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Twixxel spawned in yet another foggy, endless planes world, where the lights looked flat and the shadows were the darkest he knew. Entities loved these worlds! The most recent ones did at least.
Being a monster hunter was an interesting profession, and a very nice one to have! Sure, he was always being haunted by strange monsters, the nights were mostly sleepless, the deaths were always terrifying, no one wanted to be around him, and there was no guarantee that he would come back every time he died… but hey, it was fun! And information was a valuable currency among some. What Twixxel was able to get just by knowing how to survive these creatures was enough for him to live comfortably in some worlds… until an entity got him, and he was forced to move on to another world and start all over again.
But in that world, Twixxel wasn’t looking to meet people or rest. There was a certain entity he had been looking for quite some time. He traveled from world to world hoping at least one would let him see it, but until that point, he found nothing. Maybe that world would be another lost cause, but no matter. It was becoming routine at that point. Grab wood, gather resources, make a quick house, craft a compass…
Oh. He needed redstone for a compass. And there weren’t any in the cave he was at. No matter! Twixxel would just find another cave. A bigger cave, those expansive and spacious ones would be perfect. He hoped the cave dweller wasn’t in that world, that would make things a little harder…
While walking through the world, Twixxel thought he saw something in the distance, standing near a crafting table on a hill… a person? What a rare sight! Another player in these strange worlds! Twixxel couldn’t see them that well in the distance, so of course, he walked a little closer until the stranger was fully visible. The stranger was mostly monochrome, with a small bit of red. His eyes were green, and they loosely reminded Twixxel of the eyes of a mob. What a strange looking person.
The stranger’s eyes met Twixxel’s. But that was only for a second. He very quickly looked away. Huh. Twixxel walked closer until he was sure the stranger was able to hear him.
“Hello,” Twixxel greeted.
“…hi.”
“I didn’t think anyone else would be in this world,” Twixxel laughs a bit “How did you find your way here?”
“I… just wanted to go somewhere quiet.”
There was a strange sadness in the stranger’s voice. Well, that certainly was a quiet world. Quiet and empty.
“Uhh… are you looking for something?” the stranger was looking at him again, but still avoiding eye contact.
“I’m looking for a cave. I need to find redstone for a compass.”
“There is a giant cave entrance to the east. You can try there. Do you want me to take you there?”
Twixxel agreed. It wasn’t every day he had a companion, especially in these strange worlds. Every attempt Twixxel made at conversation didn’t seem to have been working too well, the stranger wasn’t very favorable to conversation. That was okay, Twixxel could be quiet if he had to.
“The cave isn’t too far from here. Just a bit further to the north,” the stranger pointed in a direction Twixxel assumed was north. Twixxel refrained from pointing out that it was the same direction they’d been walking all along “I’m going to chop down that tree near the river. You can go ahead, okay?”
“Aren’t you coming with me?”
“No, I don’t need anything from the caves.”
“Then I’m coming with you.”
“…alright.”
True, Twixxel didn’t need anything from the river either, and he could always gather wood elsewhere… but it had been a while since he had a companion. He was allowed to savor the stranger’s company before their inevitable separation, right? Right.
The river wasn’t far from their path. The waters looked strange in that world. No reflections, no transparency. Completely flat, like everything else. It had been an interesting sight at first, but now, Twixxel could only imagine what horrors the waters below could be hiding.
The hunter kneeled down in front of the river and, with slight dread, touched the water. It didn’t feel any different, it really was just water. He drew circles around the liquid absentmindedly. Nothing happened.
“Are you looking for something?”
Twixxel startled. The stranger was kneeling right beside him.
“It’s nothing. I was just thinking, this world is really strange, isn’t it?”
“…yeah, it is.”
The stranger looked ahead. What was his ordeal? Twixxel couldn’t remember any players that were that standoffish. But then again, he hasn’t met every single player, so who knows, really.
