain, his blue eyes holding Wemmbu's with the weight of absolute truth.

Players couldn’t be trusted. Players would hurt and kill him if they knew what he was.

‘An Ender Dragon.’

The people of Farville were an exception, maybe, but exceptions didn’t disprove the rule.

Wemmbu understood this. He had accepted it the way he accepted the color of the sky—as fact, immutable and beyond argument. And yet sometimes, standing at the edge of the server with the wind in his hair and the distant houses glimmering below, he felt something restless stir beneath his ribs. A curiosity. A hunger for more than five visits in as many years.

He didn’t voice it, of course. Eggchan would disapprove. He would worry, and worrying made Eggchan's wings go stiff, his voice turning flat in that particular way that made the air feel heavier.

The sun slipped lower, bleeding gold into pink, then into the first hints of lavender dusk.

Wemmbu shifted his weight on the precipice, feeling the rough grass bite through the fabric of his trousers. His tail coiled behind him for balance, the dark scales catching the light in brief iridescent flashes.

He wasn’t wearing his netherite armor—it sat folded in his inventory beside his spear—and the poet shirt he wore instead was loose at the collar, the sleeves billowing slightly each time the wind picked up.

Wemmbu had spent the afternoon here, as he often did, watching the sky, the forest, and the distant town, letting his thoughts drift without anchor. The peak of the Far Lands was the only place where the horizon didn’t feel like a wall. The only place where the world opened up instead of closing in.

Eggchan didn’t like him coming here. His best friend said it was dangerous, that the edge was unstable and the fall was too great for even a water bucket to guarantee safety. But Eggchan wasn’t here now. Wemmbu had left while his best friend was deep in his usual work, bent over his office desk with research papers spread before him like wings. Wemmbu hadn’t said where he was going. He never needed to say, because Eggchan always knew anyway.

Below him, impossibly far, a fox circled in lazy spirals before vanishing into the treeline.

Wemmbu tracked its movement, then he pushed himself to his feet in one fluid motion. He stood balanced on the very edge, arms stretching above his head, spine curving as he yawned. The drop before him was immense. But Wemmbu didn’t fear it; he had never feared heights, not even as a child clinging to his mother's scaled back while she soared through the endless void.

‘Falling was only dangerous if one didn’t know how to land,’ he thought absentmindedly.

He drew the water bucket from his inventory with a flick of his wrist. Then, without ceremony or hesitation, Wemmbu stepped off the edge of the world.

The wind became a roar. It whipped past his clothes, stirring the ribbon from his braid until it streamed behind him like a banner. The oak forest rushed up to meet him, individual trees resolving from a green-black blur into distinct trunks and branches. He aimed for the narrow gap between two oak trees, and just before the ground could claim him, he emptied the bucket at his feet.

The water broke his fall with a splashing sound, and Wemmbu stepped onto solid earth without so much as a stumble. He scooped the water back into the bucket, placed it back in his inventory, and began walking.

The forest closed around Wemmbu immediately. Here, beneath the dark canopy, the light was dimmer and greener, filtered through layers of leaves that rustled with unseen movement. Mushrooms clustered at the bases of trees, their red and white caps glowing faintly in the shadows. Wemmbu's boots found the path without conscious thought. He had walked this route so many times that his body knew it better than his mind.

Left at the fallen trunk carpeted in moss. Right at the clearing where the ground grew thick with ferns. Straight through the copse of birch that stood pale and strange among the darker trees.

Wemmbu could have walked this path blindfolded. The path was etched into his bones by now, every root and stone memorized through years of repetition. Eggchan had taught him the route when he was still new in the Overworld, walking him through it again and again until Wemmbu could trace it in his sleep.

Along the way, the Seraphim would pause at certain trees, clearings, and patches of earth that looked no different from any other. He would place a hand against the bark or the soil and murmur something resonant that made the air shiver.

“Wards,” his best friend had explained.

These were protective measures to keep dangerous players from wandering too close, to turn away those who might wish them both harm. Wemmbu had accepted this explanation the way he accepted all of Eggchan's explanations: with trust, with gratitude, and with the quiet relief of being so thoroughly protected.

Of course, Wemmbu didn’t notice that the wards ran along every possible route out of the forest. He didn’t notice that they formed not a wall against intruders but a circle around a center, and that he was the thing being kept at its heart.

His tail swayed behind him as he walked, occasionally brushing against a low-hanging branch or sweeping fallen leaves from the path. Wemmbu hummed a tune, a meandering melody that rose and fell with the rhythm of his footsteps. His thoughts turned to their dinner tonight.

Potatoes, he had harvested them just yesterday. Carrots too, their orange roots thick and sweet. His best friend had gone to the town the day before; Wemmbu remembered the slight tension in the Seraphim's shoulders when he returned, the way his wings had refolded before settling. His jaw had been set in that rigid line that meant he was displeased about something but didn’t want to share it.

Wemmbu had offered to go in his place. He always offered. And Eggchan always refused, his voice flat and final, a door closing without a handle on Wemmbu's side.

It was simpler not to argue. It was easier to accept his refusal, to nod and ask what had been purchased, to help put away the materials in the darkness of their basement where the shelves were always fully stocked. Eggchan had brought back cuts of beef wrapped in brown paper and fresh eggs nestled in a cloth-lined basket.

Wemmbu hadn’t asked what else his best friend had done in town. He had learned, over the years, that some questions made Eggchan's gaze turn unreadable and his wings draw inward. Wemmbu didn’t like it when this happens. It always made something cold settle in his stomach that he couldn’t name and didn’t want to examine.

The forest began to thin, and Wemmbu slowed his pace. The transition was subtle: a gradual increase in light, a shift in the quality of the air from close and damp to open and warm. He passed between two oaks whose branches intertwined overhead like clasped hands, and there it was.

The cottage stood in a wide clearing, as though the forest had been asked to step back and had obliged.

Two stories of oak and deepslate cobblestone rose from the earth, their lines clean and well-maintained. Flowering vines climbed the walls in cascades of purple and green, their petals trembling in the early evening breeze. Soul lanterns hung from iron posts along the gravel path, their blue flames flickering with a light that cast no heat. The windows were dark behind their pale curtains, save for one on the ground floor where the soft golden glow of froglight seeped through the fabric. The front door stood open.

And there, in the doorway, leaned Eggchan.

His best friend was motionless. His arms were crossed over his chest, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled to the elbows and wrinkled at the joints.

His wings—the great white primaries that rose behind his shoulders, the smaller pair that framed his face—were held stiff, their feathers slightly lifted as though stirred by wind Wemmbu couldn’t feel. His shaggy hair fell across his forehead in pale, disordered strands, and his blue eyes were fixed on the treeline with unwavering focus.

He didn’t shift his weight. He stood in the doorway as though he had been standing there for hours, as if he had known exactly when Wemmbu would emerge from the trees and had positioned himself accordingly.

Maybe he had. ‘He always knew,’ Wemmbu thought.

Wemmbu grinned. The cold thing in his stomach dissolved instantly, replaced by the familiar warmth of homecoming.

“Yo,” he called, stepping onto the gravel path and hearing the familiar crunch of stone beneath his boots.

“Bro. You're late. It's almost sunset.” Eggchan's voice was flat, but there was a sharp edge beneath the words. His gaze didn’t move from Wemmbu's face. It tracked him with the precision of a hawk watching a field mouse, missing nothing: the wind-tangled braid, the dirt on his boots, the way his tail still swayed with the leftover energy of his walk.

Wemmbu shrugged, his tail flicking lazily behind him. “My bad.”

He didn’t sound sorry. He knew it, and he knew his best friend knew it. He passed through the doorway, close enough to catch the scent of parchment and ink that always clung to the Seraphim’s clothes, and stepped into the warmth of their home.

As Wemmbu crossed the threshold, he felt the faintest brush of feathers against his shoulder; covetous, there and then gone.

The cottage opened around him. The ground floor was a single wide space, divided by function rather than walls; the living room and dining area bleeding into the kitchen, all of it lit by the soft luminescence of froglights set into the floor in clean geometric patterns.

The furniture was mismatched but deliberate: an oak dining table surrounded by chairs with mismatched cushions in faded indigo, a pair of armchairs arranged before a fireplace that sat cold in the summer warmth, and bookshelves that lined the walls and spilled their contents onto side tables and windowsills. Purple and blue accents appeared in the throw pillows, the woven rug, and the ceramic vases that held dried lavender and wild grass.

It wasn’t messy, but neither was it organized. Books lay open on the arm of the sofa, a mug half-full of cold milk sat forgotten on the mantelpiece, and a violet blanket had been draped over the back of an armchair.

The windows were covered by light blue curtains. No one could see in and no one could see out. The curtains were always drawn, Wemmbu realized vaguely, though he had no memory of ever closing them himself. Eggchan must be the one doing it.

He crossed the room toward the kitchen, his tail brushing against the leg of the dining table. Behind him, he heard Eggchan sigh; a soft exhale that wasn’t quite exasperation or relief but something suspended between the two.

“Dude, at least try to sound sincere.”

Wemmbu rounded the kitchen island and turned to face his best friend, who had followed him across the room and settled onto one of the high stools on the other side of the counter. The island sat between them like a border, its surface slightly scarred with knife marks and ringed with burn stains.

Wemmbu leaned his palms against the wood and met Eggchan's eyes. “Hey, I'm always sincere,” he joked, his tone light.

Eggchan's frown deepened. The smaller wings beside his face twitched, a brief flutter of feathers that revealed and then hid his cheekbones. His skin, sun-kissed in the overhead light, seemed paler now.

“And be more careful. Jumping from the Far Lands’ edge with no armor and just a water bucket? Stop that.”

There it was. The knowledge.

Wemmbu's smile didn’t waver. He didn’t ask how Eggchan knew; had not asked in years, because the answer was always the same.

Eggchan always knew where he was. It was a constant, as reliable as sunrise, as predictable as the way the soul lanterns flickered to life each evening without Wemmbu ever needing to light them.

He had asked once, when their friendship was still young, how Eggchan always knew. The Seraphim had tilted his head and regarded him with those depthless blue eyes and said, simply, “You’re my best friend. How could I not know?” The answer had seemed sweet at the time. It still did. Wemmbu had never questioned it further, and thus Eggchan had never elaborated.

“Alright,” Wemmbu said, lifting his hands in mock surrender. "I'll get down in other safer ways."

Eggchan's expression didn’t change. His wings remained stiff, the great white arcs of them rising behind his shoulders with a tension that made the air feel thicker.

For a moment, something moved behind his face: a flicker, or a ripple, as though the human architecture of his features was a mask laid over something far older and far stranger, and that something was pressing against the underside of his skin. His pupils didn’t contract in the light. His breathing was too slow, the chest beneath his wrinkled dress shirt rising and falling with the mechanical regularity of a bellows.

“I'd prefer it if you didn't go up there in the first place. It's dangerous.”

The words landed with a different weight than before. The flatness of Eggchan's voice had given way to something edged, something that pressed against Wemmbu's chest like a hand and pushed.

The Seraphim's blue eyes held him in place; not staring, not exactly, but regarding him with an intensity that felt almost physical. His wings didn’t move. The smaller pair beside his face had drawn back, exposing the full severity of his expression: the hard line of his jaw, the faint tension in his brow that most would miss but that Wemmbu had learned to read over years of careful observation.

In that moment, Eggchan didn’t look like his best friend. He looked like something holy in the oldest sense of the word.

‘He was a Seraphim, after all. Not just an angel, but a Seraphim.’

Wemmbu held his ground. He had weathered worse from Eggchan. His best friend’s protectiveness was not new; it was a constant.

Sometimes it flared into sharpness, into arguments that ended with locked doors, long silences, and the hollow sound of Wemmbu's own breathing in a black room that felt smaller than it had before. There was a stretch of days—weeks?—that Wemmbu couldn’t quite remember. A door that wouldn’t open. The taste of food passed through a gap too narrow for his shoulders.

Wemmbu tried to not think about it. It happened for a reason, of course.

His best friend had explained it to him afterward, had held his hands and spoken in that low, steady voice about dangers that Wemmbu had been too naive to understand. The confinement had been for his protection, and the isolation had been for his safety.

Eggchan cared about him. And care, real care, sometimes meant doing things that hurt. It was normal. It was okay.

“Okay, fine. I won't, alright?” Wemmbu let out a breath, letting his shoulders soften. He looked up at Eggchan with a smile that he hoped would smooth the furrow from his best friend’s brow.

“Anyway, what do you want for dinner?”

Eggchan didn’t move for a moment. His gaze remained fixed on Wemmbu's face, searching, evaluating, peeling back the layers of his smile as though looking for something hidden beneath.

The light from the floor caught his eyes, pale blue against the tan warmth of his skin, and in that glow his pupils seemed to have swallowed the irises entirely: two dark wells in a face that was otherwise composed. His wings shifted, a slow motion, the appendages rustling as they resettled against his back. The smaller wings near his face relaxed by degrees, folding forward again to frame his jaw, but not before Wemmbu caught a glimpse of something in the Seraphim's expression.

Something strange. Something that watched him the way a dragon might watch its hoard.

“Hm,” Eggchan said, and the tension in his posture began to dissolve. “I think I want steak.”

Wemmbu snapped off a mocking salute. “Aight, bet.”

He turned toward the stove. Behind him, he felt rather than saw his best friend settle more comfortably onto the stool, elbows resting on the counter, chin propped on one hand.

The Seraphim’s gaze was a physical weight between Wemmbu's shoulder blades, steady and unblinking. It didn’t waver as Wemmbu retrieved the wrapped cuts of beef from the cold box. It didn’t shift as he set out salt, pepper, and a knob of butter that glistened under the light. His best friend’s stare remained fixed, a constant pressure.

The stove flared to life with a twist of Wemmbu's wrist, blue flame licking the underside of the cast-iron pan.

He moved through the kitchen with the ease of long practice, his tail swaying behind him, the scaled silver tip occasionally curling around the handle of a drawer and pulling it open without his hands. He seasoned the meat with a generous hand, pressing the salt into the red flesh until they dissolved, and laid the cuts in the pan with a satisfying sizzle.

The kitchen filled with the scent of searing meat and melting butter. Wemmbu moved from stove to counter and back again, retrieving carrots and potatoes from the basket by the window, washing them under the tap, setting them to boil in a pot of salted water.

Outside, the sun completed its descent. The light filtering through the curtains shifted from gold to a soft violet, and the soul lanterns along the path outside began to glow more brightly in response, their blue flame a counterpoint to the dying day. The cottage walls seemed to draw closer in the dimness, the froglights on the floor pulsing with a rhythm that matched no heartbeat Wemmbu had ever known.

Eggchan watched him.

He hadn’t looked away. His chin rested on his hand, his expression smooth and impenetrable as polished stone. His blue eyes tracked Wemmbu’s every movement with the stillness of something that didn’t need to blink.

The firelight caught the edges of his wings and made them glow faintly. The smaller wings beside his face had gone utterly motionless, as though even that small movement would distract from the act of observation. He looked, in that moment, less like a friend sharing an evening meal and more like a collector admiring a prized possession: a painting hung in a locked gallery, a jewel kept in a velvet box, a songbird that had been taught to sing only for him.

There was something strangely settled about him. The faint tension that had shadowed his features earlier had eased, leaving behind a stillness that was almost serene.

His gaze never left Wemmbu. As though reassuring himself that he was still there.

Wemmbu, his back turned, didn’t see any of this.

He was humming again, prodding the steaks with a fork, checking the sear and adjusting the flame. His thoughts drifted to the carrots, and whether he had added enough salt to the water. Then to the potatoes, debating whether to mash them with butter or serve them roasted.

Wemmbu wasn’t thinking about the weight of the gaze on his neck. Because that weight was as familiar as his own heartbeat, as predictable as the curtains that were always drawn, the windows that never opened, and the front door that locked from the outside when Eggchan thought Wemmbu was asleep.

“Medium rare,” Eggchan said, when Wemmbu glanced over his shoulder with a question about doneness.

“A man of taste,” Wemmbu replied humorously, and returned his attention to the stove.

The night came on in full, drawing itself around the clearing. In the kitchen, Wemmbu plated the steaks, mashed the potatoes with butter and cream, and arranged the carrots in a neat line beside the meat. He set the plates on the counter and pulled up his own stool across from his best friend, their knees nearly touching beneath the overhang of the island.

The Seraphim's expression had softened into something almost warm, the hard edges of his face gentled by the golden light. He looked like Wemmbu’s best friend again.

"Bon appétit," Wemmbu announced, and began eating.

They ate in companionable silence. The food was good. Wemmbu ate with the enthusiasm of someone who had spent the afternoon perched on the edge of the world and had worked up an appetite on the walk home. Eggchan ate more slowly, cutting his meat into precise pieces, chewing each bite with measured deliberation.

Across the table, Wemmbu had the faint impression of being watched. And whenever he looked up, Eggchan was already looking back.

“So. Did you enjoy your walk?” Eggchan asked. His voice was calm now, the earlier sharpness smoothed away, but the question wasn’t quite casual.

Wemmbu nodded, swallowing a mouthful of mashed potato. “Yeah, bro. The sky was really clear today. You could even see all the way to Farville.”

“Right, Farville,” Eggchan repeated. His words were neutral. “You were watching the town?”

“Just looking.” Wemmbu shrugged, cutting another piece of steak. “From the edge, I mean. You can't really see people from up there. Just the rooftops.”

“Okay,” Eggchan said, and his tone was agreeable and pleasant, the inflection of someone making conversation over dinner. But his fork had paused halfway to his mouth, and the smaller wings beside his face had drawn back just slightly, just enough to reveal the subtle tension in his jaw.

“I guess that's harmless enough.”

There was a pause. Wemmbu continued eating, unbothered, his tail curling contentedly around the leg of his stool.

The silence stretched, filled only by the clink of cutlery against plates and the soft hiss of the dying flame on the stove. When Eggchan spoke again, his voice was lighter, almost idle.

“Y’know, I was thinking of adjusting the wards tomorrow. Some players from the town were getting a little too close.”

Wemmbu looked up, a question forming on his lips. The perimeter wards were interesting and strange. He remembered bits and pieces of Eggchan’s explanation: something about detection, boundaries, and the way his strange powers could distinguish between a welcome guest and an unwanted intruder. The details, however, had long since dissolved into a blur of Seraphic terminology and concepts far beyond him.

More than once, Eggchan had attempted to explain the system in greater detail. Wemmbu had listened with interest, following along for as long as he could before the conversation inevitably wandered into territory he couldn’t quite grasp. By the end, he usually found himself nodding and hoping the important parts would stick.

A few of them had. The wards watched over the forest surrounding the cottage and helped keep dangerous players away. Beyond that, Wemmbu was content to leave the finer details in the Seraphim’s hands.

“Sounds good,” Wemmbu said, because it always sounded good, and because Eggchan’s expression had relaxed again into that familiar, gentle attentiveness. “Uh, need any help?”

“No.” The word came quickly, too quickly, and then softened. “I mean— thank you, but it's delicate work. You don’t need to worry.”

Eggchan smiled, and it was a kind smile, the smile of someone who wanted only the best for the person across from him. "You've already done so much recently. You should rest, bro."

Wemmbu didn’t feel particularly tired, but he nodded anyway.

His best friend was usually right about these things. Eggchan knew what Wemmbu needed, often before Wemmbu knew himself. It was one of the things that made living here so effortless. There were no difficult decisions to make, no uncertainties to navigate. There was only the cottage, the forest, and the edge of the Far Lands on days when Eggchan was too absorbed in his research to notice Wemmbu sneaking away.

There was only this life, peaceful and protected, a life that asked nothing of him except that he stay within its strict bounds.

Wemmbu finished his steak. He reached for his glass of water and drank deeply, the cool liquid washing away the salt.

Across from him, Eggchan had finished eating as well, his plate nearly clean, his cutlery arranged in parallel lines. He was still watching. Of course he was still watching. His blue eyes reflected the froglight in pinpricks, and his expression was unreadable.

“Thanks for dinner,” Eggchan said. His voice was soft, genuine.

And Wemmbu, warm and safe in the golden glow of their kitchen, smiled back at him. “Anytime, dude.”

Outside, the soul lanterns flickered. The forest pressed close against the clearing, dark and silent. Inside the cottage, behind the drawn curtains and the locked doors, the evening settled into its familiar rhythm: the quiet clink of dishes being gathered, the soft rustle of wings.

And beneath it all, there was the steady, unending gaze of a being who had once failed his precious friend, and who would burn the SMP to embers before he failed him again.

Chapter Text

The dream began the way it always did, with darkness and the distant sound of screaming. Wemmbu recognized it immediately. He had walked this memory so many times that its edges had worn smooth, its horrors faded to the texture of old parchment.

The fear was still there, of course, somewhere beneath the surface, but it no longer clawed at his chest the way it once had. It was simply a story now. A memory he already knew the ending to, and the ending itself was what made it bearable.

The darkness of the End surrounded him: cold, vast, and humming with a frequency that vibrated in his bones.

Wemmbu was small again. His horns had just breached the surface of his skull, nubs of silver-gray that ached when he pressed on them, and his wings were still too weak to carry him farther than a few stumbling feet. He was hidden. He was always hidden, tucked into a crevice between mounds of Endstone on an island far from the main platform, the one with the empty pedestal where an egg had once rested.

The egg there had been a decoy. His mother had told him this many times, her voice a low rumble that vibrated through the stone and into his chest. She had laid a false egg on the central island, a hollow thing of calcium and illusion, so that greedy players would take it, leave the End, and never think to search for the true child she had hidden away.

The players in this dream were faceless. They always were. Wemmbu could remember the glint of their diamond armor and the way their boots had struck the Endstone, but their features blurred into smears of shadow and light.

The cruel players had come during a window of absence. His mother had hissed it to him as she shoved him deeper into the crevice, her great scaled body coiling around the entrance like a wall of living obsidian.

The God of the End was nowhere, and the Guardian of the End wasn’t in his usual post. His mother's voice had been thick with fury and betrayal, her words jagged as she spoke of the two beings who should have protected them. “They abandoned us,” she had growled, her purple eyes burning in the dark. They let the players through. They wanted this. The God and the Guardian betrayed their own realm.

Wemmbu had believed her then, and he believed her still. What reason did he have to doubt the only parent who had ever loved him, the great Ender Dragon who had wrapped herself around him and called him her precious, singular treasure? The gods were unreliable. The gods wouldn’t protect him. This truth had been seared into him that day, and it had never faded.

The dream shifted, the way dreams do, skipping over the long hours of hiding while his mother fought.

Wemmbu remembered the sounds vividly. The roars that shook the island. The twang of bowstrings. The terrible, wet sound of a diamond blade finding purchase in scales that had never been broken before. He remembered the silence that followed, vast and suffocating, and how he had pressed his hands over his mouth to keep himself from screaming. His mother had told him that no matter what he heard, he must not make a sound.

She had died protecting him. And she had died believing the End gods had forsaken them both.

The rage that rose inside Wemmbu was old and familiar. It was a scar that had healed into something hard and cold rather than something tender.

Wemmbu wasn’t the type to plan revenge. He wasn’t the type to nurse grudges until they bloomed into action. But he had learned, that day, that players were dangerous. That they would kill for greed and trophy. He learned that the world beyond his mother's embrace was a place of cruelty and violence.

And then, just as the dream threatened to tip into the unbearable, the light came.

It began as a soft glow at the edge of his hiding place, white and warm, and with it came a presence that settled over him like a wing.

The angel appeared young. That was the first thing Wemmbu had noticed back then; the angel looked like a teenager, like someone his own age, with tan skin, white hair, and eyes the color of clear blue. His white wings were enormous, even in the cramped space of the crevice, and they folded around Wemmbu with a gentleness that made his heart ache.

Wemmbu didn’t trust the angel at first. His mother had warned him about players, about strangers, about anyone who might try to take him away. But the angel had knelt in the stone, not reaching for him just yet. He simply waited, patient and still, his expression soft with something that looked like recognition and felt like relief. And when the angel finally spoke, his voice was low, steady, and kind.

“I've been looking for you,” he had said.

The dream never showed what happened next with clarity.

There was only the sensation of a hand closing around his own, and then a weight settling into his bones. It had felt immense and soothing, like a blanket woven from starlight. It was an oath, though Wemmbu hadn’t known the word for it then. It was the distinct feeling of being claimed by something holy, something that would never let him go.

The angel was a Seraphim, and he was his.

They eventually left the End together. And when the cold void gave way to the warm green of the Overworld, Wemmbu had understood, with a certainty that felt older than he was, that this was meant to be. That they were meant to be. Two survivors; two outcasts.

An Ender Dragon and a Seraphim against a world that would tear them apart if it ever found them.

The dream dissolved, and Wemmbu stirred to consciousness.

“Wemmbu? Bro.”

The voice was familiar, low and nonchalant, and it pulled him upward through layers of sleep with gentle insistence. He felt a hand on his shoulder, shaking him with careful, measured pressure. Not too hard, not too soft. Exactly enough to wake him up without startling him.

Wemmbu opened his eyes. The afternoon light filtered through the oak canopy in flickering shafts of gold and green. He had to blink several times before the world resolved into clarity. Above him, the leaves rustled with a breeze he couldn’t feel. Before him, kneeling in the grass with his hands now folded neatly on his lap, was Eggchan.

His best friend looked older than he did in the dream. Of course he did. The dream was an old memory, preserved in amber, and years had passed since that fateful day in the End.

Eggchan's jaw had sharpened, his shoulders had broadened, and the softness of adolescence had given way to the lean facial structure of adulthood. His white shaggy hair fell across his forehead in its usual disordered sweep, and his blue eyes regarded Wemmbu with a strange expression: curiosity, perhaps, or something adjacent to it. The smaller wings beside his face fluttered once, then settled. He was wearing a simple suit, the sleeves rolled to his elbows, the fabric slightly rumpled from a day spent indoors.

Wemmbu rubbed his eye with his fist, smothering a yawn. “Oh, hey,” he murmured.

He was sitting on the grass with his back against the trunk of an oak tree, his legs crossed and his tail coiled loosely beside him.

The training area stretched out before him in a wide clearing behind the cottage, a space that bore the unmistakable marks of daily, vigorous use.

The ground was packed gravel and bare earth, worn smooth in the center where his footwork had scoured the grass away over years of repetition. Training dummies stood at intervals along the perimeter, their burlap bodies stitched and re-stitched where his weapons had torn through them, their armor stand frames notched with the memory of countless strikes. The trees at the clearing's edge bore scars of their own: trunks scored with the clean lines of axe and sword practice, branches lopped off at precise angles where he had practiced his aim with thrown weapons.

A rack of unused training swords leaned against one trunk, and a set of iron weights sat in a row beside a patch of earth that was more crater than ground, the result of repeated impact drills. The air smelled of churned soil, sap, and the faint tang of cobblestone.

Wemmbu remembered now. ‘Melee practice.’

He had run through his forms until his arms burned and his breath came in sharp, controlled bursts. Then he had sat down against the tree to rest, and apparently rest had become sleep.

His netherite chestplate was still strapped to his torso, the enchantments flickering faintly under the dappled light, and his axe was still in his dominant hand, his fingers loosely curled around its handle. Wemmbu had fallen asleep in full armor, which was absurd, and yet the netherite armor was so familiar to him now that it felt almost like second skin.

He didn’t remember sleeping in it, but of course he had dreamed. Wemmbu always dreamed whenever he slept, whether the dreams were memories or something nice and safe, like his everyday life in the cottage.

“Dude, you've been sleeping for an hour and a half,” Eggchan said.

His voice was certain and precise, carrying the quiet inflection of someone who had kept careful count of every minute. His head wings fluttered once, a brief flicker of movement that revealed and then hid the line of his jaw. His expression was slightly twisted with something that looked like fondness, or assessment, or neither.

Wemmbu straightened against the trunk, rolling his shoulders to work out the stiffness.

He slid his netherite axe into his inventory with a practiced flick of his wrist, the weapon dissolving into motes of light that vanished into the slot on his hotbar.

“I guess I'm a little tired,” he admitted, shrugging. “What's up?”

Wemmbu placed his hands on his lap, sitting cross-legged on the grass. His scaled tail swept idly behind him, brushing fallen leaves into a scattered pile. The afternoon sun was warm on his face, and the last fragments of the dream were already fading, retreating to the back of his mind where they lived.

He didn’t mind that they lingered there. They weren’t unpleasant, not really. There was a comfort in that dream despite its darkness. There was a light at the end of it: the fated moment when he met his best friend.

“Oh, nothing really,” Eggchan said. He hadn’t moved from his kneeling position, his wings folded behind him in perfect symmetry, the great white arcs of them rising above his shoulders. “I was just about to ask if you wanted to continue sleeping in your bedroom. Sleeping here must not be comfortable bro.”

Wemmbu chuckled, not denying it. The tree trunk was rough against his spine, and his neck had a crick in it that he hadn’t noticed until now.

“Uh, yeah.” He stretched, raising his arms above his head and feeling the satisfying pull of muscle. Then he reached for the clasps of his chestplate, working at the straps with practiced efficiency. “But I'm pretty well rested now. Don't need to sleep for more.”

He had undone the first clasp when his best friend spoke again.

“Wait.”

The word was flat and final, like a door closing. Wemmbu stopped, his fingers stilling on the second clasp, and looked up with his head tilted to the side. His hair, tied high in a ponytail for today's training, shifted across his back with the movement. Eggchan was smiling now, a small and pleasant curve of his lips that didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“You should keep those on,” his best friend said. “I was going to send you on an errand, actually.”

Wemmbu brightened. "Yo, really?"

He straightened, abandoning the clasp, his tail giving an involuntary flick of excitement. An errand. That could only mean one thing.

“Yep. You can visit Farville today. I've got a list of tasks for you to do.” Eggchan's voice was nonchalant, even casual, but there was something measured in the way he spoke, as though he were granting a privilege that could be revoked at any moment.

Wemmbu felt a surge of anticipation. ‘Right, it’s been a while since I visited Farville.’

The townsfolk with their kind smiles, their yellow aesthetic, and their endless questions about when he would visit again. It had been several weeks since his last trip, and the stagnation of the cottage had begun to press against the edges of his mind in ways he didn’t care to examine too closely. He would never tell Eggchan that, of course. The Seraphim would disapprove, and he would worry too. Worrying made Eggchan unreadable and strange. Wemmbu much preferred the version of his best friend who knelt before him now with a pleasant expression and an errand list in hand.

“Alright,” Wemmbu said, refastening the clasp he had loosened. His netherite armor sat snug against his torso once more, the enchantments humming faintly against his skin.

Eggchan always insisted on proper protection whenever Wemmbu left the forest. It was one of his rules, and Wemmbu followed it the way he followed all of Eggchan's rules: without question and without complaint, because the rules themselves existed to keep him safe.

His best friend rose from his kneeling position with a fluidity that seemed almost mechanical, his wings barely rustling with the movement. He extended a hand toward Wemmbu, and Wemmbu took it, letting himself be pulled to his feet. Eggchan’s grip was cool and firm, his palm smooth against Wemmbu's calloused fingers.

He held on for a moment longer than necessary, his thumb briefly pressing against the inside of Wemmbu’s wrist before releasing. He was likely checking his pulse.

“So, what's on the list?” Wemmbu asked, dusting off the grass on his trousers.

His dark tail swayed behind him with barely contained energy. He was already thinking about the walk to Farville, the familiar path through the oaks, the moment when the trees would thin and the town would reveal itself in its cluster of rooftops and chimneys.

Eggchan's expression remained neutral, but his gaze was fixed on Wemmbu's face with an intensity that missed nothing.

“Mutton,” he began listing. “Porkchops. Materials for bookmaking. Leather, primarily, and a decent quantity of paper. Ink sacs for writing ink.” He paused, his head wings giving a small flutter. “It's mostly supplies for my research, and the meat is for us both. We're running a little low.”

Wemmbu nodded, filing each item into his memory.

His inventory was a chaotic mess of weapons, potions, and half-used stacks of building materials. Wemmbu began sorting through it as he listened, moving items between slots with the efficiency of long practice. He aligned his favorite spear in his primary hotbar slot, its netherite head gleaming with enchantments he had applied himself. Beside it, his axe and his sword sat ready. Golden carrots went into the slot reserved for food. Splash potions of strength were tucked into a corner where he could reach them without looking. And lastly, wind charges and ender pearls for mobility.

He didn’t need fireworks or an elytra to fly; his own wings, currently folded and hidden from view, could carry him if necessary, though he rarely unfurled them. They drew too much attention, and his best friend had taught him that attention was dangerous.

“I think that's everything,” Eggchan said. He was still watching, his blue eyes following the movements of Wemmbu's hands as he organized his inventory.

“You've been good lately, so I figured you'd appreciate the trip.”

There was something in the phrasing that snagged at the edge of Wemmbu's awareness, something about the way his best friend talked as though Wemmbu were a child being rewarded for obedience. But the thought was fleeting, there and then gone, washed away by the anticipation of the errand.

Eggchan was just being Eggchan. He was protective. He liked to acknowledge when things went smoothly, when Wemmbu followed the rules and stayed safe. There was nothing strange about that. There was nothing strange about any of this.

“Thanks, bro,” Wemmbu said, and he meant it. He flashed Eggchan a grin, sharp and genuine, his purple eyes crinkling at the corners. “I'll be back before you know it.”

"Before sunset," Eggchan apprised. The words weren’t a suggestion. They landed with the weight of a condition, a stern boundary fixed in place.

His expression hadn’t changed. It was still pleasant and calm, but there was something in the set of his jaw that brooked no argument. “Be careful, dude. Stay on the path, and if anyone gives you trouble, you come straight home. Don’t engage unless you have to.”

It was the same warning he gave every time Wemmbu left their forest. By now, Wemmbu knew it by heart. He could have recited the words alongside him, matching them sentence for sentence. ‘Be careful. Stay on the path. Come straight home.’ The instructions settled into his mind as naturally as breathing.

It was endearing, really, the way his best friend fussed over him like a mother hen. Eggchan worried because he cared; he always had. And his worries had a way of becoming rules. They became curfews, routines, and reminders repeated often enough that they felt less like restrictions and more like common sense. They became the quiet certainty that someone was always looking out for him, always keeping watch.

Wemmbu didn’t mind. There was comfort in being cared for so thoroughly. Comfort in the constant presence of a gaze that never seemed to stray far from him.

"I know, I know," Wemmbu reassured, adjusting the straps of his chestplate one final time.

Then he reached into his inventory and pulled out a cloak, its fabric a deep navy blue that pooled in his hands. The garment was long, meant to fall to the ground. As he swung it over his shoulders and fastened the tie at his throat, the heavy cloth settled around him in a way that concealed the glint of his netherite armor beneath. Only the tip of his tail peeked out from under the hem, the dark silver scales catching the light as it swayed.

He didn’t pull up the hood. Instead, Wemmbu reached back and gathered his ponytail, freeing it from the collar so that it fell behind him in a sweep of violet against the navy color.

The cloak lent him an anonymity Eggchan wanted. In Farville, the townsfolk knew him well enough, but the path between the cottage and the town wasn’t always empty.

He turned toward the treeline, orienting himself in the direction of Farville. The forest path was already forming in his mind, every twist and turn mapped with the precision of years. Behind him, he heard Eggchan's wings shuffle, a soft susurrus of feather against feather, and then the Seraphim spoke one last time.

"Good. Off you go, then."

Wemmbu lifted a hand in a lazy wave, and stepped into the path between the trees. The navy wool trailed behind him, skimming the forest floor.

The forest swallowed Wemmbu quickly. The oak trees closed around his form, their trunks dense and their canopies thick. Within moments he was nothing more than a flicker of movement between the leaves. The afternoon light followed him in fragments, scattered and golden, and then even those fragments faded as he moved deeper into the woods.

Eggchan didn’t move for a moment.

He stood at the edge of the training clearing, his arms loose at his sides and his wings held in their usual perfect symmetry.

The pleasant expression he had worn for Wemmbu was gone. It had slipped from his face the moment the Ender Dragon disappeared from view, replaced by something neutral and stiff, a mask carved from marble and left to weather. His blue eyes, which had been warm with attentiveness, were now cold and slightly pale, fixed on the point in the treeline where Wemmbu's violet hair had last been visible.

The Seraphim didn’t look away. He didn’t even blink.

The forest was silent around him. The only sound was the soft, steady rhythm of his breathing, slow enough to be almost imperceptible, and the faint rustle of his wings as he shifted his weight.

A single white feather detached from the curve of his primary wing.

It floated upward, drifting on a current of air that seemed to exist for it alone, and as it rose it began to change. The barbs dissolved and reformed; the shaft thickened and curved. By the time it reached the height of Eggchan's shoulder, it was no longer a feather at all. It was a blue eyeball, with a slit pupil that dilated once before focusing. A pair of tiny white wings sprouted from its sides, fluttering with a motion that was too fast, too mechanical, like the wings of a hummingbird made from eyes.

The Seraphim flicked his wrist.

The eyeball turned and flew into the forest, following the path Wemmbu had taken. It wove between the oaks with an agility that defied its strange anatomy, its tiny wings beating a soundless rhythm. Within seconds it had vanished into the shadows.

Eggchan closed his eyes.

The clearing remained silent. And then, slowly, other shapes began to emerge from the edges of the training area.

They came from behind trunks, from within the dense foliage of the underbrush, from the hollow spaces between roots. Eyeballs. Dozens of them. Each one bright blue, each one with its own pair of tiny white wings, each one rotating slowly in the air as its gaze swept across the forest. They had been there the whole time, hidden in the shadows, watching from every angle.

They didn’t all reveal themselves. Only the ones closest to the clearing emerged, and even they remained half-concealed, peering out from behind leaves and branches with the patient stillness of spiders in their webs.

None of them were watching the clearing. They were all facing outward. Facing the forest. They focused on every possible direction from which something might approach.

The Seraphim opened his eyes. The blue of his irises had been swallowed by the black of his pupils, leaving only two dark depths in a face that was no longer bothering to appear human. His expression was empty, and his gaze remained hollow. He turned his head with a motion that was too smooth, the movement of a creature that had learned to mimic life without ever quite inhabiting it.

There was a bird in the trees.

It was small and vibrantly colored, its feathers a riot of orange, yellow, and green. A sun conure parrot. It was perched on a branch near the edge of the clearing, its claws gripping the bark with a tension that betrayed its wariness. Its black beady eyes were fixed on the Seraphim with an intelligence that no ordinary bird should possess.

The eyeballs turned in unison. Every single one of them rotated, pupils dilating, and locked onto the parrot.

The bird froze.

The weight of the Seraphim's gaze was immense. It pressed down on the innocent parrot like a physical force, a suffocating pressure that made the air itself feel thick and unbreathable.

The tiny creature didn’t flinch. It didn’t even try to fly. It couldn’t. It was pinned to its branch by the sheer, crushing attention of a being that had once stood before the heavens and been deemed worthy of redemption, a being whose very nature was holy judgment made to manifest.

A fallen angel, who now held the power of a Seraphim.

Eggchan frowned. The expression was small, almost delicate, a faint downward curve of his lips that didn’t reach the black pits of his eyes. His voice, when he spoke, was soft and almost gentle.

“Silly bird. You're not supposed to be here.”

His enchanted bow materialized in his hand in an instant. One moment his palm was empty. The next, the weapon was there, its wooden limbs curved and gleaming, its string already drawn back with an arrow nocked and ready. The motion was seamless, faster than thought, faster than the eye of a bird could follow.

The arrow whistled through the air.

It struck the parrot in its left eye with a sound that was wet, small, and final. The impact carried the tiny body backward, pinning it to the trunk of the tree.

Blood sprayed in an arc, spattering the bark and the leaves below. The parrot's remaining eye went wide and glassy before the light drained from it entirely. The body twitched once, twice, and then went still. The arrow had driven clean through the skull and into the wood. The bird hung there, its bright feathers already darkening with blood, its beak slightly open in an expression that might have been surprise.

The floating eyeballs didn’t react. They continued their silent vigil, their pupils fixed on the corpse for a moment longer before they turned back toward the forest, resuming their watch.

The Seraphim lowered his bow. He studied the dead bird for a long moment, his expression unreadable and his head tilted slightly to the side. The blood was beginning to drip down the trunk in slow trails. A few droplets had landed on the grass below, glistening darkly in the afternoon light.

Then he dismissed the bow with a shift of his wrist, and it vanished back into his inventory as though it had never been used.

"Go away," the Seraphim murmured. His voice was barely a whisper, flat and utterly devoid of emotion. "Stupid God of the Overworld."

He turned away from the tree and walked back toward the cottage, his wings folding behind him with the slow grace of a closing door.

The floating eyeballs remained where they were, hovering in the shadows, watching the forest with their blue light and their tiny white wings that beat without sound. Then, one by one, they withdrew.

They slipped back behind trunks, sinking into foliage, tucking themselves into the hollow spaces between branches where the darkness lay thickest. Within seconds, the clearing appeared empty again, innocent and still, as though nothing had ever disturbed its peace. But the blue eyes were still there. They were always there, nestled in their hiding places, their pupils dilated and unblinking, their tiny wings folded against their spherical bodies. The forest was never unwatched.

The parrot's blood continued to drip. The afternoon light caught the red hue and made it gleam, bright and wet against the dark bark. The forest remained silent, and the cottage door closed with a soft, final click.

Chapter Text

The marketplace of Farville bloomed around Wemmbu like a garden of noise and color.

Stalls lined the cobblestone path in orderly rows, their wooden frames draped with canopies of yellow and white that rippled in the afternoon breeze. The air carried the scent of fresh bread, smoked meat, and something sweet that Wemmbu couldn't identify.

Players moved through the spaces between shops in a steady flow, their voices overlapping into a pleasant hum of conversation and barter. The cobblestone beneath his netherite boots was worn smooth by years of footsteps, and the lanterns that hung from wooden posts along the main road had been lit early, their flames flickering gently even in the daylight.

Farville wasn't a large civilization. Two hundred people, maybe a few more. But it carried itself with the confidence of a place that had never known scarcity.

The stalls were heavy with goods. Diamonds glinted from display cases. Netherite ingots sat in locked chests beside enchanted tools that shimmered with purple light. Golden apples were stacked in neat rows, their surfaces catching the sun and throwing it back in warm gleams. Players traded diamonds for weapons, iron for wool, XP bottles for potions brewed in stands that bubbled and hissed at the edges of the market.

Wemmbu stood at the counter of a small shop tucked between a bakery and a leatherworker, his fingers resting on the worn wood as he waited.

The shopkeeper, a woman whose nametag read [Ater_ink] above her head in faint dark letters, was humming softly as she gathered his purchases. Her movements were unhurried but precise, each item wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine before being placed into a cloth bag.

“Four bundles of leather, as requested,” she said, her voice carrying the comfortable cadence of someone who enjoyed her work. “And the paper. This batch is good quality, I tell 'ya. Pressed it myself last week. You'll want to keep it away from anything damp though.”

Wemmbu nodded, filing the information away. Eggchan would know how to store it properly.

A small tug at his cloak drew his attention downward. The child who had attached himself to Wemmbu earlier stood pressed against his side, one tiny fist clenched around a fold of navy wool.

He couldn't have been older than eight, with a mop of brown hair that fell into his eyes and a round face still soft with baby fat. His nametag read [Tomu]. He had appeared beside Wemmbu somewhere between the marketplace and the residential sector, silent and starry-eyed. He had been following him ever since.

A few stalls away, a cluster of other children played some game involving sticks and a leather ball, but their attention kept drifting toward Wemmbu. They would look, whisper, then look again, their faces bright with the particular fascination kids reserved for things they didn't quite understand but desperately wanted to.

It had been this way since his first visit. The children of Farville had decided, with the absolute certainty only kids could manage, that Wemmbu was someone worth following or sneaking peeks at.

The first time he had come here, Eggchan had walked beside him. Wemmbu remembered that day with sharp clarity.

The Seraphim's wing had brushed against his back with every step, a constant pressure behind him. Eggchan's gaze had swept the market with the cold assessment of someone cataloging threats. His hand had rested on Wemmbu's shoulder the entire time, guiding him away from certain people, certain conversations that he deemed unsuitable.

