//------------------------------// // Octavia's Studies // Story: Minecraft: A New Adventure // by Blackdrag-rose //------------------------------// Pinkie, Octavia, Steve, and Alex stopped running as they emerged from the deepest part of the mine, returning to the area that contained all the Deepslate they had found earlier, where the group stopped and huffed for a moment, each looking back at the path that lead to the Ancient City. "What in the world was that thing?" Alex asked, echoing what Steve said back when the creature first showed itself to them, by erupting from the floor in front of them no less, though she was also stunned by something else, it was able to push Pinkie back, meaning if they fought it they would be killed in no time. "It was a Warden... our friend says that her brothers must have updated the world while we were sleeping," Pinkie replied, reminding them of what happened when they tried to conquer that one dungeon, the entire area had been edited by one or more of the Admins, all in an instant when Octavia thought about it, "however, she is unsure of who made this: was it one of the Builders, and if so why haven't they intervened, or did the Admins find some notes that added this or did they make it just to mess with us." "As you said earlier, she had no idea this place even existed, otherwise she would have warned us not to come here, or she would have warned us about that creature." Octavia said, though at the same time she considered the information that they had gained just now, all while glancing back down at the path they had come from, as the gears in her head were turning as she considered how best to use this information, causing her to turn to the others for a moment, "I think I'm going to stay at the top of the stairs for a time and study the Warden, in it's natural habitat, and see if there's anything else we can learn about it, just in case we encounter it again." "We shouldn't stay in this place for too long, at least not near the entrance to the Ancient City." Steve stated, as he had no idea if the Warden would be able to track them down, even though it did seem like it had been moving based off of sound, and he didn't want to push their luck with the terrifying creature, before he glanced at Pinkie for a moment, "Is your armor okay after tanking that monster's attacks?" "Yeah... it might have been dented a little, but I'll be able to fix it up in no time." Pinkie replied, though even she was both amazed and terrified by the Warden's terrifying power, where she sighed for a moment before glancing around the rest of the area, just to see if there was anything else, as she was still looking for something in the walls, "Octavia, just be careful if you head back down there... that thing is much stronger than you might realize." "Oh trust me, I'm counting on it." Octavia remarked, though to be sure her studies bore great fruit she also obtained a few of the new items that they had found in the Ancient City earlier, which she was able to identify with her lens as Sculk, the pure block, with the webbing being 'veins' one called a Sensor, and two with bones that were a Catalyst and a Shrieker, all given to her by Pinkie. With those items in hand, thanks to Pinkie's copy ability, Octavia carefully headed down into the depths of the Ancient City, to stay near the edge so she could observe the terrifying creature, while Pinkie and the others resumed exploring the rest of the Deepslate area. It didn't take her too long to get back down to her destination, where she found the beast roaming in the darkness that they had left it in, though she came to a stop and carefully mined part of the stone wall so she could have a better view of the city they had discovered. Sure enough the Warden was a massive beast that was taller than an iron golem and was made from the same material that the Sculk was made from, while it's arms, legs, and even chest section had what looked like bone armor, and it's chest seemed to glow a little every now and then. What was interesting was that the Warden moved like it was blind and relied on sound to track down it's targets, as without anyone in the surrounding area it seemed to be stumbling around, but she had to correct her thoughts a few seconds later as she found a Skeleton walking into the Ancient City. The Warden heard the Skeleton's bones creaking and instantly turned to face the direction it was in, where Octavia found that it didn't move this time around, rather it seemed to be gathering energy before witnessing it firing off what looked like a sonic burst that zeroed in on the Skeleton and smashed it to pieces in an instant. "A sonic weapon... great, just one more problem to add to the list." Octavia whispered, keeping her voice low just in case the echo of her talking could be heard by the Warden, where she found that it didn't seem to notice her talking, though as she said that she found that the Experience of the Skeleton was absorbed by the Sculk and slight expanded the territory it covered, "That, however, might be worth looking into... do enemies have to be near a certain block when they die, or can they be anywhere near the Sculk... I need to do some testing." Octavia remained in her lookout area for a time, observing the Warden as it wandered around the Ancient City, reacting to all of the cave noises that were in the area, be it any other monsters that happened to enter it's domain, who perished in seconds with either the sonic power or a swift punch, or the natural sounds a cave had. She noticed that there was some sort of connection between the Warden and the sensors that were scattered throughout the city, as