The hunter spent a couple of seconds drawing shapes in the water. It was almost calming, if a bit boring. There were no water ripples in that world. Just flatness. Twixxel sighed and brought his hand back, shaking it to dry it out. Some of the leftover water splashed around, he could even see some of it land on the stranger.
But the moment water splashed in the stranger’s eye, a deafening scream was heard. Twixxel was taken so off guard that he didn’t even have a moment to defend himself from the upcoming attack. He felt himself getting thrown onto the floor and getting a considerable amount of damage.
Much slower than he would have liked, Twixxel began to get up and raised his head to look at the stranger. He looked at Twixxel in a strange mixture of rage and guilt.
There was something about the endermen a lot of people found scary, and Twixxel could certainly see it. Especially when they screamed like that. It would have been nice to know he had been talking to one the whole time, but whatever…
“You’re an enderman?” Twixxel asked the obvious.
“…yeah.”
“But…” Twixxel quickly got on his feet and walked in front of the enderman guy “you’re so short.”
“What.”
“Like, bro, you’re the same height as me! How can you be an enderman?”
“Seriously? I almost slammed you to death, and this is what you have to say?”
Twixxel didn’t know what he was so baffled about. Mob people weren’t that strange of a sight, Twixxel has seen many of those. The other day, he even saw a wither skeleton man! Sure, he was a village slave master, and he ruined the lives of all those he came across… but evil existed everywhere, right?
“It’s okay, bro. I wasn’t even that hurt!”
The enderman stared at Twixxel with disbelief.
“I’m done with this. I’m leaving.”
“What? Hold on—”
“I’m leaving. And I’m sorry, okay?”
And so, the strange enderman walked off. Twixxel felt a little guilty for scaring the mob person off, but there was nothing he could do about it now. The hunter could only move forward…
At last, Twixxel found the redstone he needed to craft the compass. And immediately, he started to follow where it was leading him. Twixxel walked, and walked and walked… and he reached a house. It was made of wood, with an unfinished stone ceiling. That place looked… familiar.
“Huh. I don’t think it was supposed to lead me here…”
“What are you doing here?”
Twixxel shrieked and turned to look behind him. It was the stranger! Was that his house? Twixxel — very carefully avoiding eye contact — showed the stranger his compass.
“I followed the compass, it led me here…”
“Well, this is a spawn point.”
“It led me to another spawn point?”
“Yeah? That’s what compasses do. Where did you think it was going to lead you?”
Twixxel sighed. It was all looking like another lost cause. No harm in telling him, then.
“I look for and hunt entities. The one I’m looking for can only be found with a compass.”
“…an entity? I don’t know any mobs that can be found with a compass.”
“No, I’m not talking about mobs. I’m talking about strange, creepy stuff! Cave dwellers, crawlers, supernatural stuff, all of that.”
“…uh-huh,” the stranger was a skeptic, it seemed. Well, most were, so that wasn’t a problem.
“Hey, do you mind if I build my own house around here?”
“Suit yourself.”
Twixxel began bringing out the wood out of his inventory. He’d build a simple house, comfortable enough for him to stay for a couple of days.
“My name’s Twixxel, by the way,” he called to the stranger.
“Twixxel? That’s a cool name.”
“What about you?”
“Hm?”
“What’s your name?”
“Well, people call me Mob. You can call me that.”
An odd name, but Twixxel supposed it made sense.
After Mob finished his house, he invited Twixxel to look for food with him. His plan was to steal seeds and crops from a village. Twixxel brought his compass, it would at least be able to lead them back home.
They walked in silence. Twixxel constantly watched the compass, still looking for any change in direction. Just to be sure. But after a short while, Mob apparently got enough of the silence between them.
“So…” Mob’s voice was hesitant “what exactly do you do?”
“I told you, I hunt monsters.”
“No, I mean, what do you really do?”
“I just told you again, I hunt monsters.”
Mob sighed and began rubbing his eyes.
“Dude, listen… you can’t seriously expect me to believe that, right?”
“Most people are skeptics, it’s okay if you don’t believe me. These creatures don’t appear for just anyone. You either have to be very unlucky, or you have to hunt for them yourself.”
