Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first time it had happened, the day had started like a normal day. Xisuma had woken up and made a cup of tea before reading a book in his reading chair. It had been a cold April morning, the perfect weather to read.

But Xisuma’s peaceful morning had been ruined when someone loudly knocked on his door. Xisuma sighed and stood up, he walked to his door and opened it. In front of his door, looking panicked, was Joe.

“Xisuma, Cleo” Joe tried to say, he was breathing heavily like he had run here.

“Woah, Joe calm down. Take a deep breath” Xisuma said, he took a deep breath for Joe to copy. Joe copied the breath and took a few more deep breaths. “Good, now slowly tell me what’s going on. Is something wrong with Cleo?”

“Yes, I can’t find them, they have disappeared. We planned to meet up yesterday but they didn’t show up. I checked over their whole base, but I couldn’t find them anywhere. I asked the other hermits but none of them have seen them” Joe said.

“Maybe they just went resource gathering or something, the people on this server are very good at losing track of time” Xisuma tried to reassure Joe.

“Xisuma, you know Cleo. You know that this isn’t like them, they also tell me when they go somewhere. Can you just do your admin thing and tell me where they are, I’m worried” Joe said. Xisuma had to admit that he was right, this wasn’t like Cleo at all.

“Of course, just give me a second” Xisuma said, he usually didn’t use his admin powers to find someone unless there was an emergency. This wasn’t an emergency yet but Xisuma was sure that Cleo wouldn’t mind.

Xisuma opened his admin windows and searched for zombiecleo, but they weren’t there. “She- she’s not on hermitcraft” Xisuma said, he checked the chat trying to see when they had logged out, but they hadn’t.

There was no notification of anyone leaving.

“What do you mean she’s not on hermitcraft? Where else could they be?” Joe asked, he was starting to panic again. “Joe calm down, I’m sure this is just a mistake. And wherever Cleo is, they can take care of themselves” Xisuma said.

He was trying to stop Joe from panicking but the truth was that he was starting to panic too. One of his players had disappeared from the server and he had no idea where she was.

“I know that they can take care of themself but she can’t just have disappeared right? You should be able to find her anywhere, the fact that you can’t is worrying” Joe said, he made a great point. Xisuma searched for Cleo in his tabs again and again. It was no use though, every time the same result would show up.

No player under this name was found.

“Joe, keep searching for Cleo on the server. I’m gonna keep trying to find them anywhere else. Maybe their code just glitched out, there is a chance that they are still on the server” Xisuma said.

He took out his communicator and sent a message into the chat.

Xisumavoid: One of the hermits, Cleo, has gone missing. If anyone knows anything about their whereabouts please inform the rest of us. For now don’t panic and I would appreciate it if all of you could keep an eye out for them.

He put his communicator away again and walked back inside, his book long forgotten. He got behind his computer and searched for Cleo again, nothing. Xisuma tried a few more times but was met with the same result again and again.

No player under this name was found.

It was like Cleo had never even existed, but they had. They were out there somewhere, Xisuma just knew it. And they might be in need of help, that thought made Xisuma look again and again.

The only thing that stopped him was when there was a knock on his door. Xisuma sighed and stood up, he walked to his door and opened it. Three hermits were standing in front of him, all of them with the same face of concern.

“What’s going on?” Xisuma asked the second he saw their expressions. In front of him were Mumbo, Cub and Doc. “We can’t find Grian, Scar or Ren anywhere” Mumbo started.

“What do you mean?” Xisuma asked fearing the worst.

“We decided that we would go looking for Cleo in groups of two. We all paired up with someone, Mumbo with Grian, Cub with Scar and me with Ren. But when we went over to their bases, they were empty” Doc started explaining.

“We looked all over and even messaged them but we didn’t find them and we got no answers. With Cleo also missing we decided to immediately tell you, please tell us that they are just hidden somewhere” Cub said.

“I- let’s hope so” Xisuma pulled up his admin panels again. He typed in the first name, Grian

No player under this name was found.

He typed in goodtimeswithscar.

No player under this name was found.

He typed in the last name, a little bit of hope left in him as he typed Rendog

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma wanted to hit something, how was it possible that four hermits had disappeared. He looked back at the other three hermits, he loved being an admin but he hated to have to tell them that their dear friends had gone missing.

“They are also gone, wherever they are I can’t find them” Xisuma hated to admit it, but it was the truth. He took a deep sigh and went into admin mode, they needed to find the missing hermits.

“Okay, we now have four missing people. We have to make sure that they are the only ones missing. I’m calling an emergency meeting” Xisuma said, he had already taken out his communicator.

