//------------------------------// // Into Fire // Story: Ponies in Minecraft // by yolky206 //------------------------------// Twilight woke up to another morning in the world of Minecraft. She greeted her friends and decided to go outside to read a little more about the world they were in. She opened her book and flipped to a random page labeled 'Strongholds' and began reading the passage. Strongholds Strongholds are strange ruins found in the overworld of Minecraft underneath the surface. Only three exist for each world, but they are filled with rare blocks and resources that are found nowhere else. Stone Bricks, Cracked Stone Bricks, and Mossy Stone Bricks are three of the most common blocks you can find there. Cracked and Mossy Stone Bricks are not able to be crafted and you can only find them in the Strongholds. However all three blocks have a chance that a creature called a Silverfish could be hiding in one. The blocks break differently and can be hit in order to lure one out. More information is on the Silverfish page. The most important thing in a Stronghold is an End portal. The blocks making it can't be found anywhere else and can only be activated by placing Eyes of Ender in them. The portal will activate and if you jump in, you will be sent to the End Realm. Inside the Strongholds, you may find chests with items that could help you in the future. The best way to find the closest Stronghold is to throw an Eye of Ender and follow where it goes. It's a smart idea to carry many with you, because sometimes explode in the air and are not retrievable. Strongholds contain many different rooms, such as libraries, dungeon cells, and twisting hallways. Getting lost is not a smart idea in this generated structure. The passage was interesting, and the word 'libraries' intrigued Twilight to read as much as possible about the Strongholds and anything found within them. She was sure that if she could find one then all of them could read about Minecraft and how to get out safely. The only problem was ACTUALLY finding the Stronghold. Traveling underground was more dangerous and somepony could easily get lost in the twisting cave tunnels. The only safe option was crafting a few Eyes of Ender. Twilight flipped open to the page for the Eyes of Ender and began reading. ------------- While Twilight was reading Pinkie was having the time of her life. She was jumping in and out of the Nether while Rainbow watched from the Lava world and Applejack watched from the overworld. Whenever they'd try to talk to her she just jumped back into the portal. She was traveling through both worlds for a long time until she tripped while jumping into the portal. When she recovered she found herself in the Nether with Rainbow sternly looking at her. "Pinkie! I've been trying to get your attention for three minutes! Listen to me for once!" "Okay Dashie! What is it that you want?" "I was planning on flying over to the Nether Fortress and I need you to guide me there. You ARE the only one who seems to know where it is." "Okay! But why don't we get the others to come with? It would be a bajilion times more fun!" "No Pinkie, why don't we just go together? Every time all of us go on a trip it ends with somepony getting hurt. I don't want to have everypony die out here in the Nether." "Alright! Lets go!" Pinkie happily cheered before bouncing off in a direction. "First we have to go this way...." ------------- "Here we are! This place looks REALLY spooky huh Dashie? I bet there are all sorts of scary Zombie Pigmen, Wither Skeletons, Magma Cubes, Ghasts, and Blazes wandering around the dark hallways! This is going to be really fun!" "How do you know that there are all of those Mobs here?" "I just do. Now lets go! I wanna go pick up some Blaze rods!" Rainbow sighed and followed her happy friend down into the depths of the Nether Fortress. The blocks around them were dark-colored and looked like a bunch of bricks firmly pressed into one shape. There were some fences down the hallway they were in that looked like they were made out of the same material. The paths were twisted and there were sometimes holes in the ground where either Rainbow or Pinkie could easily fall through and into the Lava below. Rainbow just weaved her way around the holes while following Pinkie deeper into the fortress. The walls widened a bit when Rainbow entered a room. The room was shaped like a cube and had a staircase against the back wall that led upwards. Pinkie was already on the last step by the time she walked in. "Come on Dashie! We're almost there! Just a few more rooms to go through and we'll be there!" "Be where exactly?" "The room with the Blaze Spawner of course!" "You