It had taken years to reach that day. Months of arguments conducted in the quiet, stubborn way that Eggchan always argued. He never raised his voice or lost his temper; he simply repeated his refusal in the same flat, final tone until Wemmbu’s protests crumbled against it like waves against a cliff.

The Seraphim had hidden him from the world with the thoroughness of someone burying a secret. No players, no villages. His best friend ensured he had no contact with anyone beyond the oak forest, the cottage, and the Far Lands peak; a place Wemmbu was allowed to visit only because Eggchan couldn't physically fence off the edge of the server.

The isolation had been total. Wemmbu hadn’t seen another face besides Eggchan's for years after leaving the End. He hadn't even heard another voice. He hadn't known, during those long and quiet years, that he was being kept from anything at all. He had accepted it without question, as naive people often do, never imagining there might be anything beyond the boundaries drawn around him.

But the restlessness had grown.

It had started in his muscles, an ache his training couldn't fully soothe. Then it had spread to his mind, a hunger for something more than the same trees, the same rooms, the same blue eyes watching him from across the room. Those eyes that never seemed to blink quite often enough. Dark irises that followed him from the kitchen to the stairs to the door, steady and always there.

Eventually, Wemmbu had begun to ask questions. What was beyond the forest? What did other players look like? Could they visit a village, just once, just to see?

Eggchan had refused, his wings stiff and his gaze heavy with a worry that Wemmbu didn't fully understand.

And then, slowly, incrementally, the refusals had begun to soften. Maybe Eggchan had realized that Wemmbu's restlessness wasn't a phase he could outgrow. Perhaps he had understood that keeping Wemmbu locked away forever would eventually breed resentment, and resentment was a crack in the foundation of their friendship he had so carefully cultivated.

Or maybe he had simply grown tired of the constant arguments. Wemmbu could be stubborn too, in his own way, and years of asking the same questions had worn grooves into Eggchan's patience.

The compromise had been this: Wemmbu could visit the nearest civilization, but only with Eggchan. And later, once Eggchan had deemed the town safe and the townsfolk trustworthy, Wemmbu could visit alone. But only when Eggchan permitted it, only when Eggchan said yes.

The arrangement had been presented as a gesture of trust, and Wemmbu had accepted it with gratitude. He had been required to promise, in exchange for this small freedom, that he would never go anywhere else without Eggchan's explicit command. He had promised, and Wemmbu meant it. He had never broken that promise.

Six visits in total. This was his sixth. Each one had required permission, and each permission had been granted like a gift.

It was fine. It was better than fine. The townsfolk were kind, the civilization was lively, and for a few hours every few months, Wemmbu could remember what it felt like to be part of something larger than a cottage in the woods.

“Here are the ink sacs,” The shopkeeper continued, pulling Wemmbu back to the present. She placed three small glass vials on the counter, each one filled with a dark liquid that shifted thickly when she moved them. “Squid ink, fresh from the river trade. Your friend will be pleased with these, I think. He always did have an eye for quality.”

Wemmbu smiled, the expression tugging at the corner of his mouth. “He's particular about his writing supplies.”

“Particular is good, it means he knows what he wants.” The shopkeeper returned the smile, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “And how is your angel friend? Keeping well, I hope?”

“He's fine,” Wemmbu replied. The answer came easily, the way all vague answers came easily after years of practice. “Busy with, uh, research. You know how it is.”

Ater_ink nodded, though her expression suggested she didn’t, in fact, know how it was. No one else did.

Eggchan's research was a mystery to Wemmbu as well, a constant background hum of books, notes, and late nights in the upstairs office Wemmbu wasn't supposed to disturb. The Seraphim studied history, psychology, and the architecture of the mind. Wemmbu had asked about it once, early in their life together, and his best friend had explained in a way that was both thorough and utterly opaque, leaving Wemmbu with more questions than answers.

He remembered the way Eggchan's head wings had fluttered when he spoke, the way his blue eyes had brightened with feverish intensity.

Although he was happy for his best friend’s enthusiasm, Wemmbu hadn’t asked again. Whatever Eggchan was studying, it seemed to exist somewhere beyond the limits of his understanding.

“You should visit more often,” The shopkeeper said, her voice warm.

She gestured toward the child, who was still clutching Wemmbu's cloak with the devotion of a limpet. “The little ones adore you. Look at him. You'd think you were his older brother, the way he follows you around.”

Wemmbu glanced down at the child. Tomu gazed back up at him with wide, unblinking eyes, his grip on the cloak tightening as though he feared Wemmbu might leave if he let go.

‘This kid is strange,’ Wemmbu thought with a little fondness.

Quiet, clingy, and entirely too trusting of a stranger who didn’t belong in Farville. But he was also kind of cute, in the way that small things were cute, and Wemmbu found himself reaching down to ruffle the brown hair with his free hand. The strands were soft beneath his fingers. Tomu made a small, pleased sound and pressed closer.

“He’s just curious,” Wemmbu pointed out.

Ater_ink laughed, a bright sound that cut through the market noise. “The kids like you. Well, we all do. Farville's a friendly place, but you bring out something special in some of us. Maybe it's the mystery, y’know? A demon hybrid who lives in the forest with an angel. It sounds like the start of a fairy tale.”

Right, a demon hybrid. That was what he told them, exactly what Eggchan had instructed him to tell anyone who asked.

Demons were common in the Unstable SMP, just another variant among the countless hybrids that populated the server. His horns and tail drew no suspicion, especially when the latter was mostly covered. No player looked twice at a demon browsing the market stalls, and no one wondered why an angel might be guarding one so closely. “It was a necessary disguise,” Eggchan had explained.

A dragon was a trophy waiting to be claimed. The Ender Dragon's sole offspring, the last of a bloodline that players had tried to exterminate, was something most would kill to possess.

Thus, Wemmbu pretended to be a demon for his safety, and he had repeated the falsehood plenty of times now that it felt like honesty.

The shopkeeper's kindness was genuine, and he had no desire to dim it with the thoughts of his casual deceit. So he only shrugged, the movement casual, and reached into his inventory for the diamonds.

“Here,” he said, placing five diamonds on the counter. They caught the light and scattered it in rainbow fragments across the wood. “For everything. Keep the change.”

The shopkeeper's eyes widened. “Uh, that's far too much. The leather alone is worth maybe two, but the rest—”

“Keep the change,” Wemmbu repeated with a casual tone. He was already gathering the cloth bag, tucking it carefully into his inventory.

“Uhm, you do good work, and good work deserves good pay.”

The shopkeeper stared at him for a moment, then shook her head with a smile that was half exasperation and half affection. “Aren't you sweet? Most traders would've haggled me down to an emerald. But not you. Not our Wemmbu.”

‘Our Wemmbu.’ The phrase settled over him like a warm blanket, unfamiliar and unexpectedly pleasant.

He wasn't sure when he had become theirs. He wasn't sure if he had earned it. But the shopkeeper said it with such easy sincerity that he found himself believing it anyway.

“There's a festival coming up,” Ater_ink added, leaning her elbows on the counter. “Annual devotion for the God of Order. We celebrate it every year around this time. A week of feasting and offerings. The priests say it's to honor the god who keeps the SMP stable, but really it's just an excuse to eat too much and dance in the square. The farmers bring in their best harvest for the blessing ceremony.”

The shopkeeper smiled at him. “You should come. Bring your angel friend too. The two of you would definitely be welcome.”

Wemmbu listened with half his attention, the rest of it drifting toward the children still playing in the corner of his vision.

He knew about the God of Order. Everyone and their mothers knew about the God of Order. The being who had once been a king, who had ascended to godhood after the wars and now ruled the Overworld with a steady and watchful hand.

Eggchan was the one who taught him about the gods in the SMP. His best friend had told him many things about the gods, and none of them were flattering. They were unreliable, self-serving. Even the End gods had abandoned the Ender Dragon when she needed them most. Wemmbu had absorbed these lessons the way he absorbed all of his best friend’s words, which was to say completely and without question. The gods weren't to be trusted or worshipped. The gods were, at best, a distant irrelevance, and at worst, a threat.

‘But a festival sounded nice,’ he thought.

“Maybe,” Wemmbu said, noncommittal. “I'll ask Eggchan first.”

Ater_ink beamed. “You do that. And if you do come by, participate in the dance. It'd be fun.”

Wemmbu laughed, surprised by the offer. “I'll keep that in mind.”

“Mhn. Oh, you mentioned you’re looking for meat earlier, yeah? The butcher's shop is two streets over, just past the fountain. You can't miss it.”

“Thanks,” Wemmbu said, and meant it. He gave Tomu's hair one final ruffle, then gently pried the child's fingers from his cloak and took his small hand instead. “Come on, little guy. Let's go find some porkchops.”

The child nodded solemnly, as though porkchops were a matter of great importance, and fell into step beside him.

The walk through the marketplace was slow. Not because the distance was great, but because the townsfolk wouldn't let him pass without acknowledgment.

A woman selling wool waved at him from her stall, her face bright with recognition. An older man clapped him on the shoulder as he passed, his grip firm and friendly. A pair of teenagers loitering near the fountain straightened at the sight of him, their expressions shifting into eager grins. One of them mimicked a spear thrust with enthusiasm, and the other called out something about the combative tricks Wemmbu had performed during his last visit a few weeks ago.

More voices joined the chorus as he walked. A baker leaned out of his shop door to shout a greeting. A group of women sorting herbs at a stall paused their work to smile and wave. Even the players who didn’t approach him directly watched him pass with small smiles. They had long since decided he was one of their own, however infrequently he visited.

Wemmbu fielded these greetings with a mixture of warmth and awkwardness.

He wasn't accustomed to attention. The cottage was quiet, and the forest was often empty. Eggchan's presence was a constant, but it was a quiet constant, a watchful silence rather than an outpouring of noise. At home, there were no unexpected hands reaching for his shoulder, no voices calling his name from across a crowded square. There was only the soft rustle of wings and the unblinking gaze that followed him from room to room.

Here, in Farville, everyone seemed to know him, and while the kindness was genuine and the smiles were real, he didn't quite know what to do with it. He smiled back. He nodded. He lifted a hand in a wave that felt slightly stiff.

Wemmbu hoped his discomfort wasn't as visible as it felt. The cloak helped. The heavy navy wool gave him something to hide behind, a barrier between himself and the world. The tip of his tail peeked out beneath the hem as he walked, swaying with each step, and Tomu kept trying to step on it in a way that might have been intentional.

A woman approached through a crowd, her expression a mixture of relief and exasperation. Her nametag read [Mika01], and her brown hair was the same shade as Tomu's. The resemblance was unmistakable.

“There you are,” she said, her voice carrying the particular exhaustion one would hear from a parent. “I'm so sorry. He slipped away while I was talking to my friends. Tomu, you can't just run off like that.”

Tomu looked at his mother with the betrayed expression of a child who had been having a very good time and saw no reason for it to end. He didn't release Wemmbu's hand.

Wemmbu crouched down, bringing himself to the kid's eye level. “Go on,” he said, trying to be gentle. “Your mom's looking for you.”

Tomu's lower lip jutted out. It was a formidable pout, the kind that had probably won him many battles against parental authority. But Wemmbu was immune to pouts, or at least he pretended to be. After a moment of silent negotiation, the child released his hand and trudged toward his mother.

“Sorry,” Mika01 said again, scooping Tomu into her arms. “You know kids. He's been talking about you for weeks. Ever since your last visit. I think you've got a fan, dude.”

“It's fine,” Wemmbu said. “He's cute.”

“Say bye bye now,” the mother instructed, and Tomu lifted one small hand in a wave that was more tragic than cheerful.

Wemmbu waved back, a small smile tugging at his lips. He watched them disappear into the crowd, the mother carrying her child toward the residential streets. A second later, he turned to continue toward the butcher's shop.

A fountain burbled behind him. The sun was warm on his face. The market hummed with life, commerce, and the easy peace of a civilization that had known nothing but safety for years.

Wemmbu glanced up at the sky, noting the position of the sun. It was still a few hours before sunset. He had plenty of time. He would finish the errands and be home before the light began to fade. Eggchan would be pleased. Eggchan was often pleased when Wemmbu returned on time, his expression softening from that watchful tension into something warmer, something that looked like relief.

All of a sudden, every communicator in the vicinity pinged at once.

The sound was unmistakable. A sharp, synchronized chime that cut through the marketplace noise like blade through silk.

Wemmbu stopped walking. His hand, already reaching for his inventory, froze mid-motion. Around him, the other players were doing the same. Conversations halted, laughter died.

Wemmbu pulled out his communicator. The screen flickered to life, and there it was, stark black text against the pale blue background:

CptFallow was slain by green_0fficer using [Viridis].
CptFallow left the game.

The marketplace erupted into confusion and panic.

A player nearby gasped. A man near the fountain was already running, his boots slamming against the cobblestone path as he headed toward the entrance gates. Others were backing away from the main road, their faces tight with anxiety. The woman who had sold Wemmbu his ink was standing by her shop, one hand braced against the frame, her expression stricken.

Their reactions made sense. The Unstable SMP had been a peaceful server for several years now, more specifically in the Overworld. The civil wars and the conflicts that followed had faded into history.

Most of the players in Farville had probably lived most of their lives without hearing the ping of a death notification. Some of the younger ones, the teenagers who had been loitering by the fountain, had probably never seen one at all. The message on their screens wasn’t just alarming. It was a relic of a time they had been raised to believe was over.

Wemmbu stared at the message. The name meant nothing to him.

The nametag [CptFallow] wasn't someone he knew. He wasn't someone he had ever met. But a death message in Farville, a civilization that had been peaceful for as long as he had known it, meant something had gone wrong.

"If something goes wrong, you come straight home."

The Seraphim’s voice echoed in his mind, flat and certain. It was the rule. It had always been the rule. Trouble meant retreat; it was as simple as that. Wemmbu could almost feel the weight of Eggchan's gaze, the way it pressed down just firmly enough to guide, to steer him away from anything that might threaten the careful safety of their life together.

In this scenario, Wemmbu was supposed to put his errands aside, walk back into the forest, and let whatever was happening in Farville happen without him. That was what his best friend had warned him to do. And if Wemmbu disobeyed, if he involved himself in something that had nothing to do with him and everything to do with the violence Eggchan had spent years protecting him from, then there would be consequences.

Eggchan would be angry. His wings would go stiff and his blue eyes would fix on Wemmbu with that heavy, unblinking stare that made the air feel thicker. The Seraphim might lock him in the basement again, without anything but the clothes on his back.

But the death message had made his heart skip.

Not with fear, but with something else. Something that felt like the moment before a jump, the breathless anticipation of a fall. Something that sang in his blood and made his fingers curl around the ghost of a weapon he wasn't holding just yet.

It had been so long since he had seen a death message. Years of living in the oak forest, hundreds of blocks away from the nearest civilization, where the communicator's range didn't reach and the only announcements were the ones Wemmbu gained after a basic accomplishment. The silence of the forest had been complete. No deaths, no kills, no violence. Only the soft rustle of wings, the quiet scratch of Eggchan's pen, and the suffocating peace of a life with no edges.

Wemmbu had trained for combat almost every day. He had practiced until his muscles screamed and his spear had worn grooves into his palms. He had struck training dummies until their wooden frames splintered, and he had done it all without ever feeling the resistance of real flesh, the jarring impact of a blow that landed on something that could bleed.

Wemmbu had never once used those skills against a real opponent. But his body knew what it wanted. His body had been waiting for this without his own knowledge.

The Unstable SMP was peaceful, supposedly. The soldiers of Capital City enforced that peace with an iron hand, across the many civilizations of this realm. Anyone who disrupted it was dealt with swiftly and permanently.

'So why had someone killed in Farville?'

Curiosity was a dangerous thing, and Wemmbu knew this. His best friend had told him this, had repeated it so many times. Curiosity led to questions, questions led to attention, and attention led to potential discovery.

But curiosity was also the thing that had driven Wemmbu to the Far Lands’ edge, the thing that had made him wonder what lay beyond the forest, the thing that had fueled years of arguments until Eggchan had finally relented, allowing him to visit the town. Curiosity was the reason he was standing here now, in this marketplace, with the sun on his face and the smell of fresh bread in the air.

Curiosity was as much a part of him as his horns or his tail.

And right now, curiosity was a drumbeat in his chest, a pulse that matched the rhythm of his heart. It whispered the same thing over and over: find out what's happening.

Surely Egg wouldn't know. Wemmbu would check what had happened, just a quick look, and then he would leave. He would be back before sunset. He would walk through the cottage door with the supplies in his inventory and an innocent expression on his face. Eggchan would never have to know. He would be back before Eggchan even had time to worry.

Wemmbu slid his communicator back into his inventory and began to move.

The crowd parted around him without seeming to notice he was there. His senses sharpened, the way they always did when something interesting was about to happen. His ears caught fragments of conversation as he walked, snatches of panicked words that he pieced together like puzzle pieces.

“At the gates—soldiers with green shields—They killed him—they actually killed him—”

His purple eyes tracked the flow of the crowd, noting who was running toward the gates and who was walking the opposite away. His instincts hummed beneath his skin, a low and familiar thrum that had been dormant for too long. Wemmbu wove between players with fluid ease. His body strangely remembered how to move like this, slipping through gaps with a grace that his training alone couldn’t teach.

Some of the townsfolk were retreating into their homes. The woman who had greeted him earlier, the mother, was ushering other children through a doorway with hands that slightly trembled. The marketplace, so lively moments before, was dissolving into chaos. Stalls were abandoned mid-transaction.

Wemmbu followed the current of fear to its source.

The entrance gates came into view after a few minutes of fast walking.

They were tall structures of oak and iron, flanked by watchtowers that rose above the perimeter wall. The gates themselves stood open, which was wrong. They should have been closed the moment trouble appeared. But the soldiers manning the gates had been caught off guard, and now they stood in a tense line before the threshold, their yellow shields raised and their swords drawn.

They faced a group of armored figures whose shields were painted a dark, unfamiliar green.

Wemmbu ducked behind the corner of a house near the gates, pressing his back against the stone wall. His navy cloak blended into the shadows, and he peered around the edge with the stillness of a predator observing prey.

The green-shield soldiers were arguing with a man who appeared to be some kind of mayor figure. The mayor was an older player with a weathered face, and he stood behind the line of yellow shields with his hands raised in a placating gesture. His voice was calm but strained, the voice of someone trying very hard to prevent something that had already begun.

“We want no trouble with you,” the elder was saying. “We’re a peaceful town and we trade fairly. If your players are struggling, we can discuss terms, but this is not the way.”

The lead green soldier laughed. It wasn't a kind sound. “Bro, discuss terms? We've been discussing terms for months. You sit here with your diamonds and your golden carrots and your full storehouses, and you tell us to wait? Our people are hungry and our farms are failing. And you assholes refuse to share even a fraction of what you have.”

“We… we have offered what we can spare.”

“Offered? You offered scraps, bastard.” The soldier took a step forward, and the yellow shields tensed. “We're done negotiating. You will open your storehouses, or we will open them for you. And if more of your people have to die for that to happen, then so be it.”

Wemmbu's gaze swept the scene, cataloging details with automatic efficiency.

Six green soldiers in the front line, heavily armored but moving with the clumsiness of players who weren't accustomed to real combat. Two more flanking the group, their shields raised to protect against arrows from the watchtowers. The mayor behind four yellow soldiers, who held their swords with a grip that was too tight and their stances too wide. Their eyes darted between the green soldiers and each other, looking for reassurance that wasn't there.

They were scared. It was obvious they hadn't expected this.

The green soldier who had been speaking raised his hand. The motion was casual, almost lazy. But his fingers were curled around an ender pearl, its surface shimmering with the promise of teleportation.

Wemmbu moved before he knew he was moving.

His own ender pearl was thrown in the space between two heartbeats. He didn't think about it. He didn't weigh the consequences. His arm knew the motion, and the pearl sailed through the air in a perfect arc that intersected with the soldier's trajectory.

The world shattered into purple static and reformed with a lurch. In an instant, Wemmbu was standing in front of the mayor, his body interposed between the old man and the soldier who had appeared at the same second.

The air crackled with the residue of two simultaneous teleports.

The green soldier's sword was already descending toward the mayor, a diamond blade cutting through the air with a whistle.

Wemmbu's netherite axe was rising to meet it.

The clash of metal on metal rang out across the square. The impact jarred up Wemmbu's arms, a shockwave that traveled from his wrists to his shoulders. It felt nothing like striking a training dummy. It felt alive.

The soldier's eyes widened behind his diamond helmet. He had expected to cut down an unarmed civilian. He hadn't expected a navy-cloaked figure with silver-gray horns and a netherite axe to materialize in front of him. He stumbled back, his sword arm vibrating from the force of the parry, his boots skidding on the cobblestones.

Wemmbu advanced. The fight began in earnest.

It wasn't a fight like how Wemmbu had imagined fights would be. It wasn't a spar, a practice session with the training dummies that didn't hit back. It was fast, brutal, and real, and every nerve in Wemmbu's body was alight with the thrill of it.

The world narrowed to a series of sharp, vivid moments. The glint of a sword swinging toward his ribs. The scrape of his netherite boots against stone as he pivoted. The harsh rhythm of his own breathing, faster than it ever was in practice.

His cloak billowed around him as he moved, the heavy wool catching the air and snapping like a banner. A soldier lunged at him from the left, his sword aimed at the gap between Wemmbu's pauldron and chestplate.

Wemmbu sidestepped without looking, his body reading the angle of the attack before his mind could process it. His tail swept out, hooked the man's ankle, and wrenched it sideways. The soldier crashed to the cobblestones with a clatter of armor and a grunt of pain.

Another came from the right, his shield raised to bash against him. Wemmbu's axe was already there, the netherite blade catching the edge of the shield and wrenching it aside. Wemmbu reversed the swing, slamming the flat of the axe head into the soldier's helmet with a sound like a bell being struck. The man staggered, his eyes unfocused.

The Farville soldiers had fallen back, their yellow shields forming a protective wall around the mayor.

They were watching with expressions that shifted from fear to disbelief, then to something that looked very much like hope. Someone in the watchtower was cheering, a distant voice that barely registered. But Wemmbu wasn't listening. He was fighting.

The green soldiers regrouped and came at him again, three at once this time, their swords swinging in multiple arcs.

Wemmbu ducked under the first sword. He spun past the second, feeling the blade miss his ribs by a finger's width. The third he caught on the haft of his axe, the impact ringing through the wood and into his palms. He shoved back with enough force to send the soldier stumbling into his companions.

Wemmbu moved without thinking, his body responding to stimuli before his mind could process them. It was as if some deeper part of him remembered how to do this even if the surface of his consciousness did not. His movements didn’t feel learned; they were remembered.

A soldier grabbed at his cloak, fingers twisting in the navy wool and yanking hard. Wemmbu felt the fabric pull tight against his throat.

He unclasped it mid-strike, the brooch releasing with a flick of his thumb, and let the cloak fall away in a pool of fabric at his feet. The soldier stared at the netherite armor revealed beneath, the enchanted plates glinting with purple light, and in that moment of hesitation, Wemmbu smiled at him.

It wasn't a kind smile.

He had the strangest urge to unfurl his wings as he fought. They were hidden now, folded into whatever pocket of reality that kept them invisible when he didn't need them, but he could feel them straining against the barrier. They ached with the desire to spread wide, to lift him above others and give him the height advantage he craved.

Wemmbu wanted to use his spear. The axe was good, but the spear was an extension of his body in a way no other weapon could match. He wanted to fly. He wanted to show these soldiers what an Ender Dragon could do when properly motivated.

He wanted to feel the wind beneath his patagia, the weight of the spear in his hands, and the raw, terrifying joy of combat at its fullest expression.

But he didn’t. There were too many people watching. The wings would raise questions he couldn't answer. The spear would draw attention he couldn't afford. And Eggchan would already be furious enough without Wemmbu adding a full public reveal of his heritage to the list of transgressions. So he kept his wings hidden, and his spear in his inventory.

The soldiers were retreating now. They had come expecting a helpless town and instead found something they couldn't comprehend. Their formation had crumbled. They stumbled backward, shields raised defensively, swords held in grips that had gone slack with fear.

Wemmbu pressed the advantage. His axe was a blur of netherite and enchantment, its blade tracing arcs of purple light through the air. A sword thrust came at his chest, and he twisted, letting it glance off his pauldron with a screech of metal on metal. A shield bash aimed at his head, and he dropped, feeling the edge of the shield pass through the space where his horns had been a heartbeat before. He swept the soldier's legs out from under him, hooking one ankle with the haft of his axe and pulling. The man hit the ground hard, his shield clattering away across the cobblestone.

Wemmbu was laughing. He didn't know when he had started laughing, the sound wild and slightly unhinged. It made the green soldiers flinch.

One of them broke formation and ran for the gates. Another followed immediately, his boots slamming against the stone in a panicked rhythm. The watchtower archers had found their courage and were shooting arrows at the fleeing soldiers.

The square was chaos, loud and alive, and Wemmbu was at the center of it, his blood singing, his heart pounding against his ribs like a caged thing demanding release.

His axe swung in an arc that would disarm the last soldier standing before him. The motion was clean and practiced, a move he had performed a thousand times against his training dummies.

The strike connected.

There was a sound. A wet sound, different from the clash of metal and the thud of shield against armor. A sound that stopped Wemmbu's heart mid-beat.

The blade had bitten into the gap between the soldier's helmet and chestplate. It was the place where Wemmbu had been aiming, because a strike there would force a surrender without causing permanent damage.

But he had miscalculated. The soldier had turned at the last moment, trying to flee, and the blade had slipped. It had found the soft flesh of the throat instead of the armored collar.

It was a sound that Wemmbu hadn't meant to make. He pulled back his axe and saw, with a shock that hit him like cold water, that the netherite edge was slick with too much red. The soldier was on the ground. His blood was spreading across the cobblestone, a dark stain that seeped into the cracks between the path. He wasn't even moving anymore.

Wemmbu's communicator pinged.

The sound cut through the noise of the square. Every other communicator pinged a heartbeat later, a chorus of chimes that spread outward from the gates in a ripple of notification.

Wemmbu didn't need to look at the screen. He knew what it said. He could feel the words burning themselves into the air around him.

green_0fficer was slain by Wemmbu using [Verdict].
green_0fficer left the game.

Silence fell right after.

The remaining green soldiers had fled through the gates, and someone finally had the presence of mind to close the entrance. The heavy iron groaned as it swung shut, the bar dropping into place with a thud that reverberated through the square and up the soles of Wemmbu's boots. The watchtower archers lowered their bows. The yellow soldiers stood in a loose cluster, their shields still raised, their eyes fixed on Wemmbu.

The corpse shimmered. It dissolved into motes of pale light, the particles rising before winking out one by one. Within seconds, there was nothing left on the cobblestone path but a cracked green shield and a few scattered items from a dropped inventory.

Wemmbu stared at the spot where the soldier had been. The blood was spreading across the cobblestone in a slow, dark spread.

Wemmbu had killed him. He hadn't meant to kill him. He had been aiming to disarm and incapacitate. But his body had moved faster than his intentions, and his axe had struck true. Verdict. The name he had given it in a moment of grim humor, because an axe didn’t judge. An axe only did what the hand wielding it asked, and Wemmbu's hand had asked for this, even if his mind had not.

‘Oh… the Farville people,’ he thought distantly.

They were peaceful, and they were kind. They had smiled at him, patted his back, and invited him to their festival.

But they would look at him now and see a killer. The blood was still wet on the cobblestone, still glistening in the afternoon light. They would see what he had done and they would be afraid. They would—

The square erupted into cheers.

Wemmbu blinked. The sound was so unexpected that it took him a moment to process it. The Farville soldiers weren't shrinking away from him. They were surging forward, their shields lowered and their faces split with grins. The watchtower archers were shouting his name. The mayor was being helped to his feet by a woman, and even he was smiling, a weary but genuine smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes.

“Wemmbu!” someone shouted.

“Did you see that? He took on six of them!”

The townsfolk who had been hiding in their homes were emerging now, their faces shifting from fear to relief and excitement as word spread.

And there, near the back of the crowd, Mika01 was holding Tomu in her arms. Tomu was waving at Wemmbu with the same small hand he had held earlier, the motion frantic and joyful. His face was bright with the uncomplicated admiration of a child who had just watched his hero save the day.

“Wemmbu! Wemmbu! Wemmbu!”

The chant was growing, spreading through the crowd like fire through dry grass.

Wemmbu stood in the center of the square, his axe still in his hand, his armor splattered with blood that wasn't his own. The blood was already drying, turning tacky and dark against the purple enchantments. He didn't know what to do with the adoration being poured over him. He had expected fear, perhaps rejection.

He hadn't expected this at all.

The crowd continued to press closer, their voices overlapping, their hands reaching out to touch his shoulders and his arms. Someone was patting his back. Someone else was trying to shake his other hand. The Farville soldiers were looking at him with expressions that bordered on wonder, and the townsfolk were laughing and shouting his name. Wemmbu let it happen.

He didn't know what else to do. His muscles were still singing with the memory of movement. Every nerve in his body was alive in a way it had never been before.

That was what combat felt like. That was what it meant to use the skills he had honed for so long against something real, something that bled, fought back, and lost.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, beneath the roar of the crowd and the pounding of his heart: a small, quiet voice was whispering.

It was whispering that the sun was sinking lower in the sky, that Eggchan would be waiting at the cottage door, his wings stiff and his eyes fixed on the treeline. There would be questions, answers would need to be given, and no amount of cheering from the people of Farville would protect Wemmbu from the consequences of what he had done.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, a familiar voice was reminding him that his best friend would be so, so angry if he found out.

But Wemmbu couldn't hear it over the sound of his name being chanted by a hundred voices, couldn't remember it over the exhilaration still singing in his blood.

The afternoon light caught the blood on his armor and made it gleam.

High above the square, in the branches of an oak tree that grew near the fountain, two parrots were perched.

The larger one was a macaw, its feathers a bold mix of scarlet, blue, and yellow that caught the afternoon light and splintered it into gleaming fragments. The smaller was a sun conure, vivid in yellow, green, and orange, its body half-hidden among the leaves. Their beady black eyes were fixed on the scene below with an intensity that no ordinary birds could possibly possess. They observed as the blood spread across the cobblestone, the body dissolving into sparks of light.

They had seen how the Ender Dragon fought.

The macaw tilted its head. Its claws tightened on the branch, scoring the bark with faint lines. It watched the dragon stand in the center of the cheering crowd, his chest heaving and his silver horns catching the light. It watched the blood drying on his netherite armor and the way he smiled: uncertain, overwhelmed, and secretly pleased.

The macaw made a sound. It wasn't a squawk or a chirp but something softer, something almost musical. It was the sound of recognition, of a search that had spanned decades and finally, finally reached its end.

The sound was swallowed by the noise of the crowd below.

Then the macaw spread its wings and launched itself from the branch. Its body arrowed through the air toward the horizon, toward the distant spires of a kingdom that sat at the center of the Overworld, toward the god who was waiting for news.

The sun conure remained. It settled deeper into the leaves, its yellow-green feathers blending into the shadows. Its black eyes stayed fixed on the dragon below, still watching, still waiting.

Chapter Text

Sunlight fell through the oak canopy in slanted streams of gold, each beam a river of warmth that pooled on the soft earth, illuminating patches of wildflowers Wemmbu had learned to avoid without thinking.

White blooms and pale blue petals shifted in a breeze too gentle to hear, their stems bending and straightening in a peculiar rhythm. The air carried the scent of stone and the distant hint of tree sap, and beneath it all lay the stillness that Wemmbu had come to associate with the forest.

His boots found the familiar path without guidance. The forest was dim, as it always was, but the darkness here wasn’t particularly oppressive. It was the darkness of shelter, of canopy and shade, and Wemmbu had long since stopped noticing it as anything other than home.

The navy cloak wrapped around his shoulders bore faint traces of the day's events. He had patted most of the stone debris from its folds after the fight, but a fine layer of dust still clung to the hem, and a small tear near the collar marked where the soldier had grabbed him. The tear was barely visible, but his best friend would notice anyway. Eggchan noticed everything, after all.

‘Today had been a good day,’ he thought, the words settling in his chest with the warmth of the fading sunlight on his back.

The errand list was complete. The writing materials sat in his inventory alongside cuts of meat that the butcher had refused to let him pay for, pressing the wrapped packages into his hands with great enthusiasm. The children had waved at him as he left, and the soldiers at the gate had straightened and nodded with a respect that was entirely new.

The fight had been the center of it all, the bright and burning core around which the rest of the day had arranged itself.

The memory of combat still hummed beneath his skin. His axe meeting flesh. Bodies moving against his own, alive and unpredictable in a way that no armor stand could replicate. He had spent years practicing combative forms, and yet he had never tested those skills against something alive. Not since leaving the End. Not since his mother died.

The fight had kindled a strange and familiar flame inside him.

It burned low in his chest, and every time he prodded at it with his thoughts it flared a little brighter. The thrill of a sword glancing off his armor. The jarring impact of his axe against a shield. The moment when the soldier grabbed his cloak and Wemmbu unclasped it without breaking stride, the fabric falling away like discarded skin. The look on the soldier's face when he saw the netherite beneath. That wide-eyed, slack-jawed helplessness.

Wemmbu wanted to see that look again. He wanted to earn it.

He had never fought a real opponent until today. He had trained alone, against dummies and the unyielding trunks of oak trees, and he had always assumed that a real fight would be different enough to humble him.

Wemmbu had expected to fumble, to make mistakes that no amount of solo practice could have prepared him for. Yet the moment the first sword had descended toward the mayor, Wemmbu's body had moved as though it had been doing this for a lifetime.

His axe found gaps in their armor, his feet positioning themselves on the ground with a precision that felt less like learning and more like remembering. Something old and sleeping had stirred behind his ribs, and it wasn’t done stirring. A lock inside his chest had opened, and behind that lock was a version of himself he had never met but recognized anyway.

The townsfolk had cheered even when the death message appeared on their communicators. They chanted his name and pressed closer with shining eyes, and not one of them had looked at the blood on his armor with anything other than gratitude.

Killing was supposed to be wrong. Eggchan had taught him that, had repeated it so often that the words were imprinted in Wemmbu's mind. But the people of Farville hadn’t seen a killer. They had seen something good in him despite the slick red on his weapon. The disparity unsettled something in him. The rules he’d been given didn’t match the server he had witnessed.

A soft chirp sounded near his ear.

Wemmbu turned his head and found himself eye to eye with a small parrot perched on his shoulder.

The bird was a blend of color: yellow, orange, and green feathers. Its claws were tiny pinpricks of pressure through the wool of his cloak, and its beady black eyes regarded him with an expression that was comically curious.

The parrot tilted its head. Wemmbu tilted his own in response.

The bird made another sound, a soft warbling chirp that was entirely too charming for a creature he had been told to fear. It shuffled closer along the slope of his shoulder and pressed its beak gently against his cheek. The touch was light, exploratory. When Wemmbu didn’t pull away, the parrot rubbed the side of its feathery head against his jaw with a contentment that vibrated through its tiny body.

'Cute,' Wemmbu absentmindedly thought.

He had never seen birds in the oak forest before. Not once in all his years of living here. There were foxes, rabbits, and the occasional wandering wolf, but the trees were always silent, the sky above the canopy always empty of wings.

Eggchan had explained this to him long ago. Birds were the eyes of the God of Order. They were messengers and instruments of a being that Eggchan described with a flat, dismissive tone: a god whose reach extended across the entire Overworld and whose attention was never benign. The fact had been delivered without anger but with the weight of absolute certainty.

Birds were dangerous. If Wemmbu ever saw one, he was to come home immediately.

But this parrot in particular had done nothing dangerous.

When it had first landed on his shoulder, a while after he exited Farville's gates and entered the field that separated the town from the forest, Wemmbu had frozen.

His hand immediately drifted toward his inventory, toward the slot where his axe rested, and he waited for the bird to reveal itself as something other than what it appeared to be. The parrot had only chirped at him. It had made a melodic sound and then, in a voice that was tinny but unmistakable, it had mimicked the chant of the Farville crowd.

“Wemmbu! Wemmbu!” The words had been distorted by its tiny throat, rendered cute rather than triumphant. Wemmbu had stared at it for a long moment before a surprised laugh escaped him.

He had tried to shoo it away. He lifted a hand and made a gentle sweeping motion, but the parrot had only fluttered a few feet into the air and then returned to its perch. Wemmbu had tried again and again, and eventually he gave up and resumed walking with the bird clinging to his cloak.

It would leave on its own when it grew bored. Birds didn’t belong in the oak forest, and surely this one would realize its mistake and fly back to wherever it had come from.

It hadn’t left, however. It was still here now, rubbing its head against his cheek, making soft sounds of contentment that Wemmbu could feel as much as hear. He slowed his pace slightly, his stride shortening so that the bird wouldn’t be jostled by his movement. The parrot made an appreciative chirp and settled more firmly against the crook of his neck.

Wemmbu never had a pet. The cottage had no animals, and Eggchan had never suggested getting one. But there was something pleasant about the small weight on his shoulder.

Surely Eggchan would understand. The bird was practically harmless. It had done nothing but chirp, nuzzle, and mimic his name in a voice that made him smile. When they reached the cottage, he would show Eggchan how gentle it was. Then Eggchan would see that not all birds were spies, that not everything in the world was a threat waiting to strike. And if Eggchan still insisted that the parrot leave, Wemmbu would let it go.

The trees began to thin. The quality of the light shifted, and Wemmbu slowed his pace further, his heart lifting at the familiar approach of home. He passed between two oaks whose branches entwined overhead.

The cottage stood in its wide clearing. The setting sun poured through the gap above in streams of pink and gold, washing the oak walls in faint light.

The deepslate cobblestone supports gleamed with a faint iridescence, and the flowering vines that climbed the walls seemed to glow from within. The soul lanterns along the gravel path hadn’t been lit yet, and their iron posts stood like silent guards against the gathering dusk. The windows were dark behind their pale curtains, but the cottage itself was radiant.

Wemmbu felt the tension in his shoulders ease. The supplies were in his inventory, and he had returned home before sunset.

The parrot on his shoulder went rigid.

Its claws tightened suddenly, digging into the wool of the cloak with a grip that was almost painful.

The small body that had been warm and relaxed against his neck was now full of tension. A sound escaped it. Not a chirp but something lower, a thin warble that vibrated with an unease Wemmbu hadn’t heard from it before. The feathers along its back lifted, and its head swiveled toward the treeline, toward the clearing, toward the cottage itself, as though it was seeing something Wemmbu couldn’t.

Wemmbu glanced at the bird. It had even begun to tremble. He slowed his steps, frowning, and scanned the clearing himself.

There was nothing around. The gravel path was empty, and the soul lanterns were unlit. The cottage waited in the golden light with its door closed and its curtains drawn, as peaceful as it had ever been.

“Weird,” Wemmbu murmured.

He kept walking. The parrot pressed itself against the back of his neck and burrowed into the folds of his hood, its trembling growing more pronounced with every step he took toward the cottage. By the time he reached the gravel path, it had wedged itself beneath the heavy fall of his ponytail, hidden entirely from view.

Eggchan wasn’t waiting in the doorway.

The absence registered as Wemmbu stepped onto the gravel. Usually, when he returned from Farville, Eggchan would be leaning against the doorframe with his arms crossed and his wings folded behind him, his expression a careful mask of neutrality.

Sometimes his face was pleased, sometimes it was displeased. But it was always present, and its absence now felt strange. Not wrong, exactly; just unusual.

Maybe Eggchan was in his office, losing track of time in his research, and didn’t notice the sun’s descent. Or perhaps he trusted Wemmbu enough now that he didn’t feel the need to wait at the door. That was a good thing. Trust was always good.

The gravel crunched beneath his netherite boots, and the cottage remained silent.

Wemmbu's steps slowed as he approached the front door, and he couldn’t have said why. The parrot was a small, shaken thing against his nape.

As his hand closed around the doorknob, a decision settled in his mind. He would tell his best friend about the fight, though perhaps not every detail. The parts most likely to cause worry could remain unsaid. What mattered was that Eggchan knew the town was safe, the soldiers had retreated, and no one important had been harmed. The gratitude of the townsfolk would be proof enough.

And more than anything, Wemmbu wanted him to see that he was capable of defending himself, that all those years of training hadn’t been wasted, and that he was strong enough to keep them both safe.

The desire ran deep, older than his memories of the cottage and the forest. Somewhere within him lingered a longing to repay the Seraphim’s care, to stand between him and danger for once. He wanted to protect Eggchan as Eggchan had always protected him, to take on the role of the shield instead of remaining the one sheltered behind it.

Maybe after hearing about what had happened, Eggchan would finally see that Wemmbu didn’t need to be hidden away anymore.

Wemmbu's hand closed around the doorknob—

His gut twisted.

The sensation was sudden and visceral, a cold knot coiling in his stomach without warning. His hand froze on the metal. His pulse, which had been steady and calm, stuttered and then accelerated. The hair on the back of his neck rose, and the parrot pressed itself so hard against his nape that he could feel the frantic beat of its tiny heart.

‘Something felt… wrong.’ He just didn’t know what. Wemmbu couldn’t identify the source of the sudden dread that had seized him, but every instinct he possessed was suddenly alert.

The cottage looked the same as it always had. The soul lanterns were still unlit, and the windows were still dark. The clearing was still peaceful, still beautiful, still bathed in the pink and gold of the setting sun. Nothing had changed. Nothing was different.

Wemmbu opened the door.

The darkness inside the cottage felt strange.

Not the comfortable dimness of a curtained room, but a blackness that seemed to have texture. The froglight patterns that usually glowed from the floor were dim because of a rug. The lanterns that should have been flickering in their sconces were cold and dead. The air itself felt heavy, dense with a stillness that wasn’t the stillness of an empty room but the held breath of something waiting.

Wemmbu stepped inside. The stream of sunset light that fell through the open door cut a narrow, golden path across the wooden floor. Beyond that path, the darkness was absolute. The parrot was a small, shivering weight against his neck. He closed the door behind him, and the light narrowed to a sliver and then vanished.

“Bro?” Wemmbu called out.

His voice sounded strange in the silence; smaller than he intended. The dark seemed to swallow the word, and for a long moment there was no response at all.

Then his eyes began to adjust. The furniture resolved itself from the blackness in gradual shades of gray.

One of the armchairs by the cold fireplace, its cushions empty and its blankets undisturbed. The dining table with its mismatched chairs, each one pushed neatly into place. The kitchen island where he had cooked early this morning, its scarred wood surface now invisible in the gloom. Every surface was still, and every shadow was deeper than it should have been.

And there, in the armchair that faced away from the door, was Eggchan.

The Seraphim's wings rose above the back of the chair in twin arcs of white. They were the only bright thing in the room, and even they seemed muted, their usual luminescence dimmed to something cold. The smaller pair near his face weren’t visible from this angle. The only other detail Wemmbu could make out was a crossed leg, the gleam of a polished shoe catching the faintest edge of light from the curtain's hem.

He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t doing anything at all. Eggchan was sitting in the dark, and he had been waiting.

Wemmbu's hand found the clasp of his cloak.

“You're back,” Eggchan said.

The voice was quiet and flat, the same nonchalant tone he always used. But it came from everywhere and nowhere, the words not directed at Wemmbu but simply placed into the air like objects on a table. There was no feeling in it. The two syllables hung in the darkness long after they should have faded.

“Yeah, dude.” Wemmbu kept his own voice casual. The cold knot in his stomach hadn’t loosened. “I got everything you asked for.”

A pause; the kind that had weight. Eggchan didn’t turn. The stillness of him was so complete that Wemmbu found himself wondering, for one irrational moment, if the figure in the chair was a statue, something Eggchan had left behind to give the illusion of presence while the real Seraphim was elsewhere. But then the shoe shifted, a fractional movement, and Wemmbu's thought process evaporated.

“Okay,” Eggchan said simply. “So how was Farville?”

The question was the same question Eggchan always asked. The same cadence, the same placement in the conversation. But the tone felt odd. There was no curiosity in it, no genuine interest. The words were hollow, like a script being followed for reasons Wemmbu couldn’t discern.