Xisumavoid: Emergency meeting at spawn, everyone please be there. This is really important.

“Let’s go” He said to Doc, Mumbo and Cub. The four of them flew over to spawn, it didn’t take too long before they arrived. Xisuma looked around, waiting for the rest to arrive.

They waited thirty minutes, most hermits had arrived now. Xisuma did a headcount, there were 26 hermits this season, only 18 showed up to the meeting. The missing hermits were Cleo, Grian, Scar, Ren, Etho, Impulse, Tango and Bdubs.

Xisuma told the other hermits to not panic, he also told them to stay together. A buddy system was introduced, Xisuma didn’t know what had happened but he needed to make sure that it wouldn’t happen again.

He paired up with Keralis, Keralis said something about making sure that he wouldn’t overwork. Xisuma went back home the second the meeting ended, Keralis followed him. He walked inside and checked the names of the hermits.

No player under this name was found.

No player under this name was found.

No player under this name was found.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma hit the desk with his fist, eight people couldn’t have just disappeared. He had to find them, but he had no idea how. Keralis put his hand on Xisuma’s shoulder “It’s gonna be okay, we’re gonna find them” Keralis said.

The next few weeks were spent looking for his players, day in day out Xisuma sat behind his computer searching for them.
If it hadn’t been for Keralis, Xisuma would have worked nonstop. But Keralis made him take breaks, Xisuma often lost track of time. After weeks of searching the only thing that Xisuma found was a message from a woman saying something about her husband having disappeared.

It wasn’t until a month later that a player returned, the player who had gone missing first was also the first person to return. Xisuma had been sitting behind his desk like every other day, until he got a message from Joe.

Joehill: Cleo is back

Xisuma shot up he sent a message back, while he was typing he was already walking outside.

Xisumavoid: Where are they?

Joehills: Back at their base

Xisuma flew up and made his way over to Cleo’s base. He had never gone as fast as he was going now. He arrived and walked into Cleo’s main building, he saw Joe standing next to her bed.

There Cleo was, peacefully asleep.

“I’m scared that if I move they’ll disappear again” Joe whispered. Xisuma moved towards her, he had to knew where they had been. And if the other were still there, he shook Cleo’s shoulder.

Her eyes opened slowly, they blinked a few times “Xisuma, what are you doing here?” Cleo asked. Joe shot forwards before Xisuma could even get a word out, Joe hugged Cleo tightly. Cleo looked confused but hugged Joe back “What’s going on?”

“Cleo, you and seven other hermits have been missing for over a month now” Xisuma said, he didn’t know how else to say it. “Xisuma that isn’t funny, you’re not really the pranking type but kudos for trying I guess” Cleo said, still hugging Joe.

“He’s not joking, about a month ago I went over to your base and you were gone. Even Xisuma’s admin powers couldn’t find you” Joe said.

“You- that’s not possible I didn’t go anywhere. You two have to be pranking me, this really isn’t funny” Cleo said, they were getting angry now. “Cleo what date do you think it is?” Xisuma asked.

“I don’t know like the 20th of April or something” Cleo said.

Xisuma took out his communicator and showed her the real date, the first of june. Cleo looked at it, she was about to say something but Joe showed her his communicator. He had finally stopped hugging her and was now showing the date on his communicator.
Cleo took out their own communicator, her eyes went wide as she looked at the date. “This really isn’t a prank? If this is a prank I’m gonna kill the both of you” Cleo said.

“This really isn’t a prank, seven hermits are still missing” Xisuma said, he had been checking his communicator the whole time, maybe other hermits would be returning too. “What is the last thing you remember?” Xisuma asked.

“Nothing weird, I just went to bed one night and woke up today” Cleo said.

Xisuma’s communicator went off, he took it and read the message that was sent “Etho is back too” Xisuma said, he started becoming hopeful. Were all of his hermits returning?

“Joe, stay here with Cleo, I’m going to Etho” Xisuma said before leaving. He could hear an okay from Joe and an I don’t need a babysitter from Cleo.

Xisuma went to Etho, he just like Cleo didn’t remember a thing. One by one his hermits started returning after Etho Tango returned, then Ren, then Impulse, then Bdubs and after Bdubs Scar returned. Xisuma went over to all of them, but none of them remembered a thing.

Xisuma went over to Grian’s base, he was the one person who hadn’t returned yet. He stood in front of Grian’s bed, together with Mumbo, just waiting until Grian would return.

It didn’t take long before Grian spawned in, but there was something different about his respawn. He didn't respawn asleep, his eyes were open, he had tears in the corners of his eyes as he stared at the ceiling.

“Grian? Are you okay?” Xisuma asked softly.

