Chapter 5: Guests in Another World
------Dolphy------
I asked the ponies if they were hungry, and they told me that they were, so I led them inside the Town Hall. I asked them to wait at the large table in the dining hall that we used to use for celebrations back when all sixteen of the original Crafters were here.
I still remember the day we learned about furniture from the crafting guide. We’d been using stairs for chairs and full blocks for tables for a long time before we got that book. The first proper furniture we made was the table and chairs in the dining hall.
Anyway, I called the children down and made my way to the Town Hall kitchen, where I found Kryanna and Huey working on dinner in my absence. Those two are the best at crafting here besides me. There were steaks and potatoes cooking in the oven, and they were even using the Extreme Furnace that was my pride and joy to turn flour into bread. When I found out that I could turn a bundle of wheat (or barley) into flour and cook that to make bread, I was surprised. We’d been using three bundles each for loaves of bread before that. Sure, using the flour consumes furnace fuel, but it allows us to make three times the amount of bread for the same amount of grain!
There I go reminiscing again. Anyway, I congratulated the pair on their hard work and helped them to get the food to the table, along with some apples, carrots and fruit juice.
I joined the children and our guests at the table and gave the okay to dig in. I made sure the apples, carrots, potatoes and bread made it to our guests, since I could tell they were herbivores instead of omnivores like the rest of us. The yellow pegasus—Fluttershy (I need to remember that)—seemed taken aback at the sight of us eating steak, so I made a mental note to ask what was wrong later.
Our guests sure were hungry, that’s for sure. I lost count of how much food they ate, but I still remember that each one drank two cans of fruit juice. Don’t they realize that a can of fruit juice is 1000 millibuckets? That’s a whole bucket per can! The orange one—Applejack—couldn’t stop staring at the apples for very long, either. What, are apples not even blocky on their world? Our worlds really are nothing alike, are they?
What’s even more surprising is that they still had room for dessert after that! I brought out four cakes (having guests is a special occasion, of course), and everyone—our guests included—was able to eat an entire slice. With there being 21 of us at the table, there were 3 slices left over, but I saw that pink pony—Pinkie—eying those remaining pieces, so I had to move them to save them for later. I think I’ll let Kryanna and Huey have two of the extra pieces, since they made most of dinner all by themselves. I might take the third extra piece for myself, but I’ll have to wait and see.
After the children washed up and went to bed, I showed the ponies where they’d be staying. There are a lot of rooms in Town Hall that were still unused, so I quickly turned six of them into makeshift bedrooms. I gave each one a bed, a crafting table (I hope they can use those), a rubbish bin, a bedside table with a lamp, some bookshelves, a wall-mounted clock (it’s amazing what one can do with item frames if they just think for a little bit), a multi page chest (it still baffles me how one small chest can hold 585 stacks of items. Do the diamonds really help that much?), an Ender Chest, a writing table with a chair, and a stereo (old habits die hard. My family used to have a stereo for each of us back when Yip and Yipe ran the radio station, and I still don’t think a bedroom can be complete without one).
After our guests had each claimed a room, I asked Fluttershy if I could talk to her, since she still seemed a bit skittish. She gave me permission, but she was so quiet, I almost didn’t hear it.
------Ponies------
The dragon-like named Dolphy smiled gently at Fluttershy as he sat down on the wooden chair in front of the table in the bedroom he’d lent her. Fluttershy herself was sitting on the bed, shifting nervously.
“I noticed that you were… Less than impressed by our choice of food for me and the children,” Dolphy began. “I understand that you and your friends are strictly herbivorous, but is it really such a horrible thing for omnivores such as the children and myself to eat food that we naturally can?”
Fluttershy whispered a response that was something along the lines of cows being sapient.
Dolphy’s eyes grew huge.
“Cows are sapient where you come from?” he asked in surprise. “That’s strange. The cows here—and most animals, for that matter—aren’t very smart at all. They can’t talk, they wander around aimlessly, and they don’t even try to protect their own young when anything threatens them, whether Crafter or monster. The only smart animals out there are horses, donkeys, wolves and ocelots. We refrain from eating them for exactly those reasons. And we don’t always kill the cows, either. We use them for milk, too.”
Fluttershy stared at him for a little bit before responding, still quite softly.
“If that’s the way you are, and that’s the way life is here, I guess I should leave that part of you alone.”
“Thank you, Fluttershy,” Dolphy replied.
Before Fluttershy could respond, however, Kryanna burst into the room, her face painted with pure terror.
“Daddy! Endermen!” she screamed before she jumped into her father’s arms, shaking in terror.
“It’s all right, Krya,” Dolphy said as he stroked her long hair gently. “As long as no one looks them in the eyes, they won’t hurt us.”
“But that’s just it!” the young dragon-like sobbed, “Bodwin looked out his window, and a group of Endermen in the Badlands on the edge of town made eye contact with him! They’re on their way here right now!”
