Not Alone; A Timely Scheme

"Okay, while I'm here, I might as well check this place out."

With a torch in one hand and a Stone Axe in the other, Joro ventured further into the woodland mansion.

He went into the first room, which had a bunch of Cobblestone Stairs and Slabs all over the wall. He also saw, opposite to the entrance, a row of five flower pots with five different flowers in each pot.

"Okay. Flower room. This place isn't spooky after all."

Aside from the flowers, there was nothing of interest in this room so Joro took one flower pot and a white flower named Lily of the Valley as another souvenir of his trip into the mansion and made his way out of the flower room.

He visited all of the rooms on the ground floor and found that all of the rooms looked normal. There was one the looked like a dining room, a room that had a lot of cobwebs, a room that had a pumpkin sitting on top of some Cobblestone Slabs. He did find a chest in one of the rooms, and was expecting some treasure of sorts since most generated structures in the world would sometimes have a chest spawned with loot in it. But when he opened it, there was nothing inside.

"Has this place already been looted?" Joro thought to himself.

Hex and Uni were mining for stone and other resources so they wouldn't have been in the woodland mansion. That just leaves Kil who also went along with him in the Shadow Forest but didn't go in deeper since his goal was to chop down wood.

Then again, there might also be a chance that chests generated in the woodland mansion do not contain any loot. The last version he played was 1.7.10, and he was very sure that the woodland mansion was not a thing in that version. Kil also said that a lot has changed since they last played, but chose not t divulge any info on what the changes are since he wanted them to experience those changes first.

Since Kil was way more knowledgeable about the game than them, he might as well ask first.

[Joro: hey kil, i found a house in the forest?]

[Kilnareth: srsly? is it made out of dark wood?]

[Joro: yeah?]

[Kilnareth: damn, you just found a woodland mansion. those are rare as fuck.]

[Joro: really? there's one if you just go further in the Shadow Forest.]

[Hex: Shadow what-now?]

[Joro: you know, the dark oak forest thats near us.]

[Hex: Oh... why the hell did you give it an edgy-ass name?]

[Uni: why even name it in the first place?]

[Joro: you guys are just jealous because its a cool name and you guys aren't cool.]

[Hex: How in the... huh? That doesn't make sense.]

[Joro: your mom doesn't make sense]

[Uni: oooooh, he got you there.]

[Hex: i am confusion.]

After a round of debating whether they should keep the name Shadow Forest or if Joro is actually gay, he closed down the chat and ignored the Chaos Twins.

"So Kil hasn't been here then."

Based on Kil's reaction from the chat, he deduced that he has not come across the woodland mansion yet. He also further inquired about the details about the woodland mansion and that he confirmed that, although there are chests inside, no loot will spawn in it.

Joro felt iffy about that part, like something was not right. Every chest in the game was randomly generated, whether that be a Chest in a Minecart or a blacksmith's chest in a village, all had stuff in them. It would be a strange move for the developers to include a structure that had chests in them but having no loot. In addition, not all Dark Oak forests have a woodland mansion generated as well, so the rarity of it should be enough to reward the players of finding one.

But since Kil, the Minecraft veteran among the group, said that no loot spawned in chests here, then Joro will just have to believe him.

Now that the ground floor was fully explored, he made his way to the staircase up to the second floor.

'I wonder what I heard back then...' Joro recalled the strange footsteps he heard earlier, and was curious about it.

Was that just his imagination or was he not alone in this mansion?

Joro felt a chill down his spine. He convinced himself that there were no ghosts in the game, and he can proceed if he was thinking rationally. It wasn't that he was afraid of ghosts, but he can be easily frightened by a lot of things. He likes horror games but dislike games that depended on jumpscares to up the scare factor.

Aside from the single torch he had in his hand, there was also the sight of the moonlight shining through the large windows which gave an atmospheric light to the surroundings. This could only be done with shaders, and it just upped the creepy factor of the mansion even more.

But when he stood in the middle of the hallway deciding which direction to take, he heard faint whispers from his left ear. It sounded very close, as if it was just right beside him. Joro turned around instinctively, and just as he expected, no one was there. It was exactly the fact that he expected it that gave him the chilling sensation.

The creepy happenings didn't stop there.

From the left hallway, he could hear the sounds of faint sobbing. Curiosity got the better of him and he slowly made his way towards the sobbing sound was.

The more he closed in, the more clear the sobbing was. It was from a woman, from what he could hear. He could sense the grief from the crying woman, as if she had lost something dear to her. He traced the crying sound and found himself standing in front of a Dark Oak door.

Joro swallowed his saliva, a bit overwhelmed with the current situation he was in. He steeled and convinced himself that this was just a game before opening the door. He quickly saw... nothing. It looked like it was just an ordinary bedroom.

"Psst."

With wide eyes, Joro quickly turned around to where the sound was. It sounded like it was directly by his ear, but he couldn't see anything. His heart beat faster when he heard that, but he started to calm down when he saw nothing. He turned around to check the bedroom once more when–

"Aaaaaahhhh!"

"Aaaahhhh!"

His ears were blasted with a loud shout and he was frightened to hell and back by it that he had shouted in fear as well and his character took a step back while looking up.

The main culprit?

It was a man in dark blue robes with his hood overshadowing his face.

"Ahahahahaha!"

It didn't show on his character, which just stood there, but he was actually on the floor laughing while holding his stomach in his room.

Meanwhile, Joro was breathing heavily. He controlled his character to kill the perpetrator with his Stone Axe.

"Wait, wait, don't–" Kil pleaded while laughing when he saw his character was about to die.

