Chapter Text
“4”
The world disappeared and his mind was swallowed by the dark.
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He stumbled, gasping for air, falling to the ground. There was purple behind him and something blinked in the corner of his blurry vision.
His whole body was shaking and he tried to calm down, tried to look around, figure out where he was but he couldn't move and his vision was blurry and everything hurt and- Was he dead?!
Panic crashed over him, so much worse than before and he curled into himself, clutching his chest in hopes of getting any proof of being alive.
Was he trapped in some afterlife as well, his body rotting in a corrupted kingdom in a dead world, never to be found again?!
The thought tore a sob from his throat and it hurt so badly… should the dead feel pain?
Tears were burning on his face, choking him as the threads of his body and mind were pulled to breaking point.
He was dead, wasn't he? He had to be.
And his friends were still somewhere and he couldn't save them and now he was no longer a part of existence and why was being dead this painful?!
Xb desperately wanted it all to be over, to be happy, alive, home. To have his friends by his side and build and joke and prank and – live.
Screaming broken pleas into his surroundings didn't alleviate his pain, only making his throat close up further until he felt like he was on the brink of suffocation, heaving.
Could you die in the afterlife?
Was he stuck in a loop of pain and death for all eternity?
No, no, no. Nonononono, please no.
He couldn't take it.
He had done his best. Sure, he had made mistakes but he had fixed them, had helped and protected his friends and in general been a good person, right?
Right?
There was no way he deserved this. He had tried so hard. He'd done well in life!
The Universe didn't care.
Because he was dead and in pain and, even worse, alone. His friends wouldn't find him and he wouldn't even get a funeral and-
Had he really been that horrible?
Why didn't he deserve anything good, at least in death?!
Everything seemed foggy, reality was no more and his mind hurt worse than his aching body ever could and he just wanted his thoughts to stop, to drift in the nothingness.
But that relief wasn't granted to him as the pain burned and overtook his senses and his thoughts were racing too fast and he just wanted it to be over, to stop, to-
“Xb?”
Something in the fog of pain was calling his name.
Was it Xornoth, here to taunt him even after his death?
Would the cycle of pain turn into one of torture?
Why wouldn’t the Universe help him!
“XB!”
The voice sounded familiar, friendly, lacking any distortion and ill intent and something in his broken mind compelled him to listen, to cling to the flicker of hope it was instilling in him.
Hands were placed on his shoulders and he frantically pushed them off, scrambling away with a yelp. They were going to hurt him again. He didn't want more pain. He couldn't take more pain.
“Xb, hey, buddy. I'm here to help. Can you please look at me?”, the voice sounded gentle, drenched in concern. And it felt alive, not like the staticy death the monster’s words had been reeking of.
And there was no magic in the way they spoke.
Finally, finally Xb was away from it.
Yet he could still hear the hum of its magic in his ears, feel it burn his back. Strong and confusing, lacking any discernable goal or source.
But the voice felt save.
Xb looked up, desperately trying to find the source of the voice, to get away from all of this.
“Be-Beef?”
“Hey, yeah, it's me. You're okay now”, the blurry shape of his friend lifted his hands up in a motion displaying surrender as he stepped towards and knelt down in front of him.
“Are you- Are-”, he swallowed heavily, the words glued to his throat with fear: “Are you real?”
“Of course I am. I'm as real as you are”
Was he himself real? Was this just a hallucination of his dying mind? Was this his afterlife trying to lull him into a feeling of safety only to tear it from him again?
“Xb, Xb hey, you need to breathe, okay?”, he sounded panicked.
Why was he also panicking? Was the monster going to come back? Was the pain going to worsen? Was he beyond saving?
“Am I- Am I real? Am I dead? I- I'm dead, I'mdeadImdeadImdeadIm-”, he didn't have enough air to speak, forcing his words to stop as black spots clouded his vision.
“Xb!”, the blurry figure that was Beef grabbed his hands.
The touch startled him but his hands felt warm and alive and he didn't have the energy or control over his body to pull away if he wanted to.
“Listen to me, you are alive and you are real. We both are. Here”, one of his shaking hands was placed over his own heart and he could feel the frantic beats beneath his fingers.
“See? You're okay”
He had a heartbeat.