keep saying things about the Blazes, but how do you know all of this?" "I read Twilight's book one day. I learned almost everything about Minecraft! I even know how many pigs it takes to screw in a lightbulb!" "Pinkie, you shouldn't read Twilight's book without permission. She needs that book so she can figure out how to get us home." "Okay.... But do you want to hear the rest of my joke?" "Sure. How many pigs DOES it take to screw in a lightbulb?" "None! That's because there aren't lightbulbs in Minecraft!" Rainbow watched Pinkie fall from the stairs while laughing her head off. She let out a chuckle as well and tried to help Pinkie off of the ground. She grasped Pinkie's hoof and yanked her up so she was standing on all four legs. The pink pony was still laughing a bit, but at least she had her balance and could walk. Rainbow pushed her foreward and up the stairs so they could continue to explore the Nether Fortress. ------------- Meanwhile Twilight finished reading just about everything about everything in Strongholds. She learned how to craft Eyes of Ender and what resources could be found in the ruins. The only thing she didn't get to read was information on the End Realm. That's because most of the pages about it were too faded to make out any words and some pages were missing or clawed out. There weren't any pictures either. The only thing she managed to learn was that Endermen came from that realm and the only way to get to it is through the End Portal in a Stronghold. Twilight sighed with a bit of frustration and leviated the book into her saddlebags before Applejack came running up to her. "Twilight!" Applejack yelled while running over to Twilight. "Ya gotta come over here! Pinkie's missin'!" "Missing?" Twilight asked with surprise. "What do you mean missing?" "Well, Pinkie was jumpin' in 'n out 'o the Nether 'til she tripped." Applejack began explaining. "She fell into the portal and hasn't come back yet." 'Oh no.' Twilight thought. 'If Pinkie somehow manages to mess up something in the Nether or breaks the portal then she will never get out.'. "Is anypony in the Nether with her?" "Rainbow has been in there for a while now." Applejack said. "Ah hope that she's takin' care 'o Pinkie or tryin' to get back here." "I hope so too. But we should probably find them and see if anything's wrong. If they do end up dying......" "Let's not think 'bout that sugarcube. Ah'll go 'n get the others while you prepare some supplies. We should meet back at the portal when we're done." Twilight nodded and ran into the house. She had some food and weapons stored in some of the chests just in case of an emergancy. She quickly opened the chests and began levitating everything out. She dropped some items back in the chest and put the ones she needed in her saddlebags. She shut the chests, but opened them again to re-organize the items so they could easily be found. Once she was finished Twilight ran out of the door and up the path to the Nether Portal. When Twilight made it to the portal Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity, and Spike were waiting for her. She slowed down a bit and carefully distributed the resources equally between her friends before jumping into the portal. ------------- Rainbow continued to follow Pinkie into the deepest parts of the Nether Fortress. They passed many rooms, some with Lava in the center, some with more staircases, and some that looked like balconies. They were about to head into the next room, which had some sort of weird plant growing on some soulsand. There were two patches of the soulsand with the plant in them along with a staircase in the middle of the room. Rainbow began heading up the stairs, but Pinkie pulled up some of the plants. The item that dropped was red and looked like tiny seeds gathered in a cluster. "Look Dashie! I found some Nether Wart!" "Nether Wart?" "It's a plant that grows on soulsand in the Nether. Twilight can really use this for some potions!" Rainbow gave up on finding out what Pinkie was talking about and reached the top of the stairs. She peeked her head over the top and saw the Nether sky. There was only one path left, and that led to a room with almost no walls. There was a strange spawner block in the center of the room with a spinning orange creature in it. The creature started spinning faster until a Mob popped out of it. The Mob had smoke for a body with strange, orange, flamed-designed rectangular prisms that were floating in a circle around it. It's head had two small eyes and the lower half of the head looked burnt out. The creature turned to where Rainbow was watching and it's body burst into flames. She only had a few seconds