“I guess I haven’t been unlucky enough. I’ve never seen any.”
“That’s good! They’re very dangerous. If you get killed by one, you can’t even respawn, you can only move on to the next world. And they hate hunters, I’m never able to get a good night’s rest.”
“Why do you even hunt these creatures? Are you some weird masochistic thrill seeker?”
“It’s not that… I’ve just been doing this all of my life, you know? I’ve been plagued by these creatures since the beginning, I don’t know anything else.”
Was that sympathy Twixxel saw on Mob’s distant gaze? Or was it pity? What for, Twixxel couldn’t tell.
“What is this monster you’re hunting right now?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know what it looks like. I just know it exists.”
“If you’ve never seen it, how do you know it exists?”
“I once traveled to a populated world. I told a player that I was a hunter, and he told me of an entity he saw once. He told me he would use a compass to find his way in the worlds. He would always build his base somewhere at spawn and travel far away for resources. And when he wanted to go back, he would follow the compass. But one day, the compass led him somewhere deep into a cave…”
“And then what?”
“I don’t know. We were both blown up by a creeper, and I never saw him again.”
“How do you even know that guy was telling you the truth?”
“After a while you just kinda have a sense for when they’re lying. And I think he was telling the truth.”
“…you think.”
“Yeah?”
“So…” Mob looked around, seemingly considering his words “You’re looking for an entity, you don’t know how it looks like, you don’t know what it does, you don’t know for sure if the guy who told you about it was telling the truth, and all you have to find it is a compass?”
“…yeah…”
“Alright, listen,” Mob put his hands together “Since you haven’t found anything, why don’t you forget about it for a while and… do something else?”
“I don’t think I can do that. Since the entity isn’t in this world, I have to move on to the next one… and I have to keep doing this until I find it.”
“Why? What is forcing you to do this?”
Twixxel honestly didn’t have an answer.
“You’re looking for something that might not even exist. And I know you said that these creatures exist, but who’s to say that this entity you’re looking for is real? How do you know that guy wasn’t just a good liar?”
“…”
Well, didn’t that hurt? Of course, Twixxel had doubted the existence of many of the creatures he had hunted himself, but…
It had been so long. And he had seen nothing. Not even a sign that it might exist besides that player’s account.
“You said you’ve been plagued by these creatures your whole life. Don’t you want to live a normal life?”
“‘Normal’ never lasts with me. Something always comes and ruins everything.”
The bitterness in Twixxel’s voice seemed to have caught Mob slightly off guard.
“…well, has anything, uh… hunted you in these last few worlds?”
“…no, nothing. Ever since I started hunting this entity, nothing has hunted me.”
“Then there is nothing for you to worry about, right?”
Maybe. You never know with these creatures, what if they start targeting you? Twixxel thought. But he decided not to voice that concern out loud and let that conversation die. That was a train of thought he didn’t want to consider again. It made him remember companions he had long abandoned.
So, Twixxel redirected his thoughts towards their destination. The village — they were nearing it! Just below the hill they were walking on. Twixxel quickened his pace, sure that Mob would follow as soon as he saw it too.
The village stood near a lake, some of its structures were even built above the water. Twixxel examined the farms from above. That seemed like enough food for both of them.
When Mob caught up with Twixxel, he too examined the farms.
“I’ll get the ones farther up. You get these,” Mob pointed to farms closest to the hill.
“Alright!” Twixxel nodded and began to climb down.
The crops weren’t anything unique. Wheat, carrots, potatoes… despite its strangeness, it seemed to be a vanilla world after all. Twixxel gathered some of the hay bales too, stacking them up in his inventory. Finally, he took the seeds he got and replanted them. The farmer villager seemed somewhat pleased with that action, even if he disapproved of the theft.
Twixxel went to meet up with Mob, who was in the process of stealing hay sacks himself.
“We’re going to need some water too…” Mob mused, grabbing a bucket out of his inventory.