“It was alright,” Wemmbu replied. His hands remained on the clasp of his cloak, but he didn’t remove it. The parrot was still hidden beneath the hood, and something told him to keep it there. “A little busy. The market was pretty crowded today.”

“Crowded.” Eggchan repeated the word without inflection. “Did anything interesting happen?”

Wemmbu felt the question settle over him, heavier than the gloom of the cottage.

He could lie. He could say “nothing, just the usual errands,” and his best friend might accept it. But Eggchan always knew. The Seraphim always knew where Wemmbu had been and what he had done, and lying now would only make whatever was about to happen worse.

“Actually, yeah,” Wemmbu admitted. He kept his tone light, almost conversational. “There was some trouble at the gates. A few soldiers from another town. They were trying to—”

“Oh I know.”

The words cut through the darkness, flat and final. It wasn’t an interruption but a termination. The sentence Wemmbu had been building collapsed in his throat.

His mouth went dry. “You know?”

Eggchan didn’t answer immediately. The pause stretched, and in that pause Wemmbu became aware of the cottage around them in a new way. The darkness wasn’t uniform. It moved, shifting at the edges of his vision, pooling in the corners and spreading along the walls in slow currents. The shadows beneath the dining table were too deep, and the space behind the armchairs was too black. The air had grown cold; a cold that seeped through his cloak and pressed against his skin.

“I know everything that happens to you, Wemmbu.”

The armchair creaked. Eggchan was standing up. The motion was slow, his wings unfolding with a rustle of feathers that was too loud in the silent cottage. They spread to their full span, and in the darkness they seemed to have no end, their white edges fading into the black as if they were made of the same substance as the shadows.

The Seraphim turned, and his face emerged from the gloom in increments. The sharp line of his jaw, too sharp, the angles too precise. The pale sweep of his disheveled hair, white as bone. The smaller wings beside his face were drawn back, fully retracted, and their absence made his expression unreadable in a way that was worse than anger.

His eyes found Wemmbu’s, and they weren’t the blue Wemmbu remembered.

They were pale, so pale they were almost white, and they reflected light that wasn’t present in the room. The pupils didn’t contract, the lids didn’t blink. They fixed on Wemmbu with an intensity that wasn’t human. Wemmbu had always known that some part of his best friend wasn’t normal. He had accepted it years ago, folded it neatly into all the other strange things that made Eggchan who he was. But now, for the first time in a while, he couldn’t look away from it.

And with a cold clarity, Wemmbu understood that he wasn’t looking at his best friend right now. He was looking at the part of Eggchan he had spent years pretending not to see.

“I know about the soldiers,” the Seraphim said slowly. He took a step forward, and the dark floor didn’t creak beneath his weight. “I know about the fight, the death message. I know that you killed someone today, and I know that the townsfolk cheered your name and everything.”

He took another step. The darkness moved with him.

“I know you disobeyed me.” Eggchan frowned.

Wemmbu's hand tightened on the clasp of his cloak. The parrot was so still against his neck that he would have thought it dead if not for the faint, rapid flutter of its heart.

“Bro, I wasn't trying to disobey you. They were going to kill someone else. I couldn't just stand there and watch.”

“You could have.” Another step. The smaller wings near the Seraphim’s face remained retracted, and his expression was a smooth and terrible blank. “I told you what to do if something went wrong: come straight home. That was the rule.”

“Players were in danger.”

“Players are always in danger.” His voice didn’t rise in anger. It remained quiet, almost gentle, but the gentleness was the gentleness of a blade sliding out of its sheath. “Players are cruel and greedy and they will hurt you if you let them get close. Wemmbu, I have told you this for years. And still you threw yourself into a fight that had nothing to do with you.”

Wemmbu's jaw tightened. The cold knot in his stomach was warring with something else now. Something stranger. “I just tried to help. They were grateful, and no one got hurt except the soldiers.”

“But you killed someone.” The words landed with the weight of a physical blow. “Your name appeared on every communicator in that area. Players you do not know, players who might come looking for you. They know what you look like now. Other people will talk and the news will spread. And eventually it will reach someone who understands what you really are.”

Wemmbu swallowed. “I… I didn't think about that.”

“Bro, hah. Of course you didn’t.”

Eggchan stopped walking. He stood a few feet away now, close enough that Wemmbu could see the faint, unsettling glow of his irises, the way they cast no light on the face around them. “You didn’t think, because you never do. You feel restless and you wander. You feel curious and you check things out. You feel angry and you fight.”

“Wemmbu, I have given you a home, a safe place, everything you could possibly need, and in return you risk everything for the approval of strangers who don’t even know you."

“That's not fair.” Wemmbu's voice came out harsher than he intended. “They're good people. And I'm not a teenager anymore. I can protect myself. You should be proud of—”

“Proud?” Eggchan’s voice dropped to a whisper, incredulous and still. “Are you serious? You want me to be proud of you for almost dying. For putting yourself in danger for people who would turn on you if they knew what you really were.”

“They wouldn't—”

“Of course they would.”

The Seraphim's wings spread wider, and the darkness in the cottage deepened in response. It rolled outward from him in waves, swallowing the faint gray outlines of the furniture, erasing the walls and the ceiling, until the only things visible were the white wings and his pale, luminous eyes.

“Do you know what players do to Ender Dragons? Do you remember what they did to your mother?”

The mention of his mother hit Wemmbu like a blade between the ribs. He flinched; he couldn’t help it. The constant nightmare from his slumber flickered behind his eyes. The darkness of the End, the sound of weapons, and the cheers of players who had killed his mother.

The Seraphim saw the way he flinched. Something moved behind his eyes, a flicker of calculation, and when he spoke again his voice had changed. The hardness was still there, but it had been wrapped in something softer. The wings lowered slightly, and the shadows stopped getting closer.

“You probably think I’m being cruel,” Eggchan said with a solemn tone. The words were slow, measured. “You think I enjoy keeping you here, but I swear I don’t. Every restriction I place on you hurts me too. But I’d rather have you hate me and be alive than love me and be dead.”

Wemmbu's throat tightened. The shift in his best friend’s tone was so seamless that the cold knot in his stomach began to loosen before he could stop it. “I don't hate you.”

“I know you don’t.” Eggchan stepped closer, resting his hands on Wemmbu’s shoulders. The touch was light, almost hesitant, but his fingers felt cold even through the cloak. His blue eyes became brighter amid the darkness of the cottage. “You’re my best friend, Wemmbu. The only person in this world who really matters to me. I’ve already lost you once, and I don’t think I could bear going through that again.”

The words lingered between them, stirring faint unease beneath the guilt already weighing on Wemmbu’s chest.

“What do you mean… you lost me once?”

Eggchan’s expression blanked, then slowly, it softened around the edges. “Back in the End, after your mother died. It took me a long time to find you.”

His gaze drifted for a moment, as though he were looking past the room and into a memory only he could see. “When I finally did, you were so small and so frightened. I remember thinking that if I’d been a little later, something really bad might’ve happened to you. After that, I promised myself that I wouldn’t let anything hurt you again. I wasn’t going to fail you twice.”

The explanation settled over the confusion, covering it without making it disappear.

Eggchan had searched for him, and he had found him. Everything he did, every rule and overprotective habit, stemmed from that promise he had made long ago. Wemmbu wanted to believe it. He wanted to accept the explanation and let the matter rest. As he looked into his best friend’s worried eyes, the tightness in his stomach slowly eased, leaving behind a heavy weariness that seemed to sink into his bones.

“I'm sorry,” Wemmbu said. “I… I didn't mean to worry you. I just saw the soldiers, and I moved. My body knew what to do.”

Eggchan was silent for a moment. His hands remained on Wemmbu's shoulders, the weight of it steady. Then he sighed. It was a soft sound, tired and sad, and it made Wemmbu's chest ache despite everything.

“I believe you,” Eggchan said. “But the damage is already done. Your name is out there now, and we’ve gotta take precautions.”

“Precautions?”

“Yes.” Eggchan's voice was calm now, reasonable. The voice of someone explaining something that was for Wemmbu's own good. “Until I can figure out how bad the damage is, you'll need to stay somewhere safe. Somewhere no one can find you. The townsfolk are still worked up about you, and that needs to die down a bit. A few days at most.”

Hearing those words, Wemmbu's eyes moved without his permission. Toward the staircase and the basement door beneath it.

He knew what was down there. He had been down there before. The memories were fragmented and hazy, scattered across his mind like pages torn from a book and rearranged in the wrong order. But the shape of them remained. The cold, the silence.

An obsidian box with an iron door.

The ceiling was low enough that he could touch it if he stood on his toes. There was no torch, no source of illumination beyond the thin crack beneath the iron door that vanished when the bolt slid closed. The darkness inside was absolute, a darkness that drank sound and warmth. Wemmbu remembered lying on the floor and feeling the obsidian leech the heat from his body. He remembered waiting for the door to open, not knowing how long he had been waiting because time didn’t exist in the obsidian room.

There was only the cold, the dark, and the slow unraveling of his own thoughts.

“Huh,” Wemmbu said. His voice sounded distant to his own ears. “The basement?”

“I know it’s not comfortable.” Eggchan's grip on his shoulder tightened slightly. Not enough to hurt, but just enough to hold him in place. “But it’s the safest place in the whole forest. No one can find you there.”

Wemmbu wanted to refuse. Every instinct he had was screaming at him to pull away, to turn and run back into the forest. But Eggchan's hand was on his shoulder, and his eyes were no longer pale and terrifying but sad, so sad, the blue Wemmbu remembered from all the years they had spent together.

“For a few days,” Wemmbu clarified. It wasn’t quite a question.

“A few days, maybe even less. I’ll work as quickly as I can.”

Wemmbu's hands hung at his sides. The parrot was still hidden against his neck, trembling so faintly he could barely feel it.

“Okay,” he said. The word felt like a stone dropping into still water. “That’s… fine, I guess.”

His best friend smiled at him. The expression was small and warm, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Thanks. I knew you’d understand.”

His hands moved to Wemmbu's cloak. The gesture was gentle as he began to unfasten the clasps. Wemmbu stood still and let him. Letting him do whatever he wanted was easier. It had always been easier: to let Eggchan braid his hair, organize his inventory, and decide when Wemmbu could leave the cottage and for how long. Resistance took energy, leading to arguments and stretches of silence that lasted for days. It was easier to let him.

The cloak fell away. His best friend's hands paused after draping the navy wool over his forearm.

His blue eyes dropped to the nape of Wemmbu's neck without hesitation, without searching, as though they already knew exactly where to look. The parrot was huddled beneath the fall of purple hair, its feathers a shock of color in the dim room. Yellow, blue, and green; vivid and unmistakable.

The silence that followed was absolute.

"Oh." Eggchan's voice was flat, too flat. The voice of a door closing.

“It's just a bird,” Wemmbu explained. The words came out too fast. “It, uh, followed me from Farville. It's harmless, Egg. It just sat on my shoulder the whole way back.”

Eggchan didn’t move. His hand was still extended over the cloak, frozen mid-motion, and his eyes were fixed on the small parrot with an expression that was entirely empty. The smaller wings beside his face hadn’t rustled. Even the shadows in the room had stopped moving. Everything had stopped.

“You brought a bird into our home?”

“I… I was going to tell you about it. It didn't seem like a big deal. It’s, uh, friendly anyway.” Wemmbu reached up toward the parrot, intending to coax it onto his finger, to show Eggchan how gentle it was.

Eggchan's hand caught his wrist.

The grip was cold. It was colder than it had been a moment before, colder than skin had any right to be. The fingers pressed into the bones of Wemmbu's wrist with strength that was just shy of bruising. When Wemmbu looked at the Seraphim’s face, the sadness was gone. There was nothing in its place. Nothing at all.

“You brought a bird into our home.” The repetition wasn’t for emphasis. It was as though he was confirming the facts to himself, cataloging each transgression. “After everything I told you. You saw a bird, and instead of swatting it away, you let it follow you. You let it touch you. You even hid it from me.”

“Bro, I didn't hide it.” Wemmbu's voice came out defensive, but there was a tremor beneath it now. “It was just sitting there. Look at it. It's not dangerous at all.”

The Seraphim looked at the trembling parrot beneath his hair.

The parrot made a sound Wemmbu had never heard before. A thin, keening whimper that vibrated against his skin. Its feathers flattened, and it tried to burrow deeper into his hair, its claws scrabbling desperately against his collar. The parrot was afraid. It was so afraid that its tiny body was shaking, and Wemmbu could feel that fear as clearly as he could feel his own heartbeat.

Eggchan's free hand moved. The motion wasn’t fast. It was slow, almost delicate, his fingers extending toward the parrot with the precision of someone plucking a flower. Wemmbu tried to step back, but the grip on his wrist held him in place.

“No, wait—”

The fingers closed around the parrot.

The bird let out a single, piercing shriek. The sound was high and thin and terrible, cutting through the gloom like a blade. Then Eggchan's hand tightened, and the shriek became a wet, brittle crunch, and then there was silence.

Blood seeped between his fingers. It dripped onto the folded cloak over his forearm in heavy drops. The parrot's body was limp in his grip, a crumpled heap of colorful feathers that had been warm and alive moments ago. The blood was red and vibrant against the tan color of the Seraphim’s skin.

Wemmbu couldn’t move. The bird that had rubbed its soft head against his cheek, that had chirped his name in its tiny voice, that had trusted him enough to hide in his hair, was gone. It was dead. There was only blood now.

Blood on Eggchan's hand. Blood on his cloak. Blood soaking into the floorboards.

“Be gone, foul thing,” Eggchan clicked his tongue. He opened his hand and let the body fall. It hit the dark floor with a sound that was soft and final.

“Gods have no place in this house.”

“Hey…” Wemmbu's voice came out cracked and quiet. He couldn’t stop staring at the small, broken body. At the feathers that were no longer bright and warm. “Why’d you do that? It wasn't… it wasn’t hurting anyone. It was just a bird, Egg.”

“It was a spy.” Eggchan wiped his hand on the edge of the navy cloak. The motion was unhurried, almost disgusted. “I’ve told you this before. The God of Order uses birds as his eyes. This one was watching you, and it was going to report to him right after this.”

“How are you this dense? You led it right into our home,” the Seraphim sneered.

“… You don't know that.”

Wemmbu's hands were shaking. The cold knot in his stomach had become something else. Something that burned and strangled itself into tighter knots. “It could have been a normal bird. It could have been nothing.”

“Dude, I can’t believe you’re arguing with me over this.” Eggchan's voice was hard again. The sadness was gone, even the disgust, replaced by something immovable. “This is why we have rules. This is why you need to listen to me. You just don’t get it, do you? You can’t even see the dangers the way I can.”

He reached for Wemmbu again.

Wemmbu flinched hard.

The movement was instinctive and involuntary. His body pulled back before his mind could intervene, and Eggchan’s hand stopped in midair. The Seraphim’s expression faltered. For a single moment, something flashed behind his eyes, raw and unguarded, before it was carefully tucked away again. His features softened, and the smaller wings beside his face folded forward with a rustle, the gesture almost apologetic.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” his best friend said. His voice was gentle now. “I didn’t want to do that in front of you, but it had to be done. You understand, right?”

Honestly, Wemmbu didn’t understand. Not at all. His heart was pounding so hard he could feel it in his throat, and his hands were shaking, and all he could see was the dead body of a small bird and its blood seeping through their floor. But Eggchan was looking at him with those solemn blue eyes again. Eggchan had always protected him. Eggchan was his best friend.

“Yeah,” Wemmbu heard himself say. “It's fine, Egg. I understand.”

“Finally, bro.” Eggchan stepped forward and wrapped his arms around Wemmbu. The embrace was warm and solid, the great white wings folding around them both and enclosing them in feathers and shadow. His arms tightened, the hold firm enough that Wemmbu felt the pressure in his ribs, the slight restriction of his breath. “I'm sorry for this too. You're my best friend. Everything I do is for you.”

Wemmbu stood rigid in the hug. The blood on Eggchan's hand was still wet. He could feel it seeping into the fabric of his poet shirt, warm and sticky against his skin.

“Now,” Eggchan said, pulling back. His expression was calm; gentle, reasonable, and utterly certain. “Let's get you settled.”

He led Wemmbu toward the staircase. The basement door opened onto a narrow flight of deepslate stairs that descended into a storage room lined with shelves. Barrels of food sat against one wall, and chests of sorted materials stood in the opposite. His best friend crossed to the far corner and knelt, his fingers finding a seam in the floor that a stranger would have never noticed on their own. A hidden trapdoor swung open on silent hinges, revealing a second set of steps beneath the first.

These were narrower, steeper, and the darkness below them was thick and still. The air that rose from the opening was cold and carried no scent at all.

Wemmbu knew those steps. His feet remembered the number of them. At the very bottom was a room of seamless obsidian with an iron door and a heavy bolt on the outside.

“Your inventory,” Eggchan said, holding out his hand. The blood was still on his smooth fingers. “I’ll keep everything safe for you.”

Wemmbu hesitated. His axe. His spear. His armor. His communicator. Everything that made him feel like himself. Without them, he was just a creature in a box.

“It’s only for a few days.” Eggchan's voice was soothing, repeating his words earlier. “You’ll be safe here. No one can reach you or hurt you. I promise.”

The words wrapped around Wemmbu like an embrace, or like hollow chains. He slowly opened his inventory. His axe, Verdict, its edge still faintly stained from the fight. His spear, the haft worn smooth by years of use. His netherite armor, piece by piece, the enchanted plates and straps clinking softly as he handed them over. His strength potions. His golden carrots. His ender pearls. His building materials. His communicator, the screen dark and blank. Everything.

Wemmbu gave everything he had until he was standing in the threshold of the obsidian room in nothing but his clothes, his feet bare on the cold stone.

“Alright,” Eggchan said. He touched Wemmbu's shoulder, patting gently. The fingers were cold against his shirt. “I’ll come for you soon, for your food.”

With a soft push, Wemmbu entered the obsidian box. The iron door swung shut, and a second later, the locks and the bolt slid into place. The dark swallowed Wemmbu whole.

It was absolute. Not the dimness of a curtained room or the shadows of the forest at twilight, but a blackness so complete that his eyes couldn’t adjust because there was nothing to adjust to. Wemmbu couldn’t see his hands. He couldn’t even see the walls, though he knew they were there, close and suffocating. The obsidian absorbed everything: light, sound, and heat. He was alone in the dark, and the dark itself felt patient.

Wemmbu pressed his back against the cold wall and slid down until he was sitting on the floor. The obsidian was rough against his bare feet. His heart was still pounding and his hands were still shaking.

'A few days. I could survive a few days,' Wemmbu thought. Eggchan had said so. His best friend promised.

But every instinct he possessed recoiled from this. The obsidian box was wrong. The sight of the parrot’s broken body, the memory of those beady eyes without life, all of it pointed toward a truth he had spent years refusing to examine. The unease had never truly left him. It had lingered beneath every reassurance, buried beneath gratitude and fear, only to resurface whenever the cracks grew too wide to ignore. But Wemmbu had always found a way to look away. Of course he did.

Eggchan had saved him, and he cared about him. Outside the cottage waited a server that would gladly tear him apart for what he was. Believing his best friend was easier than questioning it.

The darkness pressed close around him. He shut his eyes and found no difference on the other side of his eyelids.

For a fleeting moment, a faint chirp drifted through the silence. It might have been a memory rising from somewhere within him, or merely the mind’s desperate attempt to fill the quiet with something familiar. Whatever it was, the sound faded almost immediately, swallowed by the stillness until nothing remained except the darkness and the quiet rhythm of his breathing.

Drawing his knees to his chest, Wemmbu listened to that small proof of his own existence and waited.

The door didn’t open for a long while.

Wemmbu didn’t know how long he sat there. Time didn’t exist in the obsidian room, after all.

Chapter Text

The office of the God of Order sat in silence, disturbed only by the scratch of a pen.

Daylight streamed through the arched windows in broad panels, catching the motes of dust that drifted through the still air. The room was spacious without feeling cavernous, its high ceilings supported by smooth stone columns carved with geometric designs.

The walls were sandstone, and between the columns hung tapestries depicting the history of the Unstable SMP. Battles from the early years, their threads darkened with age. The coronation of a king who had risen from the ashes of civil war, his wings outspread and his expression solemn. The ascension of three mortals into something beyond mortality, their forms haloed in gold, crimson, and void-black thread.

Potted ferns and flowering vines spilled from alcoves set into the walls, their leaves catching the light and softening the clean lines of the architecture with touches of green. The floor was a mosaic of polished stone tiles arranged in a pattern of interlocking circles.

At the center of the room stood a grand desk of dark oak, its surface covered in documents, ledgers, and correspondence arranged in neat, purposeful stacks.

Parrot sat behind his desk, his pen moving in steady strokes across a piece of parchment.

The quill was white, a feather shed from his own wing and shaped into an instrument more practical than the wings themselves. His handwriting was precise, each letter formed with the care of someone who had been writing decrees for longer than most players had been alive. The black claws of his fingers held the quill with a light, controlled pressure, and his black eyes tracked each line of text with an attention that missed nothing.

His wings, huge and vivid, were folded neatly behind him, their tips brushing the polished floor. The King was dressed in a fitted coat of deep green with gold embroidery along the sleeves and collar, the fabric tailored to accommodate the span of his wings without restricting their movement. A sash of pale yellow crossed his chest, pinned with a brooch shaped like a feather.

The document before him was a revised resource allocation order.

Several new civilizations had formed along the eastern edges of the Overworld in the past decade, their populations swelling faster than the existing farm infrastructure could support. The monthly shipments from Capital City had been stretched thin, and Parrot had spent the morning recalculating distribution routes to ensure no settlement went without them.

A small conflict near the Far Lands had been a symptom of this larger problem. Apparently, a town struggling with their failing harvests had looked upon its wealthy neighbor with envy that curdled into violence. A report of the incident had arrived two days ago, delivered by a soldier who had ridden hard from the borderlands. There had been a fight at the gates, and a mysterious defender. Luckily, there were only a few casualties among the townsfolk.

Parrot had filed the report away for further investigation and returned to the root of the problem, which was resource allocation. That was a problem he could solve with ink and arithmetic.

The scratching of his pen resumed. After several minutes, he paused and set it aside, reviewing what he had written. Throughout it all, the prayer-hum lingered at the back of his mind, a constant murmur of a thousand voices blending together like distant water.

Most days the God barely noticed it. The prayers of his devotees had become as familiar as his own heartbeat, a background noise he could tune out or focus on as needed.

Sometimes a particular voice would rise above the others, a nametag attached to a desperate plea, and he would pause to listen and decide whether intervention was necessary. A farmer praying for rain on his northern fields. A young woman asking for courage before a difficult conversation. The nametags surfaced and submerged, brief flickers of individual need against the vast hum of their collective faith. Today the prayers were considerably quiet. Gratitude for safe harvests. Requests for guidance in matters of justice. The usual rhythms of a peaceful realm.

Peace. It had taken decades to build, and Parrot had built it with his own clawed hands.

The King remembered the early years of his reign, after the Civil War, when the server was fractured and bleeding and every day brought fresh conflict.

He had been young then, mortal, a king crowned in the aftermath of tragedy. The war had taught him things he couldn’t have learned any other way. That peace was not the absence of conflict but the management of it. That people needed freedom to feel safe, but too much freedom bred chaos. That a king couldn’t rule through force alone, because force created resentment, and resentment festered into rebellion. These lessons had been hard-won, paid for in blood and grief, and Parrot had never allowed himself to forget them.

So the God of the Overworld had learned to rule through other means.

He granted civilizations their autonomy, allowing each settlement to govern its own affairs while operating within a broader framework of mutual obligation. He positioned himself as a supervisor rather than a ruler, a guiding hand rather than an iron fist.

The players of the Overworld worshipped him because they chose to, not because they were compelled. They looked to Capital City for protection and resources, and Parrot provided both with a generosity that earned him devotion more genuine than any demanded tribute. The monthly shipments of supplies weren’t charity but contract, a visible reminder that the King provided for those who acknowledged his authority.

Most civilizations accepted this arrangement without question. Most players never thought to ask why the shipments were necessary in the first place, or why the farms beyond Capital City's walls always seemed to produce just slightly less than what was needed.

But supervision wasn’t enough. It had never been enough.

Parrot had been alive for a very long time, and the years had taught him that the appearance of freedom was often more effective than freedom itself. He had seen what happened when supervision failed, when a civilization's internal disputes spilled across its borders and threatened the stability of the server. The King had learned that the best way to prevent such spillage was to ensure it never occurred at all.

A well-timed rumor could dissolve an alliance before it became a threat to the broader order. A carefully placed shortage could remind a prosperous city of its dependence on the capital. A disaster, manufactured and then heroically resolved, could reinforce the faith of the people in their God and remind them why they prayed. Parrot didn’t employ such underhanded methods often. They were tools of his last resort, reserved for situations that couldn’t be addressed through diplomacy or decree. But he kept them sharp, and he didn’t pretend they didn’t exist.

A God of control who refused to control wasn’t a god after all.

He picked up his pen and continued writing. The revised allocation order would resolve the immediate tensions. In a few months, the harvest would improve, and the conflict near the Far Lands would fade into history. And if it did not, Parrot would find another way. He always did.

A sound reached him through the open balcony doors. The beat of wings.

Parrot looked up from his desk. Beyond the arched doorway that led to the balcony, the afternoon sky was clear and blue, marred only by a few soft clouds.

And against that blue, growing larger with each wingbeat, was a macaw. Its feathers were vivid even from a distance. Scarlet, blue, and gold arranged in patterns that gleamed in the sunlight. It flew with purpose, its path straight as it arrowed toward the balcony, and its wings beat with a rhythm that spoke of urgency.

Parrot set his pen down and rose from his chair. His own wings, big and bright with the colors of a sun conure, rustled softly as he moved. The feathers were primarily yellow, green, and orange, layered in patterns that had become more brilliant with each passing decade of his godhood.

The balcony doors stood ajar. The God pushed them wider and stepped out into the open air.

Capital City sprawled beneath him in orderly grids of sandstone and smooth stone, its buildings arranged with the precision of a map brought to life. Streets ran straight and clean between structures that rose in elegant lines, their flat roofs dotted with gardens and small trees.

Temples dedicated to the God of Order stood at regular intervals, their facades carved with the feather-and-crown sigil that had become his emblem. Markets bustled in the plazas, their canopies bright against the pale stone. Players moved through the streets in flows that were busy but unhurried, their paths crossing and diverging in patterns Parrot could trace from memory. The walls of the city were visible in the distance, a pale line of stone that encircled the entire capital, and beyond them the landscape rolled outward into farms, forests, and the distant blue haze of mountains.

The city had grown over the decades.

When Parrot had first been crowned, Capital City had been a modest settlement clustered around a central fortress. Now it stretched for miles in every direction, its population numbering in a few thousands. The walls had been expanded three times to accommodate the growth, and the gates had been widened to allow the constant flow of traders and pilgrims who came to visit the temples.

Temples to the other gods had been built as well, though they were fewer and smaller. Flame's shrines stood near the eastern gate, their braziers always lit and their walls adorned with the weapons of warriors who had come to pray for strength. Spoke's was harder to find, tucked away in places that seemed to shift position depending on the hour. The God of Change preferred his worship to be elusive, and his devotees learned to find him through instinct rather than instruction.

The macaw landed on the stone railing of the balcony.

Its claws gripped the sandstone, and it made a sound that Parrot recognized immediately. Not a chirp or a squawk, but a rapid, urgent warble that vibrated with barely contained energy. The bird's beady black eyes fixed on him, and its wings fluttered with agitation. It hopped along the railing and the warble rose in pitch as though the news it carried was too important to wait.

A few steps closer, Parrot stood before it. The parrot fell silent.

His parrots were extensions of himself. Each one was created from a feather of his own wings, imbued with a fragment of his consciousness and his memory.

They carried his intelligence, his perception, and his ability to recognize names and faces. When they flew across the Overworld, they weren’t merely observing. They were understanding, cataloging, and comparing what they saw against the vast archive of Parrot's knowledge. And when they returned to him and dissolved back into feathers, their memories became his own, integrated seamlessly into the whole of his consciousness.

It was a power the God had gained upon ascending to godhood, one of the many gifts that had come with his domains of peace, justice, and control.

In the early years, he had used it liberally, dispatching dozens of parrots to watch over every corner of the Overworld. It was because Parrot had been searching for something. Someone. A precious friend; a soul that should have returned years ago but never did.

He rarely sent parrots out anymore. His network of soldiers and officials provided more than enough information to govern the server, and dispatching too many parrots weakened his wings. Each feather lost was a small diminishment, a temporary decline in his physical form that took time to restore. While the feathers always grew back, the process was slow, and Parrot had learned to be prudent.

Besides, some of the parrots he had sent out years ago hadn’t returned at all. They had simply vanished, their connection to him severed without warning.

The loss was more than physical. Each parrot that disappeared took with it the fragment of consciousness he had invested, and recovering from that absence took time. He had his suspicions that they were being killed. His parrots didn’t simply die. Something must be hunting them. But he hadn’t yet investigated. There were always more pressing matters that required his focus.

Interestingly, this macaw didn’t seem like a recent dispatch.

Parrot studied its plumage and felt the faint resonance of its creation, a thread of connection that stretched back further than most. It had been sent out years ago. Decades, maybe. One of the original flock he had released to search the farthest reaches of the server, from the center of Capital City to the very edge of the Far Lands. A bird he had given up on ever seeing again.

His breath caught in his throat. The sensation was unfamiliar; Parrot wasn’t accustomed to surprise.

“Could you be…” he began to whisper.

The King shook his head. The motion was sharp, a dismissal of a thought that was too fragile to hold.

He had hoped before. He had hoped so many times before, in the early years when every returning parrot had seemed to carry the promise of discovery, and each time the hope had curdled into disappointment. This parrot was old, and old parrots returned with old memories. It didn’t have to mean anything. It probably didn’t mean anything anyway.

But the macaw was still warbling with urgency, its feathery body practically vibrating on the railing. Its claws tapped against the sandstone in a rapid rhythm. Its eyes, black and bright, stared into his with an insistence that bordered on desperation.

Parrot extended his hand. The parrot hopped onto his fingers without hesitation. Its claws were light and sharp against his skin.

His powers activated on contact. The parrot's body shimmered and dissolved, its form unraveling into sparks of golden light that swirled once and then coalesced into a single feather. Soft and faintly warm.

Parrot closed his eyes as the memories flooded into him.

Years of flight compressed into a heartbeat.

The macaw had traveled far, crossing forests and mountain ranges, its sharp eyes scanning the landscape below for any sign of the soul it had been sent to find. It had passed over cities and villages, over temples and ruins, over battlefields where the grass had long since grown over the scars of old wars. The macaw had lingered near the Far Lands, drawn by something it couldn’t name, and there it had discovered a town.

A yellow-bannered civilization tucked against the edge of an oak forest. Farville. The macaw had watched the town for years, patient and undetected, observing the comings and goings of its inhabitants from the high branches of oak trees and the shadowed eaves of rooftops.

A figure in white appeared in the memories.

Parrot looked closer into the memory. The angel walking through the market was familiar, though not in the way he expected.

Eggchan had always been unassuming, his presence quiet and passive, marked by the small wings that framed his face. The angel Parrot remembered hadn’t possessed the huge white wings that now rose from his shoulders, vast even beneath the dappled light of the market stalls.

The difference was startling. Parrot had heard that Eggchan had been redeemed by the heavens, that his full seraphim power had been restored, but seeing it for himself was something else entirely. The great wings folded and shifted with effortless ease, while the smaller wings beside his face rustled as he spoke to a shopkeeper, the same fluttering motion Parrot remembered from years ago.

Olive skin with shaggy hair the color of fresh snow. It truly was Eggchan. The closest companion of Parrot’s precious friend.

The angel moved through the market stalls with the caution of someone who preferred not to draw attention. The macaw had watched him buy food without lingering, only exchanging brief, guarded greetings with the townsfolk who recognized him. It had watched him return to the oak forest alone, disappearing beneath the dense canopy as though he had never been there at all.

Months passed in the memories, flickering past. And then, a new figure appeared with the angel, strolling through the market with casual ease.

A player in a navy cloak, its hood down, revealing a face that made Parrot’s heart stop.

‘Is it really you?’ Parrot thought, desperate hope rising in his chest.

The figure was different yet achingly familiar. The skin was pale lilac instead of the warm complexion Parrot remembered from the years before the war. The hair, once a cascade of purple curls that fell to the small of his back, had become a dark violet curtain of straight strands that reached past his knees when unbound, often seen tied high or woven into a braid.

The horns that had once been dark and gently curved were larger now, silver-gray and deeply ridged, sweeping back from his temples in graceful arcs. A scaled tail swayed beneath the hem of his cloak, its dark surface catching the light in brief iridescent flashes.

And lastly, the eyes. They were no longer black but a vivid, luminous purple.

But beneath those changes, the face was unmistakable. The bone structure was the same, the high cheekbones and sharp jaw that Parrot had seen in another lifetime. The grin was the same too, quick and full of chaotic energy that time had failed to dull. Even from a distance, in fragments of overheard conversation, Parrot recognized the cadence of his voice. The same laugh. The same restless energy that lingered in every movement, even when he stood perfectly still.

It was Wemmbu.

The memories accelerated. The macaw had stayed and watched with the patience of a creature that carried a god's purpose.

It observed Wemmbu visit Farville several times, each visit a rare and precious event that drew the townsfolk to him. The bird had watched him laugh with the shopkeepers and ruffle the hair of children who followed him through the streets. It had seen the navy cloak flutter in the breeze, the tail sway, the horns catch the sunlight.

And then, lastly, it had seen the fight. The green soldiers at the gates. The ender pearl thrown with perfect accuracy. The netherite axe cutting through armor and flesh with movements that were fluid, precise, and terrifyingly familiar. The macaw had watched Wemmbu fight, and it had recognized the style, the speed, the particular way he shifted his weight before a strike.

And then the macaw had seen the death message.

green_0fficer was slain by Wemmbu using [Verdict].

The nametag had appeared on every communicator in Farville.

The macaw had seen it and known. It carried Parrot’s own mind, his memories, and the desperate hope that had endured for decades. This wasn’t a coincidence. It wasn’t a false lead or another resemblance cruel enough to raise false hope.

This was Wemmbu.

The townsfolk had even chanted his name, and the sound had carried across the square from a hundred different voices. Each repetition had only reinforced what the macaw already knew. What Parrot now knew.

Parrot opened his eyes, but the images from the macaw's memories did not fade.

They burned against the back of his eyelids, vivid and undeniable, and for a long moment he could do nothing but stand on the balcony with the feather clutched in his desperate claws. The prayer-hum had receded to a distant murmur. The documents on his desk and the resource calculations he had been working on, all of it had shrunk to irrelevance. There was only the feather in his hand and the memories it had poured into him.

That was definitely Wemmbu.

For decades, Parrot had scanned the Overworld. He had spent years hoping, being disappointed, and hoping again anyway. He had dispatched fragments of his own being to search every corner of the server, losing some to fates he still didn’t understand. He had pored over reports, chased rumors, and endured the gentle pity of those who urged him to move on.

And now the God had found him. The macaw had watched for years, patient and faithful, and it had finally brought back the truth. Wemmbu was alive.

The face from the macaw’s memories lingered behind his eyes, and Parrot found himself comparing it to the person he knew way before everything. The differences were obvious enough that no one could mistake them. Wemmbu looked even younger than he had before the war, his features slightly altered. Yet none of those changes obscured the truth. If anything, they only confirmed it.

This wasn’t the same body, but it was undeniably the same person.

Parrot’s focus lingered on the eyes. Not black, as they had once been, but a vivid purple. It was the same color of ender particles. The particular color of an Ender Dragon’s gaze.

Parrot's mind, trained by years of processing information and drawing connections, began to move even before his emotions could catch up.

Dragon horns. A dragon's tail. Dragon eyes.

Wemmbu hadn’t simply reincarnated into a new body. His soul had taken a form that wasn’t merely a hybrid but something far rarer. Something that pointed toward the End, toward the Ender Dragon that had died a few years ago, toward a lineage that had been thought extinct. The implications were vast, and Parrot could already feel the pieces falling into place in the back of his mind, waiting to be examined.

A sharp thought surfaced, urgent and demanding attention, but before Parrot could pursue it, a knock sounded on the double doors of his office.

The God turned. The motion was mechanical, his body responding while his mind was still caught in the torrent of memory and revelation.

Parrot crossed the balcony threshold and walked back into the office, the lone feather still clutched in his hand. His wings folded and refolded behind him, a small betraying motion that he forced himself to still. He had just settled into his chair when the knock came again.

“Come in,” the King called. His voice was steady. He made it steady.

The doors opened, and Theo stepped inside his office.

His friend was a cockatiel hybrid, his crest feathers a soft sweep of white and yellow that rose from his forehead and fell back behind his head in a soft curve. His wings were smaller than Parrot's, suited for short flights rather than long journeys, and they were folded neatly against his back. He wore a fitted vest of pale blue over a black shirt, the cut formal but comfortable, and dark trousers that fell to netherite boots.

His eyes were hidden behind dark sunglasses that he rarely removed, and his expression, as always, was calm and faintly amused.

A demigod of Order, Theo had served as Parrot's second in command for years, handling the daily operations of the palace with casual efficiency. He was also one of the few people Parrot trusted without reservation. If anyone could be told about Wemmbu, it would be Theo. But not yet. Not until Parrot had confirmed the memories with his own two eyes.

“Hey,” Theo greeted, lifting a hand in a small wave. His crest feathers lifted slightly as he took in Parrot's posture, the slight tension in his wings that Parrot hadn’t been able to fully conceal.

“You've got a visitor.”

Before Parrot could respond, Theo stepped aside, and the visitor entered.

The temperature in the room rose by several degrees. The air thickened with dry, crackling heat that made the potted ferns nearest the door slightly wilt, their leaves curling inward.

FlameFrags walked through the door at an unhurried pace, his presence filling the room the way fire filled a hearth.

The God of Conflict was tall and broad-shouldered, his dark skin marked with the faint striping of a tiger that ran along his arms and the sides of his neck. His dreadlocks, woven with golden rings, fell past his shoulders in heavy ropes. A black blindfold covered his eyes, but his gaze was still palpable. The distinct and unmistakable sense of being watched by something that didn’t necessarily need sight to see.

Flame wore netherite armor trimmed with redstone, and over it a cloak of deep crimson embroidered with flame patterns in gold thread. Heat shimmered in the air around him, a constant visible distortion that made the edges of his form seem slightly unreal and distorted. The flames that wreathed his dominant hand in his true form were banked now, reduced to a faint shimmer, but their presence was still felt in the warmth that radiated from his body.

Parrot nodded to Theo, who saluted and withdrew. The double doors closed behind him with a soft, resonant thud, and the latch clicked into place.

Flame approached the desk. His netherite boots made no sound on the stone tiles, but the heat that preceded him announced his progress. Parrot remained seated, his composure restored.

“Hey bro,” Flame greeted.

“Flame.” Parrot kept his voice level, pleasant, the voice of a king greeting an honored guest. His heart was still beating a little too fast, but his expression betrayed nothing. “What brings you here?”

It was an unusual visit, admittedly. Parrot would be lying if he said he wasn’t surprised.

The three primordial gods met annually in the Aether to discuss the state of the server and the progress of their respective domains. The meeting itself was a tradition that had begun shortly after their ascension, a formal acknowledgment that the Overworld, the Nether, and the End were interconnected and required coordination.

Their last gathering had been only a few months ago, and the next wasn’t due for another half year. Visits outside of that schedule were rare. Flame had his own domain to manage. The Nether was a realm of constant conflict, and the God was kept busy by his duties. The fortress of the Nether kept him occupied with the endless skirmishes between players and piglins, the management of the bastions, and the prayers of warriors who sought his blessing before battle.

For Flame to leave the Nether and travel to Capital City, something must have prompted the journey.

“Just passing through, bro.” Flame stopped before the desk and crossed his arms over his chest. The pose was casual, but the muscles beneath his armor were corded with a tension that didn’t match his tone.

“I just visited Lomedy a while ago. Figured I'd stop by here too.”

Parrot’s stance loosened just slightly. Lomedy. The old farmer who had been a friend to Flame before and after the war, who had chosen to remain mortal and grow old while the gods around him stayed young.

Parrot breathed a little easier, though the relief was tinged with something sharper. He hadn’t realized how tense he had been until that answer ruled out a different possibility, one so nonsensical he was almost embarrassed by it. For a brief moment, Parrot had wondered if Flame had come to tell him that he found Wemmbu first.

The thought left a sour taste in his mouth. It bothered the King more than he cared to admit.

“That's nice,” Parrot said smoothly. “How’s he doing?”

Flame shrugged one shoulder. The motion was casual, but the heat that radiated from him made the gesture seem heavier than it actually was. The air around him shimmered faintly. “He's alright. As alright as a sixty-year-old man can be, bro.”

Lomedy wasn’t a demigod. He had been offered the chance, as all close friends of the gods were, but he refused. He had chosen to age, to feel the years settle into his bones, and to eventually die as all mortal players did. It was a choice Parrot respected but couldn’t fully understand. Having the option of eternity and turning it down felt, to him, like a kind of wasted opportunity, though perhaps Lomedy would never see it that way.

The farmer had always struck Parrot as stubborn, the sort of player who made a decision and saw little reason to revisit it. Age had done nothing to soften that tendency. He devoted himself to his farms with diligence and remained one of the few mortals who seemed unimpressed by divinity, treating gods with the same practicality and consideration he showed everyone else.

“He’s been a great help to me recently,” Parrot said, steering the conversation toward safer territory. “His automatic farms have increased resource output significantly. With the new civilizations forming in the east, I’ve been able to allocate resources more efficiently because of his work.”

Flame nodded slowly. “Yeah, he mentioned that. He said you’ve been sending him requests for expanded crop yields. He’s been working on a new carrot farm design too.”

“He does seem to have a talent for that sort of thing.”

Flame huffed a quiet laugh. “Yeah. He does.”

The conversation lapsed into silence after that. It wasn’t uncomfortable, exactly, but neither was it easy.

Parrot and Flame had once been close, bound by shared battles, shared grief, and the particular closeness of fighting side by side in wars that had nearly destroyed everything they cared for.

However, the decades following Wemmbu’s death had stretched that bond thin. Flame had retreated into the Nether, burying himself in his domain with a single-minded focus that left little room for social visits. Parrot had done much the same in the Overworld, immersing himself in resource allocations, diplomatic correspondence, and the endless, delicate work of maintaining peace in the server.

They still saw each other in the Aether each year. They exchanged updates, pleasantries, and the occasional conversation like this one. Yet the easy camaraderie of their youth and mortal years had gradually given way to something more formal. The distance between them wasn’t born of resentment; it was simply distance. Time and responsibility had carved their lives into separate paths that no longer crossed as often as they once had.

“Anyway, bro.”

Flame uncrossed his arms and rested a hand on the back of the chair facing Parrot’s desk. His tiger-sharp claws tapped lightly against the wood. “Y’know I’ve been feeling some unease in the Overworld lately. Another rebellion brewing or what?”

Parrot wasn’t surprised by the question.

Just as he could sense injustice and disorder within his domain, the small disturbances that rippled through the peace of the Overworld, Flame could sense conflict. The instincts were similar in nature: a constant awareness of disruptions within their realms, accompanied by the ceaseless murmur of prayers from their followers.

Flame’s prayers were different from Parrot’s. It was harsher, bloodier.

Warriors seeking strength before battle, their voices edged with anticipation. Generals asking for victory, their words formal and measured. The dying whispering his name with their final breath, offering up the conflict that had consumed them. Parrot had heard glimpses of those prayers once, during a battle that had nearly cost him his life, and he didn’t envy Flame for the burden of carrying them at all.

“It's nothing serious,” Parrot assured. He leaned back in his chair, his expression smoothing into a reassuring smile. “A resource allocation problem, that's all. The population in the SMP has been growing faster than our farms can support. It's caused some tensions in the outer settlements, but I’m handling it.”

The King gestured to the documents spread across his desk, the neat rows of calculations and distribution routes. “Working on it right now, actually.”