before the creature flung three fireballs toward her. Rainbow hid behind the staircase and away from the Mob's sight. Pinkie was still trying to get all of the Nether wart out of the ground and into her saddlebags, so she didn't pay too much attention to Rainbow being attacked. "pinkie!" She called out to get her friend's attention. "I was just attacked! Please tell me that you know how to stop that thing from flinging fireballs at me." "You got attacked? Let me see!" Pinkie said before peering over the ceiling of the room. The Mob was still there, but more of them kept spawning. She crept down the stairs without them looking at her and explained to Rainbow what they were. "Those are Blazes. I think we're going to need the Blaze rods that they drop when you kill one. You can't hit their fireballs back like the Ghast, so you have to dodge them. We just need to attack a few of them for a bit." "So we're going to fight?" Pinkie nodded. "Awesome! Let's go get those Blaze rods!" Rainbow cheered before getting her sword out and walking up the stairs with Pinkie right behind her. ------------- Twilight ran through the Nether while frantically looking around. As soon as she got in the Nether she casted a Searching Spell so they could get to Rainbow and Pinkie quickly. During the entire run down the path where her friends went to there were Ghasts firing at them. Gravel that made up some of the path fell when the exploding fireballs hit it, which forced Twilight and her friends to build their way across. However the journey wasn't too long and soon she could see a dark fortress built over some Lava. "This must be where they went to." She said to her friends. "I think they're in that room up there." Twilight pointed her hoof to a room in the fortress that was high above the sea of Lava. There were some Mobs floating around the room and firing some fireballs to the center. "All the way up there?" Fluttershy nervously asked. "I think so. But it looks like you can get there from inside of the fortress. It might be safer going that way too." Twilight explained. "I hope they're all right." Spike said. "I think those creatures are Blazes, and aren't they very dangerous Mobs?" "Yes they are. Rainbow and Pinkie must be attacking them for a reason. But they're going to need help, let's go." ------------- Twilight's spell sent both her and her friends down twisting corridors and cube rooms until the could hear breathing. Heavy breathing and clanking metal could be heard from right above theirs heads. They could even hear Mobs falling over and Rainbow and Pinkie cheering as each Mob went down. Twilight pulled out her sword and motioned for the others to do the same before climbing up the stairs to fight. When she reached the top of the stairs Twilight could see Blazes almost everywhere, fighting Rainbow and Pinkie without end. She gasped with shock before running into the fray to help clear some of the creatures from the area. "Hi Twilight!" Pinkie happily greeted. "I guess you found us." "Yeah Pinkie, I did. Just don't scare us by running off on your own. You know how dangerous Minecraft is." "Hey, it's all right. Pinkie was with me the whole time and we didn't get hurt until now. These Blazes can really leave a mark!" "Well, we got yer side now." Applejack said with determination in her eyes. "We won't back down from this here fight 'til we're all safe 'n sound." "I have to agree with Applejack." Rarity said. "These wretched creatures will burn my mane out if we don't do something." "I umm.... I'll fight as long as we're here." Fluttershy said. "I'm sure that I can be useful somehow... if that's okay with you..." "And I want to help." Spike said. "So it looks like we're all ready to fight our way out of this." Twilight said. "Once we clear these Blazes out, make a run for it and don't stop until we're all in the clear." All of them nodded in agreement and turned to fight the Blazes before any more harm was done. ------------- During the fight all of them suceeded in killing a large fraction of the Blazes that spawned in. Torches were places everywhere around the spawner so it would be harder for the Blazes to spawn in. All that was really left to do was pick up all of the items the blazes dropped. Twilight recognized them as Blaze rods and how they were nessecary for creating Eyes of Ender. She levitated a few of the rods into her saddlebags and heard a ding. The others looked over to Twilight and began picking some of the Blaze rods up as well. A ding was heard for everypony (except Spike) followed by a cheer from getting another Achievement. When everything was cleaned up, all of them started the journey back home to the overworld.