He had a heartbeat and he was alive and Beef was here and Xornoth couldn't hurt him anymore.
The world tilted as the tension left his body, replaced by broken relief and then he was pulled into a hug, hands clinging to the back of his friend's shirt and sobbing into his shoulder.
“There you go. You're save now”, Beef muttered, rubbing soothing circles onto his back only for the motion to still as Xb heard him inhale sharply.
“That's a pretty deep wound there, my guy. Good thing I have health potions on me”
Xb was pulled away from Beef, just a bit but still enough to make him panic.
“Hey now, I'm not going anywhere, I promise. But you need to drink this, alright? Can you do that for me?”
An open glass bottle was held against his lips and the smell of magic almost made him recoil. But something in him told him he should comply and so he did, the sweet taste of the magic making him feel sick until, suddenly, the pain lessened.
It only made him cry harder.
“Good job, thank you”, Beef pulled him back into a hug and he practically collapsed against him, bawling his eyes out.
His friend resumed his comforting gestures, drawing circles onto his back and muttering soothing words that kept him grounded.
And so he cried, completely breaking apart as panic and confusion and exhaustion and worry overtook his body and mind, the emotions tiring him out.
Until they faded and left behind nothing but a crushing emptiness in his chest.
His hands relaxed their death grip on Beef's shirt, but he still didn't look up when he asked, voice rough and scratchy: “Where are we?”
“Home, on Hermitcraft. In Grian's weird rift cave to be exact”
The mention of the rift made him flinch, but it also explained the prickling feeling of magic on his back. It was uncomfortable.
Sure, the rift and everything that had come out of it – Grumbot and Kerilson included – had something magical about them that Xb couldn't place but now, after everything, he was certain that it wasn't good.
“We need to destroy it. Please, Beef, it needs to be gone”
“I agree, you have no idea what's been happening, but we can't, not yet. We need to get the others back first”
Right. His friends were still missing.
“I- I tried to find them”, his voice cracked again and if he had any tears left, he would be crying again.
“Hey, it's alright Buddy. I don't know what you did but I'm sure we'll figure something out together”
“Hmh… Beef, what's happening with the world? It's safe, right? It has to be-”
“Yeah. Xb, you're safe here. I promise. It's just”, he sighed: “I think the rift is hurting – corrupting? – the world, or trying to at least. The world's fighting. But there've been more glitches and the fog got worse, closer, like the things around you aren't there until you get closer. I don't know why it's only happening now, the rift's been around for a while now after all. Maybe because Joe and X aren't here. But I've kept an eye on it and from how it seems, the world is winning. So we're okay”
“For now?”
“For long enough. We'll get the others back and destroy this thing”
He nodded. Beef sounded so determined and he didn't have the energy or willpower to disagree, he couldn't – and didn't want to – do anything but take his words for the truth, believe him, believe that everything would be okay.
But there was still one… thing… missing. A threat Xb needed to know wasn't here.
“Have you seen Kerilson?”
“Ker- who?”
“Little guy, volleyball head, controlled by whatever power made that rift”
“No…? Xb, I don't want to question you and whatever happened to you”, he could practically feel Beef glancing at the rift: “whatever it did to you, was horrible, but are you sure this… Kerilson… exists? At least in this world”
“Yes! I- I've seen it. Here. It brou- It brought me there. I know it did”
“Okay, okay. Well, I've not seen it anywhere, so I think you're good…Maybe the rift, you know, made you see it? We have no idea of its effects”
“No! I'm sure it existed… right?”, Xb freed himself from the hug, sitting back, head pounding: “I- I built it a throne!”
It wasn't there.
Xb stared at the empty spot.
“I…”
“You've clearly been through a lot”, Beef looked at him: “You were definitely… somewhere, even if Kerilson wasn't real”, he sounded empathetic and Xb didn't know if he appreciated or despised that fact.
Kerilson hadn't been real… but that didn't make any sense! There's no way he would have gotten to that world without it, even if he had been under the rift's influence, right?
Right?
Was that why the power hadn't saved him? Because it had no physical form?
But Xornoth had said it had one.
But Beef would have noticed it at one point. And the throne he built was gone.
What had happened?
How in the Universe had he even gotten back?
Could Kerilson pull him back there?
No, no, Kerilson didn't exist… But he had to! He couldn't have imagined him. He wasn't losing his mind!
