Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Martyn came to consciousness slowly, then all at once. There was a resounding silence that surrounded him, and it unnerved him. He couldn’t remember how he’d gotten to- wherever he was, and he didn’t know what had been happening before he’d blacked out. The more that he tried to remember, the more the pain in his skull blossomed.

Pushing his apparent amnesia out of his mind, Martyn stood up shakily. Whoever kidnapped him must have forced him to take a suspicious stew that caused blindness, because everything around him looked to be an unnatural inky black that wasn’t craftable. He moved to try and find a wall, when a voice he didn’t recognise came from somewhere behind him.

“Oh, you’re awake! I’d thought it would be longer because you lost your last life, but apparently not!”

Martyn whipped around, trying to identify where the voice was coming from, when he saw a tall woman in a black dress with a veil. He knew who she was, anybody on a server with limited lives would. The person he was standing across from him was the goddess of death. It was then that what she’d said caught up to him. “I’m dead?!” The words spilled out before he could stop himself, and he internally reprimanded himself. It was unacceptable to talk back to gods like that.

It made more sense than he would like to admit, but he didn’t want to accept that he’d died. Failed, most likely, because he felt he would probably remember more if he’d won.

Lady Death laughed, but not unkindly. “Yes, you died. But I’m here to offer you a deal. There’s a way for you to have another chance at the end you want. However, there are some restrictions placed on us Gods so that we don’t play favourites and give whatever gifts we want to our children or lovers.” She waved her hand, and a couple of chairs and a table rose out of the fog. “Take a seat, please.”
Martyn slid into the seat closest to him, wondering what he was getting himself into. He’d do a lot for a second chance, but he had some boundaries that he wouldn’t cross.

As if taking his silence as an invitation to continue, Lady Death resumed her explanation. “In order to give someone a gift, let alone one as big as a second chance, we need to have them prove their worth to us by completing tasks or fulfilling favours for us. It helps that we can’t directly meddle with the affairs of mortals, so that in itself opens opportunities for quests.”

Martyn nodded dumbly, trying to process what she was saying. In order to have this ‘second chance,’ he’d need to do a favour for Lady Death. A deal with a higher power is not something to be taken lightly, no matter how beneficial it may seem at first.

“As it turns out, there is something I need done that, if completed properly, would deserve such a reward.” Lady Death continued, leaning forward and steepling her fingers. “There is a server that I am unable to reach because a God of Chaos has locked me out, instead sending the ‘dead’ to a conceived afterlife. Because of this, I do not have any sway in how long people live, and two of my children have been killed before their time, corrupted by that false afterlife.”

A book, almost as inky in colouration as everything else swirled into being on the table. Martyn hesitated, holding a hand over it, and glanced at Lady Death making sure that it was okay with her first.
She nodded in answer to his unasked question, and he picked it up and started looking through it.

It had a list of several strangely named events, the dates that they happened, and any deaths that occurred. Deaths that maybe would occur? Martyn decided to not overthink it. His headache was bad enough already.

“What do you want me to change about it?” Martyn asked, finally having worked up the courage to speak to Lady Death after his mistake.

Apparently it was the right thing to say, because she seemed to be encouraged by his question. “All I ask is this: You keep my children from dying, and you kill any pawns that that insolent God has three times each. In return, I will help you get the ending you want.”

Martyn looked at the book in his hands, then at Lady Death. If that was it, then… “When do I start?”

She smiled wide, baring her teeth enough that it was visible through her veil. “Now.”

Chapter Text

Even after all of the servers that Martyn had gone to, nothing compared to first spawning in a death-capped server. There was always a rush as your code adjusted to the servers, but the constant looming feeling that you were going to die wasn’t something that you could mimic.

Martyn shook off the thought and winced from the influx of light all of a sudden, disoriented from the sudden transportation from the dark that was the realm of death.

Putting the book that held the timeline in his inventory, he started to look around, finding himself in a wooden box. It was empty of anything that would help him break through the walls surrounding it. Maybe if he hurried, he could pile up enough dirt to make it over a wall before someone came. Before he could get started, he heard the sound of someone hacking at the wall closest to him. Before he could formulate what he was going to say to whoever was on the other side, a block broke and the person coming through the wall was revealed.

“Hey there! I’m Dream, the admin of this server, and I was in the area when you spawned, so I thought I’d give you a hand. What’s your name?” Dream was wearing a green hoodie, a smiling mask, and netherite armour. If Martyn hadn’t been in 3rd Life, he would’ve mistaken his words for genuine kindness. Dream chopped through another block and stepped into the enclosure, holding out his hand.