“You can let me—” Twixxel’s offer was cut short as Mob grabbed some water from the lake with the bucket, coming in contact with the water in the process. To the hunter’s surprise, Mob didn’t even react.
“I can touch water, but it stings a bit. You just startled me that one time,” Mob clarified.
“Ah. Okay, then.”
After the two went back to their spawn, Twixxel finished building his house. Slightly bigger than what he had originally planned, comfortable enough to be a home. Mob had given him three blocks of wool to make a bed with. The wool blocks were all black, a detail that Twixxel found amusing.
Twixxel walked outside, seeing Mob’s house. It was much bigger than his own, with some more empty space. Mob was placing some poppy flowers next to his door. Twixxel supposed endermen liked poppies. He’d seen a couple carrying them around during his travels.
Hm…
Twixxel had a feeling that Mob was someone easy to provoke. And well, he was allowed to have fun once in a while, correct?
“Hey, Mob!” Mob immediately switched his attention to the hunter “Can you pick up grass blocks with your hands? Like a real enderman?”
“A real enderman? Am I not enough of an enderman to you?”
“Not if you can’t pick up a grass block. All endermen can do that. So you can too, right?”
Mob rolled his eyes. He walked to the nearest grass block he could see, kneeled in front of it and studied it for a couple of seconds. With near-surgical precision, Mob separated the block from the others with his hands and picked it up. The enderman presented the block to Twixxel, almost smugly.
“So? What do you think of that?”
It was impressive, really! Twixxel tried very hard to hide his amazement. No one he had ever met was capable of such a feat. But it lacked the flawless accuracy of full enderman mobs, which couldn’t be achieved by any player or enchantments.
“Dude, that was so sloppy,” Twixxel teased.
“Sloppy?” Mob almost looked scandalized “Just because I can’t do it perfectly like mob endermen you think I was sloppy?”
“Yeah.”
“I’d like to see you do better,” Mob gestured towards the many grass blocks around them with his head “Come on, try grabbing one with your bare hands.”
Twixxel confidently stepped forward and kneeled down in front of a grass block. Thinking back on what his companion had done, he studied it for a few seconds, looking for the invisible line that separated it from the other blocks. When he found it, the hunter used his hands to separate the block. It seemed to have worked! Twixxel tried to lift up the block, but it quickly broke and turned itself into dirt. Mob laughed.
“Guess you can’t do better after all, bro.”
“Dude, shut up!”
What followed were weeks worth of peaceful days. At first, things weren’t all that different. It was the same sleepless nights and the same urge to go to another world, grab the compass and look for the entity. But after a few days, things started to calm down. At some point, Twixxel was even able to sleep properly! And Mob wasn’t bad company, and even though he remained a skeptic, he was fairly understanding of Twixxel.
It was nice enough. Sometimes, Twixxel even forgot why he went into that world in the first place. He still used the compass, but only to locate himself and Mob across the world. And of course, no signs of that entity anywhere they went.
Maybe it was better that way. Maybe all he needed was a break.
Twixxel woke up feeling renewed. He had a feeling it was going to be a good day!
“Good morning, neighbor!” Twixxel called from his house.
“Neighbor? Really? Since when were you civilized?” Mob stepped outside, looking at the sun in the sky.
“Why are you acting like I don’t know what civilization is? I’ve been in those worlds too, bro.”
“From the way you act, I doubt it. You’re the most uncivilized player I have ever met.”
“Oh, you better watch it. You don’t want to mess with me, unless you want to see some of my barbaric player moves. You could get hurt.”
“Yeah, right. Like you’re strong enough to hurt me.”
Despite the dismissive words, Twixxel could tell Mob was amused. So he laughed.
“What are we going to do today? I’m out of iron, so I was thinking of going mining.”
“And I’m out of coal… we can go together. Do you have your compass with you?”
“Yeah, right here,” Twixxel reached into his inventory and brought out his compass “How far are we going today?”
“Not too far, I hope. Come on, I want to be back before it gets dark.”