Flame glanced at the papers. The blindfold made the direction of his gaze difficult to track, but the slight tilt of his head was enough to indicate his attention. “Alright, bro. Let me know if you need backup or something.”

“I will, dude. Thank you.”

Flame's head tilted further. His attention had shifted, drawn by something Parrot couldn’t immediately identify. Then he realized. The slight motion of Flame's chin was directed toward the edge of the desk, where a single feather lay. The King had carelessly set it down when he sat, his mind too full of memories to remember to hide it. It rested beside a stack of correspondence, small and incongruous against the dark wood.

“You stalking someone, bro?” Flame's tone was light, almost teasing. He knew about Parrot's parrots and the surveillance they enabled. Although he didn’t know how often they were used, or for what purpose. Most people didn’t.

Parrot’s hand moved before he could think better of it. He caught himself almost immediately and forced the rest of the motion into something slower, sliding the feather into the drawer beneath his desk as though it were of no consequence. But the correction came a moment too late. Anyone paying attention would have noticed the initial haste. Flame’s blindfold hid his eyes, but Parrot could feel the weight of his attention settle on him.

“It's nothing,” Parrot said. He paused.

The feather was in the drawer now, out of sight, but the revelation it had brought was still burning behind his ribs, demanding acknowledgment.

The King wanted to tell someone. He wanted to say the words aloud, to make them real by speaking them into the air. For decades he had carried this hope alone, tending it in secret while the people around him urged him to let it go. And now the hope had been fulfilled, and the weight of the secret was suddenly unbearable.

But Flame had given up searching years ago. The God of Conflict had been the first to give up.

“I was just thinking,” Parrot said slowly, testing the waters, “about Wemmbu.”

The temperature in the room didn’t change, but something in the atmosphere did. A stillness, some kind of tightening. Flame's posture remained casual, his arms crossed and his shoulders relaxed, but his jaw tightened. The motion was small, a flicker of tension that came and went in an instant.

Parrot had known the God long enough to see it, and he had known him long enough to know what it meant.

“Parrot.” Flame's voice was heavier now. The casual warmth had drained from it, replaced by something that wasn’t anger but was adjacent to it. A weariness. A frustration that had been worn smooth by years of repetition.

“I thought we were done with this.”

Parrot said nothing. His hand rested on the closed drawer. Inside, hidden in the dark, the feather settled.

“It's been decades.” Flame's tone wasn’t unkind, but it was firm. It was the voice of someone delivering a truth he believed was necessary, even if it hurt. “We searched for years, bro. We sent countless players to every corner of the server. We checked the spawn points, we checked the End. Spoke checked the End himself, and you know how rarely he does anything on his own. And there's been nothing. No sign or trace.”

The God of the Nether paused, and the silence that followed was heavy with the weight of old grief. “He's probably spawned into another server by now, moved on to somewhere he can start fresh. Somewhere he doesn't have to deal with all this.”

Parrot's wings twitched behind him, vibrant feathers lifting for a moment before settling back into place. A small, betraying reaction he couldn't quite suppress.

Flame's words weren't new. Parrot had heard variations of them for years. Spoke had said much the same after exhausting every lead he could find, arguing that souls were unpredictable and that searching for a specific reincarnation was an exercise in self-torture. Other immortal friends had been gentler, suggesting that the resources devoted to the search might be better spent elsewhere, on problems with clearer solutions. Even Flame, who had cared for Wemmbu too, had eventually chosen to let him go in the end.

Under different circumstances, Parrot might have agreed with them. But circumstances had changed.

His macaw had returned with memories of evidence. The God of Order had watched Wemmbu move through a civilization millions of blocks away. He had seen him fight, had heard his name carried across the town square by dozens of voices. The King knew something the others didn't.

Parrot understood, on some ambiguous level, why Flame had given up. The guilt between them was different, shaped by different histories and closeness.

Flame and Wemmbu had been rivals before they were friends, and their rivalry had been sharp-edged and competitive. They had pushed each other in ways that sometimes went too far, and both of them had often paid the price for it. Flame had cared for Wemmbu, but that care had been tangled up in regret and the unfortunate knowledge that their last interaction hadn’t been kind.

Letting go, for Flame, wasn’t abandonment. It was the hope that Wemmbu had been reborn somewhere far from here, somewhere he could live without the weight of old rivalries and old wars pressing down on him.

But Parrot had never been able to see it that way. Their circumstances were vastly different.

Wemmbu had died for him. The final sacrifice of the war had been made to preserve Parrot’s life, and no amount of time could separate that fact from everything that followed. Perhaps it was stubbornness, maybe it was guilt. Either way, the idea of simply letting go had always felt wrong. As though accepting Wemmbu’s disappearance without a fight would diminish the value of the gift he had been given.

“Right,” Parrot said. His voice was calm now, neutral. The voice of a king who had been handling difficult conversations for years. “I was just… thinking. It's nothing, really.”

Flame studied him for a moment. The blindfold made it impossible to read his eyes, but the set of his mouth suggested skepticism. His jaw was still tight, and his shoulders hadn’t fully relaxed. He didn’t believe Parrot. But he also didn’t press.

Maybe he was tired of this argument, or maybe he didn’t want to reopen a wound that had taken years to scar over.

“You're dismissed, Flame.” Parrot's tone was polite and final.

“It was good to see you. Thank you for stopping by.”

A pause. Flame's fingers tapped once against the back of the chair. Then he nodded, a single sharp motion. The heat in the room receded slightly as he turned toward the doors. His cloak swirled behind him, the crimson fabric catching the faint light.

“If you need anything,” Flame said over his shoulder, “let me know.”

The doors opened and closed. The latch clicked. The God of Conflict was gone.

Parrot exhaled. The tension in his wings released by slow degrees, the feathers settling back into their proper alignment. He listened to the sound of Theo's footsteps in the corridor outside, escorting Flame back through the winding halls of the palace.

The prayer-hum at the back of his mind continued its quiet murmur, the voices of a thousand devotees asking for things he could grant. The sunlight continued to stream through the windows, steady and indifferent to the revelation that had just reshaped his entire world.

The King opened the drawer and took out the feather. It was light and faintly warm, still thrumming with the residue of the power that had returned it to him. He held it between his claws and thought about what he had seen.

Wemmbu was alive.

Wemmbu was living somewhere near the Far Lands with Eggchan, the angel who had once been his closest ally. Somehow, through all these years, he had never told anyone. Eggchan had kept Wemmbu hidden and allowed the gods to believe he was gone.

Parrot didn’t know why Eggchan had kept him a secret. The Seraphim was a pacifist, neutral and soft-spoken, loyal to the friendship between them above all else.

‘Did he fear what the gods might do if they found Wemmbu?’ Parrot wondered curiously. Perhaps the angel had wanted to shield him from the weight of his past, from the memories of a life that had ended in sacrifice and pain. Parrot could understand that impulse. He could even forgive it, provided Eggchan was willing to explain himself when the time came.

What mattered was that Wemmbu was real. Wemmbu was here, in the Unstable SMP, and Parrot knew exactly where to find him.

The macaw's memories had shown him the exact path to Farville. The God could go there. He could see Wemmbu with his own eyes, confirm the memories with his own senses, and understand what had happened in the decades since Wemmbu's death.

The King could tell Flame. He could even send word to Spoke, though the God of Change was cryptic and rarely appeared outside the annual meetings in the Aether. Regardless, Parrot could share the evangelion with the others.

But something held him back.

Flame had given up. Flame had told him, in a voice full of regretful finality, that Wemmbu was gone and search was hopeless, that Parrot was chasing a ghost. And Spoke, for all his mischief, had never seemed as invested in the search as Parrot was. The God of the End had mourned Wemmbu in his own way, with offerings left at the edge of the void and enigmatic remarks about the nature of souls.

But the both of them hadn’t spent decades combing the Overworld for signs of Wemmbu's return. They hadn’t dispatched pieces of their own being to search every corner of the server.

‘No,’ he thought. Parrot would keep this to himself. ‘But only for now.’

He would find Wemmbu alone. He would confirm the macaw's memories with his own eyes. He would understand what had happened, why Wemmbu had been hidden, why Eggchan had stayed silent for so long. And then, once he had answers, once he was certain, he would decide what to do next. Parrot would decide who to tell, and when, and how.

He picked up his pen. The resource allocation order still needed to be finished. The problems of the server didn’t pause for personal revelations. The civilizations of the Overworld still needed their shipments, and the farms still needed to be expanded. The delicate structure of peace still needed to be maintained.

But his thoughts were no longer on harvest yields and distribution routes. They lingered instead on a navy cloak and a pair of purple eyes that had once been black. On a face that had changed in form but not in essence. With some effort, Parrot turned his attention back to the documents spread across his desk.

Farville wasn’t going anywhere. Neither, it seemed, was Wemmbu.

The scratching of his pen resumed. The afternoon light shifted across the floor in slow increments. The prayer-hum continued to murmur at the back of his mind.

For the first time in decades, he knew where the search would lead. Parrot was thankful.

Chapter Text

The cottage was still in the early morning, and Eggchan was cooking breakfast.

His hands moved with quiet precision over the stove. He cracked two eggs into a heated pan, arranging slices of baked potato along the pan's edge where the heat was gentlest. The yolks settled into soft circles, and the whites began to crisp at the edges exactly the way Wemmbu preferred.

Eggchan had learned this preference through years of careful observation, noting which foods disappeared first from the plate and which were pushed aside. Baked potatoes were a favorite. Eggs were tolerated as a necessary protein, but Wemmbu liked them when the yolks were soft and a scattering of dried herbs was sprinkled on top.

The herbs had been harvested by Wemmbu last spring. Eggchan remembered the afternoon clearly.

Wemmbu had knelt in the small garden behind their cottage, his tail swaying with satisfaction as he tied the cut stems with twine and hung them to dry above the sink. He had been proud of that harvest, proud of contributing something to the cottage that wasn’t cooking itself. Eggchan had stood in the doorway, watching him with a small smile.

This was the life they had built. Self-sufficient, isolated, and safe. The memory was a warm thing, and Eggchan held it briefly before setting it aside.

The froglights embedded in the floor had been adjusted, their usual glow brightened and left unobstructed. Warm light pooled across the kitchen counter, catching along the rim of the glass of water Eggchan had just poured. The stove hissed softly beneath the pan. The curtains were drawn, as they always were, the pale blue fabric reducing the daylight to a faint gleam along the seams and edges.

The cottage didn’t feel dark, however. It felt enclosed, sheltered, a complete world unto itself that held everything of value.

Eggchan flipped the eggs with a careful slide of the spatula. The motion was unhurried, the whites lifting cleanly from the iron.

Cooking for Wemmbu had become part of his routine, right after the dragon lost the chance to do it himself. It was a small thing, but it was necessary. Wemmbu needed to eat. He needed food that was gentle on the stomach, especially after several days spent in the obsidian box.

Until the locks could be opened for good, a warm meal in the morning was one of the few comforts Eggchan could place directly into his hands.

He turned off the stove. The plate was arranged with the same care he applied to everything he did for Wemmbu. Two eggs, their yolks intact and bright. Three slices of baked potato, seasoned with salt and dried rosemary. A glass of water, cool and clear. Eggchan placed the meal into his inventory with a flick of his hand, the items settling into their slots with a faint shimmer, and then he turned away from the stove.

The cottage was quiet around him.

The armchairs by the cold fireplace were empty, their cushions undisturbed. The dining table where Wemmbu usually sat with his tail curled around the leg of his chair was bare. The bookshelves were still, their volumes gathering a thin layer of dust that Eggchan hadn’t bothered to clean. It only felt irrelevant.

The only thing that mattered in this cottage was downstairs, waiting in the dark.

Eggchan descended the stairs to the basement. The steps were cold beneath the soles of his shoes, and the air grew cooler with each step, the warmth of the kitchen receding behind him.

The storage room at the bottom was dim. Eggchan didn’t light up the lanterns. The darkness here was familiar, a lesser version of the darkness below, and he moved through it without needing to see. The barrels and chests were shapes in the gray, their contents inventoried and organized. The hidden trapdoor in the corner was invisible unless one knew exactly where to look.

Eggchan knelt and found the seam with his fingers, the slight irregularity in the stone that marked the entrance. The hinges opened without sound.

The second set of stairs was narrower than the first, steeper, and the darkness below was absolute. The air here was cold and carried no scent at all. It was dead air, an air that had never known sunlight, and it pressed against Eggchan's skin as he descended. He didn’t mind it. The darkness was a tool, and the cold was a necessity. Obsidian had properties that resisted all light, all scrying, all observation, and those properties were what kept Wemmbu safe. The discomfort was temporary, but the safety was permanent.

The iron door at the bottom of the stairs was set into a frame of seamless obsidian. Three locks were bolted into the stone, their mechanisms sturdy and well-maintained, and a heavy iron bar crossed the center.

Eggchan's hands moved through the sequence of unlocking with practiced efficiency. The first lock clicked. The second, then the third. The iron bar slid back with a sound that echoed in the narrow stairwell.

He didn’t push the door open. He pulled it ajar just enough to create a gap the width of his hand, a sliver of space between the iron and the obsidian block.

“Wemmbu.” His voice was soft. “Your breakfast.”

Eggchan reached through the gap, his arm disappearing into the absolute blackness of the obsidian room. His fingers found the stone floor, cold and smooth, and he set the plate down from his inventory. The glass of water followed, placed carefully beside it.

The darkness inside the box was total. His seraphic eyes couldn’t even penetrate such shadow. Obsidian was the only material in the Overworld that resisted him completely, and he had chosen it precisely for that reason. If even Eggchan couldn’t see inside, neither could anyone else. Neither could any other god with their prying eyes. Thus, Wemmbu here was invisible. He was unreachable, he was safe.

A lilac hand emerged from the darkness, pressing three stacked plates into his waiting palm.

The routine was the same every morning. Eggchan received the previous day’s dishes, and Wemmbu received his meal. They exchanged these small necessities with as few words as possible, both moving through the ritual with the practiced familiarity of repetition. It was easier that way. Every conversation lingered too long afterward, settling heavily beneath Eggchan’s ribs and forcing him to confront feelings he spent the rest of the day trying not to examine.

Eggchan silently slipped the plates into his inventory. He was about to withdraw his hand when gentle fingers closed around his wrist.

The grip was light. Not forceful, not angry. It was only present, a circle of warmth in the cold air of the stairwell.

Eggchan stared at where the lilac hand emerged from the dark, the only visible part of Wemmbu within the absolute darkness of the box. The hand was calloused from years of training, the palm rough with the memory of axe handles and spear shafts. The fingers were still strong. Eight days without sunlight, without movement, without anything but cold obsidian walls and darkness, and Wemmbu’s hand remained strong enough to tighten and hurt him.

It was strong enough to yank him forward against the iron door. Strong enough to demand answers, to demand release, to demand that Eggchan stop this and let him out. The power and capacity were there. Wemmbu could have pulled. He could have hurt him, and he could have fought.

And Eggchan would have let him. He would have let Wemmbu do anything only if it meant he was safe and sound.

But the hand did none of those things. It simply held his wrist with gentleness that made Eggchan’s chest constrict until breathing became difficult.

“Egg.”

Wemmbu's voice was quiet, hoarse from disuse. It was carefully neutral, the tone of someone holding back whatever he actually felt for the sake of the person he was speaking to.

“How long am I gonna stay here?”

The question wasn’t an accusation. It was a request for information, delivered with the same calm acceptance Wemmbu had shown every morning for the past eight days. He didn’t shout. He didn’t pound on the walls. He asked, and he waited, and his hand around Eggchan's wrist was gentle.

Eggchan's breath left him in a slow, unsteady exhale. His heart squeezed painfully behind his ribs. His jaw tightened until his teeth ached. He had to ungrit them before he could speak.

“Just a few more days.” His tone was tender, kind. The voice he used when Wemmbu was sick or hurt or frightened, the voice he had cultivated over years of being the person Wemmbu trusted most.

“I promise.”

There was silence from the darkness. The hand around his wrist didn’t move for a moment.

Then Wemmbu's voice came again, softer this time, almost dismissive, as though he was trying to make the words casual and easy.

“‘Kay. Miss you.”

The fingers uncurled. The lilac hand withdrew into the black, and Wemmbu didn’t appear in the gap. He didn’t press his face to the opening. He simply retreated into the obsidian box and let Eggchan go; the gentleness of it was unbearable.

Eggchan's throat tightened. He forced a smile onto his mouth, a shape his lips had learned to make regardless of what lay behind it.

“I… miss you too.”

He closed the door. The motion was immediate, his hands moving through the sequence of locking and bolting without hesitation.

The iron bar slid home. The first lock clicked, and the second, then the third. The sounds were loud in the narrow stairwell, each one a statement of finality. Eggchan didn’t pause between them. Because if he paused, he might think about the gentle hand around his wrist, the voice that had said “miss you,” the fact that Wemmbu could have hurt him because of his cruelty and had chosen not to.

Thinking about those things served no purpose. The door was closed. The locks were secure. Wemmbu was safe. That was the only truth that mattered.

Eggchan stood at the bottom of the stairs for a moment, his hand still resting on the iron door. The darkness pressed against him, and the cold seeped into his shoes. Eventually, he turned and climbed back up, through the hidden trapdoor, the dark basement, and up to the first floor of their cottage. The froglights were still glowing, and the curtains were still drawn. Nothing had changed. The cottage was exactly as he had left it, and that was the problem.

Now, the cottage was always exactly as he had left it. The little signs of another person being around had vanished, leaving behind a stillness that felt far too large for a house meant for two.

Eggchan walked to the sink and placed the dirty plates inside. They clinked softly against the basin. He didn’t wash them, at least not yet. He stood at the sink with his hands braced against the counter and his head bowed. His wings, the great white primaries that marked him as a redeemed Seraphim, were stiff behind him. The smaller wings beside his face had folded forward, covering his cheeks and the corners of his eyes, and he didn’t push them back. He let them hide him.

The reaction was involuntary, a physical betrayal of something he refused to name. Eggchan hadn’t felt this heaviness in a long time. He had thought himself beyond it.

He pushed away from the sink and crossed to the kitchen island. The stool where Wemmbu usually sat was empty, its wood scarred where claws had tapped against it over years of meals. Eggchan lowered himself onto the stool beside it and leaned his elbows on the counter. He pressed his palms against his face, the heels of his hands digging into his eye sockets, and released a breath that shuddered through his entire body.

‘It’s been eight days now,’ Eggchan thought with helplessness.

Eight days since he had led his best friend down the basement and locked the iron door behind him. This was the longest time Wemmbu had been hidden in the obsidian box.

The previous confinement, over a year ago, had lasted only four days. That had been a different situation, a different kind of precaution, and Wemmbu had raged against the walls. Eggchan remembered the sounds. The pounding of fists against obsidian, the shouting that tried to echo through the floorboards. His best friend had been younger then, less controlled, and by the third day he had gone quiet with exhaustion. By the fourth, Eggchan had deemed the danger passed and let him out.

Wemmbu hadn’t spoken to him for a week after that. But he had understood eventually. He always understood.

This time was different. Wemmbu hadn’t shouted. He hadn’t pounded on the walls. He had accepted the confinement with a quiet compliance that was, in its own way, far more difficult to bear.

Each morning Wemmbu returned the plates without fanfare. He barely talked. And when he did, his voice never accused.

The obedience was a gift, a proof of trust that should have reassured Eggchan. Wemmbu trusted him. Wemmbu knew that this was necessary. He was willing to wait in the dark for as long as Eggchan asked him to. That trust was precious, and that trust was being tested, and that trust was holding.

Eggchan pressed his palms harder against his face. The pressure was grounding, and the darkness behind his eyelids was familiar.

He allowed himself, for a moment, to feel the weight of what he was doing. The cold of the obsidian box. The darkness that never lifted. The voice saying “miss you” in a tone that was trying so hard to be casual. Eggchan allowed himself to feel it, and then he set the feeling aside. Feelings weren’t useful. Feelings didn’t keep Wemmbu safe. Only action kept Wemmbu safe, and action required clarity.

He lifted his head from his hands and opened his eyes. The kitchen was still. The empty stool beside him remained empty.

Eggchan looked at it for a long moment, at the groove on the edge where Wemmbu had once dug his claw in too hard during an argument, the small scar in the wood that Eggchan had never sanded out. It was proof that Wemmbu had been there.

The cottage was full of such proofs. The notch in the doorframe from a thrown axe. The burn on the rug from a knocked-over lantern. The shelf in the bathroom where Wemmbu's hair ties were kept in a small clay bowl. The cottage was a record of Wemmbu's presence, and without him in it, the record felt hollow. The walls seemed closer, and the silence seemed louder.

Eggchan hadn’t realized how much of the cottage's warmth came from Wemmbu until that warmth was gone. The morning ritual of braiding and tying his hair. The sound of his footsteps on the stairs. The way he hummed off-key while he cooked. The weight of his tail draped over Eggchan's thigh when they sat together on the armchair, reading in the quiet hours after dinner. These things had easily filled the cottage. Now without them, it was just a building.

Without Wemmbu, the cottage was just walls and drawn curtains and a stove that he used to cook meals for one.

Eggchan missed his best friend. The admission was a wound that refused to close. He missed Wemmbu with an intensity that bordered on physical pain, a hollow ache that had settled into his chest eight days ago and hadn’t left even for a second.

It was irrational, in some ways. He had spent years without Wemmbu before. Decades, even. He had crossed realms searching for traces of him, followed rumors that led nowhere, spent countless nights staring at empty pages and wondering if he had already arrived too late. Eggchan had endured all of that and kept moving.

Yet somehow, these eight days hurt no less.

The ache was familiar. It was the same ache that had accompanied him through every fruitless search and every passing year. The same quiet grief and guilt that had lived beneath his ribs for decades. Distance had never dulled it; time had only worsened it.

Now, with Wemmbu only a few floors below him and separated by little more than obsidian, iron, and necessity, it seemed to hurt even more.

But missing Wemmbu was irrelevant. What mattered was keeping him alive. What mattered was ensuring that the world outside the oak forest couldn’t reach him.

‘He can’t leave, not yet,’ Eggchan thought. The world outside was still dangerous.

The conviction settled over him like a shadow as he crossed the cottage. From the outside, countless of his eyes had been watching.

The festival for the God of Order had begun today.

Farville was draped in yellow and white banners, the fountain decorated with garlands of wildflowers, the market stalls rearranged to make room for dancing and feasting that would occupy the next three days. The townsfolk were excited. Eggchan had seen them through a dozen hidden eyes, heard their voices through ears that weren’t his own. They spoke of the festival with anticipation, of the prayers they would offer and the blessings they hoped to receive.

The players spoke of their god with reverence. “The God of Order was kind and approachable,” they said. He walked among his devotees during festivals, and he listened to their prayers directly. The God had been known to visit nearby civilizations in person, appearing at temples and market squares alike, his presence a reassurance that the Unstable SMP was watched over and protected.

This was the problem. Parrot was approachable, attentive. And during the festival, when the veil between god and devotee was thinnest, Parrot would be listening to every prayer whispered in his name.

Farville was only a short distance from the oak forest. Its people were still talking about the demon hybrid who had saved them eight days ago, and their talk hadn’t diminished with time. Eggchan's eyes had observed the market gossip. The story had spread from the witnesses to their friends, from their friends to the outer farms, from the outer farms to traders who carried it to other towns.

They talked about a young warrior in a navy cloak. Gray horns that caught the light. A tail that swept soldiers off their feet. A nametag attached to a death message. Wemmbu.

The townsfolk spoke it with admiration, with affection, with the particular warmth reserved for local heroes. They didn’t know they were endangering him. They couldn’t know.

But the danger was real, and it was growing.

A particular man had voiced his suspicions aloud two days ago. Eggchan had been watching through an eye tucked into the eaves of the bakery, and he had heard every word.

The man had been speaking to a small group near the fountain, his voice low and conspiratorial. “I'm telling you, that wasn't a demon hybrid,” he had said. “I've seen demon hybrids. Their tails don't have scales like that. And the horns. Dude, those weren't demon horns. My cousin used to work in the End cities, and he said—”

The man hadn’t finished spreading his gossip. Eggchan had made sure of that.

The body had been removed before dawn. The man's friends were still searching for him, and they would never be able to find him. No death message had appeared within the vicinity because Eggchan had been careful to make it look like a mysterious accident. A fall into a ravine, or perhaps a disappearance in the forest. The man had become a mystery, and mysteries were safer than truths.

This was what protection required. This was what Eggchan had sworn to do.

In the years before Wemmbu's death, when Eggchan had been nothing but a fallen angel with poor eyesight and limited power, he had been incapable of this kind of action. His bow had been unreliable, and his seraphic abilities had been diminished.

Eggchan was forced to rely on words and diplomacy, on the careful, exhausting work of talking his way out of situations he couldn’t fight his way through. And his best friend had been the one to step in when words failed. Wemmbu had fought and killed and put himself in danger because Eggchan couldn’t protect him.

Wemmbu had died because Eggchan couldn’t protect him.

That single, immutable fact sat at the center of everything Eggchan had become. He hadn’t been strong enough then, but he was strong enough now. His redemption by the heavens had restored his full seraphic power. His eyesight was perfect, and his aim was steady. His eyes could watch every corner of the forest, the town, the roads in between. And his eyes told him that the festival was dangerous, that the God of Order was listening, that Wemmbu's name was still on the lips of Farville's players.

A single prayer was all it could take. One devotee offering thanks for the mysterious warrior who had saved their mayor, one mention of the name Wemmbu in a prayer directed at the God of Order, and Parrot would know.

The King had been searching for Wemmbu for decades. He had hounded Eggchan in the years after Wemmbu's death, asking for help in the search, seeking out the guardian angel who should have been able to find his charge. Eggchan had refused. He had avoided the God of Order ever since, dodging meetings and keeping his distance from the temples where Parrot's presence lingered.

Eggchan had known, even before he found Wemmbu in the End, that when he did, he wouldn’t share him. Those people had let Wemmbu die. They had stood by while Wemmbu sacrificed himself for a king who didn’t deserve him.

They didn’t get to know he had returned. They were better off never knowing.

So the festival was a threat. Wemmbu couldn’t leave the obsidian box while prayers were being offered and a god was listening. He couldn’t even roam the forest, because the festival might draw travelers, and the travelers might see him. Seeing led to talking, talking led to discovery. The danger was too great.

Eggchan calculated the days in his mind. Three days for the festival. Another two or three days for the devotional energy to dissipate, for the God of Order's attention to turn elsewhere, and for the town's excitement to settle back into its usual rhythm. Five or six more days in total. Perhaps seven, to be safe.

He would reassess as his eyes fed him information. If the situation calmed sooner, he would let Wemmbu out earlier. If it worsened, he would extend the confinement. The primary objective was Wemmbu's safety, and Wemmbu's safety required patience.

Eggchan's gaze drifted to the closed door of the basement stairs.

Wemmbu was down there now. Sitting in the dark, waiting. The compliance Wemmbu had shown over the past eight days was treasure, and Eggchan didn’t take it for granted. The first time Wemmbu had been hidden in the obsidian box, he was angry. This time, he wasn’t. This time, he accepted the confinement with quiet obedience that spoke of trust. He was learning, and the years of careful guidance and control were bearing fruit.

Wemmbu was becoming more controlled, more cautious and aware of the dangers that surrounded them. The incident with the parrot had been a setback, but setbacks were expected. Wemmbu had still come home, and he had still planned to tell Eggchan the truth.

The foundation of trust between them was still intact, and Eggchan would continue to build on it. A few more lessons, and Wemmbu would learn to kill the birds himself. A few more confinements, and Wemmbu would learn to avoid situations that required them.

The conditioning was slow work, but it was effective.

Wemmbu was already calmer than he had been years ago. He was already more obedient, more understanding. Given enough time, he would become exactly what Eggchan needed his best friend to be. Safe. Protected. Incapable of endangering himself or being endangered by others.

The thought settled into Eggchan's mind with the cold clarity of absolute conviction. It might seem cruel, but it was love. It was the purest form of love he had ever known, a love that didn’t flinch from difficult decisions or temporary suffering.

Eggchan had let Wemmbu die once because he was too weak to protect him. He wouldn’t let it happen again. He would lock Wemmbu in a hundred obsidian boxes if that was what it took. He would kill a hundred players who spoke too loudly about dragon scales. He would burn the world to embers and rebuild it as a cage, and Wemmbu would be safe inside it, and that was all that mattered.

He rose from the stool. His wings unfolded behind him, the stiffness in them easing as he moved. The smaller wings beside his face drew back, revealing the hard set of his jaw and the unblinking blue of his eyes.

Eggchan crossed to the window and pulled the curtain aside just enough to see the clearing outside. The soul lanterns were unlit, the gravel path was empty, and the forest was still. The morning light was pale and gold on the oak trunks. Today was a beautiful day. Wemmbu would have loved it.

Wemmbu would have stood by the doorway, commenting on the weather then asking if he could train outside for longer than usual.

Eggchan let the curtain fall.

He turned back to the cottage. The dirty plates were still in the sink. He would wash them later. For now, he had work to do. The wards needed checking, and the perimeter needed reinforcing against the increased traffic the festival would bring. His eyes needed to maintain their vigil over Farville and other nearby towns. The God of Order was listening, and Eggchan wouldn’t allow a single prayer to reach those divine ears if it carried the name of his best friend.

He climbed the stairs to his office, opening the door and sitting down at his desk. The books were open to the sections he had been studying last night.

Eggchan had been researching conditioning, reinforcement, the methods by which behavior could be shaped over time. The texts were dense, written by scholars who had never met a Seraphim and never befriended an Ender Dragon, but the principles were sound. Wemmbu was responding well, and the trajectory was positive. With continued application, the desired outcomes would be achieved.

Eggchan picked up his pen and began to write. The scratching of the nib against paper was the only sound in the cottage. The morning light pressed against the drawn curtains.

The festival began in Farville, bright and loud and full of prayers. And beneath the floorboards, beneath the hidden trapdoor and the iron locks, Wemmbu sat in the dark and waited for the door to open.

Eggchan wouldn’t let him wait much longer. A few more days. He had promised, and he intended to keep his promise.

Every promise he made to Wemmbu, he intended to keep. The promise to protect him, to never fail him again. The promise that the obsidian box was temporary. When the time was right, Wemmbu would step out into the light of their home and everything would be as it was before. Eggchan kept his promises. He would keep this one too.

The pen continued to scratch against parchment. In the silence of the cottage, Eggchan worked, and waited, and cared in the only way he knew how.

Chapter Text

The obsidian box was cold. It had been cold for so long that Wemmbu had forgotten what warmth felt like, the type of warmth that came from sunlight or a stove or the press of a shoulder against his own.

The cold wasn’t a sharp thing but a slow one, a patient kind that seeped into his bones over the passing days and made a home there. The cold was always around, a constant companion in the darkness.

The silence was worse. It wasn’t true silence, at least not at first. In the beginning, there had been the faint hum of tinnitus, a high and persistent ringing that filled his ears when no other sound was present. That ringing had driven him to distraction in the first few days. He had pressed his palms against his ears to block it out, had hummed to himself until his throat went raw, had talked aloud to the darkness just to hear something other than the ringing.

But the ringing never stopped, and eventually Wemmbu stopped fighting it. The tinnitus had become familiar, a background noise that his mind had learned to tune out. Now the silence was simply silence. Deep, complete, and undisturbed by anything except the occasional shift of his own body against the obsidian floor.

His eyes had adjusted to the dark easily, which wasn’t so strange.

Wemmbu remembered, distantly, the first time he had left the End. Eggchan had led him through the portal and into the Overworld, and the sunlight had been a physical blow. His eyes had burned and watered for days, and Eggchan had kept the curtains drawn and the lanterns dim while Wemmbu's vision slowly learned to process the brightness.

He had been a creature of the End, born in a realm without sun, and the Overworld had been an assault on senses he didn’t know he possessed. Now the process had seemingly reversed. Days in the obsidian box, and his eyes had relearned the dark. The absolute blackness that had greeted him when the iron door first closed was no longer absolute.

There was a faint glow to the obsidian walls, a violet luminescence so subtle that he hadn’t noticed it until he had nothing else to look at. It was barely there, a suggestion of light rather than light itself, but it was enough to remind him that he could still see.

Wemmbu had spent the days in his head. When his thoughts became too loud, he let them drift. When they drifted too far, he pulled them back. There was a rhythm to it, a cycle of awareness and retreat that he had learned without meaning to.

Sometimes he counted the seams in the obsidian, tracing the lines with his eyes until the numbers lost meaning. Sometimes he recited training forms in his mind, the sequences of footwork and strikes that he had practiced a thousand times in the clearing behind the cottage. Sometimes he simply stopped thinking altogether, letting the darkness press in until there was no difference between the inside of his head and the outside. Those were the easiest times, the times when the cold, the silence, and the waiting became bearable.

A scent hung in the air now, faint but distinct.

Eggs and baked potatoes, seasoned with dried rosemary. Eggchan had brought breakfast a while ago, passing the plate through the gap in the iron door along with a glass of water. Wemmbu had eaten the potatoes first, their warmth a brief comfort in the cold, but the eggs remained on the plate. Two eggs, their yolks soft and their whites crisped at the edges exactly the way he preferred.

Wemmbu stared down at the faint outline of the plate. The violet luminescence of the obsidian was barely enough to trace the shape of the eggs against the ceramic.

He hadn’t moved in some time. The glass of water was in his inventory, waiting to be drunk after the meal. The meal was waiting to be finished. Wemmbu was waiting. He had been waiting for seven days, or perhaps nine, or perhaps more.

Wemmbu had tried to count the meals, but the meals came at irregular intervals, and the darkness made no distinction between morning and midnight.

The first few days, he had counted carefully. He marked each meal on his fingers, reciting the number to himself when the silence grew too heavy. He waited for the door to open, for Eggchan to say that it was time to come out, that the danger had passed, that he could return to the cottage and the life they had built together.

However, the iron door had only opened for meals. The meals kept coming, the door kept closing, and Wemmbu eventually stopped counting because counting made the waiting harder.

He had stopped hoping, too. Not completely. There was still a small, stubborn part of him that listened for the sound of the locks every moment he was awake.

But hope was a painful thing in the dark. It rose and fell with each sound from above, each faint creak of the floorboards that might have been footsteps and might have been nothing at all. And when the door opened for another meal and not for his release, the hope curdled into something heavier. Wemmbu didn’t let himself name it.

‘It was okay. Eggchan wouldn’t keep me here without reason.’ Wemmbu thought.

Something must be happening in the world above, something dangerous enough that Eggchan had decided the obsidian box was the only safe place.

Wemmbu clung to this thought the way he had once clung to his mother's scales in the dark of the End. Eggchan was his best friend. Eggchan had promised to protect him, and protection sometimes looked like locked doors and cold stone. Wemmbu understood that. He had to understand that, because the alternative was a thought he couldn’t afford to think.

Wemmbu looked at the eggs. He hadn’t eaten them yet. His appetite had been strange lately, present in some moments and absent in others, and right now the thought of eating felt distant.

Instead, his mind drifted to the basket of eggs Eggchan had bought in Farville. That must have been more than a week ago. ‘How were their stocks holding up?’ he wondered.

Eggchan was meticulous about inventory, but he sometimes forgot to restock when he was deep in his research. The potatoes in the basement might be running low. The carrots, too. Wemmbu had harvested a good crop before the incident, but that had been days ago, and Eggchan had been eating alone in the cottage above.

‘Was he eating okay?’ Wemmbu thought distantly. Eggchan sometimes forgot to eat when he was worried. Wemmbu had learned to press food into his hands during those times, to sit with him at the kitchen island until the plate was empty.

When he gets out of the box, Wemmbu would check the stocks. He would harvest whatever was ready in the garden. He would cook a proper meal for them both, something warm and filling, and they would sit at the kitchen island and eat together the way they always did.

The thought was a small comfort. Wemmbu held it close, because he had nothing else to hold.

His thoughts then drifted to Farville. The ink shopkeeper had mentioned a festival last time. An annual devotion for the God of Order, a celebration of harvests, peace, and the watchful care of the server’s protector.

Wemmbu remembered her description, as well as other things he had heard before. Feasting and dancing in the square, farmers bringing their best crops for the blessing ceremony. The festival must be happening now, or soon. The townsfolk would be hanging banners and decorating the temple. The children who had last followed Wemmbu through the market would be excited, too.

Farville was a religious town. Wemmbu had seen the temple near the square, its smooth stone facade carved with the feather-and-crown sigil of the God of Order.

The townsfolk prayed there often, clasping their hands together and closing their eyes. He had caught glimpses of them through the open doors during his visits, their expressions peaceful and focused. A player he befriended had once said they prayed for good harvests, for protection, for the continued peace of the Unstable SMP.

Wemmbu stared at the eggs on his plate. His thoughts felt slow and strange, disconnected from each other in a way that might have worried him if he was paying attention. He wasn’t paying attention. He was thinking about prayers.

‘Should I pray?’ Wemmbu thought. For the garden, maybe. The small patch of carrots and potatoes beside the cottage that he tended with care.

A good harvest would mean less reliance on Farville, less need for Eggchan to make the trip into town. It would mean more time at home, more time together. That was worth praying for, was it not?

But Eggchan would be angry if he knew. Eggchan had told him many times that the gods weren’t to be trusted, that they were self-serving and cruel. The lessons had been repeated so often that they became facts in Wemmbu's mind. The gods were dangerous, unreliable. The God of Order in particular wasn’t to be spoken to.

But Eggchan wasn’t here. Eggchan couldn’t even see him. The obsidian box was warded against scrying. That was the whole point of the box. It was a place where no one could find him.

And if no one could find him, then no one would know if he clasped his hands and thought a few grateful words toward a god who probably wouldn’t hear them anyway. There were thousands of players in the Overworld, thousands of prayers rising to the God of Order every day. One more voice in the dark would probably be lost in the noise.

Wemmbu rolled his shoulders, working out the stiffness that had settled into his joints. The obsidian box was small, barely large enough for him to lie down, and his muscles ached from the constant cold and the lack of movement.

He shifted his position and pressed his palms together the way he had seen the Farville players do. The gesture felt awkward. Wemmbu had never prayed before. In the End, prayers hadn’t been a thing. Communication with the End gods had required unique offerings and rituals that carried weight. The idea of a god who only needed you to close your eyes and think was strange. It suggested a kind of attentiveness that Wemmbu wasn’t sure he believed in.

But the God of Order must be a little kind, if the Farville townsfolk were any indication.

They prayed to him with gratitude and devotion, and they seemed to believe that he listened. That he wasn’t the distant, self-serving figure Eggchan had described. Wemmbu had watched the players praying inside their temple, and he had wondered what it felt like to believe in something that way. To trust that someone was listening.

Wemmbu closed his eyes. There was no difference between the darkness behind his eyelids and the darkness of the box, but he closed them anyway because that was how a prayer was done. He took a breath that tasted of cold stone and rosemary.

‘Uh. Hello, God of Order.’

The words felt clumsy in his mind. He wasn’t sure how to address a god. Was there a proper title, a formal greeting he should have known? The Farville townsfolk always began their prayers with reverence, their voices hushed and their postures humble. Wemmbu had never paid attention to the specifics of the temple ceremonies. He had never thought he would need to.

‘Thank you for the harvests this year. Uh, keep blessing us for good harvests, I guess.’

Wemmbu paused, and the silence pressed in around him. He thought about the garden beside the cottage, the small patch of earth he had turned with his own hands. He thought about the vegetables pushing up through the soil, the plants spreading their leaves toward the sun. He thought about Eggchan, who sometimes forgot to eat when he was deep in his research, who needed someone to press food into his hands and sit with him until the plate was empty.

These were small things, domestic things. The life they had made together in the cottage, quiet and sheltered and safe.

‘And, uh, thanks for keeping the server peaceful. That's... that's it, I think.’

He was about to open his eyes when a thought surfaced, sudden and unbidden. The festival. The townsfolk would be praying for more than harvests. They would be praying for protection, for safety, for the continued peace of the server. They would be thinking about their families, their friends, and their neighbors.

Wemmbu wondered, distantly, ‘would they be praying for me too?’

The thought was strange and brief, and he let it go. It didn’t matter. He was in the obsidian box, hidden, and no one was praying for him. No one even knew he was here.

A voice spoke in the darkness.

“Wemmbu?”

The word was soft. It was barely more than a whisper, a single name spoken with tenderness.

Wemmbu's eyes opened, though the darkness was the same. His heart stuttered once and then resumed its rhythm, faster now. He didn’t move. His hands were still clasped in front of him, frozen mid-prayer. The voice had been unfamiliar, a voice he had never heard before, and yet it had spoken his name with a familiarity that made his skin prickle.

“Is that really you?”

The voice again. Still soft and questioning, but there was a tremor in it now. A barely contained urgency that made the words vibrate at their edges, as though the speaker was holding back something vast and overwhelming.

Wemmbu stared into the dark. His breathing had gone shallow without his permission. The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, filling the small space of the obsidian box the way water filled a bucket.

And then there was light.

It wasn’t a bright light. It didn’t hurt his eyes the way sunlight had hurt him when he first left the End. It was a soft glow, golden and warm, the color of candlelight or the last moments of sunset.

The darkness receded by degrees.

For a heartbeat, the box was empty. Then Wemmbu blinked, and someone was kneeling in front of him.

There was no movement or sign of arrival. One moment there had been nothing but obsidian walls, and the next a figure occupied the cramped space as naturally as if he had always been there.

The figure was slightly translucent at the edges, his form flickering faintly like a reflection in still water. The gentle radiance seemed to come from within, glowing through skin and cloth alike, spilling from the great wings folded tightly behind him. Yellow, green, and orange feathers overlapped in brilliant layers, pressed close to fit within the confines of the box. Even restrained, the wings felt impossibly large, magnificent enough to fill the small space entirely.

The figure was a man. He was dressed in elaborate clothing, a fitted coat of deep colors with gold embroidery along the sleeves and collar. Atop his head sat a crown of gold, delicate and ornate, its points catching the glow and scattering it in fragments across the obsidian walls.

His hair was green with streaks of blue and yellow, swept back from his face in an elegant and slightly disheveled style. His face was marked with black contour around the eyes that extended to his nose. His eyes were black and beady, fixed on Wemmbu with an intensity that made the small space feel even smaller.

He looked exactly like a parrot. Particularly the parrot that had followed Wemmbu home from Farville, perched on his shoulder, rubbing its feathered head against his cheek. The same parrot that Eggchan had killed with his bare hands. They were even the same colors.

The man's expression was a chaos of emotion.

Surprise was there, raw and unguarded. Longing was there, too. Then desperation, barely contained, trembling at the corners of his mouth and the edges of his eyes. And beneath all of it was something else, something so intense and focused that Wemmbu couldn’t look at it directly.

The man's eyes, black and unblinking, swept over Wemmbu's face with hunger that was almost physical. He took in every detail: the violet hair, the purple eyes, and the silver-gray horns. His breath caught in his throat as if he were seeing something he had never thought he would see again.

Wemmbu scrambled backward. His back hit the obsidian wall immediately, and the cold bit into his shoulders through the fabric of his poet shirt.

There was nowhere to go. The box was barely large enough for one person, and now there were two.

Wemmbu blinked hard, once and then again. The man didn’t disappear and the glow didn’t fade. Everything was still there, real and impossible.

“How...” Wemmbu's voice came out hoarse. He swallowed hard, his throat dry, and tried again.

“How are you here? Who are you?”

His heart was beating so fast he could feel it in his mouth. His hands had unclasped and were pressed flat against the obsidian floor, the cold stone grounding him. Wemmbu was acutely, painfully aware of his own vulnerability. No weapons, no armor. Nothing but the clothes on his back and the cold of the box. He placed the half-eaten plate of eggs into his inventory with a quick motion, his eyes never leaving the figure before him.

The man opened his mouth, then closed it. His hand rose to his chest and pressed there, as though he were trying to calm a heart that was beating as wildly as Wemmbu's own. His wings rustled behind him, the great feathers scraping softly against the stone.

When the man spoke, his voice was unsteady, thick with an emotion Wemmbu couldn’t name.