Martyn racked his brain for an answer that would do the job. “Hi! I’m Woods, nice to meet you, Dream. Thanks for doing that, I was wondering what was going on there.” He stepped forward and shook Dream’s hand, letting it go quickly.

“Well, Woods, this is the Dream SMP! It’s a pleasure to have you with us! Would you like a tour?” Dream didn’t seem much different, but Martyn had spent months around people who were hard to read. He seemed happy with Martyn's answer, so he was in the clear for now.

“I’d like that. So, can you tell me what’s going on in this server?” Martyn didn’t know when he’d joined, but hopefully Dream was in the mood to help him out a bit. Martyn knew he’d been sent back before Lady Death’s children died, but everything else was vague.

“We get along well for the most part, which is good;” Dream lied, like a lying liar. “Because everyone only has three lives.”

“Wait, three?” Martyn exclaimed, looking at the hearts on his arm. Sure enough, all three were filled in, bright green hearts looking back at him. On a logical level he knew that he'd have the same number of lives as everyone else, but actually being green again for the first time in what felt like months was the most rejuvenating feeling he'd felt in a long time.

Dream must have taken his surprise for fear because he nodded solemnly in an effort to reassure Martyn. “I know it’s not that much, but I’m just learning how to be an admin. It’s been quite a shock that so many people have been joining recently.”

That was as good an opening as any. “Oh, really? Is there anyone I might know about?” His soul was on the line, and Gods weren’t something to be taken lightly.

Dream shrugged. “Why don’t you come this way; I can show you around and introduce you to some people.” He turned and led Martyn out of the enclosure, placing the planks back behind him. At Martyn’s questioning look he elaborated. “Security measure. Because we’ve been gaining more popularity recently, we’ve started to worry about hackers.”

They walked in silence for a while until they reached a river where a boat was waiting. Dream hopped in and barely waited for Martyn to get settled before starting to row. “There are a few rules you should know about before we get to the mainland. There is no bad griefing allowed. Doing that will at best get you temporarily banned. Also, since I’m new to the whole… admin thing, we’ve been taking progress slower. That way it doesn’t strain the server, and we can work on bigger achievements as a community. We’re still working on the Nether, so for now the End is off limits.”

Martyn nodded. It seemed like a simple request at first, but limiting the progress of an entire server was a way to make sure that nobody was able to get out of control quickly.

“That’s fair. This place seems really chill.” Martyn lied through his teeth. Just being around Dream was putting him on edge, and the fact that his progress would likely be monitored or blocked was unsettling.

“Then I think you’ll fit right in, Woods.” Dream sounded like he was smiling.

The two stepped off the boat, and Martyn couldn’t name a time he’d been happier to stand farther away from someone.

They walked in silence off and on, with Dream pointing out different locations of interest and Martyn nodding and trying to figure out any spots that were easily defendable.

Eventually, they came upon a house that had a few colourful banners displayed proudly upon it. Martyn zoned back into the conversation. “-And this is Eret’s house, but it doesn’t look like he’s home right now. He’s also a newer member. Joined three days ago, if I’m correct. You might get along well.”

Martyn stopped paying too much attention to Dream after that. Eret was a name he swore he’d heard of before. If Dream would only leave him alone, he’d be able to look at the book, but that didn’t seem like it was going to happen anytime soon.

Chapter Text

If Dream had no other qualities worth mentioning, he could talk for hours. Martyn had found a good place to settle down but was unable to get a word in edgewise that he didn’t need any help, thank you. That led to Martyn being practically dragged around the server until night had nearly fallen. Then Dream gave him a half stack of oak planks and wished him another warm welcome to the server.

Yeah, Martyn was kind of bitter. After sprinting to the area he’d had in mind for a base, he lit a couple of torches he’d grabbed from a random chest.

The area he’d chosen was a hill that was surrounded on three sides by a river, and Martyn quickly got to work making a hut to stay in and some basic wooden tools.. He flattened the top of the hill, then used the rest of the planks to form a meagre house.

Martyn crafted a door and placed it in the entrance. As soon as he determined that it was structurally sound and spy-proof, he hung the last of his torches on the walls and pulled out the inky book and opened it to the beginning. Stamped on the inside of the cover were two names in white ink: Wilbur Soot and Tommy Careful Danger Kraken Innit.

It was helpful to know which Players he would have to look out for. He flipped it open to the beginning, where it listed all of the people and their relationships to Wilbur and Tommy. Martyn skipped past the ones he didn’t need yet, absentmindedly noting them for the future. He stopped when he reached the name that had come up in his conversation with Dream.

That’s why the name Eret had sounded familiar to him. Gossip spread like wildfire through hardcore servers, and anyone who single handedly set up a killing room for five people on a server with a population of fifty was widely regarded as a threat.