[Kilnareth was slain by Joro]

Kil didn't even had a chance to control his character after he was barraged by a bunch attacks from Joro. His health was even low to begin with so it knly took two regular hits from Joro before he died. His character dropped dead on the floor while all the items on his person, which were mostly wood, exploded in all directions.

His death didn't bother him at all though. In fact, his death just made him laugh harder.

"You dick!" Even though Kil couldn't hear him since he just murdered him, he still shouted at where Kil died with extreme frustration.

[Uni: Oof. F.]

[Hex: Big F.]

As per tradition, Hex and Uni sent their F's in the chat.

...

Fifteen minutes prior to Joro's arrival at the woodland mansion.

"Holy shit, I actually found a woodland mansion?" Kil stood with eyes wide opened as he saw the rare structure before him.

From what he could recall, back in 1.11 which was the update that introduced the mansion and new type of hostile mobs, this was the only place where Illagers spawned.

Illagers, in a sense, were the hostile variants of the normal Villager. They have the same appearance as their passive variants except their skin are grayish and had different attires.

Seeing the mansion, Kil already had a plan brewing up. He was eyeing an item that can be acquired here, aside from raids. In fact, it was way more easier to get it here rather than doing a raid.

Making his way into the entrance, Kil quickly ran through all the rooms and quickly dispatched a Spider Spawner that was inside a room filled with cobwebs. He then went to another room that had a chest inside it.

Aside from the normal Bones and common items, Kil was surprised that this item spawn in the chest.

"An invis pot?!" Kil went wide eyes when he saw this potion. The chances of potions spawning were around 15%, alongside enchanted books! What's more, the type of potion was completely random so Kil felt very lucky when he saw the Invisibility Potion.

As the name would suggest, drinking this potion would turn one invisible. Even the player tag would disappear as well. The downside to this is that the invisibility effect does not affect armor or held items and they could still hear the sounds of walking or sprinting even under invisibility. But only an idiot would do those under the effects of the potion, and Kil felt like he had gotten a good trolling item.

Moving up to the second floor, there he met with one of the types of Illagers.

This Illager wore a dark gray jacket, blue jeans, and held an Iron Axe in his hand.

Vindicators. Not much is known on this type of Illager aside from the fact that they will you down with their Iron Axe much like an axe murderer seen in those horror/thriller movies.

Compare to the normal mobs, have slightly higher health points, with a Vindicator having 24 hp or 12 hearts. Fortunately, the Vindicators are slow since they move at walking speed and can be easily maneuvered around. But an unarmored player still has to be careful around these hostile mobs since they deal more damage and wields an Iron Axe which deals 9 hp damage, equivalent to four and a half hearts.

It took sometime for Kil to dispatch the Vindicator since he had to be careful with this one. He had a lot of stuff with him and he wasn't planning on retrieving them if he died to this single Vindicator.

...Actually, that would be a lie, but he will feel embarrassed if he died to a lone Illager.

Kil's tactic was the usual hit-and-run meaning he hits the mob first and back off and wait for his attack cooldown. If this were 1.7.10, he would just throw a barrage of axe swings at the Vindicator with no problem at all.

It took a while, but he managed to defeat the Vindicator, and he got a single emerald out of it.

"Now that the Vindicator's down, all that is left should be–"

Just as he was about to turn around and find then other type of Illager, he had taken damage from something.

Turning around, he managed to see a glimpse of a white ghost before it phased through the wall.

But seeing that ghost made Kil smirk.

"Good. Looks like the party came to me."

Looking at the opposite side of the hallway was an Illager that wore a dark robe with golden trim and was currently waving his arms around. After that, more of those small white ghosts spawned– or rather, summoned by it, and the small ghosts rushed towards Kil.

Evokers. Similar to that of a Vindicator in terms of health but the style of combat of an Evoker is very different to it's melee brethren. An Evoker is incapable of attacking; instead, they cast various spells as a form to hurt the player, most commonly used is Summon Vex.

The Vex were small white ghosts that wield swords and can go through walls. Once a Vex lands a hit on the player, they will immediately step back before attacking once more. The annoying part about this is that these little scoundrels had the ability to fly and had a small hitbox that most would fail to hit.

The way to fight an Evoker was to kill it quickly before it summons more Vex.

Fortunately, Kil didn't have to use the hit-and-run tactic on it. He made good use of the jumping attacks which deal more damage to quickly kill the Evoker.

This was Kil's goal.

On the ground, aside from the emerald, was a small yellow totem with green gems for eyes and had a nose similar to the Villagers and Illagers. This artifact could save the player from death.

The Totem of Undying was a special drop that can only be acquired by killing an Evoker. It can't be found in dungeons or other randomly generated chests. If a player holds one either in their main hand, or the off-hand, and once the player takes fatal damage, the totem will activate and heal the player and gives them Fire Resistance II(40s), Regeneration II(45s), and Absorption II(5s).

This item was a must-have whenever someone does a Hardcore playthrough, and is a very good item all in all.

Now that he had acquired the Totem of Undying, he now had to kill all the Vexes without dying. Kil didn't plan on wasting the totem against these summons.

After a while of missed attacks, he managed to kill all the Vexes and only had two hearts left.

"Fuck! I should get back home pronto."

Just as he was about to go back downstairs, he peered through a window and saw someone standing atop the canopy of a Dark Oak tree.

"Joro?"

Just then, an idea immediately sprang in his mind and he immediately crouched down so that his player tag couldn't be seen.

The sun was about to set and it was going to be dark soon.

Joro doesn't know about the woodland mansion, and Kil had an invis pot...

Kil had an evil grin on his face.