They traveled far from spawn into an unexplored ravine. Using some water buckets to get down, they began mining. The ravine led them down to another spacious cave. It was connected to other cave systems that went down and down.
“This cave goes deep… I think we might be nearing bedrock,” the enderman said.
Were caves even supposed to go that deep? With how much they walked, they wouldn’t be able to get back before nighttime at that rate… but at least they were getting a lot of ores! Iron, coal, redstone, diamonds…
Twixxel glanced at his compass, expecting to see it point to the west, where their spawn was. Instead, it pointed north, to a path that led ever deeper into the cave system. Strange.
Twixxel looked back at Mob, who was busy trying to reach an iron cluster. Silently, he made his exit, following the compass’s direction deep into the cave.
It was then Twixxel remembered the reason he had arrived at that world. A smile crept up at his face, and he felt it. Adrenaline, dread, anticipation, all at once. Twixxel walked faster, deeper and deeper.
Finally. Finally! Now all he had to do was face the entity. And then, he would be free from it. Finally free from another entity.
Twixxel reached a dead end, but the compass kept telling him to go forward. So Twixxel grabbed his pickaxe and began to break the deepslate in his path. He made a stairway that went down, down, down… his pickaxe broke. No matter, he’d use the iron pickaxe he brought as backup. And he kept going down, down, down…
“Twixxel…?”
Mob’s voice startled Twixxel out of his trance.
“Mob?” Twixxel turned back and saw Mob standing near the hunter in a step of the large deepslate stairway — when did it get that long? He looked concerned.
“What are you doing?”
Twixxel took a shaky breath, a slightly manic smile on his face.
“Mob, you should go back without me.”
“What? Twixxel, what are you—”
“I found it,” Twixxel showed Mob his compass, his hands were shaking “The entity. I found it. It’s here.”
Mob stared at the compass for a few seconds, processing what Twixxel was telling him. But before he could react, the hunter started mining again.
“I knew it, I knew I would find it someday. It was just a matter of time. It was chasing me too, just like all the others. Every single one of them is always chasing me.”
“What are you talking about? Nothing is chasing you!”
“Mob, go back. This could be dangerous for you.”
“And it isn’t dangerous for you?”
“I’ve lived my whole life like this. I can handle it,” Twixxel faced Mob, and the hunter could see that small bit of sympathy in his companion’s expression once more. What was that for? Twixxel didn’t need any sympathy.
The last block of deepslate broken fell down into an endless dark. Twixxel, startled, took a step back. It was nothing like he had seen before, only heard about.
“The void,” Mob’s eyes were wide “Wait… wasn’t there supposed to be bedrock around here?”
Twixxel glanced at his compass once more. It told him to go forward.
“It’s somewhere down here. I know it is.”
“Twixxel, we can’t survive the void. We’re not even supposed to be able to access it.”
“…then why did it lead me here?” the question was quiet, Twixxel wasn’t sure if Mob even heard it.
Twixxel cleared out some space around them. He took out a water bucket from his inventory and threw the water into the hole he mined, creating a waterfall that descended endlessly down below.
“Twixxel, don’t you dare.”
Twixxel took his pickaxe and mined a second block right next to the waterfall. Then, he jumped into it.
But before he could do anything else, Twixxel felt his arm being grabbed with an excessive amount of force. The hunter looked up to see Mob, looking desperate. It made something within Twixxel stir uncomfortably.
“Twixxel!” the hunter had never heard Mob scream like that before. He sounded scared “I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but I’m not letting you fall down!”
“Mob, let me go!”
“No, I’m not letting you go! I’m not letting you kill yourself!”
Frustrated, Twixxel swung at Mob with his pickaxe, successfully hitting him. Mob reflexively let go of Twixxel’s arm. However, he lost his balance and fell into the void along with the hunter.
The fall was longer than what Twixxel was capable of keeping track of. The hunter expected to feel the crushing suffocation the few players who have fallen into the void described. But he felt nothing like that, only the wind of free fall hitting him.