…Or was he?
Beef opened his mouth to say something else but Xb interrupted him: “I need time to think… please”
The worried frown on his friend's face deepened, but he nodded anyway: “Okay, are you sure you want me to leave?”
Something in his mind was screaming to tell him to stay, not to leave him alone here but he nodded, breathing a “yes”.
“Alright”, Beef stood up: “Take as long as you need. I'll just go back to making cards, I guess…You know when to find me whenever you're ready”
“Yeah…Thank you”
Beef offered him a strained, worried smile, putting on his elytra and grabbing his rockets: “Of course. We have to stick together, especially now”
And with those words and the sound of a firework, he was gone.
Exhaling shakily, Xb turned back to the rift, keeping his distance.
Had he really just imagined Kerilson?
What about Xornoth?
He put a hand on his side, flinching. No, that had been real. The terror he had felt had been real. His wound was real, although the health potion had helped a lot.
How had he ended up in another dimension?
“What did you do to me?”, he muttered, staring at the unchanging rift that had taken his friends and was hurting his world and had done Universe knows what to him.
Of course, there was no reaction, no answer, and Xb had to push down a sudden wave of anger.
This thing had taken the safety that he had finally, finally regained after the troubles and pain that had dragged themselves through his childhood, had been his childhood. And now it had ripped his family from him and crushed his happiness and he was not going to let it continue.
“I HATE YOU”, he screamed, as if the rift cared, as if the Universe gave a shit about his pain, about the ones he loved and would do everything to save.
“I AM GOING TO DESTROY YOU”, he stepped closer, exhaustion from before burned away by scalding, white-hot rage.
The rift remained calm, but he felt the magic radiating from it crackle and thicken around him, almost like he could grip it, tear it to shreds.
Or like it would do the same to him.
He wouldn't let that happen.
“YOU ARE A MONSTER”, he felt like he was moving through stormy waters, his anger a rock in the waves, keeping him afloat.
“And you are going to regret what you did”, his voice was drenched in hatred that would have probably suffocated any truly living being.
“I'm going to get them back, you hear me? I'M GOING TO GET MY FRIENDS BACK AND I AM GOING TO ERASE YOU FROM EXISTENCE!”
His head was still pounding but anger and grief weighed so, so much heavier on him, guaranteed to drown him should he fall into the rift's merciless waves of magic.
And, just for a second, the grief took over his senses.
“GIVE ME BACK MY FRIENDS!”, and with his cry filled with desperation and pain, the air suddenly changed and the storm of magic became a calm sea once again.
The sudden lack of force made him stumble, startle and turn around, a silent scream caught in his throat as he nearly tripped over a familiar looking figure directly in front of him.
Kerilson was back.
How?
He didn't exist! Was he dreaming?
No, no, this felt real.
Xb scrambled back, closer towards the rift yet – somehow – unable to bring more distance between himself and Kerilson.
“You left me there to die!”, he accused, not able to think of anything else, to realize the implications of the thing being here.
It lifted an arm and Xb stared at the dark, swirling crystal it was holding, beckoning him to take it.
He didn't want to! He wanted to run, fly away, scream for Beef and never turn around but instead he found himself reaching out and grabbing it, hot, painful, wrong magic burning his hand and sending sparks through his arm.
Then he was walking backwards, not able to will his feet to still as the crackling of the rift's magic worsened, became louder, more all-encompassing.
Frantically, he looked around, searching for something, someone, who could help him.
His gaze landed on Grumbot.
He could swear the robot was grinning.
But before he could be sure, purple encompassed his vision and he was standing back in the glow of the rift.
Unwillingly, his hand tightened on the crystal, the surprisingly fragile material cracking beneath the force.
His mind screamed at him to not let it break yet he wasn't able to stop, drop it and flee.
“Don't be afraid! I'm going to send you to your friends”, the voice in his head sounded wrong, not distorted, just wrong.
He wanted to say something, protest, argue, ask questions, anything!
However, the sounds of the crystal cracking overshadowed his thoughts.
And then it broke.
Xb's world was swallowed in purple. And he drowned in it.
»Xbcrafted joined the world
Anomaly detected…
World Status: Unstable.
Old data found…
WARNING
Inconsistencies with current logs.