Grian shot up in bed, he looked at Xisuma. He looked around the room, his eyes landed back on Xisuma “Your eyes are purple” Grian said. “Uhm yeah they are” Xisuma responded.

“They're not green, not yellow, not red” Grian mumbled.

“Are you okay Grian” Mumbo asked just as softly as Xisuma had. Grian looked over at Mumbo, he started crying. Mumbo walked to him and took him in his arms, trying to comfort him.

“what’s going on Grian? What happened?” Mumbo asked.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry” Grian said. “Sorry for what?” Xisuma asked.

“I killed him, I killed Scar” Grian said through his tears. “What do you mean you killed Scar?” Mumbo asked. “He- he was on his red life an- and we fought to the death. I won” Grian said, the last part of the sentence he said so softly that Xisuma almost didn’t hear it.

“Grian Scar is fine, he respawned right before you did. Do you remember where you were?” Xisuma asked. “Scar’s okay?” Grian asked “Yeah of course he’s okay, he’s in his base” Mumbo said.

Grian shot up from his bed, he ran out of the door. Xisuma and Mumbo shared a look before following him. Grian had gone to Scar’s base, when Xisuma and Mumbo got there he was hugging the man and apologizing while crying.

Scar was trying to comfort him, but Xisuma could see that he was just as confused as he was. After Grian had calmed down enough he explained what happened, he told them that he, Scar, Ren, Bdubs, Tango, Impulse, Cleo and Etho had been tranported to another world.

In this world they had three lives and they had to fight each other to the death. It was some kind of game that could only have one winner.

Grian didn’t explain anything in too much detail he just told them about the game and about how he and Scar had been the last two. They had fought to the death and Scar had lost, making Grian the winner of this ‘game’

No one else remembered anything, Grian said that he didn’t want to tell them. Xisuma told them the basics, but he didn’t say anything about Grian killing Scar.

They assumed that Grian remembered because he had been there the longest. Grian didn’t talk about the game after that, he stayed with Scar a lot after he had returned. Apparently the ‘game’ had given Grian a lot of nightmares.

Xisuma didn’t know what had happened but he sure as hell hoped that it would never happen again.

Chapter Text

It had all started like a normal day for Fwhip, he was on his way to his sister Gem. She had called him over saying that there was something wrong. She sounded quite panicked so Fwhip had told her that he would just come over.

When he arrived at her place he saw her pacing around. “Hey Gem, what's wrong?” Fwhip asked. He had no idea what to expect but whatever it was it must be serious if Gem’s reacting to it like this.

“It’s Scott, he’s gone” Gem said before she could say anything else Fwhip asked “What do you mean gone?”

“Gone as in gone, I went over to his place to get some wool but he wasn’t there. I messaged him but he didn’t answer and I got worried so I did a tracked spell but he’s not here” Gem explained.

“Okay, Gem nothing against you or your witch powers but how well does that spell work?” Fwhip asked. Gem was a great witch, she was, but there was a very big chance that all of this was just about a spell that doesn’t work.

“I am a great witch and this spell has always worked, but if you don’t believe me you can always search for him yourself” Gem said, she still looked worried. Fwhip rolled his eyes and pulled up the admin panel. He searched for smajor1995.

No player under this name was found.

“I- that’s weird, wait let me” Fwhip said as he checked on Scot, he started looking through the chat. It didn’t say that he left, Fwhip checked for Scott again.

No player under this name was found.

“What’s weird?” Gem asked, her concern only growing.

“It says that he isn’t in the world but it also doesn’t show me where he is. It’s like he just disappeared from the face of the earth” Fwhip said. “But I’m sure that it’s just some mistake” Fwhip quickly added.

He did another search this time for Joel.

No player under this name was found.

“Ah see if I search for Joel I get the same message. I’m sure that it’s just some kind of bug, I’ll try to solve it today. Scott is probably just getting materials or visiting someone else, I’m sure that he will turn up in no time” Fwhip said.

“But Fwhip, what if he doesn’t?” Gem asked.

“he will, there is nothing in empires that could have just made him disappear” Fwhip said ‘Now, if that is all I have a bug to fix” Fwhip said, he waited a second and then left to go back to his own empire.

Gem was worried about nothing, everything would be fine.

When Fwhip got home he sat behind his computer and tried to fix whatever was messing with his admin panels. He spent a few hours trying to find a problem, but it didn’t look like there was a problem.

The only thing that made Fwhip leave his computer was a knock at the door. He opened the door and saw Gem standing in front of it. She didn’t say anything and just walked inside “Can I help you Gem?” Fwhip asked.