it seemed to know the locations of the walls and whatnot, but even with that helping it she could see that it stumbled about. As she observed it, watching it decimate anything foolish enough to enter it's domain, Octavia had to wonder how the parasites would fare in a fight with the imposing creature, along with wondering if it was possible to make more than one of them appear at any given time. If such a thing was possible, and she was hoping that her thoughts were right, she could create something that not even the parasites could stand against, meaning they could wipe out the Lost Dimension and create a force to combat the terrifying might of the beings in that dimension. With that thought in mind Octavia pulled back and made her way to one of the tunnels she had seen on their way down to the Deepslate area, where she found Pinkie hard at work gathering more materials, likely having thought of a great way to reinforce the village wall with the material, before focusing on her own mission. It was a good thing they hadn't lit every tunnel up with torches, where she found herself a good spot to work in and started to remove some of the stone, making a floating platform in the crossroad she discovered, leaving a single block in each direction for the monsters to move in, before forming a wall for her own protection. With that done she carefully mined the middle block of her study area and placed the Sculk block that likely spread the material to the other blocks, the Catalyst she was calling it, into the hole, but the moment it was in place she backed off and placed herself behind the wall. With three dead ends filled with darkness, a fact she made sure of before doing this, Octavia was sure that she could get a few monsters to appear from the shadows and wipe them out, allowing her to see if her thoughts were right or id she was wrong about things. It took a few moments for anything to happen, but her patience was rewarded as a few Chupacabras appeared, where she counted three of them at least, and they seemed to be following her scent, which Octavia was fine with as she gathered a bit of fire and torched them, watching as each one perished and their Experience was absorbed by the Catalyst, which, in turn, spread to several of the surrounding blocks. "So with the Catalyst it spreads quickly," Octavia commented, though as she said that she carefully removed part of her protective wall and extracted the block in question, replacing it with a single stone while leaving the Sculk alone, and the moment she was done she retreated to the safety of her wall and set it back up, allowing her to see the area again, minus the Catalyst she had confirmed the power of, "now, let's see what happens without the key component." She waited for a few more moments, finding that the monsters took some time to appear out of the darkness, and when a Creeper appeared, she wasn't about to question it, Octavia took it down with an ice spike and found that the Sculk slowly absorbed the Experience. Such a thing told her more than she originally thought she would learn by doing this, the green spheres she and the others absorbed when taking monsters down had to be soul energy, or at least it seemed that way as she watched the Sculk operate and spread. The Catalyst spread far more than the Sculk on it's own, meaning this had to be an invasive species of some kind, though it gave her an interesting idea as she carefully cleaned up the rest, collecting all of the material she had corrupted in her experiments, though she had a feeling their ally was going to be pleased with her for this. Once everything was cleaned up, and she lit the area to be sure none of the monsters made their way into the Ancient City, Octavia pulled out some writing materials and jotted down her plan with a wicked smile on her face, because the parasites were going to pay for what happened to her and she had the perfect weapon to use against them. Before returning to the surface, however, she made a stop and observed the Warden for a longer period of time, just to confirm her thoughts on the matter, and found that it responded to all sorts of noises, including explosions from some of her fireballs and bolts of lightning, giving her an idea of what to do as she caught up with the group. "You done with that monster?" Alex asked, as she and Steve had stayed behind with Pinkie, to keep her covered just in the off chance they found their way into the Ancient City, so they could cover the opening and get away from the location in question, since she didn't want to deal with the Warden again, all while knowing Pinkie had found a gray gemstone that she pocketed for later. "Yes, and I have good news." Octavia replied, where she handed them her notes on what she wanted to do next, which caused Pinkie, Steve, and Alex to look over it for a couple of moments, each with shock, surprise, and even interest when they realized exactly what she was planning on doing next, "So, what do you guys think?" "Do you even need to ask? We're in!" Pinkie stated, as while she liked their ally's plan to deal with the Lost Dimension, the plan she had been following so far, this seemed far more potent and damaging than anything else and she was looking forward to what might happen when they set it in motion, plus she could tell that their ally was pleased, meaning she also liked the new idea. With Octavia's studies done, and Pinkie had claimed what she was looking for, the group headed for the surface, as it was time for them to prepare for the first stage of the plan Octavia had come up with and deal a crippling blow to the Admin that was in charge of the Lost Dimension.