And finally, they hit the water.
“We’re alive?” Mob sounded breathless.
“We are…” the hunter was a little in disbelief himself.
Twixxel looked around them, they were very much in the void. An endless dark with dust particles floating all around them. The terrain was completely flat, the floor blocks were made out of something that looked like grayed-out sand. There were a few scorched trees scattered sparingly across the place, alongside small dead bushes. The place smelt softly of ashes. Now, being able to survive in the void was impressive on its own, but the most shocking thing was what they saw at the distance.
The entity was there, far, far away from them. In terms of appearance, it was mostly what Twixxel already expected. Tall, humanoid, dark. A lot of entities looked like that. But there was one thing that set it apart.
The creature was gigantic. It went higher than the overworld sky itself, by thousands and thousands of blocks. They could barely even see its head.
There was a part of Twixxel that was amazed at what he was seeing. He ran forward, towards the entity he had been hunting for so long.
But like a true enderman, Mob teleported right in front of Twixxel as he ran. Twixxel screamed and stumbled backwards, almost falling to the floor.
“Twixxel, I’m not letting you go any further!”
“What—Mob?! How did you get here?”
Mob reached up to his inventory and pulled out a handful of Ender pearls. When did he get those?
“Come on, let’s go,” Mob grabbed Twixxel’s arm and began pulling him.
“What? No!” Twixxel resisted “I’m so close, the entity is right there!”
“And then what are you going to do? Do you see that thing, Twixxel?! You can’t do anything against it!”
“Mob, you don’t get it! I have to do this—”
“No, Twixxel. I’m not letting you get yourself killed because of whatever you think you have to do. Just come back with me.”
Twixxel looked back at the entity. He was so close! The entity was right there! He just had to face it, like he had done so a thousand times before, with a thousand other entities.
But…
He knew, if that creature was hostile, there was nothing he could do against it. And if it was one of the creatures that could erase him from existence, then…
Twixxel sighs. That was it, then. Retreating wasn’t like himself, but when he looked at Mob’s concerned face, he could feel his remaining resolve crumble.
“…alright. Let’s go back.”
Twixxel could swear that he heard Mob sigh in relief. Still holding onto Twixxel’s arm, Mob began guiding him back to the waterfall in silence.
But when they got to the spot where they came from, there was nothing.
“What…? Did we get lost?” Mob mused.
“No, look,” Twixxel pointed to the floor. There was a large patch of sand that seemed like it had been soaked. The hunter — prying himself away from Mob’s grasp — walked forward, kneeled down and touched the blocks “They’re wet. We definitely came from here.”
There was a moment of silence. Mob looked up at the endless void sky. Twixxel didn’t need to check to know that no matter how many blocks they had, they would never be able to climb back up.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” the enderman swore.
“I guess we don’t have a choice, we have to stay,” Twixxel got up and motioned for Mob to come closer “Come on, let’s explore!”
Although Mob seemed off-put by something, he began to follow.
The landscape was the most unimpressive Twixxel had ever seen. The sand blocks were brittle, they dropped nothing when broken. The trees didn’t drop wood either, they were too burnt to be of any use. There were no mobs anywhere in sight, passive or hostile. There was nothing.
Eventually, Mob convinced Twixxel to stop for a moment and rest. The two chose to stay at a spot near a tree, inside a circle of dead bushes. They set up a small camp there with the materials inside their inventory. It was nice to see something more alive in such a dead place.
“Here,” Mob handed Twixxel a couple of loaves of bread “You’re out of food, aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I am. Thank you, bro.”
Mob sat down beside Twixxel on the floor.
“Twixxel…” Mob began “Do you have any idea of what this place is? You said you’ve been haunted by these entities all your life, so you must have an idea, right?”
“I know a lot about entities, but I don’t know much about strange dimensions. That’s another profession. Although some entities have taken me to strange places before…” Twixxel paused for a second before shaking his head “Every description of the void we have says that it’s not a place anyone can survive in. Is this even the real void…?”