“Wemmbu, I...” He stopped, then continued. “You were praying to me. That’s why I’m here.”

Wemmbu stared at him. The words didn’t make sense. He had been praying to the God of Order, and now there was a glowing parrot man in his obsidian box claiming to have answered that prayer.

And yet…

The logical connection was clear, unavoidable, but Wemmbu's mind refused to complete it. The God of Order was a distant being, a ruler who watched over the server from a palace in Capital City, not someone who appeared in dark boxes to answer half-hearted prayers from trapped dragon hybrids.

“What the hell.” he said. The words came out flat and disbelieving.

Wemmbu looked at the man again, really looked this time.

The fancy clothes. The golden crown, clearly handmade by skilled artisans. The huge parrot wings, their feathers layered in patterns that seemed almost too perfect. The way the glow around him pulsed faintly with each breath he took. This wasn’t a hallucination. Hallucinations didn’t have this much detail, and hallucinations didn’t look at him with that particular mixture of hope, heartbreak, and desperate relief.

“…Dude, no way.” Wemmbu's voice was barely a whisper. “Like, actually?”

The man smiled. It was a small smile, and it softened the chaos of his expression into something almost gentle. But the gentleness didn’t quite reach his eyes, which remained fixed on Wemmbu with that same intense, searching hunger.

“Yes. Actually.”

Wemmbu's frown deepened. He pulled his knees up toward his chest, a defensive posture that was mostly instinct.

The God of Order. This was the God of Order. The being who ruled the Overworld, who maintained the peace of the server, who received the prayers of thousands of players every day. The being Eggchan had warned him about for years, describing him as selfish and dangerous.

And he was here, in Wemmbu's obsidian box, looking at him with a strange expression.

“I don't really know how you got here,” Wemmbu said, and his voice was firmer now. He was trying to sound confident, trying to project a control he didn’t feel. “Or if my half-assed prayer actually brought you. But you need to get out. Eggchan won’t like this.”

The God's expression flickered at the name.

The hope in his face dimmed, replaced by something sharper, more assessing. The change was subtle but immediate, as though he had just remembered something important and unwelcome.

His eyes moved from Wemmbu's face to the walls around them, taking in the obsidian, the iron door, and the complete absence of anything else. His gaze swept over the bare stone and the darkness that pressed in from all sides. His frown deepened, and the warmth in his expression cooled into something harder.

“Wemmbu, why are you here?” The question was quiet but firm, the voice of someone who was used to getting answers. “Are you in danger?”

“Bro, I'm not in danger.” The reply was too quick, too automatic. Wemmbu heard the defensiveness in his own voice and winced internally.

“Are you trapped?”

The God's attention fixed itself on the iron door. He studied it with the focus of someone who understood locks and the absence of handles. He noted how the door was secured from the outside, the way the only light came from the thin gap at its base, and how the obsidian walls were seamless and unbroken. Then his black eyes returned to Wemmbu, and they moved over him with careful attention that made Wemmbu want to disappear.

The God stared at the absence of armor and weaponry, at the way he was pressed against the wall as far from the God as he could get.

“I'm not trapped,” Wemmbu said. He forced the words out with as much conviction as he could muster. “I'm fine, I swear, bro. Can you just get out the way you came from? Eggchan would be livid if he saw you. He might even… blame me…”

He trailed off. The full weight of the situation settled over him like a second layer of the cold.

If Eggchan discovered that Wemmbu had somehow summoned the God of the Overworld into the very place meant to keep him hidden, the consequences would be catastrophic. Eggchan had spent years warning him about the gods, repeating the same lessons over and over until they were carved into Wemmbu's thoughts. And this particular god, the God of Order, was the one Eggchan hated most. The one whose parrots Eggchan killed on sight. The one Eggchan had told him to never, ever pray to under any circumstances.

And Wemmbu had just prayed to him. He had clasped his hands, closed his eyes, and spoken a few clumsy words of gratitude. And the God had answered. The God was here, kneeling in the obsidian box, looking at Wemmbu with those intense black eyes.

Eggchan was going to be so, so angry.

But the God before him didn’t look dangerous, or self-serving, or cruel. He only looked… worried, desperate. He looked like someone holding himself together by sheer force of will, as though seeing Wemmbu had torn something open inside him that he was struggling to keep contained.

There was a wildness to his expression too, a barely restrained intensity that went beyond simple concern. The way his black eyes lingered on Wemmbu felt strange somehow, too focused, too intent. Like he was afraid that if he looked away for even a moment, Wemmbu might disappear into the obsidian.

The King’s expression had changed while Wemmbu was lost in thought.

The relief was still there, buried deep beneath the surface, but it had been overtaken by something quieter. His black eyes swept over the obsidian space, then back to Wemmbu. He didn’t linger on any one detail for long. He didn’t need to. Something had already settled behind his gaze; not confusion, but understanding.

It happened so quickly that it unsettled Wemmbu. It was as if the King had taken everything in at once and arrived at a conclusion he wasn’t willing to argue with.

“I see.” The words were almost absentminded. “Eggchan put you here.”

It wasn’t a question, but Wemmbu’s silence was answer enough. The God fell silent for a few seconds, his expression unreadable.

Then, softly, “…I should’ve found you sooner.”

The words landed in the obsidian darkness with the weight of a verdict.

The God leaned forward ever so slightly. The glow around him brightened, but his expression remained carefully composed, as though he were holding back far more than he intended to say. When he spoke, his voice was steady. Only the quiet urgency beneath it betrayed him.

“Wemmbu… I’ve been looking everywhere for you. For so many decades. I’ve searched every corner of this server. I never stopped, not for a single moment. And now I’ve finally found you, and you’re… here.”

His attention traversed briefly around the obsidian before settling on the iron door.

“In this small box.”

The God frowned deeply. The relief that had filled his expression moments ago gave way to quiet thought, his words slower now, measured with the care of someone trying to understand before passing judgment.

“I don’t know what Eggchan’s thinking right now. Maybe he believes he’s protecting you in some form. Maybe he truly thinks this is the safest place for you.”

His translucent hand brushed lightly against the obsidian wall.

“But safety isn’t meant to look like this.”

The glow around him steadied. When the God spoke again, the sharpness in his voice had softened into delicate concern. It almost felt intentional.

“And if you wanted to be here, that would be one thing.” He paused, giving Wemmbu the space to consider before asking gently, “But would you really choose this?”

The words hit Wemmbu like a physical force.

‘Would I choose this?’

His stomach twisted. The answer should have been obvious and easy. No, of course not. But instead, all Wemmbu could think about was Eggchan’s smile when they ate meals together, the way he read to him in the evenings, how he always made sure the cottage was warm and slightly dim. The obsidian box wasn’t normal, Wemmbu knew that. But Eggchan wasn’t normal either.

His best friend was just protective and anxious.

Wemmbu flinched back, his shoulders pressing harder against the obsidian until the cold became painful. His mind reeled, trying to make sense of everything the God was saying.

And then one detail caught hold and refused to let go.

Decades. The God had been searching for him for so many decades?

That made no sense. Wemmbu was eighteen years old. He had only been alive for eighteen years. ‘How could anyone have been searching for me for longer than I existed?’ Wemmbu thought. He held onto that thought for the sake of dismissing the one prior. He couldn’t dare think of anything detrimental to his trust for Eggchan. He’s not allowed to.

“Excuse me?” Wemmbu’s voice came out sharper than he intended.

“What the hell are you talking about? I don’t know you. I’ve never met you before in my entire life.” He shook his head. “And who are you to talk about Eggchan like that? You don’t know anything about him. Just… just get out. Go back to wherever you came from and leave me alone.”

A strange sensation flickered at the edge of his awareness.

It was déjà vu. The words “I’ve been looking for you” echoed in his mind, and for a moment Wemmbu wasn’t in the obsidian box at all. He was in the End, a terrified teenager hiding in a crevice of Endstone, and a young angel with white wings was kneeling in front of him and saying those exact words.

“I’ve been looking for you.”

Eggchan had said that. Eggchan had found him, and he had taken his hand and promised to protect him.

And now this God, this stranger with his desperate eyes and his golden crown, was saying the same thing. The echo was unnerving. It made something in Wemmbu’s chest tighten with confusion and unease.

The King’s face softened. “I know. I know this must be confusing. Because it is for me too.”

His eyes lingered on Wemmbu’s face, searching it as though it held answers he had spent years trying to find. “There are things I still don’t understand. But whatever is going on here, whatever situation you’ve been put in, I know it isn’t right.”

“And I can help you, Wemmbu. I can get you out of here. I can save you from—”

The God suddenly stopped. His head tilted slightly, and his expression sharpened into something alert and watchful.

Wemmbu heard it a second later.

A sound from outside the iron door. Muffled and distant, but unmistakable. The sound of a lock being unbolted. The first lock.

Eggchan.

Wemmbu's blood went cold. His heart now hammered against his ribs with a force that made his vision swim. The sound of the first lock being turned was followed almost immediately by its opening click. There were three locks and one bolt on the iron door, and Eggchan was opening them with a speed Wemmbu had never heard before. The pauses between the clicks were too short, the rhythm too urgent.

Eggchan wasn’t coming to deliver a meal. Eggchan was coming because he knew something was wrong.

The second lock clicked open a second later. The third lock began to turn.

The God’s expression changed.

The desperation never disappeared, but something steadier settled over it, quiet calculation slipping beneath the urgency. His eyes returned to Wemmbu, and when he spoke again, his voice was low and careful, as if every sentiment had been weighed before it was offered.

“Listen to me.” The words were gentle, but firm enough that Wemmbu found himself looking back at him. “Don’t tell him I was here.”

The God reached toward Wemmbu, his clawed hand passing through his arm without resistance. The touch wasn’t physical, not truly, but Wemmbu felt it anyway: a brief pulse of warmth against lilac skin gone cold from the obsidian, gone almost as soon as it came.

His black gaze searched Wemmbu’s face for a brief moment before softening.

“When you’re alone again, pray to me. I promise I’ll answer.”

Something unreadable flickered across his expression before disappearing behind the practiced composure of a king.

“This doesn’t have to be the last time we speak.”

The final bolt slid open.

The iron door swung inward, just an inch. A sliver of dim light fell into the obsidian box from the stairwell beyond, cutting across the darkness like a blade.

Wemmbu's head turned toward it, and something in his chest seized painfully. The light was faint, barely more than the glow of distant lanterns, but it felt blinding after so many days of absolute darkness. Wemmbu squinted against it, his eyes struggling to adjust. It was somehow different from the God’s soft, golden radiance.

“Wemmbu?”

Eggchan’s voice was soft and gentle. It floated through the gap in the door; calm, soothing, and utterly controlled. “I… felt something. Are you alright?”

A pause. The sliver of light didn’t widen. Eggchan didn’t push the iron door open further. The shadows beyond the gap were deep and still, and Wemmbu couldn’t see his best friend’s face. He could only see the thin line of light, the dark shape of the doorframe, and the faint glint of the iron hinges.

“Wemmbu…”

The name settled heavily into the silence. Before Wemmbu could find the words to answer it, Eggchan spoke again.

“Are you alone?”

Something cold crawled down Wemmbu’s spine. The words themselves weren’t frightening, nor was the tone. If anything, Eggchan sounded exactly as he always did. That was what made it worse. It didn’t sound like a question. It sounded like something he already knew the answer to.

His instincts screamed at him, a primal warning that something was very, very wrong. The voice was Eggchan’s voice, and the gentleness was Eggchan’s gentleness, but beneath both was a presence that Wemmbu had never felt before. Something holy and watchful and utterly without mercy.

The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. His heart, already racing, now pounded with a fear that was entirely instinctual. This was Eggchan. This was his best friend. And yet everything in Wemmbu’s body was telling him to run and hide.

Wemmbu turned back toward the center of the box.

The God of the Overworld was gone.

There was no glow, no translucent figure. There was no parrot-winged man kneeling in the cramped space.

The obsidian box was exactly as it had been before the prayer, cold and empty. The violet luminescence of the walls was the only light, and the silence was the only sound. The God had vanished as though he had never been there at all, as if the entire encounter had been a hallucination conjured by isolation and desperation.

Wemmbu blinked. He stared at the spot where the God had knelt, and there was nothing there. Nothing at all. The only evidence that anything had happened was the racing of his pulse and the echo of the God’s voice in his ears.

“When you’re alone again, pray to me. I promise I’ll answer,” the God had said.

Had Wemmbu imagined it? Had the days in the dark finally cracked something loose in his mind and let in visions?

But the warmth of the God’s hand passing through his arm had felt real. The glow had felt real. The desperate, searching expression on the God's face had felt more real than anything Wemmbu had experienced in the eight or nine days. He could still see it when he closed his eyes. The intensity of hope. The possessive thing that had flickered beneath the surface.

“I'm…” Wemmbu's voice came out rough, scraped raw by disuse. He cleared his throat, forcing the words into something steadier. “I'm okay, Egg. I'm alone.”

He grit his teeth so hard his jaw ached. The words felt like a lie, though he didn’t know why. It was technically true he was alone; the God was gone. But his gut twisted with the sense that something terrible had just happened, or was about to happen, or was happening right now beyond the iron door where Eggchan stood in the dark. His instincts, usually so sharp and certain, were a chaos of contradictory signals.

Danger, they screamed. But the danger was everywhere. The danger was in front of him and behind him and all around.

A few stiff seconds passed. The sliver of light from the door didn’t widen. The silence stretched, taut as a wire.

Then Eggchan's voice came again, still soft and gentle. Still carrying that cold undercurrent that Wemmbu couldn’t name.

“Alright. If you say so. I'll be back soon.”

The iron door closed with a soft, final sound. The locks clicked back into place: one, two, three, each clasp sliding home with a mechanical precision that echoed in the narrow stairwell. The light vanished. The darkness returned, complete and unbroken.

Wemmbu sat in the cold and the silence, his back pressed against the obsidian wall, his heart still pounding against his ribs. The plate of eggs was in his inventory.

The God of Order had been in the obsidian box, and now he was gone. Wemmbu didn’t know what was real and what was not.

He raised one hand and pressed it to his chest, feeling the rapid beat of his heart beneath his palm. He was still here. He was still alive. The darkness was the same as it had always been, patient and absolute, but something had changed. The God of Order had spoken to him. The God had looked at him with desperate eyes and promised to save him. And Eggchan had come to the door and asked if he was alone.

Wemmbu had lied, and the lie felt like both a betrayal and a lifeline.

He didn’t know what he believed. The only thing he knew, sitting in the dark with the echo of two voices in his ears, was that the world outside the obsidian box was far more complicated than he had ever imagined. And Wemmbu wasn’t sure if he wanted to stay hidden anymore.

‘What the hell had just happened?’

Chapter Text

The cottage was dim. The lanterns in their sconces had gone unlit for the approaching evening, and the only light came from the froglights set into the floor.

They were soft and cold, a pale glow that pooled in geometric patterns and left the corners of the room in shadow. The armchairs by the cold fireplace were empty, and the dining table was bare. The kitchen island had been tidied, every jar and utensil in its proper place. The curtains were drawn across every window, the pale blue fabric holding back the last of the day's light.

Eggchan stood by the window that faced the back clearing.

He was motionless, his form half-consumed by the shadows that clung to the edges of the room. His wings were stiff behind him, the white primaries held at an angle that was too rigid and controlled. The smaller wings beside his face folded forward, their feathers covering the edges of his jaw and the corners of his mouth. His expression was unreadable, smoothed into a blankness that revealed nothing.

The froglights barely reached him, their glow catching the edges of his feathers but leaving his eyes in darkness.

He raised a hand and parted the curtain. The motion was slow, his fingers curling around the fabric and drawing it aside just enough to create a gap the width of two fingers. A sliver of sunset light fell through the opening, cutting across his face. It illuminated one blue eye, the pale skin of his cheekbone, and the corner of his mouth that was neither smiling nor frowning.

Eggchan blinked once against the brightness, then looked out.

The clearing behind the cottage was bathed in the last light of the afternoon. The sun hadn’t yet begun its descent into dusk, but it hung lower than it had an hour ago, and the shadows of the oak trees stretched long across the gravel.

The training area behind the cottage had been worn down by years of use. The clearing was mostly packed dirt and gravel, the grass long since trampled away, and the ground at the center was smooth from countless hours of footwork. The trees nearby were scarred from practice, their bark cut through with axe marks and the deeper holes of spear thrusts. A rack of swords leaned against one trunk, and a set of iron weights sat in a neat line beside a patch of earth that had been beaten into a shallow crater.

And at the center of the clearing, Wemmbu was training.

He moved through his forms with fluid precision that made the violence look like dance. His fists were his weapons today, his knuckles wrapped in thin strips of cloth that had begun to fray at the edges.

Wemmbu worked through a sequence of strikes against one of the sturdier dummies, his body flowing from one position to the next without pause. A jab to the torso, a hook to the head, then a spinning kick that connected with the dummy's side and sent a shudder through the wooden frame. His feet shifted across the gravel in patterns that were both practiced and instinctive, his tail sweeping behind him for balance. His hair, tied high in a ponytail, whipped through the air with each turn.

He was remarkable. Eggchan had always known it. From the first moment he had seen his reincarnation, a terrified child hiding beneath mounds of Endstone, Eggchan had recognized something precious.

And Wemmbu was remarkable now, older and stronger, his body a weapon honed over years of relentless training. The muscles of his back shifted beneath his poet shirt with each movement. The scales of his tail caught the light. The ridge of his horns swept back from his temples in a curve that was elegant.

Eggchan watched him, and for a moment he saw two lives layered atop one another.

The present and the past refused to stay separate. One moment he was looking at an Ender Dragon with pale lilac skin, silver-gray horns, and a tail that moved with a life of its own. The next he was seeing purple curls, black eyes, and a grin he knew better than his own reflection.

The illusion flickered back and forth before settling once more on the present.

It didn’t matter. Wemmbu gave himself away the moment he started moving. The subtle shift of weight before an attack, the unconscious corrections to his footing, the fierce satisfaction that always followed a perfectly executed combination.

The body had changed, but the soul had not. Eggchan would have recognized him anywhere. Some things were simply his to know.

Eggchan had seen those exact movements a thousand times before, in another life and another body. He had stood at the edge of crumbling structures and watched his best friend fight, and the feeling that rose in his chest now was the same feeling that had lived there then, only more intense.

Pride. Fondness. The quiet, unwavering certainty that this person belonged to him.

Eggchan would have smiled at the sight. He would have stood by the window and watched his best friend train, content to simply admire him. But he hadn’t been in the mood to smile for days now. Something had settled in his chest and refused to leave.

It wasn’t guilt, or at least not only guilt.

The guilt was always there, a constant low thrum beneath the surface of his thoughts. It had lessened slightly over the past week, diminished by the simple fact of Wemmbu’s presence. Watching him helped. Watching him cook, train, and move through the cottage with his usual chaotic energy was a balm. But the guilt never fully faded.

It lingered in memories of the obsidian box, of fourteen days of darkness, of Wemmbu’s voice through a gap in the iron door saying, “miss you.”

But there was something else now, too. Something heavier and more diffuse. A restlessness that hummed beneath his skin. A certainty that something was approaching, something he couldn’t see or predict or control. The feeling was vague and ambiguous, and that made it worse.

Eggchan was accustomed to knowing.

He knew where Wemmbu was at every moment. He knew what the townsfolk of Farville whispered in their homes and in the market. He knew the patterns of the forest, the movements of every creature that crept or crawled within the range of his eyes. And yet this feeling persisted, slipping through the gaps in his knowledge like water through fingers.

Something was going to happen. The Seraphim didn’t know what, or when, or from what direction it would come. But the weight in his gut told him it was already on its way.

Eggchan didn’t close his eyes as he watched. He didn’t need to.

If he wanted, he could have looked through several other perspectives. The floating blue eyes hidden throughout the clearing were already watching for him. Each one remained fixed on the figure at the center of the gravel. One watched from a bush near the treeline. Another lingered in the shadow cast by the training rack. Several rested high in the branches of the oak that overhung the clearing’s edge.

A dozen angles, all trained on the same point. Eggchan could access them with a mere blink.

Countless others watched elsewhere, but these eyes were fixed on Wemmbu specifically. He could see him from every direction at once, watch the rise and fall of his chest from one vantage while tracking the movement of his feet from another. There had been times when he had spent entire afternoons doing exactly that, following Wemmbu’s every movement through a hundred feathered eyes.

Not because Eggchan distrusted Wemmbu. It was simply because he needed to know where he was. Always.

It was hardly the worst thing the Seraphim had done. Eggchan had done other things that would make Wemmbu recoil if he ever learned the truth. Things that would shatter the trust between them beyond repair.

But Wemmbu didn’t know, and Wemmbu would never know.

And so Eggchan remained by the window, watching with his own keen eyes instead. Sometimes the countless eyes hidden throughout the forest were unnecessary. His own were enough.

The muffled thump of another strike reached him through the glass. Wemmbu had shifted forms, moving from fist strikes to a series of low kicks that swept at the dummy’s base. His tail coiled and uncoiled behind him as he worked, a counterbalance to the force of his movements.

It had been almost a week since Eggchan had let him out. Two dark weeks in the obsidian box. Fourteen days of cold and silence, and Eggchan had counted every single one.

The festival for the God of Order had ended. The heightened attention of the God had withdrawn, or so Eggchan’s eyes had reported. The situation in Farville had calmed down. The townsfolk still talked about the mysterious demon hybrid, but the fervor had faded and the speculation hadn’t spread beyond the town’s borders.

The Seraphim then renewed the perimeter wards, extending them deeper into the forest and reinforcing the illusions that turned ordinary travelers away. He dispatched additional eyes to monitor Farville and the neighboring towns, the one whose green soldiers had been humiliated and whose grudge might flare into something dangerous. And when Eggchan was satisfied that the immediate danger had passed, he climbed down the narrow stairs, unbolted the iron door, and let Wemmbu out.

The first few days had been difficult in ways Eggchan had anticipated and in ways he hadn’t.

The physical effects were the most obvious. Fourteen days in a small, dark space had taken a toll on Wemmbu’s body that even Eggchan’s careful meal planning couldn’t prevent. His muscles had stiffened from the lack of movement. His coordination was slightly off, his reflexes dulled by days of stillness.

When Eggchan opened the iron door and helped him to his feet, Wemmbu’s legs had nearly buckled. He leaned heavily on Eggchan’s shoulder for the climb up the narrow stairs, through the hidden trapdoor, and into the cottage. His steps were unsteady, his grip on Eggchan’s arm tighter than it needed to be.

Eggchan led him not to the living area or the kitchen but directly to his bedroom. The windows there were covered with both curtains and blinds, and the light was softer than anywhere else in the house.

Any brightness at all had been painful to Wemmbu’s eyes. Two weeks in absolute darkness had undone years of adjustment to the Overworld’s sun, and even the dim glow of froglights had been too much for him. Eggchan had fetched a strip of dark cloth and tied it gently around Wemmbu’s eyes, his fingers careful against the long violet hair.

His best friend wore that blindfold for two full days while his vision slowly relearned how to process light.

Those two days had been terrible for him. Eggchan watched Wemmbu fumble through the cottage, his hands outstretched to feel for walls and furniture, his steps hesitant. He watched him wince at the brightness of a lantern that Eggchan had dimmed to its lowest setting. He watched him sit in the armchair with his blindfold on and his hands folded in his lap, doing nothing and saying nothing, waiting for his eyes to heal.

The vulnerability of it had squeezed Eggchan’s heart with a force that was almost physical.

He had done this. He had put Wemmbu in the box, and the box had done this to him. The guilt was heavier in those two days than it had been during the entire two weeks of confinement.

But guilt was not the only thing Eggchan had felt.

After leaving the obsidian box, Wemmbu became clingy. Not in an obvious way, of course, and not in a way that demanded attention. His clinginess manifested in the subtle manner that was uniquely his.

He asked where Eggchan was going even when the answer was only the next room. He gravitated closer whenever they sat together, his shoulder brushing against Eggchan’s more often than chance could explain. He let a wing drape across his back without his usual complaint, and sometimes he leaned into the contact without seeming to realize he was doing it, the tension gradually leaving his body as feathers settled around him.

Once, while Eggchan was passing him a glass of water, he had rested a hand on Wemmbu’s shoulder. Wemmbu then covered that hand with his own and held it there.

He hadn’t spoken. He simply kept Eggchan’s hand against his shoulder, his fingers warm and calloused around it. Then, after a quiet moment, he let go and accepted the glass as though nothing unusual had happened.

On the second day, Wemmbu had finally admitted in a soft voice that he missed the warmth of another person. The words had been casual, almost offhand, the way Wemmbu said most things that mattered. But they settled somewhere deep in Eggchan’s chest and refused to leave.

The truth was that Eggchan had enjoyed it.

Eggchan found quiet satisfaction in those vulnerable days. In being needed. In the way Wemmbu stayed close to him, sought him out, and relaxed whenever he was near. In the unconscious trust of it. The certainty that if he reached out, Wemmbu would lean into the touch instead of away from it.

Sometimes, in the stillness of the cottage after Wemmbu had fallen asleep, Eggchan had caught himself wishing it could last a little longer. That the world outside could remain distant. That Wemmbu could remain here, safe and close and dependent on him.

But he knew that was impossible. Wemmbu wasn’t built for stillness.

Thus, Eggchan had compromised. He had cared for him through those vulnerable days and treasured them for what they were. Then, when Wemmbu’s eyes had adjusted and his restlessness had returned, Eggchan had let him go. Mostly.

The moment Wemmbu’s purple eyes adjusted, he threw himself back into movement with a fervor that bordered on desperation.

He exercised in the clearing for hours. He cooked elaborate meals for them both. He scrubbed the kitchen counters, reorganized the basement stocks, and harvested the entire garden in a single afternoon.

The reason became clear a few days later. Wemmbu told Eggchan, in a tone that was trying too hard to be casual, that he had felt helpless and worthless during the confinement and that he needed to make up for it. Eggchan assured him that there was nothing to make up for, but Wemmbu didn’t listen. He never listened when it came to things like this.

Still, Eggchan found contentment in watching Wemmbu take care of him. The meals that appeared on the kitchen island were more elaborate than anything Eggchan knew how to cook. The way Wemmbu checked the stocks, harvested the garden, and took on more chores than necessary felt like a kind of devotion.

Wemmbu was a caretaker and a protector by nature. He showed care through action, through small, practical kindnesses that accumulated over time. And Eggchan received those kindnesses with a quiet, possessive satisfaction.

This was his. This person, this friendship, this life they had shaped together. It was all his.

ᔑリ↸ リ𝙹 𝙹リᒷ ᒷꖎᓭᒷ’ᓭ.

The confinement proved something else, too. The conditioning was working.

Wemmbu emerged from the box not angry or resentful, but compliant. He accepted Eggchan’s explanations without argument. He didn’t question why he had been kept there for so long, or why the promised few days had stretched into fourteen. He returned to the rhythms of the cottage and looked at Eggchan with the same trust he had always shown.

The two weeks in the dark hadn’t broken that trust. They had, perhaps, reinforced it.

Eggchan knew what he had done was cruel. He wasn’t delusional. He knew that locking a person in a lightless box for two weeks, even for their own protection, was an act that would be considered inhumane by any reasonable standard.

But the standard didn’t apply here.

Wemmbu wasn’t just any person, and the dangers that pursued him weren’t reasonable. The box was built of obsidian because obsidian resisted scrying. It was small because a smaller space was harder to detect, harder to trace and find. It was dark because concentrated light would have damaged Wemmbu’s eyes over a long period of time.

Every detail of the box had been designed for Wemmbu’s safety. It wasn’t a punishment. It was a sanctuary. And Wemmbu seemed to understand that.

Eggchan watched Wemmbu move through another combination against the dummy.

A jab, a cross, a spinning move that would have shattered bone if the target had been real. The motion was skilled and precise, his body a perfect instrument of violence. And yet when Wemmbu turned his head slightly, checking his form in the fading light, his expression was open and unguarded.

He looked young, naive. He looked like someone who needed to be protected from a world that would kill him if it knew what he was, and would hunt him without end if it knew who he was.

The guilt in Eggchan's chest pulsed once and then subsided. This was why he did what he did. This was why the obsidian box existed, why the wards were maintained, why his eyes watched from every branch and shadow.

Wemmbu was strong enough to kill, but he wasn’t strong enough to survive the kind of attention his nature and history would attract. He needed Eggchan. He had always needed Eggchan. And Eggchan would never stop being what Wemmbu required. A friend. His only friend.

The Seraphim let the curtain fall. The gap closed, and the dimness of the cottage returned.

He stepped away from the window and crossed to the armchair by the cold fireplace, lowering himself onto it. The silence wrapped around him, broken only by the distant, muffled rhythm of Wemmbu's training. He leaned back and pressed his fingers to his temple, rubbing slow circles against the tan skin.

The feeling in his gut hadn’t faded. Something was going to happen. And that wasn’t the only thing troubling him.

Wemmbu had been acting strange recently.

At first Eggchan had attributed it to the aftermath of the confinement. The physical effects had been obvious enough: the stiffness, the sensitivity to light, and the way Wemmbu needed to wear a blindfold for two days while his vision recovered. Eggchan had expected some psychological effects as well. The obsidian box was designed to minimize harm, but two weeks in the dark would affect anyone.

He had anticipated a period of readjustment. Eggchan expected his best friend’s eagerness to move, to cook, to fill the days with activity after so long spent in stillness. All of that was normal. All of that made sense.

But there were other things. Smaller things that Eggchan noticed, because he noticed everything about Wemmbu.

The questions, for one. Wemmbu had always asked questions. It was part of his nature, the restless curiosity that drove him to explore and investigate the boundaries of the world Eggchan had built for him.

Before the confinement, his questions had been casual and aimless. What was beyond the oak forest? What did other biomes look like? The idle wondering of someone who had spent his whole life in one place and was content to wonder without acting.

But lately his questions had changed. They were more specific, more focused. He asked about other civilizations, not just Farville but towns and places Eggchan had only mentioned once or twice before, never enough to provoke curiosity. Wemmbu began asking about Capital City, about the Nether and the End, about the domains of the other gods.

Then he asked about the God of Order.

That was what troubled Eggchan most. Wemmbu had never asked about the God of Order before.

Eggchan had told him about the gods, of course. He explained their nature and their powers. He warned Wemmbu to never pray to them or acknowledge them or draw their attention in any way. And Wemmbu had accepted those lessons without question for years.

But now he was asking. What did the God of Order look like? How did players worship him? Was it true that he listened to prayers during the annual festival? The questions were casual, slipped into conversations about other mundane things, and Wemmbu never pressed when Eggchan answered with the same flat dismissiveness he always used. But the questions kept coming.

And there were other behaviors. Wemmbu had started opening the curtains. Just a few inches, just enough to look out at the forest.

He had never done that before. The curtains had always been Eggchan's doing, drawn against the outside world, and Wemmbu had never questioned them. Now he parted them himself, standing at the window and staring out at the trees with an expression that Eggchan couldn’t quite read.

Wemmbu then lingered at the Far Lands’ peak longer than he used to, sitting on the sharp edge and looking down at the world beyond. He had always loved that view, but lately his gaze seemed less contemplative and more searching. As though he was looking for something specific.

It was possible that the confinement had triggered this. Two weeks in the obsidian box, isolated and alone, might have intensified Wemmbu's natural restlessness. It might have reminded him of how small his world was, how limited his freedom, how much existed beyond the oak trees.

That was a logical explanation, and Eggchan held onto it with the grip of someone who knew what the alternative would mean.

If something had somehow reached Wemmbu in the obsidian box, if his best friend experienced something Eggchan couldn’t see or stop, then everything he had built was compromised. The box was supposed to be impenetrable, and the wards around the forest were still intact. Wemmbu had been alone in the dark for fourteen days, and nothing could have gotten in.

‘Nothing got in,’ he reassured himself. Eggchan repeated this until the sharp edge of doubt dulled.

The only loose thread was the flicker he felt that day, the strange disturbance that pulled him down the stairs to the iron door. But Wemmbu said he was alone, and Wemmbu wouldn’t lie to him.

However, the questions about the God of Order continued. And the parrots were multiplying, too.

Eggchan had killed so many in the past week that he already lost count. They appeared at the edges of Farville, in the trees surrounding the oak forest, even venturing close to the cottage clearing. Bright flashes of color among the branches, watching and waiting.

He had shot them down without hesitation, his bow finding their small bodies with the precision of long practice, and their corpses had dissolved into bloody feathers that drifted to the forest floor. But more kept coming.

The God of Order was searching for something. His attention was fixed on this region, his parrots were his eyes, and no matter how many Eggchan killed, replacements would arrive. At least one of them had gotten away. Eggchan was certain of it. At least one parrot had seen something, learned something, and flown back to Capital City with its report.

Parrot knew. Or he suspected. Either way, the danger was inevitable.

Eggchan opened his eyes. The images from his other eyes faded, the views of the forest's edge and the distant treeline receding to the back of his awareness. The dim froglights pulsed softly in the floor. The cottage was quiet. Outside, the muffled rhythm of Wemmbu's training continued, steady and unhurried.

He rose from the armchair in a single motion and stood in the center of the living area. His wings rustled softly behind him, white feathers settling into a more relaxed position. His expression was calm and collected. It was the expression of someone who had identified a problem and was already formulating a solution.

Wemmbu's restlessness couldn’t be suppressed forever. Eggchan had learned that lesson years ago, during the long arguments that had preceded his agreement to let Wemmbu visit Farville.

Wemmbu needed to feel free. He needed to believe he had choices, that his world wasn’t a cage but a home. If Eggchan tightened the restrictions too much, Wemmbu would rebel. He had been on the verge of sneaking away once before, years ago, when the arguments had reached their peak and the cottage had felt too small. Eggchan had seen it in his eyes. The desperation and the frustration. The love that was curdling into something sharper because love alone wasn’t enough to keep a restless dragon contained.

So Eggchan had changed his approach. He hadn’t limited Wemmbu's freedom, not exactly. He had shifted the meaning of the word instead.

He gave Wemmbu Farville as a compromise, a small piece of the outside world that satisfied his curiosity without ever putting him beyond Eggchan's reach. He made Wemmbu believe that the freedom to visit the town was a gift, a privilege, something earned rather than owed.

And Wemmbu had accepted it. He had never realized that the freedom he had been given was just another kind of leash.

Now Eggchan needed to do it again. Wemmbu's curiosity had outgrown Farville. The questions about other civilizations, other biomes, and other gods were a sign that the small, controlled world Eggchan had built was no longer enough. If Eggchan tried to suppress that curiosity, Wemmbu would eventually find a way to satisfy it on his own. He would sneak away without permission. He would put himself in danger, and Eggchan wouldn’t be able to protect him.

But if Eggchan gave him a new piece of the world, carefully chosen and carefully monitored, Wemmbu's restlessness would be sated.

A mission. An adventure. A gift, freely given by his best friend who only wanted what was best for him.

And the parrots. If Wemmbu was traveling, moving through the server on a specific route at a specific time, the God of Order's attention would be drawn elsewhere. The parrots were watching Farville and the edges of the oak forest. They weren’t watching anything else nearby; Eggchan had just checked.

A mission would draw Wemmbu out of the area where the parrots were most concentrated. It would give Eggchan time to hunt the remaining birds, to reinforce the wards, to ensure that when Wemmbu returned, the forest was secure again.

Eggchan's expression didn’t change, but something behind his eyes sharpened.

The plan was forming, its pieces slotting into place with the cold precision of a mechanism. He crossed the living area to the back door beside the kitchen and opened it. The hinges moved silently. The sunset light spilled across the threshold, golden and warm.

The clearing was exactly as it had been from the window. Wemmbu was mid-motion, his body twisting into a kick that connected with the training dummy's torso. The impact sent a tremor through the burlap frame. He landed smoothly, his tail sweeping behind him, and turned. His expression shifted from focus to curiosity when he saw Eggchan standing in the doorway.

“Hey bro,” Wemmbu said. His voice was slightly breathless, but his purple eyes were bright and inquisitive.

Eggchan’s face softened. It wasn’t a conscious change but an automatic one, the way his expression always seemed to soften when it landed on Wemmbu. For a moment, he simply watched him. The flush of exertion in his cheeks, the loose strands of violet hair that had escaped his ponytail, and the easy trust in his eyes. His best friend.

Wemmbu was strong enough to break bone with his bare hands, skilled enough to disarm trained soldiers without breaking stride. Yet for all that strength, there were dangers he still couldn’t see. Things that moved beyond the edges of his awareness.

Wemmbu never looked for those dangers. He always assumed they would never reach him. But Eggchan knew better now.

That was his job. To keep his best friend safe, whether Wemmbu understood the need for it or not.

Wemmbu glanced at the sky. The sun had begun its descent, the gold of the afternoon deepening into the amber of early evening. His expression flickered with sheepishness and recognition. “Oh, right. It's getting late. Sorry, Egg. I'll come in.”

Eggchan shook his head. He stepped out of the doorway and onto the gravel, his wings rustling softly behind him as he walked toward Wemmbu. “No. It's not that.”

Wemmbu paused. His hands dropped to his sides, and his tail curled in a questioning sweep behind him. The sheepish expression faded into something more attentive.

“What's up?”

Eggchan stopped a few feet away, the gravel crunching softly beneath his shoes. He turned his head toward the horizon, where the oak trees at the clearing's edge were silhouetted against the sunset. Their leaves rustled in a breeze too gentle to feel, and the shadows they cast shifted across the grass in slow patterns. Eggchan held the moment for a beat longer before he spoke.

“I was just thinking,” he began. His voice was calm and measured. "I know you've been asking about the outside world lately. More than usual."

Wemmbu's expression flickered. A small wince crossed his face, and a guilty grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Uh, yeah,” he admitted. “I guess I've been a little curious.”

“I know, bro. You've always been curious, and that’s not… necessarily a bad thing. That’s why I've been thinking about what you said before. About wanting to see more.”

Wemmbu's eyebrows rose slightly. His tail, which had been swaying slowly, went still. “Really?”

“The situation’s a lot quieter now,” Eggchan continued. “Farville’s settled down, the wards are holding, and things have been calm for a while.” He paused. “So I was thinking… it might be good for you to get out for a bit.”

Wemmbu blinked.

Eggchan allowed himself a small, convincing smile. “I’ve got a little mission for you, if you’re interested.”

Wemmbu stared at him. His lips parted slightly, and for a moment he seemed to struggle for words. “Wait, seriously? A mission? Like... outside?”

“Yep. Outside,” Eggchan confirmed. “Just for a short while. I'll give you the details tonight. But I thought you should know.” He paused, letting the words settle. “You've been patient, Wemmbu. You've been good. I think you've earned this.”

Wemmbu's face broke into a grin. It was the first real grin Eggchan had seen from him in days, bright and full of the chaotic energy that had been subdued since the confinement. His scaled tail began to sway again, faster now, and his hands uncurled at his sides. “Bro, that's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, I can do that. Whatever it is.”

“I know you can.” Eggchan reached out and placed his hands on Wemmbu's shoulders. The touch was light, but he let his fingers rest there for a moment. Wemmbu was warm from exertion, the heat of his body seeping through the fabric of his shirt.

“You're my best friend. I want you to be happy.”

Wemmbu’s grin softened into something smaller and more genuine. “Thanks, Egg. Seriously. I can’t wait.”

Eggchan let his hands drop. He turned back toward the cottage, and Wemmbu immediately fell into step beside him.

The sunset light followed them across the gravel. The back door opened and closed, and the froglights pulsed softly in the dim interior. Wemmbu was already talking, his voice animated with excitement, asking questions about the mission that Eggchan deflected with calm, patient answers.

The Seraphim would tell him later. He would give him the directions and the careful instructions that would keep him… safe. He would frame it as a gift, and Wemmbu would receive it as a gift.

That was the easy part. Wemmbu trusted him. He always had.

Eggchan smiled. It was a small smile, barely a curve of his lips, and it didn’t reach his eyes. The froglights cast his shadow long and dark against the wall. Outside, the sun finished its descent and the forest settled into the quiet of evening. Somewhere among the oak branches, a floating blue eye turned its pupil toward the cottage and watched the door close.

The restlessness in his chest hadn’t vanished, but it had changed. The unease was still there, lingering at the edges of his thoughts, yet the shape of a solution was beginning to emerge.

The gods were searching, Wemmbu was asking questions, and the SMP beyond the forest was pressing a little too close. But Eggchan had spent years keeping him safe. Years watching, planning, and adjusting whenever circumstances changed. He would do what he had always done. Eggchan would adapt.

Beside him, Wemmbu was still talking, blissfully unaware. Eggchan listened, and said all the right things at all the right moments.

This way, his best friend would remain safe, and everything would stay exactly as it should.

Wemmbu would have room to wander, room to grow, room to believe he was choosing his own path. The world beyond the forest could tempt him all it wanted.

In the end, he would still come home. Eggchan knew he would. Eggchan knew what was best, after all.

Chapter Text

Wemmbu's bedroom was simple, but it had been his for years, and that itself was enough.

The bed sat against the far wall, its frame carved from oak and its mattress topped with blankets in shades of violet and deep purple.

A rug covered most of the floorboards, woven from wool he had gathered ages ago and dyed in varying shades of purple. The colors bled into each other in random patterns, splotches of lavender bleeding into deeper violet, but the rug had turned out decent anyway. It was warm underfoot during the colder months, and it covered the froglights set into the floor when he wanted to sleep in darkness.

Wemmbu didn’t cover them up anymore.

The froglights in the corners still glowed their soft green, but accompanying them was a lantern on the small desk beside the closet. Its flame burned low, casting a warm circle across the wooden surface. He had placed it there a few days after getting out of the obsidian box, telling Eggchan he simply wanted a change in lighting.

The truth was harder to say aloud, even in the privacy of his own mind.

Waking up in absolute darkness now did something to his chest that it had never done before. His eyes would open to nothing, and for a few seconds Wemmbu would forget where he was. The cold would press against his memory. The silence would feel too complete, too familiar, and he would lie still, breath held without realizing it, waiting for the iron door to open.

Sometimes his hand would twitch toward the nearest wall, instinct reaching for rough obsidian instead of wood. Then Wemmbu would remember he was in his bedroom. The door wasn’t locked, and he could leave whenever he wanted.

The lantern helped. Its glow was small but present, a quiet reassurance that he wasn’t back in the obsidian box. He hadn’t told Eggchan about this. His best friend already carried enough weight on his shoulders, and Wemmbu didn’t want to add guilt to the burden. The confinement had been necessary. Eggchan had explained it clearly, and Wemmbu understood the reasons.

There was no point in making him feel bad about something that had kept Wemmbu safe. The lingering tightness in his chest whenever he woke in the dark would fade eventually anyway. It had to.

The room held other pieces of Wemmbu besides the lantern.

A bookshelf stood near the door, its shelves lined with volumes Eggchan had recommended over the years. Philosophy, mostly. Treatises on the nature of the mind, on self-discipline, inner peace, and the importance of contentment. Wemmbu had started a few of them, gotten bored halfway through, and never picked them up again. The spines were dusty now, their pages mostly unread.

The shelves held little else. Wemmbu had recently asked his best friend if there were any books about history, about the server and the wars that had shaped it. Eggchan had said no with a gentle firmness that discouraged any follow-up.

There were no history books in the cottage. Wemmbu hadn’t thought much of it at the time, but recently he had caught himself wondering about things he never cared to ask before. The absence was a quiet one, a gap in the shelves that he had never questioned because questioning it felt like doubting Eggchan, and doubting his best friend wasn’t something Wemmbu did.

He had learned what little he knew about the world through Eggchan’s words instead. Bits and pieces about distant towns, old alliances, notable players, and the gods who were said to watch over the server. Eggchan spoke of them in fragments over the years, each one complete on its own, leaving no obvious gaps to question. Wemmbu never thought to look for any.

There was a whole world beyond the cottage, a server with a past and a present, filled with players who lived their lives unaware of the remaining Ender Dragon hidden in an oak forest.

And somewhere in that world, a god had been looking for him.

The thought surfaced without permission, and Wemmbu pushed it back down.

