~A day has passed~
Chapter V: No Turning Back
The Maker tells Tacky that it will still be a while until he is ready to explore again and so encourages him to go in his place. Tacky determinedly takes his Enchanted Bow and heads into the Nether. He decides to put the Portal he had created himself to good use, and he emerges among the Crescent Mountains. Setting out southward, he creates torches and places them along his route like breadcrumbs so he can find his way back. The adventurer passes through several short, natural passages before beholding a spectacular sight: an enormous cavern with several large holes in its ceiling through which the rains from the storm outside pour down. He enters the cavern and takes a left, where the cavern narrows into a tunnel sloping slightly downward. After digging around a gravel formation, Tacky takes a few steps forward before being startled by (and startling) a Creeper, which suddenly explodes. The explosion causes the ceiling of the tunnel to collapse. Tacky jumps out of the way…but ends up on the wrong side of the cave-in.
At this point, Tacky cannot figure out exactly where the cave-in was, so he decides that the only way to go is deeper into the cave. Once again placing torches along his path, he quickly discovers a dark capillary of an abandoned mine. He jumps down into it and follows the corridor. When he reaches a junction, he turns the corner and comes face-to-face with a pair of Skeletons, which he shoots-to-kill. Proceeding more cautiously, he soon reaches a near-dead end with only small hole near the floor in the left corner. The explorer slides himself through the hole and lands in another downward-sloping tunnel, which he follows for a while until he reaches a wide room. Tired and somewhat scared, Tacky sets up a small camp in the room and takes a brief rest. After resting, Tacky continues on. He soon joins up with another part of the old mine and proceeds to make his way through that. Several mobs cross his path over the course of this trek, but curiously, none of them attack the boy. Tacky gets turned around several times by looping tunnels, which leaches him of some hope. Eventually, however, he comes across a narrow waterfall and has the idea to swim upward through that in the hopes that its source is near the surface. His hopes are dashed further, however, when this turns out not to be the case. Now getting desperate, the youthful explorer begins digging a horizontal tunnel from the waterfall’s source. His digging seems to go on and on until he suddenly bursts into another cave. Tacky sees light coming from around the corner, and, after rounding that corner, he finds himself on the edge of a large crater of a room, at the bottom of which are more tunnels leading into the abandoned mine and several nearby pools of lava. Not really caring about going upward anymore, Tacky descends into one of these tunnels and digs around another gravel column…and exposes another mysterious ruined Nether Portal. He is horrified to see yet another of these landmarks, especially one all the way down here under the Crescent Mountains. But after the horror passes, Tacky has a brilliant idea. Using his powers, he repairs the Portal frame and then uses his Fire Charge to ignite and activate the portal. He enters it, and is relieved to discover that he has emerged into the Nether from the exact same Portal he had used to get to the Crescent Mountains in the first place. Tacky collapses to the ground in an exhausted heap.
Played out in-game on 5/13/2017. Written 5/13/2017.
Four years later, IT'S BACK!