Nothing about Eret’s house had seemed like a veteran’s base though. It could easily catch fire, and it wasn’t large enough to hold anything worth defending. Something wasn’t adding up. He’d talk to this Eret after he’d gotten enough armour to not be caught by surprise.

For now, Martyn would have to wait for morning to get any of that started. He leaned back and started reading about the war for L’Manberg’s Independance.

When the sun started to lighten the sky, Martyn exited his hut and immediately started chopping down some trees. It would help him get some torches once he created a furnace to make charcoal.

With a final swing of his axe, he finished collecting a half stack of wood. It would be enough for what he needed.

Using the crafting table he’d placed inside of his camp, he made a pickaxe. Martyn walked to the edge of his cleared area and started digging the beginnings of a mine.

After a while, he fell into a rhythm and kept absentmindedly digging. He realised his mistake when he slipped off the edge of a crumbling stone into a hole he just opened.

He reacted the next second, instinctively reaching for a bucket that wasn’t there because he’d died and didn’t have one anymore. He hit the ground and felt the jolt of a too hard landing sapping away some of his life force. Martyn hadn’t thought of food, so now he needed to get out of wherever he landed.

Thinking quickly, he lit one of his new torches and stared at the hall that surrounded him. He had fallen into a mineshaft.

He placed the torch under where he’d landed, and immediately started looking around, grabbing his sword and keeping it ready. Martyn could find food later. This was a good find, if it wasn’t already looted. Eventually, he came across a chest in a minecart. Crossing his fingers, he opened it.

He’d gotten lucky. It had an iron pickaxe which he gladly traded his cobblestone one for. It also had some bread that he started eating.

Martyn was about to call it a good trip and find his way back to the surface when he felt something sink its fangs into his shoulder. He was startled, but pulled out his sword and slashed at the spider, then felt his knees buckle as a wave of pain crashed through his system. Cave spider, then. He backed up as it lunged for him, and he took another swipe at it, missing.

Another spider came around a corner, and he knew he had to make this fast. He stabbed the first spider, then hissed back at the second as it made a pass for his knees. It hesitated momentarily as if confused, but sank its mandibles in anyway. He stabbed it twice in its face as fast as he could, killing it. The magic holding his sword together was dispersed in that second, leaving him and the first spider.

Thinking quickly, he pulled his new pickaxe out to finish off the first one, grabbing his torches from his inventory as he swung down. He turned the corner, barely slowing to pick up their eyes. Crashing through the cobwebs that stuck to his face, he sprinted towards the spawner.

As he reached it, he flung out the torches just a second too late; another one had escaped the confines of the spawner. He circled around it, willing to take his time until the rest of the previous poison had worked itself out. As soon as it did, he struck.

Swinging at it, he rolled to the side as it tried to counterattack. He swung again, but only managed to get a glancing blow. The spider hissed and lunged at his throat, but Martyn was able to get his pickaxe between them in time.

As it died, he strode forward and swung his pickaxe at the spawner, not stopping until it was a mangled mess of magic. He wasn’t going to risk any accidents. He replaced the torch, and took a look around.

He dug the rest of the bread he’d pocketed out as he spotted a chest behind some cobwebs, eating it as he slowly worked his way over.

As he lifted the lid, he expected something normal, like seeds or rails. What he wasn't expecting was an embossed music disc leaning against the inside of the chest.

He picked it up and ran his fingers over the label. It was peeling, but the yellow and white was unmistakable. Martyn had found Music Disc 13. He remembered Etho pranking people by playing it around their bases. It reminded him of a better time, before Reds, before Grian.

He slipped it into his inventory and focused on leaving the cave in one piece. He didn’t have time to be hung up on his past mistakes. Besides, if he did this for Lady Death, he’d have a second chance.

After he’d left and put some of his more unimportant finds in his base, he’d asked a player, Alyssa if there was anywhere that he could listen to it. She’d laughed and pointed him in the direction of a bench on a hill. She’d even given him enough wool for a bed.

Martyn placed it into the jukebox and leaned back. It was about as relaxing as he dared to get.

Now, that’s not to say he wasn’t paranoid; that would be a lie. He was appropriately on edge, which was just enough to stop someone from taking his disc from the jukebox.

He grabbed their wrist before they could reach for a weapon. Martyn hadn’t seen them around, but that didn’t mean anything yet. They were wearing a black and white swirled hoodie that reminded him of Unus and Annus, minor Gods of time and the end of all things.

“Who are you and what do you want?” He bit out. Martyn was tired and just wanted to relax. He didn’t care about whoever this was.

The stranger bared his teeth in a facsimile of a smile. “I’m Karl Jacobs. And I want you to stop messing with the proper order of things.”