He didn’t like thinking about the God of Order. The encounter in the obsidian box had been strange and brief, and he had spent the days since trying to convince himself it meant nothing. A hallucination brought on by darkness and isolation. A trick of his own mind. But the memory was stubborn and insistent. The glow of the god's colorful wings. The desperate, searching look on his face. The words he had said, echoing in Wemmbu's head long after the god had vanished.

He hadn’t told Eggchan. He couldn’t tell Eggchan. The confession would raise questions Wemmbu couldn’t answer, and it would confirm that he had done the one thing Eggchan had always warned him against.

Wemmbu had prayed to a god, and the god answered. The god had even claimed to know him.

Wemmbu didn’t want to dwell on it. There was no point. Whatever the God of Order wanted, it had nothing to do with him.

He was just Wemmbu. He lived in a cottage with his best friend, trained solo in the clearing, cooked meals for two, and harvested the small garden at the side of their home. He wasn’t anyone that important. At least, not important enough for a god to search for. He couldn’t be. If he was, then it raised questions he had no idea how to answer.

The whole thing was a strange, isolated incident, and he had decided to treat it as such. Wemmbu pushed the memory aside, again and again, until it faded into the background noise of his thoughts.

But it had left something behind. A splinter of curiosity; a question that had no answer.

Why would a god be looking for him? What did the God of Order want with someone who had never even left the oak forest?

Wemmbu didn’t know. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to know. But the question sat in the back of his mind, quiet and persistent, and it had changed the way he looked at the world. Or it had changed the way he wanted to look at the world. The mission Eggchan had sent him on would soon take him beyond the forest and into places he had only heard about.

Maybe, for the first time, he would get to see the world for himself instead of through someone else’s stories.

He preferred doing things to reading about them. Training, cooking, and exploring the forest. His hands and feet were made for movement, not stillness. The books Eggchan gave him gathered dust because they asked him to sit and think when he wanted to move and act. Maybe that was why this mission felt so important. It wasn’t just an errand. It was a chance to see something real, something beyond the pages of books and the stories Eggchan told. Something beyond the forest.

Wemmbu’s gaze drifted away from the bookshelf and across the rest of the room.

The rest of the bedroom space was practical. Barrels and chests lined one wall, storing spare armor pieces and weapons he had outgrown or retired. An armor stand stood empty now, its usual occupant currently strapped to Wemmbu’s body. A closet near the window held his clothes, most of them in shades of white and purple, a few pieces of golden jewelry tucked into the drawers inside.

The window itself was covered by pale lilac curtains that were always drawn, and behind them, wooden blinds sealed the glass away from the outside world. It had been that way for as long as Wemmbu could remember.

Tonight the room was dim, lit only by the lantern and the soft pulse of the froglights.

Night had fallen a few hours ago, and dinner had come and gone. Eggchan had braided his hair after the meal, working through the violet strands with patient fingers, weaving them into a thick plait that now fell past Wemmbu's hips. A pale blue ribbon held it in place at the end, the same color as Eggchan's eyes. Wemmbu had sat still for it the way he always did, listening to the soft rustle of feathers each time the Seraphim shifted behind him.

Now he stood before the empty armor stand, running through his inventory one more time to make sure everything was in order.

The netherite armor sat snug against his body, its enchantments humming faintly with a purple shimmer. The chestplate was secure across his torso, the pauldrons aligned with his shoulders, and the boots laced tight to his calves. He had worn armor so often that it felt like second skin now, the weight of it familiar rather than restrictive. Beneath the plates he wore a white poet shirt with loose sleeves that billowed slightly when he moved. The dark tailored trousers and netherite boots completed the look.

Wemmbu opened his inventory and began checking each item in sequence.

The shulker of potions sat in its designated slot, filled with splash vials of speed and strength. Golden carrots in a half-stack for high saturation. Golden apples, another half-stack, their surfaces gleaming with the sheen of enchanted fruit. Cooked porkchops and steak for easy and fulfilling meals. A full stack of ender pearls, each one cool and glimmering. Wind charges, then some spare building blocks.

His pickaxe, then his axe, Verdict, its netherite edge gleaming with sharpness that could shear through diamond. He had spent an hour sharpening it earlier, working the whetstone in careful strokes until the blade was perfect.

And his spear. Requiem. The name had come to him years ago, when he was still young and the weapon had felt too big for his hands. He had grown into it.

The haft was worn smooth from countless hours of practice, the netherite tip etched with enchantments that shimmered in the low light. He favored the spear above all his other weapons. It was balanced and quick, an extension of his arm in a way the axe couldn’t match.

Wemmbu hadn’t used Requiem against a real opponent yet. In the fight at Farville, he had fought with the axe alone, the spear left untouched in his inventory.

Even so, the axe always pulled his thoughts back to that day.

He still thought about the fight sometimes. Eggchan never talked about it, and Wemmbu had learned not to bring it up. His best friend’s expression would go stiff whenever the subject drifted too close, his voice flattening into something that discouraged further questions. So Wemmbu kept the memory to himself.

But it stayed with him. The thrill of it. The way his body had moved without hesitation, faster than thought. The fear on the soldiers’ faces when they realized they were outmatched. The cheers that had followed after.

On restless days, when the cottage felt too small and the forest too familiar, he found himself replaying the fight in his head. And during the worst days, the ones spent in darkness and silence, he had held onto that memory more tightly than he liked to admit. The feeling of being stronger than others. The feeling of having control over something.

And then there was the other memory.

It lingered at the edges of his thoughts no matter how often he pushed it away. A figure bathed in golden clothing. A pleasant voice that had known his name. Wemmbu didn’t know what to do with that memory, so he did what he always did with uncomfortable things. He set it aside and tried not to think about it.

It wasn’t entirely successful. The memory lingered at the edges of his thoughts, resurfacing in quiet moments he didn’t always notice. Not as an answer, but as a pressure behind his curiosity, something that made the idea of the mission feel different from how it should have. Perhaps it was that, or maybe it was because, for the first time in his life, Wemmbu was stepping beyond the boundaries of the world he knew.

Maybe this mission would give him answers. Wemmbu wasn’t exactly expecting any. He wasn’t even sure if he wanted them. But if the world outside the forest had something to tell him, he was ready to listen.

Wemmbu closed his inventory, having finished preparing for his journey, and took a slow breath.

The excitement was a low hum beneath his skin, a vibration he couldn’t quite suppress. He had never traveled this far before. Tens of thousands of blocks or more. Eggchan had mentioned it earlier, in passing, while going over the mission.

It was farther than Farville by an enormous margin, farther than anywhere he had ever been. The distance felt almost unreal when he tried to picture it. Beyond the oak forest and the Far Lands. Beyond the small yellow-bannered town he had visited six times in his life. He would see new biomes and unfamiliar terrain. He would travel through the night. He would deliver a package to a stranger in a distant city.

The thought of it all made his scaled tail sway behind him in a slow, unconscious rhythm.

Wemmbu looked around his bedroom one more time. The bed he wouldn’t sleep in tonight. The books he had never finished. The rug with its uneven purple dyes. He wouldn’t see any of it for a few weeks.

The situation was strange, a small pang of something that wasn’t quite sadness and not quite anticipation. He would miss the cottage: the familiar creak of the floorboards, the soft glow of the lanterns, and the sound of Eggchan's pen scratching in the office.

But the world outside was waiting, and he would have to meet it.

Wemmbu left the room and stepped into the corridor.

The second floor of the cottage was narrow and quiet, the walls paneled in wood that gleamed faintly in the lantern light. To his left was the shower area. To his right, Eggchan's bedroom, its door closed. And directly ahead, a few steps away, was the office. Wemmbu walked to it and knocked softly, his knuckles tapping twice against the wood.

“Come in.” The voice was muffled but familiar, flat and unhurried.

Wemmbu pushed the door open.

Eggchan's office was larger than the bedrooms, its walls lined with bookshelves that reached nearly to the ceiling.

The shelves were packed with volumes in neat rows, their spines labeled in handwriting Wemmbu recognized. A polished desk sat near the window, its surface covered in papers, books, and a ceramic inkpot with a white quill resting beside it. A pale rug softened the floor, and several lanterns burned at intervals along the walls, their flames steady and golden. The window was covered by pale blue curtains drawn against the night, the same curtains that hung in almost every room of the cottage.

Eggchan sat at the desk with his back to the door. His wings were folded behind him, the white primaries rising above the back of his chair, and his head was bent over a book. The smaller wings beside his face shifted slightly as Wemmbu entered, a subtle acknowledgment of his presence without the need to turn around.

The quill was moving in his hand, scratching across parchment in steady lines.

Wemmbu crossed the room and stopped beside the chair. “Hello bro,” he greeted.

He could feel the grin threatening to break across his face and held it back, keeping his expression to a polite smile. ‘There was no need to seem too eager,’ he reminded himself.

Eggchan finished the line he was writing and set the quill aside. He closed the book with a soft thump and turned in his chair, tilting his head up to look at Wemmbu. Even seated, he seemed tall, the line of his jaw sharp and his posture straight. His blue eyes swept over Wemmbu from head to toe, taking in the armor, the boots, and the braid with the practiced thoroughness of someone checking for mistakes.

It was a familiar ritual. Eggchan had always been particular about protection. He was the one who had taught Wemmbu the importance of enchantments, potions, and golden apples, impressing the value of preparation on him through years of patient instruction.

In the early days, Eggchan had also been the one to keep their gear supplies stocked. He claimed most of it came from trading with nearby establishments, though Wemmbu had never quite understood how simple trade could produce equipment of such consistently high quality. During his visits to Farville, he had tried acquiring enchanted gear himself and found nothing close to what Eggchan somehow managed to obtain.

Wemmbu had asked about it once or twice, but Eggchan always brushed the questions aside with a vague explanation about knowing the right people. Eventually, Wemmbu had stopped asking. Some things were simply part of the way Eggchan operated.

“Hi,” Eggchan said. His gaze lingered briefly on the enchanted armor before returning to Wemmbu’s face.

Wemmbu stood still beneath the scrutiny. He was used to it.

“You ready?” Eggchan asked.

“Yup. Got everything I need.”

Eggchan nodded and stood up. He picked up the book from his desk and crossed to one of the shelves, sliding it into an empty slot. His movements were unhurried, his white wings rustling softly with each step. Wemmbu leaned against the edge of the desk, watching him.

“It'll only be for a few weeks, right?” he questioned casually.

Eggchan's response was slow as he scanned the spines of his books. “Yep. Like I said earlier, your destination is over a hundred thousand blocks from here. It’ll be the longest journey you’ve ever made.”

The confirmation sent another flutter through Wemmbu’s chest. A hundred thousand blocks. That was a real distance. A journey. His first time going so far, his first time seeing the world beyond the small circle of the oak forest that had been his whole life. He had been patient for years, accepting the boundaries Eggchan set and understanding the reasons behind them. But somewhere beneath that patience, the restlessness had always been there.

And now Eggchan was trusting him with something that mattered enough to send him beyond those boundaries.

“You sure seem excited.”

Eggchan’s voice broke through his thoughts. He was still facing the bookshelf, his back to Wemmbu, his hands moving unhurriedly over the book spines. He hadn’t turned around to say it. He hadn’t needed to.

That was just how Eggchan was. He always seemed to know. It was one of the things that made him Eggchan, as natural as the steady, unblinking way he sometimes watched Wemmbu from across a room.

Wemmbu laughed, a small sheepish sound. “Yeah. Sorry.” The apology slipped out before he thought about it.

“It’s fine. I get it, bro.”

Eggchan finished with the books and turned around. His wings rustled as he approached, the great primaries folding and settling behind him. He stopped in front of Wemmbu and smiled, a small curve of his mouth that didn’t quite reach his eyes. His gaze drifted to the desk, to the papers and books still stacked beside the inkpot, the materials Wemmbu had bought from Farville weeks ago.

“You know what you're tasked to do, yeah?” he said, his tone slightly distant.

Wemmbu nodded.

Eggchan pulled a scroll from the drawer beneath the desk. He straightened and looked at Wemmbu directly, his expression shifting into something more focused. “I'll go over it again, but look at this map first.”

He handed the scroll over. Wemmbu took it and unrolled it carefully, the parchment crackling softly.

The map inside was detailed in ink and paint, a sprawling network of biomes, roads, and civilizations he had never seen or known before. Forests gave way to plains, plains rose into icy mountains, and rivers cut across the landscape in winding blue lines. Settlements were marked with small symbols, their names written in careful script. The map was scaled to encompass the entire route, compressed so that the full journey fit on a single sheet, and looking at it made the scope of the adventure feel suddenly real.

Wemmbu's eyes traced the inked path from the oak forest to the far corner of the parchment, where a town was circled in dark ink. Redstone Town.

He didn’t look up for several moments. He was too absorbed, his purple gaze moving from landmark to landmark, tracing rivers and roads, committing the route to memory.

Across from him, the Seraphim watched in silence.

Wemmbu didn’t notice. His attention remained fixed on the parchment, unaware of the way Eggchan’s eyes had settled on his face. His gaze was unblinking, lingering with an intensity that felt strange, as though he were studying more than Wemmbu’s expression. The blue of his eyes had paled slightly, fixed on Wemmbu like something familiar being assessed for how far it could be allowed to wander.

Then Eggchan blinked, and the moment passed.

“It's a place called Redstone Town,” Eggchan began talking.

Wemmbu traced the route with his lilac finger, following the inked path all the way to the circled settlement. It sat at the edge of the map, isolated from the other towns, a solitary dot in the corner of the parchment.

“You'll meet the recipient of the package there. You'll know him when you see him. Don't worry about that part.”

Eggchan cleared his throat, and the sound pulled Wemmbu's attention back. He looked up hastily, smiling with a trace of sheepishness at having gotten so absorbed.

Satisfied that he had Wemmbu's focus again, Eggchan continued. “Anyway, the important thing about this mission is how you get there. The map shows the way clearly, but we have ground rules too.”

His voice had shifted, the flatness replaced by something more serious. Wemmbu straightened slightly, giving his best friend his full attention.

“First.” Eggchan held up a finger. “Don't talk to anyone unless you have to. I know how you are, bro, so don't accidentally reveal yourself.”

Wemmbu grinned. “I gotchu, dude.”

Eggchan's expression flickered with something that might have been amusement, though it faded quickly. “Second. Always watch your back. There are rogue players out there who attack travelers for their gear. I know you're strong, but PVP won't solve everything. Stick to areas without a lot of people, alright?”

Wemmbu nodded obediently.

“Last.” Eggchan's tone deepened, the seriousness thickening into something heavier. The air in the room seemed to grow still, the lanterns flickering softly as though a draft had passed through. “And you better listen to this one.”

“Do not open the package.”

The words landed with unexpected weight. Wemmbu blinked, a flicker of confusion passing through him.

He hadn’t planned to open the package. The idea had never even crossed his mind. What unsettled him wasn’t the instruction itself, but the way Eggchan looked at him when he said it. The warning felt strangely personal, as though the box mattered less than what Wemmbu chose to do with it.

For a brief moment, Wemmbu was tempted to ask why. He wasn’t the type to snoop through things that weren’t his. But the look in Eggchan’s eyes stopped him. The sharpness in them was familiar, but what lay beneath it wasn’t. It was something unreadable, something that made the question die before it could reach his tongue.

“Got it,” Wemmbu said.

The Seraphim held his gaze, and the silence stretched for a moment. Whatever he was looking for, he seemed to find it. Then he exhaled, a soft release of breath, and some of the tension left his shoulders.

“Good.”

Eggchan reached into his inventory and pulled out a familiar shape. Wemmbu's navy cloak, cleaned and repaired.

The dust and stone debris from the Farville fight were completely gone, and the tear near the hood had been patched so neatly that Wemmbu couldn’t find the seam. It looked new again, the navy wool soft and clean. His gaze caught on the fabric for a moment. He wondered, briefly, whether the blood had been harder to wash out than the feathers. Wemmbu shoved the thought away.

“You need to cover yourself at all times,” Eggchan said. “Your tail gives you away.”

He stepped closer and draped the cloak around Wemmbu's shoulders. His fingers worked the clasp at the collar, adjusting the fabric so it fell evenly. The cloak settled around Wemmbu like an old habit, comfortable and familiar, covering the enchanted netherite armor and the dark scales of his tail. The hood hung loose at the back. Eggchan smoothed the fabric over Wemmbu's shoulders once, and then stepped back.

“Turn around, bro.” He smiled. “I also got you something.”

Wemmbu turned around without hesitation. He stood with his back to Eggchan and waited, unguarded, the vulnerable line of his spine exposed.

Cool metal touched his collarbone. Eggchan's hands reached around him and clasped a necklace at the back of his neck. The weight of it settled against his chest, a small silver piece on a leather cord. Wemmbu looked down and lifted the charm into his palm as Eggchan nudged his shoulder, turning him back around to face him.

The charm was intricate. A small blue eyeball sat at the center of a silver piece. Six small wings extended from its sides, three on each edge, their feathers rendered in delicate metalwork that caught the lantern light.

The piece was beautiful and strange, the craftsmanship flawless, but there was something unsettling about it. The eye seemed almost alive, its pupil fixed in a way that felt less like decoration and more like watching. Wemmbu felt a faint pull from it, a subtle gravity similar to the one he felt whenever he stood close to Eggchan for too long. The sensation was neither pleasant nor unpleasant. It was simply present.

He looked up at Eggchan, tilting his head in curiosity. “What's this?”

“A protection charm. I made it.”

Eggchan’s smile was more sincere now, warmer. It softened the sharp angles of his face in a way Wemmbu only saw in quieter moments: when it was just the two of them and nothing needed to be decided or controlled.

“It’ll keep you safe while you’re out there,” he said. The tone wasn’t dramatic but certain, as if it was already true.

Wemmbu felt a surge of gratitude, simple and genuine. “Oh, wow. Thanks, dude.” He looked down at the charm again, then back up.

“I wish you could come with, though.”

Eggchan’s smile didn’t waver, but he shook his head. “Can’t, bro. I need to stay here and keep watch over things. Besides, this mission is for you. You’ve been wanting to see more of the world, and I trust you to handle it.”

The words sent a small rush of warmth through Wemmbu’s chest. Coming from Eggchan, they felt strangely reassuring, settling some nervous part of him he hadn’t realized was there.

Eggchan trusted him. That was the part that stuck. The rest slipped by unnoticed: the reminder that this journey existed because Eggchan had entrusted it to him, believed him ready for it, permitted it at all. Wemmbu focused only on the trust. It settled easily, unquestioned, like something that had always been true. Something that didn’t need to be examined.

“Right, right,” Wemmbu said. He let go of the charm, his hands falling to his sides.

Eggchan’s gaze dropped to the silver pendant resting against the navy fabric.

“You should keep this hidden, okay?” He reached out and tucked the charm beneath the collar of Wemmbu’s cloak, pressing it flat against his chest where the fabric would conceal it. His fingers lingered briefly before withdrawing.

“That symbol is recognizable. It marks you as someone protected by a Seraphim. If the wrong person sees it, things could go badly.”

“I got it,” Wemmbu said.

Eggchan studied him for a moment longer, his blue eyes moving over Wemmbu's face as though searching for something unspoken. Then he reached into his inventory one more time. When his hand emerged, he was holding a small wooden box.

It was unremarkable in every way. Plain oak, sanded smooth along the edges, the grain of the wood faintly visible under the lantern light.

The lid sat flush against the base, held in place by nothing more than two small brass hinges and the simple friction of fitted wood. There was no lock. No seal. No clasp or mechanism to prevent anyone from opening it. A person could lift the lid with a single finger, could peer inside in the second of a heartbeat, and there would be nothing to stop them. It was obvious the box relied entirely on the restraint of the one who held it.

Eggchan held it out. His expression had shifted again, the brief warmth fading into something closed and unreadable. His fingers were wrapped around the edges of the box, and when he spoke, his voice was low and intentional, each word placed with care.

“This is the package.”

Wemmbu reached for it. Eggchan didn’t let go immediately. His grip remained firm, his fingers pressing into the oak, and the pause stretched just long enough to feel significant.

“I mean it, Wemmbu.”

The words came slowly, weighted with an intensity that made the air in the room feel thicker.

“Do not look inside. No matter what you might wonder or what anyone might say to you. This box stays closed until you reach the recipient. I’m trusting you with this. You’re the only person in this world I can trust."

The words settled over Wemmbu with heavy gravity that made him straighten. He looked at the box, plain and unadorned, small enough to disappear into his inventory slot. Then he looked back at Eggchan, meeting those blue eyes that held his own without blinking.

“I won't,” he said. “I promise.”

The words were simple, but they weren’t something Wemmbu said lightly. If Eggchan trusted him with something, then he would see it through. It wasn’t even a decision so much as a fact of how things worked between them. Eggchan had asked him not to open it, so he wouldn’t. It was that simple.

Eggchan held his gaze. The moment extended, the silence filled only by the soft hiss of the lanterns and the distant creak of the cottage settling. His expression was difficult to read, but his eyes didn’t move away. It felt as though he were waiting for something to surface, doubt or hesitation, anything that might break the certainty in Wemmbu’s voice. Nothing came.

After a long pause, something in his expression eased, faint but noticeable, as if that was what the Seraphim had been hoping to see. Only then did his fingers loosen. Eggchan released the box into Wemmbu’s hands.

The wood was smooth and light. Wemmbu turned it over once, feeling the grain against his fingertips. Then he opened his inventory and stored the package in one of the secured slots.

Eggchan watched him store the box. He straightened slowly, his wings folding behind him with a soft rustle.

“Okay,” he said. “I'll walk you to the door.”

They left the office together. The corridor was quiet and dim, the froglights casting a soft glow along the oak walls. Their footsteps fell into a steady rhythm on the wooden floorboards, Wemmbu’s netherite boots heavier than Eggchan’s quieter steps. The bathroom door was closed. Eggchan’s bedroom door was closed. Everything was as it always was, still and familiar.

They descended the stairs to the first floor. The living area opened around them, the armchairs empty beside the cold fireplace, the dining table already cleared. A single lantern burned on the kitchen island, its flame low and steady, casting long shadows across the room.

Wemmbu’s gaze moved over the space without lingering. It was the same room he had walked through countless times, and yet he found himself noticing it more than usual. He wouldn’t see it for weeks. That thought landed quietly, unexpected, before he pushed it aside and kept moving.

He crossed to the front door and paused with his hand on the knob. Behind him, Eggchan stopped a few steps away, his wings shifting as he settled into place. The smaller pairs near his face fluttered once before going still.

Wemmbu turned to face him. They stood in the dim light of the cottage, the silence stretching between them. Eggchan’s expression was composed, but it didn’t fully settle. There was a stillness to him that felt held in place, as if something underneath was being carefully restrained rather than simply calm.

“You have everything you need?” Eggchan asked, his voice lower now, gentler in a way that didn’t loosen the control behind it.

“Yeah, dude.” Wemmbu patted the chest of his cloak where the protection charm rested beneath the fabric. “I’m all set.”

Eggchan nodded once. His eyes moved over Wemmbu slowly, taking in every detail as if confirming a final count. The cloak, the braid, the netherite boots. Nothing was rushed or missed.

“Stay on the path. Don’t talk to anyone unless absolutely necessary. Don’t let anything pull you off course. If anything happens, you tell me immediately.”

The words that followed were said with quiet certainty, as though distance would make little difference. “I’ll know if something is wrong.”

“I know, Egg.” Wemmbu held his gaze. “I’ll be careful. I promise.”

Something in Eggchan’s expression shifted, not quite softness, not quite restraint, as if it had surfaced before being deliberately contained again. The tension in his features eased by a fraction, like someone reassured that everything was still where it belonged. Then the moment passed, and his expression closed once more.

“Good,” he said quietly. “Come back when you’re done. I’ll be waiting.”

Wemmbu grinned, the excitement finally breaking through his restraint. “Thanks, bro. For this.”

He stepped forward and pulled Eggchan into a quick hug. Eggchan returned it and held him close, white wings shifting behind him as if adjusting around the space they shared. One hand settled at Wemmbu’s back, steady and grounding, keeping him in place for a brief moment before he let go with control.

Wemmbu stepped back and turned around. Then he opened the door.

The night air spilled into the cottage, carrying the scent of oak and distant wildflowers. Soul lanterns lined the gravel path outside, their blue flames flickering gently in the darkness. Their glow traced the edges of the clearing and the dark shapes of the trees beyond. Above, the sky was clear, scattered with stars visible through the gaps in the canopy. A half-moon hung low over the treeline, casting pale silver light across the gravel.

Wemmbu stepped over the threshold and into the night.

The gravel crunched softly beneath his boots. His cloak settled around him, the familiar weight of the navy wool covering his armor and his tail. The charm rested cool against his chest, hidden beneath the fabric. His inventory was stocked. The small wooden box sat secure in its slot, unopened and unquestioned.

Behind him, Eggchan stood in the doorway.

His silhouette was framed by the dim glow of the cottage, his wings rising pale and luminous against the dark interior. His expression was blank. His blue eyes followed Wemmbu's form as he crossed the clearing, moving past the soul lanterns and toward the treeline where the oak forest waited.

Wemmbu didn’t look back.

His eyes were fixed on the path ahead, on the shadows between the trees, on the world that lay beyond them. His tail swayed behind him in a steady rhythm, peeking beneath his cloak. His heart beat with a lightness he hadn’t felt in weeks.

The forest swallowed him, and he kept walking. North. Toward the unknown. With the weight of a promise around his neck and the thrill of freedom humming beneath his skin.

Eggchan remained in the doorway for a long moment. He didn’t move; he didn’t call out. His wings were still. He watched the space where his best friend had disappeared until the last echo of footsteps faded into the quiet of the night.

Then he closed the door. The locks clicked into place. The cottage was silent again.

Outside, a faint rustle passed through the clearing. Multiple pale shapes slipped from the shadowed branches, small and winged, their blue eyes turning northward in unison. The oak forest stirred, and then grew still.

Chapter Text

For the first time in Wemmbu’s life, he walked through a world that was entirely new.

The birch forest stretched around him in pale rows, and its trees were nothing like the oaks he had grown up surrounded by. Their trunks were thin and bone-white, marked with dark horizontal lines that lined the bark at uneven intervals. The leaves above were smaller and lighter than oak leaves, a yellow-green that seemed to hold the moonlight rather than block it, scattering silver across the forest floor in shifting patterns.

The air even smelled different here. Sweeter, cleaner, carrying the faint scent of sap that was sharper than the deep note of the oak forest. Wildflowers he couldn’t name dotted the ground in clusters, pale yellows and soft whites that stood out against the dark grass. Some of them released a faint fragrance as his cloak brushed past, a kind of sweetness that lingered for a step or two before fading.

Moonlight filtered through the canopy in broad shimmers, illuminating patches of the forest and leaving the rest in deep shadow.

The dragon’s violet hair swayed with the wind, tied low in a braid that brushed against the back of his cloak with each step. The navy wool billowed softly around him, the slit in the middle revealing the glint of enchanted netherite beneath. His boots pressed into the soil with a steady rhythm, leaving faint impressions in the grass that the breeze would soon erase.

His steps were sure and unhurried. He had memorized the path from the scroll Eggchan had given him, the inked route tracing through this birch forest and then beyond, into landscapes he hadn’t yet seen.

A full day had passed since Wemmbu left the cottage. A full day since he stepped beyond the familiar boundaries of the only home he had ever known in the Overworld.

He had begun his journey at night, and now the sun had cycled back into night once more.

The daylight hours had been spent crossing terrain he had only ever seen on parchment.

He ventured through open meadows first, their grasses swaying in waves of green under a blue sky. Then he crossed a small swamp, its waters murky and still, with trees draped in hanging vines that shifted without wind. The air there had been thick and damp, carrying the sound of croaking frogs and the occasional plop of something breaking the water's surface.

Wemmbu had skirted their edges rather than wading through, following the route laid out on the scroll.

He hadn’t seen any civilizations, at least not yet. The map had been specific about this path, marking it as a route that avoided most towns and settlements. Eggchan had clearly chosen it for this purpose, ensuring that Wemmbu would encounter little to no players along the way.

‘Interaction wasn’t allowed, after all,’ Wemmbu thought.

Eggchan had made that clear before Wemmbu left, his voice calm and firm as he laid out the ground rules. The rules had been set, and Wemmbu aimed to follow them the way he followed most of Eggchan’s rules. He trailed the path as instructed, weaving through the empty lands, keeping his cloak wrapped around him. It didn’t occur to him to do otherwise. Of course not.

But the solitude was strange. Wemmbu had never been alone before. Not truly. Not in the way he was alone now, walking through a forest he didn’t know with no one beside him.

Even in the cottage, when Eggchan was upstairs in his office and Wemmbu was in the kitchen or the clearing, the Seraphim's presence had always been there. A weight in the air, or a gaze somewhere just beyond the edge of his attention.

It wasn’t something Wemmbu had ever thought about consciously. It had simply been part of living with Eggchan, as ordinary as the froglights beneath the floorboards or the drawn curtains over the windows. Whether Eggchan was reading upstairs, tending to something outside, or nowhere within sight at all, Wemmbu had always known where he was without needing to look.

Not the room or even the specific direction, exactly, but simply the general feeling of him. A quiet certainty that his best friend occupied the same space somewhere nearby.

Eggchan was always there. With him.

Whether Wemmbu was cooking dinner, training in their backyard, wandering through the cottage with a book tucked beneath one arm, or lying awake in bed waiting for sleep, there was always that familiar pressure lingering somewhere around him. Sometimes stronger. Sometimes fainter. But never completely gone.

It had never really… frightened him.

Because why would it? Eggchan was his best friend. That constant awareness had simply become another rhythm of his everyday life, something so ordinary that Wemmbu could no longer imagine what its absence was supposed to feel like.

So maybe that was why the loneliness now felt so difficult to define.

Wemmbu had expected leaving the cottage to feel emptier than this. He had expected something to be missing, some silence he had never heard before. Instead, the feeling remained stubbornly at the edge of his awareness, refusing to disappear entirely.

And even now, a full day's journey from home, that feeling hadn’t entirely faded.

Wemmbu still sensed something lingering nearby.

It wasn’t close enough to touch, not close enough to hear, but present nonetheless. A subtle gravity that tugged gently at something on the boundary of his consciousness, familiar enough that he barely questioned it. More than once throughout the day, he had caught himself almost turning toward it before remembering that there was no one who could possibly be there.

Wemmbu had noticed it several times, but the feeling was difficult to explain. It was too familiar to be dangerous, and too subtle to belong to an actual person.

However, just in case, Wemmbu had turned around more than once. He scanned the horizon with sharp purple eyes, retracing his steps to check for a silhouette or a nametag, but there was never anything there. There was only the wind threading through the space, leaves stirring overhead, and the sporadic rustle of wildlife somewhere in the grass.

After the third or fourth time, he stopped checking as often.

It felt unnecessary. Whatever strange certainty that lingered in the back of his mind was probably only memory filling in a space that had always belonged to Eggchan.

Wemmbu’s hand drifted to his chest, pressing against the cloak where the silver charm lay hidden.

The metal was cool against his skin through the fabric. The charm felt heavier than it should, a small concentrated weight around his neck. Its strange, almost oppressive presence reminded him of the feeling he would get whenever he stood too close to Eggchan.

Maybe the protection charm carried a trace of that same feeling on purpose. A quiet reassurance tucked beneath his cloak, maybe a way for Eggchan to ensure his safety from far away without actually being here.

The thought warmed his chest. Eggchan had never really been the sort to give gifts. Random wisdom, instructions, books, equipment, and countless reminders to abide his rules, yes. But something made solely for Wemmbu? Something he could carry with him? This felt different. Thoughtful, maybe, and important.

Wemmbu smiled to himself, patting his chest where the charm was hidden before letting his hand fall away. Somehow, despite the miles between them, it almost felt as though his best friend had never left his side at all.

Wemmbu continued walking.

The birch trees thinned slightly ahead, then thickened again, endless pale trunks stretching into the dark. The moon had shifted position overhead, its light angling through the canopy at a different slant than before. He had been walking for hours and his legs ached with a pleasant burn, the longest trek he had ever undertaken.

The map showed that he was barely halfway to Redstone Town. The journey would take a few weeks, maybe a few more if he stopped to rest.

But despite the distance still ahead, despite the unfamiliar terrain and the solitude, he was enjoying himself.

The Overworld was so much bigger than he had ever imagined. So much more varied.

The dragon had spent his childhood in the End, moving between islands of Endstone beneath a void sky that stretched into infinity. The End was barren, beautiful in its own way, but it was a beauty of absence and coldness. Where the landscape was subtly glowing and the darkness was abyssal, where the sky and the void possessed the same color.

There were no stars in the End. No moon, no clouds. Only the endless black, the floating islands, and the quiet hum of the void. Wemmbu still loved it. He still preferred it, in some deep part of himself that would always belong to the place where he was born. He would go back one day, if Eggchan allowed it.

But the Overworld was starkly different.

Green hills, blue skies, and white clouds that drifted in varying shapes. Flowers that bloomed in colors the End had never produced, pinks and yellows and blues that seemed almost too bright to be real. There was the moon and the stars above, so constant and yet so distant, different from the empty void. During the day, the sun was warm on his face, so utterly unlike the unyielding cold of the End.

Wemmbu felt like a tourist in a world that everyone else seemed to know.

But he couldn’t help the fascination. It was his first time seeing any of this. His first time walking through a birch forest, his first time smelling wildflowers he couldn’t name, his first time being so far from the cottage and the oak forest. His scaled tail swayed with his excitement, peeking beneath the navy cloak. The adventure was both intriguing and exhilarating; he was glad Eggchan had given him this mission.

Wemmbu slowed his pace and rolled his shoulders, working out the stiffness that had seeped into his muscles from the long walk.

He wasn’t tired exactly. His body could go for hours more without rest, trained as it was for endurance. But he knew he should pause soon. A few hours of sleep would keep him sharp for the rest of the journey.

He hadn’t brought a bed because he didn’t want to reset his spawn point from the cottage. He would rather sleep on the ground, or in the crook of a tree, somewhere safe enough to close his eyes for a few hours. A power nap, maybe, nothing more.

Wemmbu stopped walking and looked around.

The birch forest was quiet. The breeze had slightly died down, leaving the pale leaves nearly motionless overhead. The only sound was the faint rustle of his cloak as he shifted his weight. His purple eyes, adjusted to the dark with the ease of a creature born in the End, swept slowly across the forest. Between every white trunk, beneath every patch of shrubs, and along every stretch of moonlit grass.

He turned in an unhurried circle, listening as much as looking. Nothing caught his attention. No shifting silhouette. No glint of armor. No torchlight between the trees. The forest stretched around him in peaceful silence, untouched and empty beneath the moonlight.

Satisfied, Wemmbu finally let out a slow breath, feeling the tension ease from his shoulders.

He truly was alone. The realization washed over him. No players, no villages hidden beyond the treeline. No familiar white wings occupying the edge of his vision. Just the forest, the moon, and himself.

His gaze wandered until it settled upon a sturdy birch whose trunk was wide enough to support his back. Wemmbu approached it without hurry, resting one hand against the bark before lowering himself onto the grass. His cloak spread neatly around him, dark navy fabric pooling over the earth while the slit revealed the enchanted netherite he was wearing. He stretched one leg, then the other, settling into a comfortable position before leaning both his head and shoulders against the trunk. The bark was cool through his hair.

Above him, fragments of the night sky peeked through the canopy, stars blinking quietly between pale leaves stirred by the occasional breeze.

For several long moments, nothing happened. Wemmbu simply sat there.

The journey had been longer than any expedition he had ever taken. His legs carried the pleasant soreness of constant movement, and the cool night air eased the lingering warmth beneath his armor. His breathing slowed naturally until it matched the gentle rhythm of the birch forest around him.

From a distance, anyone passing through would have thought he had already begun resting. Perhaps he had fallen asleep sitting upright. Maybe he was simply enjoying the quiet after an entire day of walking.

His face, however, slowly lost its usual openness, becoming unreadable.

The easy curiosity that had accompanied him throughout the day gradually faded. The corners of his mouth straightened. His eyes remained fixed somewhere beyond the canopy without truly focusing on anything above him. His jaw clenched once before relaxing again, only to tighten a second time. He remained perfectly still, hands resting loosely atop his lap beneath the folds of his cloak. If someone had asked what occupied his thoughts, even he might not have answered immediately.

Wemmbu had been trying very hard not to think about it.

Ever since leaving the cottage, he had deliberately filled his mind with everything else instead. The changing terrain, the unfamiliar flowers, and the clouds drifting overhead. Even the map Eggchan had carefully prepared, he had memorized it twice or more.

Every new sight had made it wonderfully easy to keep certain memories buried where they belonged. During the daylight, they hardly surfaced at all. There had simply been too much to see, too much to experience for the first time. But the night carried a different kind of silence, one that invited thoughts he had spent the entire day avoiding.

The obsidian box, then the soft golden glow. The voice that had spoken his name with unmistakable familiarity.

The God of Order.

Even now, remembering it made the encounter feel unreal. Gods were stories, beyond normal players and ordinary civilizations. They were figures spoken about in passing by Eggchan, usually accompanied by warnings to stay away from them.

Yet one had appeared before him without hesitation, had looked at him with relief so profound that it bordered on desperation. More unsettling still, the God had spoken as though he had expected to find him eventually. As though Wemmbu hadn’t been a stranger at all.

“When you’re alone again, pray to me. I promise I’ll answer.”

His fingers curled slightly against the fabric pooled over his lap, feeling the particular urge to clasp them together.

‘Egg isn’t here,’ Wemmbu couldn’t help but think.

That in and of itself should have settled the matter. But it made everything strangely more complicated.

Wemmbu knew, without needing to examine it too closely, that Eggchan would dislike this. Actually, dislike was too weak of a word. Eggchan had spent years teaching him to avoid the gods entirely. They meddled, they manipulated, and they always wanted something. It had been explained often enough that Wemmbu had never questioned it. There had never been a reason to. Eggchan had always cared for him. Eggchan had never given him cause to doubt his intentions.

Which was exactly why this shouldn't count as doubt.

Wemmbu wasn't betraying Egg. He wasn't choosing the God over his best friend. He wasn't suddenly believing every ridiculous thing that stranger had claimed inside the obsidian box.

The dragon only wanted to understand.

Surely there was nothing wrong with asking questions. Questions weren't betrayal.

If the God had mistaken him for someone else, then hearing the explanation would settle everything. If there truly had been some misunderstanding, then he could return home knowing Eggchan had been right all along. Wasn't that better? Wasn't it better to clear away whatever strange confusion had happened rather than let it linger in the back of his mind forever?

The reasoning sounded perfectly sensible. Wemmbu repeated it silently to himself anyway.

Just one conversation, then he would stop.

Wemmbu would return to his mission, finish what Eggchan had entrusted him with, and when he finally arrived back at the cottage, nothing between them would have changed. Eggchan never even had to know this had happened. It wasn't lying if nothing came of it. It wasn't disobedience if all he wanted was clarification.

‘Right?’

Wemmbu closed his eyes.

The darkness behind his eyelids blended seamlessly with the darkness beyond the trees. He let several slow breaths pass, doing nothing, allowing the silence to settle over him completely. Somewhere high above, leaves whispered softly against one another. A distant insect chirped once before falling quiet again. Time stretched gently around him until even he almost believed he had decided against it.

Then, before he could convince himself not to, he lifted both hands and clasped them together.

"Hey, God of Order."

The whisper barely disturbed the stillness around him. His voice felt strangely unfamiliar, quieter than intended, touched with hesitation. Wemmbu swallowed once before continuing.

"It's me again."

Another heartbeat passed.

"Can you hear me?"

He slowly opened his eyes.

Nothing had changed.

The moonlight still filtered through the birch leaves in pale silver shafts. The scattered flowers remained closed beneath the night air. The white trunks stood silent and unmoving around him. Even the breeze seemed unchanged. Wemmbu waited patiently, his clasped hands resting against his lap as his pulse beat just a little quicker than before.

Only then did the weight of what he had done settle inside him. His stomach tightened.

This time there was no excuse.

Inside the obsidian box, he had been disoriented, trapped, and alone. Restlessness could explain that prayer, but this one couldn't. This one had been deliberate. Eggchan would almost certainly be disappointed if he ever found out. The thought alone made guilt bloom uncomfortably beneath his ribs, but it was already too late to take the words back. They had been spoken. Whatever happened now was beyond him.

Still, none of this meant he believed the God. Not even a little.

Eggchan was his best friend.

The person who had cared for him. Protected him. Taught him. Patched every injury after training. Braided his hair. Stayed beside him through every ordinary day until ordinary itself had come to mean Eggchan's presence.

Nothing some mysterious God said could possibly outweigh years of that domesticity.

But the questions refused to disappear, and so did his curiosity. How had the God of Order known him? Why had he insisted he had been searching for him? Why had he spoken with such certainty?

And most importantly, why had the God looked so relieved to see him?

Wemmbu wasn't looking for reasons to distrust Eggchan. He was looking for reasons not to. He only wanted the answers to fit the life he already knew.

Surely they would. There was no doubt about it.

The seconds drifted by without interruption. The forest remained exactly as it had been before.

Against his better judgment, disappointment quietly settled beneath his chest. At the same time, relief followed close behind it.

Maybe it really had all been a hallucination. Perhaps exhaustion, darkness, and isolation had simply woven together imaginative pieces into one convincing memory. If so, then that was probably for the best. Wemmbu could properly rest now, then continue toward the direction of Redstone Town, complete his mission exactly as Eggchan had instructed, and eventually return home without ever thinking about the God of Order again.

A soft glow bloomed behind him.

Wemmbu turned, tilting his head back against the trunk, and looked up.

A figure stood beside the birch tree, leaning one shoulder against the pale bark.

His form was slightly translucent at the edges, faintly golden, although this time he was more conspicuous and perceptible. Huge wings rose behind him, their feathers layered in yellow and green and orange, folded neatly against his back. He was dressed differently than before. The elaborate regalia had been replaced by a long coat of deep green with simpler gold embroidery, still elegant but less formal, as though he had dressed for a visit rather than a coronation.

His green hair, streaked with blue and yellow, fell in careful waves around his face. The black contour around his birdlike eyes framed a gaze that was warm and expectant.

He smiled down at Wemmbu. It was a soft, unhurried smile. The smile of someone who had been hoping for something and had just received it.

For a brief moment, he simply looked at him, his eyes moving over Wemmbu's face as though making sure that he was truly there, unharmed and speaking to him willingly. The corners of his mouth lifted another fraction before he looked away toward the moonlit canopy, quietly exhaling through his nose. It was a small gesture, gone almost as quickly as it appeared, but it carried quiet relief.

Wemmbu stared up at him. The God didn’t speak first. He seemed content to let the silence remain between them, neither rushing him nor filling the quiet with explanations. Instead, he simply waited, patient enough that Wemmbu found himself wondering whether he had expected him to say something first all along.

The silence stretched comfortably before Wemmbu finally broke it, his voice quiet and touched with faint disbelief.

“You’re here.”

The God’s smile returned, slightly brighter than before, though it faded into composure almost immediately afterward. “You called.”

He pushed himself away from the tree. The God walked around to stand in front of him, his movements smooth and measured, the layered feathers of his wings rustling softly with each step. The grass never bent beneath his feet.

When he lowered himself to the ground across from Wemmbu, he folded his legs beneath him with grace. His wings shifted once before folding neatly behind him, their wispy edges hovering just above the grass without ever brushing it. His black eyes swept across the birch forest, taking in the pale trunks, the moonlit undergrowth, and the spaces between the trees before returning to Wemmbu again. This time, the smile that met him was smaller, steadier.

“It doesn’t seem likely,” the God said after a moment, a quiet note of hope slipping into his voice, “but… are you finally accepting my help?”

The question was so unexpectedly earnest that Wemmbu almost laughed. He settled for a scoff instead, shaking his head lightly.

“You’re really not letting that story go, huh?”

“Nope.” One corner of Parrot’s mouth lifted, the expression small enough that it almost disappeared beneath the quiet interest in his eyes. “It’d be strange if I did.”