“…I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m assuming you don’t know.”
“I don’t. I’m sorry.”
Mob sighed.
“Damn it. I just want to get out of here.”
Twixxel tensed. He wasn’t stupid, he knew that was coming. But so soon? Twixxel got up, faster than it was necessary. His heart beat fast and loud in his ears. The hunter faced Mob, looking down at him.
“You want to get out of here?” Twixxel’s voice trembled “I know a way.”
“You do? Then why didn’t you say that before?”
Twixxel paused.
“How much health do you have?”
“Not much, only three hearts.”
Good. That will be quick.
“Alright, here’s what you will do. Close your eyes and wait here, okay?”
A flicker of doubt crossed Mob’s face, but it was quickly gone.
“Alright,” Mob closed his eyes and hung his head. Maybe he already knew what was coming.
And out of his inventory, Twixxel brought out a diamond axe.
You see, suicide wasn’t that uncommon among hunters. It’s a fast, easy way of traveling to different worlds. And sometimes, the only way to escape some entities. Mob wasn’t a hunter, so Twixxel wasn’t sure if he was willing to do the deed himself. And really, what kind of friend would he be if he didn’t help? If only his hands would stop trembling.
What even was his problem? It was better that way. Who even knows what might happen if the entity sees them? Or if they stay there for too long? Twixxel was sure it wasn’t healthy for them.
Twixxel raised the axe the highest he could. Just one hit would be enough. Just one. Twixxel closed his eyes and swung the axe as hard as he could. He felt the impact of its hit and took a shaky breath. Twixxel opened his eyes and saw… nothing. No drops, not even the remaining smoke of Mob’s demise.
“What…?”
And suddenly, Twixxel was once again thrown onto the floor. The shock and pain were enough for him to reflexively let the axe go from his hand. For a brief moment, Twixxel wondered why Mob even bothered with weapons, because he clearly didn’t need them.
“Twixxel, what the fuck are you doing?!” Twixxel could ask Mob the same thing “Why did you try to kill me?”
“You said you wanted to get out of here. Death is the fastest way!”
“Are you crazy? I know we can just respawn, but you know this isn’t good for us.”
“Mob, just trust me. Death by these creatures is a lot worse. It might affect your next life. Or worse, you might not come back at all! Some of these things can erase you from existence.”
“Tell me why you hunt these creatures again?”
“Just let me kill you! I’ll kill myself right after, and we can get out of here!”
Twixxel attempted to reach for his axe, it didn’t fall too far from him. But Mob — with surprising ease and sleekness — ran forward and caught the axe off the floor himself.
“I’m not letting you kill me. And I’m not letting you kill yourself either. We’ll find another way,” Mob circled Twixxel until he was right in front of him.
“And what if there is no other way?”
“…we’ll think about that later,” Mob offers his hand to Twixxel “Let’s just go.”
Twixxel hesitates. He doubted there was any other way, but if Mob was willing to try… then so was he. Twixxel took Mob’s hand, he felt himself getting pulled back onto his feet. Mob pocketed the axe into his inventory — Twixxel doubted he was ever getting that back.
Strangely, when the hunter looked at his friend, he couldn’t see any traces left of the anger he had shown earlier. Instead, Twixxel was sure he saw more of that mysterious bit of sympathy once more.
“When we get out of here, I’m not letting you go back to hunting these things. You and I are going to live a normal life somewhere for as long as we can.”
Twixxel gave Mob a sad smile.
“You’ve been a good friend, Mob. But I don’t think I can ever live a normal life. They won’t ever stop chasing me, no matter what I do or where I go. If you stay with me, you could become a target.”
“Stop talking like that. I’m not leaving you, no matter what you have to say about it.”
“That’s dangerous.”
“I know,” Mob sighed “Come on, let’s pack our stuff. We’re going to keep moving.”
Twixxel followed. He stared at the entity far off from them and sighed. He hoped, for Mob’s sake, that they really could find another way out. And if they couldn’t, well… the axe was always an option.