“Sweet mother of Notch!” the adult exclaimed. “This is bad! They can teleport, so the town walls won’t keep them out! I have to hurry!”
He turned to Fluttershy with a pleading look on his face. “Could you and your friends help calm down the children and keep them safe? I know Twilight said you’d have to think about it, but I really need your help.”
Fluttershy nodded, and Dolphy kissed his daughter on the cheek. “Stay here, alright? Our new friends will keep you safe, I promise. Daddy will be right back.”
Kryanna nodded, and Fluttershy held her tight, trying her best to calm her down.
------Dolphy------
I pulled on my emergency amethyst armor and picked up the matching sword before dashing out the door to meet the enemy.
I stopped dead in my tracks when I saw just how many angry Endermen were teleporting towards the Town Hall. There were ten in all. Even with my equipment, this was going to be difficult. But if I couldn’t stop them, I wouldn’t be the only one who’d have to will myself back to life tonight, and I wasn’t sure if the children had the strength of will to do that yet.
I shouted a battle cry and charged the first Enderman, getting its attention so it’d stop approaching the children’s location. The tall and gangly horror locked eyes with me and started walking towards me. I slashed at its feet a few times, but the creature got in a hit before I defeated it, and my armor wasn’t enough to stop the damage.
I ignored the pain and attacked the next one, killing it quickly as well, but not before it got in a couple of hits in the process.
I dispatched three more in about a minute, but now all of them had noticed me and were coming for me.
I knew I couldn’t take on five Endermen at once. That’s just asking the impossible. As far as I knew, no one could.
------Ponies------
The Crafter children were all gathered in a large room that looked as if it had once been used as a council room. All fourteen were either crying, shaking in fear, or both.
The ponies tried to calm them down, but the blocky children were too scared for that to have much of an effect.
Twilight looked out the window to see Dolphy’s progress. What she saw wasn’t good at all: five incredibly tall and thin bipeds were ganging up on the Crafter, who was desperately trying to fend them off with a pinkish sword.
She looked away from the scene, but not before Kryanna saw what the unicorn had been looking at.
The young dragon-like screamed and pointed at the fight.
“Daddy’s losing! The Endermen are gonna kill him!”
The other Crafter children watched in fear as the brave Crafter fell back to eat what appeared to be an apple of pure gold.
However, before he could even sink his teeth into it, an Enderman teleported behind him and punched him in the back, forcing him to switch back to his sword to protect himself.
“NO! DADDY!!!” Kryanna shrieked, tears streaming down her face.
“I can’t just sit here and watch!” Rainbow Dash yelled, leaping towards the window and crashing through it.
------Dolphy------
I was panting heavily, desperate to find a way out of the circle of Endermen long enough to eat my enchanted golden apple. I knew that I was finished unless I could consume it, and I didn’t have enough strength left to survive the damage from the use of an Ender Pearl.
“Wyvern, I’m sorry…” I whispered with tears streaming down my face as an Enderman prepared to finish me off. “I couldn’t keep my promise.”
Suddenly, I heard the sound of shattering glass and looked in the direction of Town Hall. Something was streaking towards me at a speed that would put even the fastest train to shame.
Right as the Enderman threw the punch that would’ve finished me off, the prismatic blur collided with the monster and knocked it back thirty blocks, killing the creature.
I now had an opening, so I took it. I leaped backwards to dodge another punch and wolfed down my golden apple faster than I’d ever eaten anything before.
I felt strength return to my body at an incredible speed, and I also felt like I could withstand anything. The apple had taken effect.
I glared at the Endermen and saw the blur take out another one, leaving only three.
I jumped and slashed an Enderman, taking it down in a few hits, and only two remained.
“Go back to The End and jump into the Void!” I yelled as I took out one more.
I turned to face the last one, but the blur slammed into it, killing it. The Endermen were dead and the town was safe.
“Now what in Notch’s name was that?” I asked the air, referring to the blur that had saved me.
As if on cue, the blur zoomed right past me and stopped. I couldn’t believe my eyes: the blue pegasus from Twilight’s group was grinning at me.
“Rainbow Dash?” I exclaimed in surprise, “that was you? Not even my fastest train can go even close to that speed! That was amazing!"
She puffed out her chest in pride and her smile grew even bigger.
Before I could say anything else, the children started cheering for Rainbow Dash, so I stayed silent. She deserved this. She’d saved my life, after all, as well as all the children.
I walked up to her and extended my hand in gratitude. “Thanks for saving me back there. I would’ve been dead if it weren’t for you.”
She met my hand with her hoof and we shook.
“No problem!” she replied, and then we returned to the Town Hall to get some sleep.
I really hope the ponies agree to help me. I don’t know how much longer I can go without seeing my beloved Wyvern’s face.