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False was an excellent swordsman.
This was a well-known fact to the Hermitcraft server, who had played alongside her for many years. She competed in MCC, even winning a couple of times, and won many death games and challenges even before she joined Hermitcraft.
Unfortunately, even the best swordsmen can be overwhelmed.
False slashed at monsters, snapping skeleton bones in half and tearing through rotten flesh. A cave spider jumped onto her back, sending its fangs deep into her skin. False yelped in surprise, tearing the creature off her back once it had removed its teeth. Poison wasn't a fun effect to get, nor was it particularly useful in a fight.
False grabbed some cobblestone from her inventory and ran to the other side of the mineshaft. She quickly blocked herself in and threw down a bed. With her respawn set, and the mobs locked outside of her hidey-hole, she collapsed to the ground, using her sword as a makeshift cane.
The poison roiled in her blood, sending hot and cold flashes through her. Bile dripped from her mouth as the symbol of the effect carved itself into her left eye. Magic users could see potion effects as symbols in a person's eyes.
Invisibility was an ornate golden mirror, weakness was a broken sword, mining fatigue was a little plastic spoon, and, False's personal favourite, Dolphin Grace appeared as a jumping dolphin. Poison took the form of a sickly green film and bubbles with skulls marking them.
In a feverish delirium, she dumped her inventory on the floor, searching desperately for milk powder or a bucket of milk--
Golden apple.
It would combat the effects of the poison, but it could make her condition worse in the long run. Zombies pounded against the stone barricade False had set up. She made her decision and hastily bit into the apple.
Gold melted into magic on her tongue, the crackling plates of resistance climbing up her body and showing as a shield in her eye. A warm tingle signified the regeneration magic taking hold, washing away the effects of the poison. Gold wrapped around her heart as absorption set in.
The poison was still there, still burning in the back of her throat and making her stomach feel as though she were riding on a boat, but it was bearable now. A zombie's arm burst through a weak point in the cobblestone, a skeleton right behind it. False narrowly dodged the arrow, hissing in pain as her previous injuries split open. The regeneration hadn't healed her injuries as it was trying to hold back the poison. Blood dripped down from cuts and scrapes, making the stone floor look like netherack.
Another arrow shot through the crack, jamming itself just below False's collarbone. False bit her hand to keep from screaming--that would only attract more mobs. She put pressure on the wound, but her strength was fading.
The effects of the golden apple were beginning to wear off, and the absorption had been used up. She could respawn, yes, but it would hurt like hell. Poison-related deaths hurt to respawn from since the body had to regenerate all of the dead or infected tissue.
False heard the tug of a bowstring and shut her eyes, preparing for the killing blow.
She waited.
And waited.
But it never came.
There was a vicious roar from outside the cobblestone, and False could hear the sickening crunch of bone as whatever it was stomped the skeletons and zombies to pieces. The spiders screeched as they were torn to pieces, leaving only their eyes behind. Spore blossom particles began to filter in through the crack, and False realized that the cave was becoming lighter.
A pickaxe broke through the cobblestone barrier, allowing just enough room for a person to walk inside.
Well, that was if you counted an eight-foot tall faerie with the wings of a cardinal and the legs of a stag as a person.
They had a red paperboy cap on their head, and a great deal of ornate jewelry covered in feathers and rocks and moss. Fungus of all sorts grew on their shoulders, especially on their hooved feet. They had several sets of eyes, each more animalistic than the last. They had on dirty gardener's overalls and a long orange sweater.
Gem's sweater.
The creature rushed over to False, using their massive wings to block out the rest of the cave. They gently inspected False's wounds, pulling a variety of equipment out of an intricately embroidered knapsack. They took the arrow out of False's shoulder, cooing like a bird mixed with a wolf when False hissed in pain.
They brought False's arm to their mouth, sucking out the poison and spitting it out on the stone beside them. False could do little more than watch as the creature pulled several regeneration and health potions out of their knapsack and begin healing False's wounds.
"...G-Gem?" False asked, trying to sit up.
Gem gently pushed her back to a sitting position, "Don't move, you'll make your injuries worse."
Her voice was light and airy, layered on top of itself. The sound of a braying donkey, the purr of a cat, the whisper of the wind through aspen trees.
False's brow knitted together, but she obliged, keeping still as Gem finished cleaning and healing her wounds.
"Hold out your palm," Gem said gently.
False held out her palm, and Gem grabbed a quill from her knapsack. She rubbed lapis along the tip, and began to write swirling runes across False's palm.
They weren't regular enchantments that could be altered by coding--these were tome sigils. Iskall and Stress had shown False how to make tomes when she visited Vault Hunters. It was a difficult and long process, even with the aid of four gods.
Unbreaking, Mending, Fortune.
Gem wrote them like they were nothing. The sigils were delicate and glowed as though False had hundreds of tiny candles under her skin.
"Those are tome sigils," False said, her breath rattling in her chest, "How do you know how to make tome sigils?"
Gem smiled softly, a fondness like a mother wolf with her pup in her voice, "I've always known how to make them. They're just as magic as me."
"You're not just a stag hybrid, are you?" False chuckled breathily.
"They call me the King of the Seelie Court," Gem moved up False's arm as she continued drawing the sigils, "I don't really like the title. It's too formal for me. Empires just knows me as the Wizard of the Crystal Cliffs."
False grinned, "They don't know you're a faerie?"
"Only my brother, fWhip. He's a faerie, too, but neither of us mention it."
False hummed, "Because of the murder thing?"
"Yup," Gem replied sheepishly, "My ancestors weren't the kindest."
Gem finished with the runes, putting her materials back into her rucksack. She bent down, moving her wings in a gesture of "climb on". False obliged, carefully getting onto Gem's back so as not to hurt the faerie or hurt herself.
Once Gem was sure False was stable, the pair took off towards the swamp.
"What does the Mending sigil look like, again?"
Gem took the lapis paint from False, carefully redrawing the sigil on a piece of canvas, "Up, down, swoop, and then a line."
"Like a backwards 'e'?"
Gem laughed, "Technically yes, but don't say that to Iskall or Stress. They prefer to call it 'a swapped character'."
False raised an eyebrow, "I'm never going to understand your guy's lingo."
"That's the whole point," Gem grinned, continuing the Mending sigil.
Gem's many animals rested in the other parts of her mega base, adding to the atmosphere. It hadn't been long since Gem had revealed herself, and even less time since Empires ended, but it was nice to share knowledge and tea between a couple of non-humans.
And if False hadn't yet removed the sigil that was still drawn on her palm...well, that was for her alone to know.