Wemmbu let out a soft huff through his nose. Somehow that answer was funnier than it should have been. The God’s persistence ought to have been irritating, yet there was something oddly disarming about the way he admitted it without embarrassment, as though refusing to give up was simply the most natural thing in the world.

The faint smile faded from Parrot’s face. His gaze lowered briefly before returning to Wemmbu.

“I’ve been sending more of my flock your way,” he began. “But none of them have come back.”

Wemmbu blinked. The words settled into his thoughts, finding pieces that had quietly connected before. The flashes of colorful feathers outside the cottage. The bright birds that had begun appearing more often in the oak trees.

Then, Eggchan’s arrows striking them before they could land. The murky blood staining yellow feathers before disappearing beneath fallen leaves.

“Your flock,” Wemmbu repeated slowly. “You mean the parrots.”

The god inclined his head. “Yes.”

“I noticed more of them lately. Around the house. In the forest.” Wemmbu hesitated, choosing his words more carefully than before. “Eggchan… didn’t let them get close.”

“I know.”

There was no disappointment in the answer, no attempt to make Wemmbu feel guilty.

Wemmbu lowered his gaze to his clasped hands. The explanation fit together too neatly to ignore. Eggchan had never lied about what the birds were. They had been watching. They had belonged to the God of Order. But hearing the owner of those birds acknowledge it so calmly, without accusation, left a strange feeling sitting inside him.

“That's not why I prayed,” Wemmbu admitted after a moment, looking back up. “The parrots aren't why I wanted to talk to you.”

The God stilled ever so slightly. It was subtle enough that someone else might have missed it. His shoulders straightened, and his wings lifted a fraction before settling again. His expression remained composed, but something bright slipped into his eyes before he tucked it carefully away.

“You wanted to?” he asked quietly.

“Well… yeah,” Wemmbu admitted.

A smile formed on the God's face, colorful feathers rustling softly behind him. “I'm glad.”

The simplicity of the answer caught Wemmbu off guard. He tilted his head, studying the God's expression for some hint of exaggeration, but found none. “Why?”

“Because this is the first conversation you've come looking for,” he said, warmth unmistakable beneath his calm voice. A faint trace of amusement slipped into his smile. “Not because you were curious about how prayers worked.”

Wemmbu opened his mouth to object, then paused, quietly realizing that it wasn't entirely untrue. The guilt beneath his ribs blossomed into something more solid. “…I guess.”

“You're allowed to be curious too,” the King added lightly. “I'm just glad we're able to talk right now.”

Wemmbu shook his head, unable to tell whether he'd just been teased or complimented. Deciding to steer the conversation back before the God could sidetrack him further, Wemmbu straightened slightly. “In the box, you said you were looking for me. You acted like you already knew me, and you even said you could save me.”

His expression grew more serious. “Why is that? We've never met.”

The God’s attention wandered briefly toward the birch trees before returning to Wemmbu. His expression was thoughtful rather than hesitant. When he finally spoke, his voice was careful, each word placed with the delicacy of someone who had rehearsed this conversation countless times and still found it difficult.

“From your perspective, we haven't. At least not this time.”

Wemmbu frowned. “…Okay. That doesn't explain anything.”

“Yeah.” A faint chuckle escaped the winged god, surprisingly warm despite the weight of the matter. “I had a feeling that would be your first real question. I've had a long time to think about how I'd answer it.” His smile softened into something quieter, more personal.

“We knew each other a long time ago."

The God paused. It was the only time he appeared reluctant.

“…We were friends.”

Despite the clear words, the content refused to settle. Wemmbu leaned back slightly, crossing his arms over his chest. “I've only ever had one friend.”

“I know.”

The King held Wemmbu's gaze for a quiet moment. Wemmbu blinked, then raised an eyebrow. “And it definitely wasn't you.”

“It wasn't.” His smile returned, patient as ever. “Not this time.”

“You keep saying ‘this time.’” Wemmbu rubbed a hand over his face before letting it fall back into his lap. “It's not helping, bro.”

“There's probably an easier way to explain it,” the God admitted, looking almost apologetic, only almost. Beneath it lingered the faintest hint of amusement, as though he had stumbled upon a joke only one of them still remembered. “Unfortunately, someone interrupted my sleep in the middle of the night, so I'm a little tired right now.”

Wemmbu snorted. “Are you saying I'm inconvenient, bro?”

“You were worse.”

“Oh, so you admit it.”

“I've never denied it.” The God shrugged.

Wemmbu let out an exasperated breath through his nose. “So you were annoying back then too?”

Something brightened in the God’s expression, as if hearing something vaguely familiar. “It isn’t the first time you’ve accused me of that.”

When Wemmbu raised an eyebrow, the King’s smile widened just enough to notice. “I believe your exact words were, ‘Has anyone ever told you you’re impossible?’”

A sharp laugh escaped Wemmbu before he could stop it.

It came easier than he expected, shaking loose some of the tension that had settled in his shoulders since this impossible conversation had begun. When it finally faded, he caught himself smiling at the strange god before him, as though the sight no longer felt quite so impossible.

“Nah. Actually?”

“The sound barrier, bro.” The god clicked his tongue in mock disapproval, though he was still smiling. “You'll wake the whole forest.”

Wemmbu rolled his eyes despite himself. “Whatever. That does sound like something I'd say.”

“I thought so too.”

The answer lingered, making Wemmbu pause. It wasn't because of the words themselves, but because of how effortlessly they had been spoken. There was no insistence, no attempt to convince him that any of this was true. It sounded less like a story being told and more like a memory shared with someone who had simply forgotten it.

Wemmbu found himself looking at the God a little differently now.

“…Then, what kind of friends were we?” he asked, quieter this time.

“The complicated kind.”

The amusement settled into something reminiscent. “We didn't exactly begin on the same side of history. You were impulsive, and I was rigid. You were pretty rude, questioning every good thing I did, while I saw your every move as something evil and selfish.” The god's black eyes creased, his smile becoming a grin despite such unkind words being spoken.

“You were exhausting.”

Wemmbu stared. “Wow. Rude.”

“I'm just being honest,” the King replied without missing a beat. A quiet laugh escaped him. “You usually had a much worse comeback than that.”

“I don't even know you.”

“You didn't know me either. Not at first.” He tilted his head ever so slightly. The words remained between them before he added, quieter this time, “Knowing someone has always been something earned.”

The conversation eased into comfortable silence. For reasons Wemmbu couldn't quite explain, it didn't feel awkward.

He found himself studying the glowing figure sitting across from him. The elegant sweep of folded wings. The careful way the God rested his hands over one knee. The faint golden luminescence outlining his silhouette against the birch trees. He didn't look frightening. The God only looked impossibly mature, tired in a way sleep could never fix, yet strangely content simply sitting there beneath the trees.

“What's your name?” Wemmbu finally asked. He felt the need to; there was no nametag above the God's head after all.

The King of the Overworld blinked. For the first time since appearing, he looked genuinely surprised. Then, he smiled. “I'm Parrot.”

“Huh, that checks out. I'm Wemmbu.”

“I know.”

“Right.” Wemmbu awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck. “I'm just trying to be formal.”

The God, Parrot, smiled softly, his black eyes creasing at the edges. “I've known your name for a very long time now. I just feel… relieved, that I finally get to hear you say it again.”

Another quiet laugh escaped Wemmbu before he caught himself. This conversation was becoming dangerously normal. “Uhuh,” he said, trying to regain some composure, “do you answer everyone's prayers, or am I just special?”

Parrot tilted his head in thought as though genuinely considering the question.

“I answer the ones I can.”

Wemmbu considered that for a moment. It sounded like another one of those carefully measured answers, the kind that only seemed to raise more questions than it resolved.

His expression gradually settled as the lingering amusement gave way to something more serious. “And… you’ve been looking for me?”

Parrot nodded once. “For a very long time.”

“How long exactly?”

This time the answer didn't come immediately. The God’s gaze dropped, tracking idle patterns through the grass that never bent beneath his touch, before lifting again. “After enough years, counting stopped feeling necessary.”

His smile had disappeared entirely. “When we last saw each other, our story didn't end the way either of us expected. There were… many things left unsaid.”

Wemmbu's expression sobered. He tilted his head to the side, curious despite the seemingly heavy topic. “What happened?”

Parrot looked at him for a long moment.

“You died.”

Wemmbu blinked in surprise. The words landed quietly between them.

Only then did Parrot look away. His clawed fingers absently traced circles through the grass before becoming still.

“And when I finally found you again…” A faint, weary look crossed his face before fading almost as soon as it appeared.

“You were already with him.”

Silence stretched between them.

There was no dramatic flourish or elaborate explanation, only the quiet rustle of birch leaves overhead.

Wemmbu averted his eyes. The memory of the obsidian box pressed unpleasantly at the edge of his thoughts. He could still remember the God’s intense expression from that day, and hearing those words now made it harder to dismiss everything as a lie. At the same time, something about the way Parrot had said “with him” stirred a familiar irritation beneath his ribs, as though Eggchan were being blamed for something he had never done.

“There’s nothing wrong with Eggchan,” Wemmbu said after a while, his voice quieter now but edged with conviction. “I was being kept safe.”

Parrot looked at him again. Sadness flickered across his face, old enough to seem almost familiar.

“That’s what he wanted you to believe.”

“It’s the truth.”

Parrot didn’t argue after that. He simply looked at Wemmbu with those black, unblinking eyes, and the lack of argument was somehow more unsettling than if he had pressed the point.

Wemmbu opened his mouth to change the subject, but before he could speak, Parrot's expression shifted. His hand rose to his temple, and he glanced briefly over his shoulder. A furrow creased between his brows.

“Ugh,” he murmured. “Those flapping wings are getting on my nerves.”

Wemmbu frowned. He looked at Parrot’s colorful wings, which were folded neatly against his back, perfectly still. Then he looked around the clearing. The birch trees stood silent, and the moonlight fell in silver shafts. Nothing was moving around them.

“Bro, what wings?” Wemmbu asked.

Parrot turned back to him, faint surprise crossing his face.

“…You don’t know?”

The question came before he seemed to think better of it. His brows drew together slightly as he searched Wemmbu’s expression, as if expecting some sign that this was a joke. When none came, the surprise slowly faded into something more thoughtful, more unreadable.

A cold feeling prickled at the back of Wemmbu’s neck.

“Know what?”

Parrot didn’t answer his question immediately.

Instead, his gaze drifted past Wemmbu’s shoulder toward the treeline. His expression remained unreadable, but something about the stillness that settled over him made the clearing suddenly feel much smaller. He watched the darkness between the birch trunks for several long seconds before speaking, his voice low enough that it barely disturbed the night.

“There are things in the trees.”

His black eyes shifted, following something invisible through the branches. “They’ve been watching us ever since I appeared, maybe even way before that.”

Wemmbu’s stomach dropped.

He turned sharply, his eyes racing between the pale trunks. The branches overhead, then the undergrowth stretching into darkness. Moonlight pooled across the forest floor, untouched. Nothing moved. Nothing was there.

“I don’t see anything.”

“No.” Parrot’s bird-like eyes lingered on the forest a moment longer before returning to Wemmbu. “I suppose you wouldn’t.”

His expression softened, though concern lingered beneath it.

“I thought you knew.”

A brief silence settled between them.

“I assumed he wanted you to.”

The words landed so quietly they almost slipped past Wemmbu. Almost. Something tightened low in his chest, small enough to ignore and impossible to shake. The assumption began to take root, and before Wemmbu could stop it, the name escaped his mouth.

“…Egg?”

Parrot didn’t respond for a moment. He studied Wemmbu instead, his expression thoughtful rather than accusing, as though he were deciding whether speaking would help at all.

“Who else would care enough to watch you?”

Wemmbu’s head shook at once. He refused to believe such accusations.

“No. Egg wouldn’t do that.” The answer came faster than he intended. “He doesn’t need to. He trusts me.”

A faint smile touched Parrot’s face. It was gentle enough to resemble sympathy, though there was something quietly undecipherable and strange underneath it, as if he’d expected that answer long before Wemmbu had spoken it, as if he already knew what to counter it with.

“I’m sure he does.” His voice never lost its gentleness. “But I don’t think someone who truly trusted you would need this many eyes.”

The words weren’t spoken as a challenge. They sounded more like an observation than an accusation. Despite his apparent sincerity, there was something weird in his inflection.

Wemmbu’s hands curled into fists in his lap. His heart beat a little faster, not because he believed the God, but because the certainty in his voice refused to sound like someone trying to win an argument. A small, unwelcomed speck of doubt stirred somewhere beneath his ribs, and he buried it almost as quickly as it surfaced.

Then he searched Parrot’s face for the satisfaction of having planted that doubt, for smugness, for triumph.

He found neither. He only seemed concerned above all else. That somehow unsettled Wemmbu even more.

“You’re lying.”

“I have no reason to.”

“You’re a God.” Wemmbu gritted his teeth, his jaw tightening. “Eggchan said gods twist the truth so that people mistake it for kindness.”

Something shifted across Parrot’s expression. Not hurt, exactly, but a brief weariness, old enough to suggest he’d heard those words before. It disappeared almost immediately.

“Eggchan has told you many things,” he said softly. “But not all of them are true.”

Wemmbu opened his mouth to argue, but the God lifted a hand with quiet patience.

“I don’t expect you to believe me.” His voice remained calm, almost impossibly so. “Just remember this conversation the next time you’re here. If you ever catch the feeling that someone is watching you…” He let the words linger for only a moment. “Don’t dismiss it too quickly.”

The clearing had gone strangely still. Even the breeze seemed to have disappeared. Parrot’s attention drifted past Wemmbu for only a heartbeat, toward something concealed among the birch trunks, before returning to him.

“They’re very good at staying out of sight,” he murmured, almost to himself. Then he smiled again, calm and faintly apologetic.

“I only thought you deserved to know.”

Wemmbu frowned despite himself. Against his better judgment, he looked around once more. His gaze swept slowly across the treeline, following pale birch trunks one by one as moonlight spilled through the branches in broken patches. Nothing shifted. No flutter of wings, no shifting silhouette. Just tree bark, scattered leaves, and the quiet hum of a forest settling into the night.

Wemmbu was already beginning to turn back when something at the edge of his vision caught his attention.

A flicker. Not movement exactly. More like a brief glint of white tucked somewhere high between the leaves, gone almost before he could focus on it.

His purple eyes snapped back to where he’d thought he had seen it, searching more carefully this time. Branch after branch. Shadow after shadow. The moonshine shifted softly through the canopy, yellow-green leaves stirring just enough to blur one shape into another.

But there was nothing there, anywhere. Wemmbu kept staring for another few seconds before finally looking away, his brows knitting together. A small knot had tightened somewhere beneath his ribs.

It could’ve been moonlight. It could’ve been his imagination.

‘…Couldn’t it?’

Wemmbu’s hands were shaking. He hated that they were.

He didn’t want to believe the God. He wanted to call him a liar; to stand up, walk away, and never pray again. That would be easier, simpler.

But… the feeling had been there all day. That strange, persistent awareness lingering just beyond his senses, like someone standing a few steps behind him whenever he wasn’t looking. He had told himself it was the charm around his neck, the protection Eggchan had given him, carrying the familiar comfort of his presence. Or perhaps it was just his mind filling the solitude with something familiar.

He had accepted those possible explanations without question. But now, despite himself, another possibility had taken root. Small and impossible to pull free now that it had been planted.

“I don’t think I can believe you,” Wemmbu admitted quietly, with more honesty than everything he had said thus far. The words felt heavier than they should have.

Parrot regarded him in silence for a moment. His colorful wings shifted with the faintest rustle before settling once more.

“That’s alright,” he said gently. “Belief isn’t something I can ask of you right now. Not after everything you’ve been taught.”

The God’s smile returned, smaller now, touched with faint sympathy. “Just don’t close the door forever. If the day comes when your questions become louder than your answers…” He paused, meeting Wemmbu’s purple eyes with compassionate certainty. “Come find me again. You don’t have to face them alone.”

The smile deepened by the smallest fraction. “After all… we are friends.”

The words had barely landed before something changed.

Parrot’s expression blanked.

His head turned sharply toward the trees, every feather along his wings going still. The warmth disappeared from his face so completely that the change unsettled Wemmbu more than any warning could have.

“Wemmbu.” His voice carried none of its earlier gentleness. “Duck.”

The command struck something older than thought.

Wemmbu moved. He dropped instinctively as something whipped past the space his head had occupied a heartbeat earlier. An arrow buried itself deep into the nearest birch with a heavy crack, the shaft vibrating violently against the pale bark.

His body reacted before his mind did. Wemmbu was already standing.

A shield flashed into existence around his arm, wood and iron locking into place with practiced ease as his eyes snapped toward the treeline.

Far beyond the clearing, half-hidden among the birches, a figure shifted between the shadows. Dark armor dulled beneath the moonlight. A hood concealed their face, leaving only the pale curve of a drawn bow visible between the trunks. Another arrow was already resting against the string.

A player. An enemy.

For one suspended heartbeat, the confusion still clinging to the God’s words refused to let go. Then instinct surged forward and swept it aside. His pulse quickened, not with fear but with something older, something buried beneath months of quiet evenings and peaceful routines. The familiar thrill spread through him like fire finding dry timber, every sense sharpening at once.

His grip tightened around the shield as his free hand drifted almost unconsciously toward his inventory. Toward Verdict.

Beside him, Parrot had already risen to his feet. He spared the distant archer only the briefest glance before his attention settled on Wemmbu. There was something quietly satisfied in his expression now, as though simply being here had been enough.

“I should go,” he said, almost reluctantly. Another smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“When you’re actually alone this time… pray again, alright?” His head tilted ever so slightly. “It’d be nice to continue our conversation without being interrupted all the time.”

Wemmbu never looked away from the trees. His eyes tracked the distant figure as they slipped behind another birch trunk, waiting for the slightest movement.

“Yeah,” he answered absently. “…Alright.”

Parrot chuckled, seemingly unbothered by the distracted response.

“Keep asking questions, Wemmbu. You don’t have to answer them today. Just don’t stop asking.” His eyes drifted briefly toward the treeline before returning to him. “And I’ll send more parrots your way.”

The smile softened into something that tugged strangely at the edge of Wemmbu’s memory.

For the briefest instant, a kind of warmth stirred somewhere deep within him. It wasn’t a memory, not quite. More like the lingering impression of one, a feeling of standing beneath another sky, laughing at something he could no longer hear. The familiarity vanished as quickly as it came, leaving only the strange ache that followed it.

“Take better care of them this time.”

Another arrow sliced through the air. Wemmbu shifted on instinct, the projectile skimming past his shoulder close enough for the fletching to brush his sleeve before vanishing into the trees.

“Until next time, Wemmbu.”

The words lingered in the clearing long after they were spoken.

The golden glow surrounding Parrot dimmed, dissolving into drifting motes of light that scattered through the moonlit air. His outline blurred with them, wings becoming little more than fragments of gold between the birch trunks before they, too, slipped into nothing. The warmth that had quietly settled over the clearing vanished with him, leaving only the cold silver of moonlight and the rustling leaves overhead.

Wemmbu stood motionless for the briefest moment, staring at the empty space where the God had been. Then another movement caught the corner of his eye.

The figure shifted behind a distant birch tree.

His grip tightened around his shield.

The forest seemed strangely empty without the soft gold at his side. Wemmbu stared at the patch of grass where Parrot had been sitting only moments before.

Nothing remained. No footprints pressed into the earth, no bent blades of grass, and no lingering warmth. There was only moonlight spilling across untouched ground. His fingers twitched against the grip of his shield before relaxing again. His body wanted to turn back. One more question sat on the edge of his tongue, but the silence closed around the clearing before he could give it a voice.

Instead, Wemmbu stood there listening.

The breeze whispered through the birch leaves. His pulse gradually faded from frantic to steady, but his thoughts refused to do the same. The interaction replayed in fragments. The God's intelligent eyes. His gentle voice. The way he had spoken with quiet certainty instead of demanding belief.

Then, the accusation about something watching in the trees.

Wemmbu didn’t know what to believe. He didn’t know if Parrot had been telling the truth or carefully choosing every word to make him question Eggchan without ever asking him to. That realization disturbed him almost as much as the conversation itself.

The sharp ring of another arrow striking his shield shattered the silence.

The impact jolted through his arm, snapping every wandering thought cleanly in half. His head turned instantly toward the treeline, every trace of hesitation disappearing beneath years of drilled instinct. The dark figure was moving closer now, darting between trunks with the practiced speed of someone who knew how to hunt.

He pressed his lips together. His hand closed around Verdict's hilt, and the axe materialized in his grip, its netherite edge gleaming with a sharpness that could shear through diamond.

The questions could wait. The God could wait. Whatever Parrot was trying to tell him could wait. Someone had interrupted that conversation with an attack, and for now, that was the only answer that mattered.

“Fine,” Wemmbu muttered, his voice quiet enough to disappear into the trees. His grip tightened around Verdict until the leather creaked beneath his fingers. “I’ll think about all of that later.”

His sharp eyes locked onto the distant player.

“But first...” A slow, dangerous smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. “I'm going to make this chungy regret interrupting it.”

Chapter Text

The clash of netherite against netherite sent sparks falling across the birch forest floor.

Wemmbu's axe, Verdict, met the player's sword in a ringing collision. The force of the impact traveled up his arm and into his shoulder, a sharp vibration that settled into his bones and dissipated.

He didn’t flinch. Wemmbu had struck oak trunks harder than this, had spent years cleaving through solid wood until his hands knew the feel of firm resistance, and the shock of steel on steel was nothing compared to the unyielding resistance of a tree that refused to fall. The invisible player disengaged first, boots scraping against the grass as he leapt backward to create distance.

Wemmbu let him go. Pursuing immediately would be careless, and he was smarter than that.

Moonlight fell through the birch canopy in fragmented silver, illuminating the clearing in patches of pale glow and shadow. The leaves rustled overhead, undisturbed by the violence below. Wemmbu's discarded cloak lay crumpled against the base of a nearby trunk, the navy wool dark against the pale tree. He had thrown it there at the start of the fight. Without it, his netherite armor was fully visible, the enchantments shimmering with a deep purple luminescence.

His tail swayed behind him, freed from the cloak's concealment, the dark scales iridescent under the silver glow and moving with a mind of their own. His horns swept back from his temples in sharp ridges, catching the light and throwing it back in gleaming flashes.

Wemmbu was fully visible now; he was no longer hidden.

The thought should have alarmed him. Eggchan would certainly be displeased. But the heat of the fight had burned away most of his caution, and all that remained was the primal, exhilarating focus of combat against a real person.

Plus, those who had seen more than they were supposed to see—Wemmbu could just ban them.

The invisible player circled to the left. Wemmbu tracked the movement without turning his head, reading the disturbance in the grass and the faint shimmer of potion particles that wisped and dissolved with every step.

The invisibility effect wasn’t perfect. Movement created ripples, small distortions in the air that Wemmbu's eyes, sharpened by years in the dark of the End and the dimness of the oak forest, could follow with ease. The particles clung to the player's form like a second skin, brief white flashes that outlined a vague silhouette. It was enough to read, enough to predict.

The player wore diamond armor beneath the effect. Diamond trimmed with more diamond, a deep and layered gleam that showed enchantments stacked upon enchantments. The player was evidently well-equipped, well-prepared. He was clearly someone who had spent resources for fights like this one.

A dark brown cloak had been discarded earlier in the fight, tossed aside when Wemmbu cornered the player against a trunk and forced him to choose between mobility and useless concealment. The cloak had been immediately shrugged off after Wemmbu’s attack. Wemmbu had seen it fall, a shapeless heap of fabric now lying somewhere in the shadows.

Without the cloak, a few features of the player became noticeable, as noticeable as it could be through the screen of invisibility.

He was smaller than Wemmbu by a few inches. He moved with the darting precision of someone who had learned to compensate for a lack of raw power with speed. His footwork was good, too. His stance shifted constantly, never settling into a predictable rhythm. He was clearly experienced, a player who had probably fought many opponents before and learned from each one.

The invisible player lunged. His sword shot toward the narrow gap between Wemmbu’s chestplate and pauldron.

Wemmbu knocked the blade aside with Verdict, steel scraping against netherite as the thrust glanced harmlessly past his shoulder. He turned the deflection into a sweeping cut toward the player’s ribs, but the player ducked beneath it and answered with an upward slash that glanced across Wemmbu’s armor.

Sparks burst where enchanted metal skidded over netherite. Wemmbu barely felt the impact.

Before the swordsman could pull away, Wemmbu stepped forward and brought Verdict toward the side of his head. The player twisted at the last second, taking the blow across his shoulder instead. The force shoved him sideways, his boots digging into the damp grass as he fought to keep his footing.

Wemmbu let him go, his purple eyes bright and observant. He wasn’t trying to overwhelm the player just yet. He was still reading his patterns, still learning the rhythm of his attacks.

The player favored speed over power. His strikes came in flurries, multiple rapid thrusts designed to overwhelm an opponent's defenses before they could adjust. It was a sound strategy against a slower fighter. But against someone with Wemmbu's reflexes, it was an invitation to counter.

They circled each other. The birch trees stood silent and pale around them, witnesses to the increasing violence.

The swordsman closed the distance again. His sword flicked toward Wemmbu’s throat before dropping sharply for his ribs, the change in angle coming halfway through the swing.

Verdict met the blade with a solid block, knocking it wide before Wemmbu planted his back foot and drove a front kick into the player’s chest.

Most fighters relied entirely on the weapon in their hands. They expected distance to be measured in sword lengths, not by knees and boots. But Wemmbu had learned differently. Long years spent training alone behind the cottage had forced him to improvise, turning every part of his body into something useful. His legs were as much weapons as his arms.

The kick connected with the player's chestplate, a solid impact that sent him stumbling backward with a grunt of surprise. His boots skidded across the grass before he managed to recover.

Wemmbu gave him no such opportunity.

Verdict swept down from his shoulder in a heavy diagonal cut that forced the player into a desperate parry. Before the rebound had fully settled, Wemmbu pivoted on his lead foot and whipped a roundhouse kick toward the side of the invisible helmet. The player ducked beneath it, but the panicked movement left his posture open for only an instant.

That instant was enough. Wemmbu’s axe reversed direction in a brutal backhand and swung into the player’s shoulder.

The impact was heavy, the full weight of Verdict driving through diamond plate and into the vulnerable flesh beneath. The player staggered, specks of blood spraying across the grass, and his invisibility flickered with the force of the blow.

“Is this all you got, bro?” Wemmbu grinned.

His voice was light, almost conversational, but the thrill beneath it was unmistakable. The fight was singing in his blood, a pleasant thrum that spread through his limbs and sharpened his senses to a razor's edge.

The invisible swordsman didn’t answer his taunt. He reset his stance instead, the sword held in a guard position that favored quick thrusts over heavy swings. The potion particles swirled around him, brief flashes of white that appeared and vanished.

Wemmbu noted the change and adjusted his own stance in response, shifting his weight onto his back foot and raising Verdict into a high guard. The player was fast, but his strikes lacked the bone-deep weight that Wemmbu's own attacks carried. He was probably trying to wear Wemmbu down, to land enough small hits that the accumulated damage would slow him eventually.

It was a patient strategy. A smart one, and Wemmbu respected it.

He also intended to end the fight before it could work.

They clashed again. This time the player abandoned measured strikes in favor of speed. His sword became a blur of enchanted netherite, thrust after thrust driving toward every opening his eyes could find.

Verdict intercepted the first with the flat of its blade, the impact jolting through Wemmbu’s forearms. He shifted his footing to let the second skim harmlessly past, then caught the third thrust against the haft, the sword grinding along the reinforced wood in a spray of sparks. The fourth came lower than the others, angling toward his thigh where the armor offered less protection.

Wemmbu swept Verdict downward, deflecting the sword into the grass. Soil exploded upward where the sword tip gouged the earth.

Before the player could recover, Wemmbu stepped into his guard and drove an elbow toward his face. The player jerked backward, the elbow grazing past armor, and Wemmbu followed with a knee aimed at his midsection. His armor softened the blow, but not enough to stop the air rushing from the player’s lungs as he stumbled backward, finally managing to create a few precious steps of distance.

The swordsman was breathing harder now. Wemmbu could hear it, the ragged inhales and exhales that betrayed exertion.

‘Good,’ Wemmbu thought. The faster the player tired, the sooner this would end.

Admittedly, it wasn’t the victory he found himself impatient for.

His thoughts kept slipping away from the fight, circling back to the conversation that had been cut short. To the primordial God sitting across from him in the moonlight, colorful wings folded neatly behind his back, speaking with a patience that had felt strangely out of place.

The God should have been frightening to him; he was an entity deemed dangerous and self-serving. Eggchan had always warned him that gods were manipulative, that they knew exactly what to say.

But Parrot hadn’t felt malicious. If anything, he felt… comforting, almost familiar. The realization disturbed Wemmbu more than anything the God had actually said. But then again, his words were unsettling as well.

“There are things in the trees,” the God had warned. Then, softly, “I thought you knew.”

Wemmbu tightened his grip around Verdict.

He didn’t believe it. He couldn’t believe it. Eggchan worried too much, sure. He was protective, sometimes unbearably so. But supposedly sending whatever eyes to spy on him? Watching him without saying a word? That wasn’t Eggchan. That wasn’t the kind of angel he was. If his best friend ever wanted to know where Wemmbu had gone, he would’ve simply asked.

Eggchan had never given Wemmbu a reason to doubt him before. Why would he start now?

And yet.

The absolute certainty in the God’s voice refused to leave him.

The feeling had been there all day. That quiet awareness at the edge of his senses. The strange weight that settled between his shoulder blades while he wandered through the shifting terrain. Wemmbu had dismissed it over and over again, telling himself multiple excuses to justify it.

But what if it wasn’t just nothing? What if Parrot had been telling the truth?

Wemmbu pushed the question aside.

Now was not the time to be distracted. The invisible player was still attacking, still driving forward with those quick, darting thrusts, and one lapse in concentration was all it would take to turn the tide. The questions could wait until the fight was over.

Somehow, Wemmbu doubted they would wait quietly anyway.

The player feinted left.

Wemmbu caught the shift in weight before the sword even moved. His shoulder dipped, and his front foot turned just a fraction too far. It was subtle, the kind of maneuver most fighters would have likely missed. But Wemmbu knew exactly what was coming.

The left swing never arrived. It had only been there to draw his guard out of position before the real attack came from the right.

Wemmbu let himself fall for it. Verdict rose as though committing fully to the feint, and the instant the swordsman redirected into the thrust, Wemmbu was already moving. He slipped beneath the blade, feeling enchanted steel hiss past his shoulder, and drove Verdict upward in a brutal rising arc. The axe crashed into the player’s ribs with a sickening sound, folding him around the impact before sending him stumbling sideways with a strangled cry of pain.

“Nice try,” Wemmbu mocked. He straightened, rolling his shoulders to work out the tension.

“But I guess you’re pretty good, just a little. Better than the last chungies I fought.”

The player's helmet turned toward him. The distorted voice emerged, crackling with artificial modulation. “Tsk. You talk too much.”

“Hey. It’s one of my many charms.”

Wemmbu attacked again, a ruse toward the head that became a sweep at the legs. The player jumped over it, nimble despite the weight of diamond armor, and countered with a downward slash. Wemmbu caught it on Verdict's beard, the blades locking for a brief, straining moment.

Up close, he could see the faint shimmer of the invisibility effect more clearly. The way the potion particles clung to the armor, outlining the shape of a person without revealing any detail. The player was breathing hard, each exhale accompanied by a fresh swirl of particles. On the contrary, Wemmbu's own breathing was steady.

“You're invisible and you still can't land a solid hit,” Wemmbu said. He shoved forward, breaking the lock and forcing the player back a step. “Kinda embarrassing, not gonna lie.”

The player's stance shifted. Something in the set of his shoulders tightened, a tension that Wemmbu read as irritation. The distorted voice crackled again.

“You'll regret running your mouth.”

“Will I?” Wemmbu tilted his head, a mocking gesture that he knew the invisible player saw clearly. “So far you haven't given me much to regret.”

He lunged forward. Verdict sang through the air in a brutal horizontal cut aimed at the player’s neck.

The player caught it on his sword. Steel shrieked against enchanted netherite as the blade skidded along the axe’s edge, the impact forcing him backward despite the successful parry. His diamond boots dug into the damp earth, carving shallow grooves through the grass.

Wemmbu pressed the advantage before the swordsman could reset. He rolled his wrists, letting Verdict’s momentum carry into a rising diagonal slash that forced the sword high. The opening lasted only a heartbeat, but it was enough. Wemmbu stepped inside the player’s reach and drove the haft of the axe into his chestplate.

The player stumbled.

Wemmbu pivoted on his heel and followed through with a spinning kick that slammed into the diamond chestplate, sending the player crashing into a birch trunk hard enough to shake loose a shower of pale leaves.

His opponent was slowing.

Wemmbu could see it now. The sword still moved quickly, but every parry came a fraction later than the last. The crisp precision from the beginning of the fight had begun to unravel, worn down by exhaustion and the sheer weight behind every one of Wemmbu’s attacks.

The accumulated damage was evidently taking its toll. The strikes that had glanced off his armor had left their mark, and the heavier blows, the ones that connected fully, had done worse. He was favoring his left leg now, putting less weight on it with each step. His sword arm trembled slightly with each parry.

The fight was turning in Wemmbu’s favor.

But Wemmbu wasn’t unscathed. A cut above his eyebrow, where a lucky thrust had slipped past his guard earlier, bled freely down the side of his face. A bruise was forming on his ribs where another strike had found a gap in his armor. His muscles ached with the exertion of the fight, the constant movement and the heavy swings of Verdict taking their toll.

He was stronger than the invisible player. But this was only his second real fight, and his body was still learning how to pace itself. The player's strategy of wearing him down might actually work if Wemmbu couldn’t end this soon.

He needed to finish it.

The swordsman pushed off the birch trunk and charged again. This time there was no feint, no careful attempt to draw out a mistake. The sword drove straight for Wemmbu’s chest, the attack fueled by desperation more than precision.

Wemmbu slipped to the side, letting the thrust pass across empty air before Verdict swept toward the player’s ribs. The player recoiled just in time, but the hurried retreat left him off-balance. He recovered with an upward stab that scraped across Wemmbu’s chestplate in a shower of sparks, and before the sword could withdraw, Wemmbu’s boot slammed into his knee.

The player’s stance collapsed for a moment. It wasn’t much, but it was enough.

Wemmbu stepped into his space before he could recover. Verdict’s beard caught beneath the sword’s crossguard, and he wrenched hard with both hands. The player tried to hold on, but his balance had already been broken. The sword tore free from his grasp, spinning end over end through the moonshine before disappearing into the grass beyond the clearing.

The invisible player instinctively reached after it. That hesitation cost him the whole fight.

Wemmbu swept his supporting leg out from under him in one clean motion. The player crashed onto his back, the impact knocking the air from his lungs.

Before he could attempt to scramble away, Wemmbu was already on top of him. One knee drove into the diamond chestplate, pinning him against the damp grass while Verdict settled beneath the edge of his helmet, its blade resting where his throat should have been.

For the first time since the fight began, the player stopped moving.

The forest fell quiet around them. Only their breathing disturbed the silence, alongside the distant rustle of birch leaves overhead. Moonlight filtered through the branches, breaking across the invisible outline beneath him in pieces. The faint shimmer of the invisibility potion was all that remained of the man pinned beneath his weight.

A steady, measured anger settled over Wemmbu.

“Now,” he began, his voice low enough to make the word feel heavier than a shout ever could. Verdict pressed a fraction deeper beneath the player’s armor. “Tell me why you’re here.”

The player laughed. It was an ugly sound, shredded by the voice changer into something metallic and wrong. Even through the distortion, Wemmbu could hear the amusement beneath it.

“You really want to know?”

“I’m clearly asking you, dumbass.”

The diamond helmet tilted slightly, then after a moment, he started speaking.

“I… saw you outside Farville once. I didn’t think much of you at first, but then I caught another glimpse of you in this forest and figured I’d watch for a while.”

The mockery lingered beneath every word, growing more obvious the longer he spoke. “It’s funny what you notice when someone thinks they’re alone.

“I know for a fact that demons hybrids don’t look like that. They don’t move like predators. And they definitely don’t have tails with bright scales.”

A distorted cackle slipped through the voice changer. “I know exactly what you are, bastard.”

“You’re not a demon. You’re an Ender Dragon.”

Wemmbu’s blood ran cold.

The certainty in the player’s voice struck harder than the accusation itself. Eggchan had drilled rules into him for as long as he could remember. Hide your tail. Pretend to be a demon hybrid. And never, ever, let anyone know what you really are. Wemmbu had followed them faithfully his entire life.

So how had this stranger figured it out after watching him for only a few hours?

The question surfaced almost immediately, stubborn enough to force its way through the panic. It just didn’t fit. The player sounded certain, but every reason he offered felt strangely backwards, as though he’d reached the conclusion first and was only now searching for details that supported it.

The thought lingered only for a heartbeat before colder instincts overwhelmed it.

‘Someone knows now,’ Wemmbu realized with a heavy heart.

Eggchan had repeatedly warned him the possibility of this happening. Players were greedy, curious, and cruel. If they discovered what he was, they wouldn’t stop until they hunted him down and plausibly sold him off.

The invisible player seemed to notice the hesitation.

“What?” he scoffed. “Did you think a cloak would fool everyone? Horns are one thing, plenty of hybrids have those. But dragon scales?” He laughed again, quieter now, obviously pleased with himself. “Those are a little harder to explain.”

“Do you have any idea what you’re worth?”

Wemmbu’s grip on Verdict tightened until his knuckles ached. The anger returned, burning through the cold that had settled over him, but beneath it another thought refused to let go. Something about this didn’t make sense.

“You watched me for a couple of hours,” he said, his voice steady, though only just. “And somehow that was enough to decide exactly what I am?”

His eyes narrowed behind the fringe of his hair. “Sounds more like you were specifically looking for an Ender Dragon before you ever found me.”

The player’s sneer crackled through the voice changer, louder this time. There was something uglier in it now, something delighted and irritated at the same time.

“Does it matter?”

“It does if you’re making things up, idiot.”

The player didn’t defend himself against the accusation. Instead, his diamond helmet dipped ever so slightly. Not toward the forest, not toward Verdict. He tilted his head lower, as if he had just noticed something.

Wemmbu’s gaze followed almost on instinct. At first he couldn’t understand what had caught the swordsman’s attention. His eyes swept over the dark metal of his chestplate once, then again.

His stomach dropped.

The protection charm had slipped free from beneath his armor.

Sometime during the struggle, the cord had worked itself loose underneath his clothes. It rested against the dark metal now, fully exposed beneath the player’s wretched gaze. The small blue eyeball gleamed, its pupil dark and fixed, while six delicate silver wings caught the moonlight with every breath he took.

The invisible player went completely still.

It was a different kind of stillness than before. The player turned quiet, the tension charged with sudden, sharpened interest. The invisibility particles swirled around his helmet as he stared at the charm, and Wemmbu saw the direction of his focus shift entirely. The fight, the vulnerable position, the axe at his throat. None of it mattered in this moment. The swordsman was only looking at the charm.

“What's that?” The distorted voice was hushed. Not mocking but curious.

Neither of them moved. The clearing seemed to contract around the question. Even the breeze that had stirred the leaves a moment ago felt as though it had faded away, leaving only the weight of the player’s gaze fixed on the necklace.

Wemmbu’s fingers twitched toward the charm on instinct. He only needed to slide it back beneath the edge of his armor. Just hide it again, and—

“Interesting design.” A pause. The helmet tilted further, and Wemmbu could almost hear the pieces clicking together behind the invisibility. “That’s definitely silverwork. Huh. I’ve seen craftsmanship like that before.”

Another pause, longer this time.

The particles around his invisible form flickered. When the player spoke again, the realization had begun to creep into his voice, each observation carrying him toward a conclusion Wemmbu hadn’t expected him to reach.

“That’s not just a trinket.” His tone had grown weirder now, almost thoughtful. “That’s a charm, isn’t it?”

The words settled heavily between them. Wemmbu searched for the slightest hint of uncertainty in the distorted voice, but there wasn’t any.

“Only one kind of creature makes charms with wings on them.”

Wemmbu’s blood went cold.

“Six silver wings and one eye.” The player’s head inclined again, as though studying something crucial instead of paying attention to his current vulnerability. “A Seraphim’s masterpiece for protection.”

‘How…?’

The thought struck Wemmbu almost violently. Eggchan had never spoken about protection charms as though they were common knowledge. If anything, he’d always treated them like relics from another age, things that only a handful of beings would ever recognize. So how did this stranger know what he was looking at? How did he know enough to recognize a Seraphim’s work from a single glance?

The questions flashed through Wemmbu’s mind, but he never had the chance to voice them.

Something needed his utmost priority.

He lunged to cover the charm, but he was already too late. The mercenary twisted sharply beneath him, invisible fingers closing around the charm before wrenching it free. The leather snapped with a brittle crack that vanished beneath the roar of blood rushing through Wemmbu’s ears.

The player rolled backward, scrambling to his feet with surprising speed.

Wemmbu chased after him almost immediately, but the distance had already opened between them. The charm swung gently from the player’s invisible hand as he lifted it toward the moonlight, turning it over once, then again. The tiny blue eye caught the silver glow while its six delicate wings scattered pale reflections across the grass.

“I’m right, aren’t I?” The mockery had vanished from his voice entirely. In its place was something far worse. Greed, wonder. The kind of hungry fascination that made Wemmbu’s stomach tighten.

“This is a Seraphim’s charm. Only an angel can make these, and only someone under an angel’s protection would carry one.”

He rotated it between his fingers, turning the charm carefully as though each angle revealed another detail worth admiring.

“A Seraphim.” His voice had become almost breathless. The invisible helmet lifted, as though he were already imagining possibilities far beyond the clearing. “Do you have any idea what a single wing sells for on the right market?”

A distorted laugh slipped through the voice changer, louder and infinitely uglier. His excitement had overtaken caution completely. The player was no longer speaking to intimidate Wemmbu. He sounded like someone thinking out loud, counting currency that wasn’t his.

“Do you know what people would give for the whole set?”

The words hit Wemmbu with the force of a physical blow.

For a split second, everything else disappeared. The forest, the fight, the ache in his muscles. Even the charm itself. All Wemmbu could hear was the implication buried beneath the mercenary’s voice.

His best friend.

The man wasn’t talking about dragons or silverwork anymore. He was talking about Eggchan.

Cold, unyielding rage swept through Wemmbu before he even realized it was there. Everything inside him went unnaturally still, as though the fury had frozen solid before it could burn. Eggchan had never been a prize, nor a name to be traded between greedy players. He was home. He was safety. He was the reason Wemmbu had survived long enough to stand here tonight.

This invisible swordsman wasn’t threatening a Seraphim. He was threatening Eggchan, speaking about Wemmbu’s best friend as though he were nothing more than something to hunt, something whose worth could be measured in feathers and currency.

Wemmbu bared his teeth.

His tail lashed violently behind him, the dark scales catching the light as Verdict settled more firmly in his grip, the enchanted wood creaking beneath the force of his hand.

The swordsman was still speaking, still admiring the charm as though it already belonged to him, imagining the fortune it could bring and the things he might do with the knowledge he now possessed. Wemmbu barely heard another word. Every instinct had narrowed onto the same target until nothing else remained.

“Big words,” he said quietly, his voice carrying none of the anger burning through him. It was calm, cold, and certain.

“For someone who’s about to die.”

Wemmbu moved.

There was no transition, no gradual escalation. One moment he was standing perfectly still, and the next he was a blur of netherite and anger.

The player’s invisible hand instinctively darted toward his inventory. The Seraphim’s charm disappeared from his grasp before Wemmbu could snatch it back, tucked away in an instant.

An ender pearl shattered in Wemmbu’s off-hand, purple particles engulfing him mid-stride, and he reappeared directly in front of the swordsman with Verdict already mid-swing. The player barely raised his shield in time. The impact was tremendous. Verdict’s blade crashed against it with a sound that was less a clang and more a detonation, a thunderous crack that echoed through the birch trees as splinters of wood tore free and scattered across the grass.

The player stumbled backward, his shield arm buckling under the force, but Wemmbu was already swinging again.

He didn’t speak. He didn’t taunt. The easy provocations and lighthearted jabs from earlier had vanished, replaced by something cold and absolute.

His face was empty of expression, his purple eyes fixed on the shimmering outline of the invisible player with a focus that bordered on predatory. There was only one thought in his mind now, a single, narrowed purpose that burned away everything else.

Kill this man. Ban him from the server. Erase him before he could bring harm to his best friend.

The player tried to regain his footing, tried to create distance, but Wemmbu gave him no room.

Verdict came down in a diagonal swing that the player barely twisted away from, the blade grazing his pauldron instead of splitting it. Before the vibration had even faded, Wemmbu reversed his grip and brought the axe back around in a horizontal sweep. The player blocked with his shield again, and again the impact was devastating. Cracks spiderwebbed across the wooden surface. The player's arm trembled under the severe blow.

Wemmbu swung a third time, and a fourth, each strike heavier than the last, each one driving the player further back across the blood-spattered grass.

The shield broke.

It shattered under the fifth strike, the surface exploding outward in a shower of fractured pieces. The player cried out, a sound of genuine alarm that the voice changer couldn’t fully distort, and stumbled backward with his now-empty hand raised defensively.

Wemmbu followed. His boot slammed into the player’s chestplate in a front kick that launched him backward into a nearby birch trunk.

“Wait—”

The plea barely left his mouth before Wemmbu was already there.

Verdict carved a vicious arc through the air, catching the player across the shoulder before he could recover. The enchanted edge bit through diamond and flesh alike, tearing a jagged line from collarbone to ribs. Blood burst across the white bark in a bright crimson spray, scattering over the leaves as the player cried out and crumpled sideways.

Wemmbu didn’t give him the chance to breathe.

He tore Verdict free in one smooth motion and drove the axe down again. The player barely managed to twist away before the blade struck, but not far enough. The edge buried itself deep into his thigh instead, splitting through enchanted leggings and carving into muscle with a sickening crack. Blood splashed across the churned earth as the player screamed, collapsing onto one knee before scrambling backward with one hand pressed desperately against the invisible wound.

The coward ran. It wasn’t a tactical retreat nor an attempt to reposition. He ran with the desperate, stumbling panic of someone who had just realized his opponent wasn’t fighting to win this time.

Wemmbu was fighting to kill.

The swordsman’s limp had become impossible to hide now. One leg dragged behind the other, leaving uneven footprints smeared with blood across the grass. His free hand fumbled frantically through his inventory while Wemmbu, breathing hard, rolled another ender pearl into his palm.

Purple particles swallowed him. He appeared directly in the player’s path.

The player startled in surprise as Verdict swept across in a brutal swing. The player managed to throw himself backward, but not before the axe caught him across the chest. Diamond split with a sharp metallic crack. The blow hurled him sideways, opening another deep gash beneath the broken armor and sending a fresh splatter of blood across the nearest birch trunk.

The player hit the ground hard, the breath driven from his lungs in a strangled gasp. His hand shook violently as it finally closed around an ender pearl.

He threw it.

The aim was poor. The pearl veered sideways instead of forward, and when he materialized he slammed against another birch trunk several dozen blocks away. His injured leg buckled beneath him, sending him sprawling against the pale bark. Blood streaked down the trunk where he slid to the ground.

Wemmbu was already moving.

He walked across the clearing with Verdict hanging low at his side, the axe leaving dark droplets in the grass with every step. His tail swayed behind him as he closed the distance without slowing.

Across the clearing, the player’s hands shook so violently he nearly dropped his communicator. His fingers flew across the screen, typing with frantic urgency while ragged breaths crackled through the voice changer.

“Come on… come on… faster, fuck—”

Wemmbu threw another pearl. The particles swallowed him and spat him out in front of the player. Verdict was already mid-swing, a clean horizontal arc aimed at the gap between the player's helmet and chestplate. The blade was inches away from the invisible throat, close enough that Wemmbu could already see the kill message in his mind, could already feel the satisfaction of the death notification pinging on his communicator.

But the player vanished.

There was no pearl in his hand. No particles or shimmer of teleportation magic.

One moment he was there, the outline of his armor clear in the moonlight, and the next he was gone. The only evidence that he had ever been present was the distant, fading sound of an ender pearl triggering somewhere far beyond the forest.

Verdict continued its arc. The momentum was too great to stop, the swing committed beyond the point of recall, and the axe blade buried itself in the birch trunk with a deep, resonant thunk. The wood split around the impact, a jagged scar carved into the pale bark.

It was supposed to be the strike that would have decapitated him.

Wemmbu stood still.

The forest was silent. The type of silence that rushed in after violence, filling the space where clashing metal and panicked breathing had been only moments before. Even the leaves overhead had momentarily stopped rustling. The birch trees stood pale and motionless around him, their trunks like columns of bone in the moonshine. The grass at his feet was torn and bloodied, dark patches spreading across the green.

His armor was soaked with red, the enchanted netherite streaked with gore that wasn’t his own. Verdict's blade was slick with it, droplets sliding down the cutting edge and falling into the soil.

Wemmbu looked around. His chest heaved with exertion, each breath deep and ragged. His heart pounded against his ribs, the adrenaline of the fight still singing through his veins.

He scanned the treeline to the north. Nothing. He turned to the south. Nothing. He checked the spaces between the trunks, the shadows beneath the canopy, the distant gaps where the birch forest thinned into open terrain.

But there was no one. No invisible figure limping away. No invisibility particles flickering in the dark. No sound of footsteps or labored breathing or the distinctive crack of an ender pearl.

Wemmbu was alone.

The player had been holding his communicator, not a pearl. He had been typing something. And then he had vanished, and the only trace of his departure was a sound that shouldn’t have been possible without the item to produce it.

Wemmbu's brow furrowed. His grip on Verdict loosened, the axe hanging heavy at his side. He didn’t understand what had just happened. The mechanics of it escaped him, the logic refusing to align. An ender pearl required a pearl, but the player hadn’t been holding one. And yet he had somehow teleported away.

The invisible player had escaped.

Slowly, the realization washed over him. Cold. Heavy. Inescapable.

Wemmbu had let the coward go.

The man who knew he was an Ender Dragon. The man who knew a Seraphim was protecting him. The man who had stolen the protection charm Eggchan had given him, broken the cord from around his neck, and held the silver piece up while speaking of angel feathers and black markets with greedy, hungry delight.

That man was still alive. Still out there. Still carrying everything he had learned.

“Shit,” Wemmbu whispered. The word fell into the silence and died.

He looked down at his chest, where the charm should have been.

The space felt empty and wrong. The leather cord had snapped, the silver charm torn away, and all that remained was the faint absent feeling where it had rested against his skin through the fabric of his shirt.

Eggchan had made that charm for Wemmbu. Eggchan had given it to him, had clasped it around his neck with gentle hands and a soft smile, had told him it would keep him safe. And Wemmbu lost it. He let a stranger rip it away. He let a mercenary identify it for what it was. A Seraphim's protection. It was proof that an angel was nearby, proof that Eggchan existed.

His hand tightened around Verdict's hilt until his knuckles ached. His tail lashed behind him, the dark scales catching the light in agitated flashes.

How could he face Eggchan after this? How could he return to the cottage and admit that he had failed so completely? The charm was gone. Their identities were exposed. Somewhere out there, a player was carrying information that could destroy everything they had built. And Wemmbu had no idea where he was.

‘Should I message Eggchan?’ The thought surfaced, urgent and insistent.

His communicator was in his inventory. He could pull it out right now, type a warning, and tell Eggchan what had happened. Wemmbu could come home immediately. That was the rule. That had always been the rule. If something went wrong, come straight home.

But if he went home now, the package would remain undelivered. The mission would be a failure. He would return empty-handed, with nothing to show for his journey except a lost charm, a trail of blood, and a threat that was still out there somewhere.

Wemmbu couldn’t face Eggchan like that.

He couldn’t walk through the cottage door and see the disappointment in those bright blue eyes. Not after everything Eggchan had given him. Not after the trust Eggchan had placed in him. This mission was supposed to prove that he could handle himself. That he could be relied upon. That the independence Eggchan had granted him wasn’t a mistake.

And now look at what had happened.

The guilt settled into his chest, cold and heavy.

Maybe Wemmbu should have never left.

The thought emerged unbidden, and once it appeared, it refused to leave. He should have never asked for more freedom. He should have never been so restless, so curious, so eager to see the world beyond the oak forest.

Of course the world was exactly as Eggchan had described it. Dangerous, cruel, and full of players who would hunt them down the moment they learned what they were. Eggchan had warned him, then had protected him. And Wemmbu had repaid that protection by losing the protection charm, revealing their secrets, and letting a swordsman escape into the night.

Wemmbu didn’t want to be out here anymore.

The independence that had felt so exhilarating only hours ago now felt hollow. What was the point of seeing new biomes and new terrain if every step away from the cottage put Eggchan in danger? What was the point of freedom if freedom meant vulnerability?

Wemmbu wanted to be home. He wanted to be in the kitchen, cooking dinner while Eggchan read in the armchair. He wanted to train in the clearing behind the cottage, feeling the familiar weight of his best friend's gaze on his back. He wanted to sit by the kitchen island and talk about nothing, the easy conversation of two people who had spent their whole lives together.

But Wemmbu couldn’t go home. Not yet. Not until the package was delivered. Not until he had accomplished the task Eggchan had entrusted to him.

If he returned now, empty-handed and defeated, the failure would be absolute. He would have lost the charm and failed the mission. He would have proven that Eggchan was right to keep him hidden. That he wasn’t ready for the world. That he would never be ready.

He wouldn’t let that happen.

Wemmbu straightened slowly, his breathing steadying. The panic that had gripped him receded little by little, replaced by something colder, quieter, and far more focused.

He would find the invisible player. He would track him down and finish what he had started. But first, Wemmbu would complete the mission. He would deliver the package to Redstone Town. He would prove that he could be trusted. And then he would hunt down the man who had threatened his best friend and make sure he never spoke another word of what he had learned tonight.

Wemmbu looked down at Verdict.

The blade was still wet with blood. He wiped it clean against the grass before sliding the axe back into his inventory. Then he retrieved his cloak from where it lay crumpled beside the birch trunk. The navy wool was cold, its hem slightly damp with dew. He settled it over his shoulders and fastened the clasp beneath his chin. The familiar weight draped over his armor, concealing his tail once more.

Wemmbu turned north, toward Redstone Town.

He forced the rest of his thoughts into order. The mission came first. The invisible player could wait. So could the strange conversation beneath the birch trees, and the questions the God had quietly planted in his mind. They lingered all the same, stubborn enough that he knew they would return the moment silence found him again.

But not now. Now there was only the road ahead.

He began to walk, his netherite boots carrying him deeper into the birch forest as the trunks slowly closed around him once more.

Behind him, the clearing where they had fought faded back into the darkness. Blood stained the grass in uneven streaks. Deep gouges scarred the earth where Verdict had struck. A birch trunk stood split and splintered, its white bark stained crimson, while the broken fragments of a shattered shield lay scattered beneath it. By morning, the forest would be quiet again, leaving only those scars behind as silent proof that violence had passed through it.

Wemmbu kept walking with his cloak wrapped around him. He didn’t think about the God’s warnings, about the eyes Parrot had claimed were hidden among the trees. He didn’t think about the quiet doubts that had begun, however unwillingly, to work their way beneath the certainty he had carried for so many years.

Instead, his thoughts drifted home.

To Eggchan waiting beneath the oak canopy. To the familiar warmth of the cottage. To the promise he had made when he first accepted the mission.

Wemmbu would return.

And whatever happened after tonight, he wouldn’t let anyone threaten the life waiting for him there ever again.

This was the way things were supposed to be.

Chapter Text

Morning arrived in the oak forest with the gentleness of a held breath. Sunlight filtered through the canopy in streams of pale gold, catching the edges of leaves still damp with dew.

The trees here were nothing like the dense, crowded oaks Wemmbu had grown up beneath in. They stood wider apart, their trunks thick and their branches spreading into broad awnings that allowed the light to reach the forest floor in generous pools. The grass was soft and green, dotted with small white flowers that had opened their petals to the early sun.

A light breeze moved through the clearing, carrying the clean scent of tree sap, distant wild herbs, and something faintly mineral that spoke of caves not far away.

Wemmbu sat cross-legged on the grass with his back against a trunk and an apple in his hand, the navy cloak pooling around him. The fabric spread across the ground, the slit parted over his folded legs to reveal the netherite armor underneath. The apple was half-eaten, and he took another bite with a soft crunch, the only sound in the immediate stillness. His posture was relaxed, his breathing slow, and his tail curled loosely beside him in the grass. To anyone watching, Wemmbu would have appeared at peace.

The parrot on his shoulder chirped.

It was a small sound, bright and inquisitive, and Wemmbu glanced at it briefly before returning his attention to the apple.

The bird shuffled its feet against the wool of his cloak, its claws pricking lightly through the fabric, and then settled again with a soft warble. Wemmbu didn’t acknowledge it further. He was accustomed to its presence by now. The parrot had been with him for days, a constant companion on a journey that had otherwise been silent.

The oak forest stretched around him, peaceful and still. Somewhere in the distance, a bird called out, and another answered. The breeze stirred the leaves overhead, scattering pieces of sunlight across the grass. It was the kind of morning that invited rest, that promised safety, that asked nothing of the person sitting beneath the tree except that he breathe and be still.

Wemmbu took another bite of the apple.

He had traveled far to reach this place. The journey played back in his mind in fragments whenever he let his thoughts drift.

Meadows of tall grass that swayed in waves of green, stretching under skies so wide and blue they had made Wemmbu stop and stare the first time he saw them. Fields of wildflowers he still couldn’t name, their colors bright and strange against the dark earth, reds and yellows and purples that the End had never produced.

Mountain passes where the air grew thin and cold, his breath misting in front of his face, where the stone rose in jagged spires and the wind howled through the gaps. River valleys where the water ran clear over smooth stones and he had paused to watch the fish dart beneath the surface, salmon flashes in the current. Forests of spruce so dense that the sunlight barely reached the ground, their needles soft underfoot and their trunks straight as arrows.

Forests of birch, pale and silent, where the moonlight had filtered through the leaves and a God had sat across from him, speaking of things he still didn’t understand.

Wemmbu had seen so much. More than he had ever imagined existed beyond the oak trees of home.

The Overworld was different in ways that still surprised him, even now, even after days of walking through it. He had stood at the edge of a ravine and watched the sun rise over the distant hills, painting the sky in shades of orange and pink. He had walked through a flower forest where the blooms grew taller than his head and the air was thick with perfume, where bees drifted from petal to petal in unhurried paths.

Each new biome had been a revelation, a piece of the world he had only ever heard about in Eggchan's measured descriptions. And for the first day, Wemmbu had drunk it all in with the eagerness of someone who had spent his entire life in one small corner of existence and was only now realizing how much he had missed.

But after the incident in the birch forest, something had shifted.

The wonder hadn’t disappeared. It was still there, buried beneath the surface, flickering to life in brief moments when the sunlight caught a field of flowers or the moon rose over a mountain ridge. But it had been pushed aside, compressed into brief glances and fleeting observations.

Wemmbu no longer stopped to stare at the sky or watch the sheep grazing in the meadows. He no longer lingered at the edge of rivers to skip stones across the surface.

The weeks-long journey had become a task rather than an adventure. The destination mattered more than the path itself.

Wemmbu hadn’t rested properly in days. The three-week trip marked on Eggchan's map had been compressed into something shorter.

He walked through the nights when the moon was bright enough to see by; and when the moon wasn’t bright enough, he navigated by the stars and the faint glow of his own eyesight. He took power naps in the crooks of trees or in shallow caves dug into hillsides, always checking his surroundings first, always ensuring he was hidden before he closed his eyes. He pushed his body past the pleasant ache of exertion and into something sharper.

Wemmbu didn’t stop because stopping meant delay, and delay wasn’t allowed. Not anymore.

Every hour he spent resting was an hour the invisible player had to escape further. Every minute he spent admiring a landscape was a minute his best friend remained vulnerable.

The mission came first. The package in his inventory, unopened and unquestioned, was the only thing that should matter. Wemmbu would deliver it. He would prove that he could be trusted. And then he would deal with everything else.

His recent alertness had sharpened to a razor's edge. The days after the birch forest had taught him to watch the world differently, not as a spectator admiring its beauty but as a sentinel scanning for threats.

He had learned from the invisible player. He learned that someone could be watching him without his knowledge, tracking him across biomes, waiting for the right moment to strike. The thought made Wemmbu's skin prickle with a vigilance he had never needed before.

So he watched. He watched the gaps between trunks, the ridgelines of hills, and the open stretches of meadows. He paused at regular intervals during his journey to stand still and listen, holding his breath, letting the sounds of the server settle around him. He checked behind him more often than he checked ahead. He varied his pace and his path, never walking in a straight line for too long.

But Wemmbu found nothing. Days of walking, days of watching, and he found nothing. The invisible player had vanished, and no one else had appeared to take his place.

The absence should have been reassuring. Instead, it only made him more uneasy.

The parrot chirped again, louder this time, and Wemmbu turned his head.

The bird was larger than the small parrot Wemmbu had met in the cottage weeks ago. Its body was bigger, its beak more curved, and its tail feathers longer and more elegant. The colors were different too. Where the smaller parrot from before had been yellow, green, and orange, this bird was a cascade of scarlet, blue, and gold.

The red dominated its head and chest, while the blue and gold rippled across its wings in patterns that caught the morning light and gleamed. Its eyes were black and beady, bright with an intelligence that seemed almost knowing, and its claws gripped his shoulder with a gentle pressure through the wool of his cloak.

Wemmbu had first noticed it two days after the birch forest incident.

He had been walking through a plain of tall grass, his thoughts still tangled in the aftermath of the fight and the divine conversation that had preceded it. A flash of color in the sky had drawn his eye. The parrot had descended in a slow spiral, its wings catching the light, and landed on his outstretched hand as though it had done so a hundred times before. As though it knew him. As though it had been sent.

His heart had squeezed painfully at the sight of it. Guilt, thick and immediate, had risen in his throat. Even now, the feeling didn’t dissipate.

Wemmbu was hosting a creature sent by the God of Order. The same God Eggchan had warned him about for years. The same God whose previous messenger had been crushed to death in Eggchan's fist, its blood smeared across the navy cloak. And now here was another one, perched on his hand, looking at him with innocent black eyes.

Wemmbu had tried to shoo it away. He had lifted his arm, made shooing motions, and told it to go back to wherever it came from. The parrot had fluttered up, circled once, and landed on his shoulder. He had tried again, but it returned again. By the third attempt, Wemmbu had given up. The bird was persistent. The bird was also, he had to admit, kind of cute.

But the guilt hadn’t faded. It sat in his chest, a constant companion alongside the parrot.

He had failed Eggchan in the birch forest. He had let a mercenary escape with knowledge that could destroy them both. And now he was harboring a parrot, a creature his best friend would have killed without a second thought. The betrayal felt layered, compounding. Every chirp from the parrot was a reminder of the God he had spoken to against Eggchan's explicit warnings. Every flutter of its wings was a reminder of the charm he had lost, the protection Eggchan had given him, now in the hands of an enemy.

And yet Wemmbu could not kill it.

He knew, with a certainty that sat cold in his stomach, exactly what Eggchan would do. His best friend wouldn’t hesitate. The bow would be drawn, the arrow would fly, and the bird would fall before it could chirp a second time.

Eggchan had always been clear about what the parrots represented. They were spies, threats. They were extensions of a God who couldn’t be trusted. And Wemmbu understood that. He did. The logic was sound, and the reasoning was solid. Eggchan wasn’t wrong to protect them from the eyes of a being who might wish them harm and succeed in doing so.

But Wemmbu couldn’t do it. The bird had done nothing to him. It had accompanied him for days, perched on his shoulder or circling overhead, a quiet presence in the solitude of the journey. It had kept watch while he slept, or at least it had seemed to.

When he napped in the branches of tall trees or in the darkness of shallow caves, the parrot would perch nearby, its head swiveling and its eyes alert. It had never attacked him or brought danger to him. It had only been there, steady and constant, a small warmth against his neck. It had repeated his words back to him in its tinny voice, it had eaten seeds from his palm, and it had looked at him with beady eyes that held no malice.

And Parrot had asked him to take care of the birds he sent. The words echoed in Wemmbu's memory, soft and almost wistful.

He didn’t know if he owed the God anything. He didn’t know if he believed anything the God had said. But the request had been so simple, so harmless, and the parrot was so lovely and trusting. Wemmbu couldn’t bring himself to harm it.

He reached into his inventory and pulled out a few wheat seeds he had gathered from a field days ago.

“Here you go,” Wemmbu murmured.

The parrot perked up immediately, its head bobbing, and pecked at the seeds in his palm with quick, precise motions. Its beak tickled against his skin.

“Here you go,” the parrot repeated, its voice a tinny mimicry of his own. “Here you go.”

Wemmbu smiled despite himself. The parrot often picked up the words on its own, repeating phrases he had uttered in its presence. It was endearing in a way he hadn’t expected. The bird finished the seeds and nudged his palm with its head, searching for more. Wemmbu obliged, producing another small handful from his inventory.

When the seeds were gone, he stroked the parrot’s head with one finger. The feathers were soft, smoother than he had imagined.

The bird made a low, contented sound and pressed closer to his shoulder, settling against the curve of his neck.

Wemmbu let his hand fall and returned to his apple.

The sky was clear above the oak canopy, a pale blue brightening toward the horizon. Small clouds drifted in lazy shapes, their edges soft and white. It was the kind of sky that promised good weather, that made the world feel open and safe. Wemmbu watched it for a moment, chewing the last of the apple, and let his thoughts wander.

They circled back, as they always did, to the same three things. The invisible player. Eggchan. The God of Order.

The invisible player was a problem he hadn’t yet solved. The mechanism of his escape was still a mystery, a loose thread that Wemmbu couldn’t stop pulling at. He had replayed the moment in his head countless times during the long hours of walking.

The player had been holding his communicator. There had been no pearl in his hand, no particles of teleportation magic. And yet he vanished, the sound of an ender pearl distantly echoing through the trees. It didn’t make sense. It defied the rules of the world as Wemmbu understood them. But he needed to understand it, because understanding it was the first step to finding the player and finishing what he had started.

But the swordsman and his escape wasn’t the only thing occupying his thoughts. The God’s words had lodged themselves somewhere beneath his focus, persistent as a splinter. He had spent days turning them over, examining them from different angles, trying to fit them into the framework of the world as he knew it.

But they just didn’t fit.

Parrot had claimed they were friends in another life. He had spoken of a past where Wemmbu had been impulsive and Parrot had been rigid, where they challenged each other and argued and somehow, despite everything, cared for each other like true friends. He had spoken of Wemmbu dying. Of searching for him ever since. Of finally finding him in an obsidian box in the dark.

It was impossible. Wemmbu knew the rules of the world. Eggchan had taught him everything he needed to know.

The mechanics of Minecraft weren’t complicated, not at their core.

When a player died in a server, their soul moved on. They spawned somewhere else, somewhere new, with their memories intact but their connection to the old world severed. That was how it worked for those who came from other servers, those who had lived before and died before, carrying their past with them into each new life. And for those who were born into a server, like Wemmbu had been born in the End, death meant the same thing. Moving on. Starting over. Never returning to the world they had left behind.

Respawning back into the same server after death wasn’t possible. Eggchan had been clear about that, had explained it in the careful, patient way he explained all the important things. The rules were the rules. They didn’t bend, they didn’t break.

So Parrot's words couldn’t be true. They implied that Wemmbu had died in this server, had left it, and had somehow returned. That wasn’t how the cycle worked.

The God was either lying or mistaken. Those were the only options.

And yet.

The conversation had felt so natural. The teasing, the banter, then the comfortable silences.

Parrot had spoken to him not as a stranger but as someone he knew. Maybe even someone he had missed. The God’s black eyes brightened when Wemmbu laughed. His voice softened when he spoke of their supposed past. He remembered details, small things, the kind of things a liar might invent but couldn’t speak of so effortlessly. He quoted words Wemmbu had apparently said in another life—and they sounded so familiar, so in line with something he might actually say.

How was Wemmbu supposed to respond to that? How was he supposed to dismiss the God’s words when the God himself had been so painfully sincere?

Eggchan would say it was manipulation.

Eggchan would say the gods were clever, patient, and knew how to twist the truth to serve their purposes. And maybe that was true. Maybe Parrot had been manipulating him from the moment he appeared, choosing every word to sow doubt and confusion. But the warmth in his voice hadn’t felt manufactured, and the sadness in his eyes when he spoke of Wemmbu's death hadn’t felt like a performance.

Wemmbu didn’t know what to believe.

He only knew that he had been checking his surroundings constantly since the birch forest incident, scanning the trees for any sign of the small eyes that Parrot had described. But he had found nothing. Not once. If Eggchan was actually watching him, the evidence was invisible. And Wemmbu had decided, somewhere in the long hours of walking, that he wouldn’t pray again until he had settled things with his best friend.

The mission came first. Eggchan's safety came first. The God’s accusations could wait.

His thoughts drifted, as they always did, back to Eggchan.

The worry was a constant, low hum beneath everything else. The invisible swordsman knew he came from Farville. Therefore if he knew about Farville, he might know about the oak forest. He might discover the cottage hidden within it. He might stumble upon the Seraphim who lived there, the angel with six wings whose feathers were worth a fortune.

The possibility gnawed at Wemmbu during the long hours of journey, a persistent anxiety that kept him moving even when his legs ached and his eyes burned with exhaustion.

He had messaged Eggchan at every opportunity during his brief rests. Short messages, carefully casual, asking how the cottage was, how the wards were holding, and whether anything strange had happened. Eggchan's replies had been brief but reassuring. Everything was fine. The forest was quiet. There was nothing to worry about.

Wemmbu had read each message multiple times, searching for any sign of trouble, any hint that something was wrong. But he found nothing. Eggchan sounded the same as always. Calm, collected, and unshakable.

And yet the worry wouldn’t leave Wemmbu.

He had lost the charm. He had let a player escape with proof of a Seraphim's existence. Wemmbu had failed in the most fundamental way possible. If something happened to Eggchan because of that failure, Wemmbu didn’t know how he would live with himself.

He wanted to go home.

The notion often surfaced with surprising force, a sudden ache in his chest that he hadn’t expected. He wanted to be in the cottage, protected and hidden behind the drawn curtains. He wanted to know that Eggchan was safe, not because of a brief message on his communicator, but because he could see it with his own two eyes.

But he couldn’t go home. The mission was still incomplete.

Wemmbu finished the apple.

The parrot shifted on his shoulder, its claws adjusting their grip. Wemmbu stretched his arms above his head, working out the stiffness in his shoulders, and the bird took flight briefly, circling once before landing again on his shoulder. Wemmbu rose to his feet, brushing grass from his cloak, and turned his gaze north.

Through the gaps in the oak trees, a wall rose against the morning sky.

It was tall and built of smooth stone, its surface carved with geometric patterns that caught the sunlight effortlessly. Towers flanked its length at regular intervals, their tops crenellated and dotted with small flags that snapped in the breeze. The flags were red and white, their fabric bright against the blue sky. The wall stretched to the east and west, curving slightly, enclosing a space that was far larger than Farville. This wasn’t a small town. This was a city.

Redstone Town.

The name emerged in his mind as he stared at the distant wall. The map had marked it clearly, a circled dot at the far corner of the parchment, the endpoint of his journey. Wemmbu had finally reached it. Days of walking, days of pushing himself past exhaustion, and he had finally arrived.

Wemmbu checked his inventory one more time. Verdict, freshly sharpened. His spear, Requiem, untouched but ready. Speed and strength potions in their shulker box. Golden carrots, golden apples, and other nutritious food. Ender pearls. Wind charges. His shield. His pickaxe. Everything was in its proper place.

In one of the secured slots, deep within his inventory, sat the small wooden box. It was unopened, unquestioned, and waiting.

The parrot warbled softly, and Wemmbu reached up to stroke its head. His fingers brushed against the soft feathers, the bird leaning into his delicate touch.

Wemmbu looked at the wall again. It truly was Redstone Town. A place of mechanisms and innovation, if the name was any indication.

It was a city where someone might know how an invisible player could teleport away without a pearl.

Wemmbu would deliver the package first. That was the priority, the task Eggchan had entrusted to him. And then he would ask questions. He would find someone who understood the mechanics of the world better than he did, someone who could explain how a player could vanish without the tool to do so. He would learn what he needed to learn, and then he would hunt the swordsman down.

Wemmbu would track him across whatever biomes he had fled to, and he would finish what he had started in the birch forest. No mercy, not even hesitation. He wouldn’t let the threat to his best friend and their life breathe once more.

And if Wemmbu couldn’t find him, if the trail went cold, he would return home.

He planned to confess what truly happened. He would face Eggchan's disappointment and accept whatever consequences came. At least then he wouldn’t be empty-handed. At least then he would have accomplished something. Regardless of the outcome of the situation, Wemmbu would be there to protect their home.

Wemmbu began to walk. The grass crunched softly beneath his netherite boots, and the morning sun warmed his face.

The wall grew larger as he approached, its details resolving from the distance. The gates were open, and the city was waiting. He had a package to deliver.

Then, before Wemmbu could take another step, his ears twitched.

He went still.

His step forward stopped halfway. His boot hovered above the grass, suspended mid-motion, and then lowered slowly back to the earth.

Wemmbu didn’t startle. The motion was controlled, the easing of someone who had caught a knick in the wind and wanted to hear it more clearly. His face, which had been set with quiet determination, smoothed into something harder to read. The line of his mouth flattened. His purple eyes, fixed on the distant treeline and the high stone walls beyond, did not blink.

One of his pointed ears twitched again. His tail, which had been swaying in a slow, idle rhythm beneath the navy cloak, went still.

The forest had gone quiet around him, but not fully silent. There was still the whisper of wind through the oak leaves, the distant call of some bird far across the clearing, and the faint, far-off murmur of civilization drifting from Redstone Town. But the smaller sounds, the ones he had grown accustomed to during his brief rest, had faded. There was no rustle of small animals in the underbrush, no flutter of wings from the canopy.

The server appeared to be holding its breath.

The parrot on his shoulder stiffened in response. Its claws tightened against the wool of his cloak, and it made a low, displeased warble, a sound that was less alarm and more irritation. Its head swiveled toward the treeline, and its feathers ruffled, settling and then ruffling again.

It didn’t like being interrupted. The morning had been calm, the journey steady, and now something was intruding on that rhythm. Wemmbu felt the bird shift its weight, its small body pressing closer to his neck, and he noted the reaction without assigning it deeper meaning. The bird was simply responding to the same disturbance he had sensed.

His hearing sharpened. The faint breeze, the distant hum of civilization, and the soft, almost imperceptible sound of the parrot’s claws adjusting their grip on his cloak.

And beneath all of it, blocks away but distinct, the crushed grass beneath a footstep.

It happened only once. It was a single, brief disturbance in the rhythm of the forest. Then it stopped immediately and never happened again.

Wemmbu caught it anyway. He had been listening for exactly this kind of sound for days, scanning the world for any sign of pursuit or observation. The lesson of the birch forest incident had sunk deep into his bones. He didn’t dismiss unusual sounds anymore. He didn’t assume it was merely the wind or the wildlife.

Wemmbu waited.

The parrot made another sound, sharper this time, and Wemmbu turned slowly toward the direction of the footstep.

His purple eyes tracked across the treeline, moving from trunk to trunk, searching for the shimmer of potion particles or the outline of a crouched figure. The oak trees stood in their wide, sunlit spaces, and the grass rippled in the morning breeze. Nothing moved. The silence stretched, thick and watchful, and Wemmbu didn’t break it.

Then a voice, modulated and crackling, echoed from somewhere among the trees ahead.

“Damn, bro. You heard that?”

The voice changer was different from the one the invisible player had used in the birch forest. Deeper, with a nasal edge that scraped against Wemmbu's sensitive ears.

Wemmbu frowned. A second later, a shimmer of particles appeared behind a distant oak trunk. The abstract silhouette of an invisible form resolved itself, a vague outline of shoulders and a torso, and then the clank and slide of armor being equipped echoed through the clearing.

Piece by piece, the figure became visible. Netherite plates settled into place over an invisible frame, the dark metal trimmed with resin that carved through the surface in deep lines. The enchantments gleamed under the morning sun, a faint purple shimmer that spoke of high-level protection. It was the kind of armor that meant the wearer was either wealthy, experienced, or both.

The netherite player stepped out from behind the tree.

He was tall, taller than Wemmbu by several inches, and broad-shouldered. The armor fit him closely, sculpted to a muscular frame, and it bore the marks of use. Scars from old fights scored the netherite in places, shallow gouges that hadn’t been buffed out. The resin trim was unique, a personal touch that suggested someone who had customized their gear rather than wearing whatever they had found.

His posture was relaxed, almost casual, and there was no weapon in his hands. His footsteps were heavy but unhurried as he walked toward Wemmbu, closing the distance with the confidence of a player who had nothing to fear.

Wemmbu's purple eyes quickly swept over the figure, cataloging details.

Taller. Heavier. The armor was high-quality, well-maintained despite the scars. The trim was distinctive. The lack of a drawn weapon was either a sign of confidence or a trap.

He was already calculating, already running through the possibilities. He had only heard the disturbance now, which meant the player had either just arrived or was skilled enough to move undetected until he chose to be heard. Wemmbu doubted it was the latter. He had been vigilant, triple-checking his surroundings before resting or proceeding with his journey. If this man had been stalking him for long, Wemmbu would have noticed.

The netherite player stopped a dozen blocks away, close enough to speak without shouting, far enough that a sudden charge would give Wemmbu time to react. His hands hung loose at his sides. His helmet tilted slightly, taking in Wemmbu's stance, the cloak, and the horns.

The silence between them stretched, and then the player raised both hands in mock surrender.

“Hey, I'm not here to fight ya.” The modulated voice was almost cheerful. The helmet tilted toward Verdict. “I swear, I come in peace.”

Wemmbu didn’t reply. His grip on the axe remained firm. The parrot on his shoulder fluttered its wings and made a strange sound, something between a warble and a hiss. Its beady eyes were fixed on the armored player, and there was an intensity to its gaze that Wemmbu hadn’t seen before. Not fear, not exactly. The bird's head cocked, its feathers ruffled, and it made the sound again, sharper this time.

It seemed to know something. Wemmbu filed the observation away.

“Wow. Really?” Wemmbu's voice was flat, unreadable. “Why were you creeping around, then?”

The netherite player took a moment to answer. The pause stretched, and Wemmbu used it to study him further.

His stance was open and easily attackable. His arms were still raised, his chest exposed, and his weight balanced but not coiled for a strike. It didn’t make sense. Either he was confident Wemmbu wouldn’t attack, or he was skilled enough that even a surprise strike wouldn’t land. Wemmbu had the distinct feeling it was both.

“It's just...” The modulated voice trailed off, then found itself again. There was something almost sheepish in the pause, a hesitation that didn’t match the intimidating frame.

“Well, I wanted to check if it was really you first.”

Wemmbu's frown deepened. “What do you mean?”

The netherite player huffed, a quiet sound of amusement that the voice changer couldn’t fully distort.

“It really is you, Wemmbu.” The words came out slower now, weighted with something peculiar that the modulation couldn’t hide. “You're different now, I guess, but it's still you.”

The words landed strangely. Wemmbu blinked, processing them, and found that they didn’t fit into anything he understood or had memory of. His grip on Verdict faltered for a second before he caught himself, raising the axe into a ready position, the blade aligned with the player’s chest.

“Just make your point.”

He didn’t seem fazed by the weapon. He stood there with his hands still raised, his posture still open, and something about the casual familiarity of it tugged at the back of Wemmbu's mind. The words spoken echoed in his thoughts.

The parrot on his shoulder warbled softly, a low sound that vibrated against his neck. Wemmbu felt a strange prickle of recognition that he couldn’t quite place.

The words felt familiar, but not the voice. The voice was distorted and strange, grating in a way that made his ears ache. Yet the sentiment behind it, the tone of quiet discovery, was familiar. It reminded him of the birch forest, of colorful wings, a patient smile, and a God who had looked at him with knowing eyes, speaking of a past Wemmbu had no memory of.

The netherite player stepped forward. Wemmbu's grip on Verdict tightened, but the man moved with the same unhurried calm, closing the distance without any sign of aggression.

“I know I must look pretty dangerous right now,” he continued, and there was something almost apologetic in the way he said it, “but I don't wanna… hurt you, or anything.”

Wemmbu scoffed. The sound was sharp and dismissive. “Don't glaze yourself, please. Just tell me what you want, or better yet, leave me alone, bro.”

The words came out with more edge than he intended. He was getting fed up with this interaction. Every second he spent standing here was a second he wasn’t delivering the package.

The recipient might already be waiting in Redstone Town, wondering where the courier was. Wemmbu didn’t know exactly how the exchange was supposed to work, but Eggchan had told him he would know the recipient when he saw him, and Wemmbu trusted that. He trusted Eggchan. He needed to finish this mission and move on to the next task. He didn’t have time for cryptic strangers.

The netherite player shook his head.

“I ain't leaving.” He walked closer, still casual and unarmed. Wemmbu stepped back, raising Verdict so that its cutting edge lined with the space between the man's helmet and chestplate, where his invisible throat would be.

“Hey, where are ya going? Is it to Redstone Town?”

“Dude.” Wemmbu's voice sharpened with disbelief. “What's wrong with you? Like, who even are you? Leave me alone.”

The parrot, startled by Wemmbu's sudden movement, launched itself from his shoulder and fluttered up to the nearest oak branch. It settled there, its claws gripping the bark, and made a series of sharp sounds. The bird was obviously not pleased. Its head bobbed, its wings half-spread, and its beady eyes remained fixed on the armored figure with a look that bordered on hostility.

Wemmbu barely noticed. His attention was entirely on the stranger.

The netherite player didn’t spare the bird a glance. He didn’t even tilt his helmet toward the branch where it perched. His focus remained on Wemmbu, steady and unbroken.

“I'll come with you,” he offered, as if his words were an olive branch. “You don't recognize this place at all, huh?”

Wemmbu opened his mouth to reply, but before he could, the player closed the remaining distance. Wemmbu stiffened, his muscles coiling for a strike, his mind already calculating the angle of his counterattack. He had been ready for this, and he had known the casualness was too good to be true.

But the strike didn’t come.

Instead, a heavy arm draped across his shoulders, careless and familiar, as though they were old friends who had run into each other on the road.

“I'm pretty familiar with this place,” the netherite player said. The weight of his arm was solid but not restraining. “You should definitely come with me, bro.”

He turned Wemmbu slightly, angling him back toward the distant walls of Redstone Town. The motion was easy, almost gentle, the kind of guidance one might offer a companion rather than a captive. Wemmbu blinked once, then twice. His brain struggled to catch up with what was happening. The arm on his shoulder was warm through the netherite. The voice, despite its distortion, was somewhat friendly. Nothing about this made sense.

“But let’s eat something first.”

Wemmbu ripped himself away, stumbling a step to the side. “Wha—dude, seriously?!”

The netherite player laughed. The sound was bright and unrestrained, only slightly distorted by the voice changer. It was the laugh of a player who was enjoying himself immensely, finding the entire situation more amusing than threatening.

Wemmbu stared at him cluelessly, his heart beating faster than it had been a moment ago.

He backed away further, putting distance between them. His hand hovered near his inventory, close to the slot where his ender pearls rested in case the player decided to drop the act and attack.

“Leave me be. I don't need some invisible tour guide.”

Wemmbu turned and began walking away as casually as possible.

His pointed ears were tuned to every sound behind him, tracking the man's position without needing to look. His hand remained near his inventory, and his other tightened around Verdict. His stride was steady, purposeful, the stride of someone who wasn’t afraid but was also not foolish enough to let his guard down.

Wemmbu wasn’t scared. He wasn’t. This guy was just weird, and Wemmbu didn’t have time for weird. The package was waiting, and Redstone Town was right there.

For a few seconds, there was no sound of movement behind him.

The forest was quiet again. There was only the rustle of his navy cloak and the soft crunch of his netherite boots against the grass. The parrot launched itself from the oak branch and glided toward him, its wings spread wide, its red and blue feathers catching the early light. It was descending toward his shoulder, almost there, its shadow passing over the grass—

The sound of fast movement shattered the quiet.

Boots against earth. The unmistakable crack of an ender pearl being thrown from behind him.

Wemmbu spun in response, turning back in a single second.

Verdict was already raised, his stance already set to parry or strike. His instincts had taken over before his mind could catch up, years of training pouring into a single, fluid motion.

He saw the armored player posed mid-throw, one arm extended, the other already reaching for something Wemmbu couldn’t see. Purple ender particles swirled around him in a vortex, the magic coalescing into a pinpoint of light. Then the pearl detonated and the figure vanished, reappearing directly in front of Wemmbu in a burst of violet energy.

The netherite player bent down.

And Wemmbu's feet left the ground.

One moment he was bracing for a strike, Verdict raised and ready. The next, a shoulder pressed into his stomach, an arm locked around his waist, and the world tilted sideways.

His cloak billowed, the navy wool flaring out behind him. His braid swung backward, the violet strands brushing against the back of the netherite chestplate. His tail lashed wildly beneath the cloak, searching for balance, and his hands scrabbled against the resin trim, finding purchase on the deep orange lines carved into the dark metal.

Wemmbu was being carried. Over the man's shoulder. His stomach pressed against the pauldron and his torso draped down the player's back.

The position was undignified, absurd. It was happening so fast that his brain was still processing the ender pearl particles dissipating in the air behind them.

The netherite player ran while carrying Wemmbu like a sack of potatoes.

Not a jog, not even a brisk pace. A full sprint, his boots pounding against the grass with a speed that shouldn’t have been possible in full netherite armor.

Each stride ate up blocks of distance, the momentum jarring through Wemmbu's body in rhythmic jolts. The oak trees blurred past on either side, their trunks becoming streaks against the green of the forest. The morning sun flickered through the canopy in staccato flashes, light and shadow alternating across Wemmbu's vision as they hurtled forward. The wind whipped past his face, cold against his cheeks, tangling his braid and snapping his cloak out behind him.

“What the hell are you doing?!” Wemmbu screamed.

The parrot squawked somewhere behind them. He caught a glimpse of it through the bouncing blur, red and blue and gold wings flapping desperately to keep up. The bird swooped and dove through the oak branches, its cries growing fainter as the distance stretched.

It was fast, but the netherite player was faster. The colorful shape grew smaller and smaller against the green canopy, its indignant squawks swallowed by the rush of wind.

A laugh erupted from the netherite player. Rambunctious, delighted, and only slightly distorted by the voice changer. It was the laugh of someone who knew he had done something completely ridiculous and yet was thoroughly pleased with himself.

“This is kinda like kidnapping, huh?”

Wemmbu's fingers dug into the resin trim on the man's back. “Seriously?!”

He twisted his head, craning his neck to see where they were heading.

Through the bouncing blur of his vision, the walls of Redstone Town rose in the distance, tall against the morning sky, their carved geometric patterns catching the sunlight. The flags on the towers were bright specks of red, snapping in the breeze. They were close enough now that Wemmbu could see the dark line of the open gates and the tiny figures of guards stationed on either side.

Then the netherite player veered. A sharp turn away from the gates, away from the city, that sent Wemmbu's weight swinging against the man's shoulder. His tail flailed for balance, slapping against the netherite chestplate.

The walls of Redstone Town slid out of his vision, replaced by the green blur of trees as the player plunged back into the forest, running parallel to the tree line, putting distance between them and the city. Somewhere far behind, the parrot was still squawking, its cries now so faint they were barely audible above the thud of boots and the rush of wind.

Wemmbu could feel the man's arm steady around his waist, holding him secure against the sprinting movement, and he could feel the laughter vibrating through the netherite backplate beneath his stomach.

“Dude! Let me fucking go!”

“Nah.”