“Something is seriously wrong Fwhip, I went over to Joel’s but he is also gone” Gem started talking but before she could continue Fwhip interrupted her “Gem, did you try a spell that went wrong or something? Everything is alright, everyone is fine” Fwhip said.

He was starting to get worried over her, Gem could get a bit paranoid at times but never this extreme. “No,no everyone is not fine. I went to Mezelea, Joel’s not there, his villagers said that he hasn’t been there the whole day. I went over to the ocean empire”

Fwhip interrupted her again “Gem do you need to lay down?”

“Fwhip shut up and listen to me for a few seconds. I went over to Lizzie, she wasn’t there either, I went to Jimmy, he was also gone. I went to Joey and Katerine, both of them were there but then I went to Pearls and she’s gone too. I’m not going crazy they are gone”

“Okay fine, what do I need to do to prove to you that they’re fine?” Fwhip asked, maybe a spell had gone wrong and Gem couldn’t see some of the rulers. There was no change that five of his players had just disappeared.

“Go do your admin thing again, search for me and then for one of the people who are gone” Gem said, Fwhip took a seat behind his computer again, he searched for Gem and a map showed up with a pin at her location with coordinates.

“See, and now search for the missing people” Gem said.

“Okay” Fwhip said, he was starting to doubt himself now. He had been behind his computer the whole day trying to get the program to work but everything he tried just got him to the same result.

Maybe the program had been fixed, Fwhip searched for Lizzie.

No player under this name was found.

The same alert that had shown up before, Fwhip tried to search for Joey’s location. Again a map showed up with his exact location. Fwhip tried to search for Jimmy.

No player under this name was found.

He took out his communicator and started texting Scot, Joel, Lizzie, Jimmy and Pearl. One of them had to respond right? But no responses came, the messages got delivered but were never seen.

“I- I’m sorry Gem. How is this possible? Where? How?” Fwhip was starting to panic too, where were Scott, Joel, Lizzie, Jimmy and Pearl were more people missing? Fwhip sent a message to the chat.

Fwhip: Everyone on the server sent a message quickly

mythicalsausage: Why?

Fwhip: I’ll explain later, just do it please. It doesn’t matter what you send.

Katherineelizaeth: a message quickly.

Shubble: Message

Joeygraceffa: Okay?

pixlriffs: What’s going on?

Fwhip turned to Gem “That’s everyone except the five that you said are missing” Gem nodded, she was right but she didn’t want to be right in this scenario.

Fwhip: We suspect that a few of the rulers have gone missing

Shubble: What who is missing?

Fwhip: We think everyone who didn’t sent a message in chat, we don’t know anything for certain yet but I can’t find the people with my admin powers and they’re not responding to messages

Joeygraceffa: Scott, Joel, Jimmy, Lizzie, Pearl and Gem are all gone?

Geminitay: I’m still here, I’m standing next to Fwhip

Katherineelizabeth: So everyone else is missing

Fwhip: We think so, I’m gonna try to find them using my admin powers. I would appreciate it if all of you keep your eyes open in case anyone shows up. It could still just all be one big mistake.

“Do you have any idea about what is going on?” Gem asked.

“No, this has never happened to me before. I don’t even know where to start looking for them” Fwhip answered defeated. “I’m sorry that I didn’t believe you before”

“That’s okay, I’m gonna see if I have any books about this. Maybe it happened before? Call me if you need me” Gem said, before she disappeared. Fwhip stared at his computer, how could five people just disappear?

Fwhip started searching again this time for Pearl, maybe she was just sleeping or something. But again the same message showed up as before.

No player under this name was found.

Fwhip kept searching for hours until he got a message from another admin. He opened it, it came from the admin from hermitcraft.

Xisumavoid: A few of my players have disappeared, one of my players who also stays at your server told me that a few of your players disappeared too.

Fwhip: That is correct, do you know what’s going on

Xisumavoid: Yes, kinda. But that is not something that I want to explain over text.

Fwhip sent the admin a link to his server without thinking twice. This guy knew something that he didn’t, he knew what had happened to his players. It didn’t take long before a message appeared in chat, the admin had arrived.

As long as he knew what had happened he could stay.

Fwhip flew to spawn where he quickly spotted the admin. “You know what happened?” He asked, no time for chitter chatter, he had to know where his players where and what had happened.

“I think I do, did your players disappear from one day to another. No messages about them leaving and they won’t answer messages?” The admin asked.

“Yeah that is exactly what happened” Fwhip said

“And whenever you try to use your admin powers to find them you get a notification saying that there is no player under that name?” The admin continued.

“Yes” Fwhip said, he was done with these questions he wanted answers “What happened to them?”

“This happened before, one day one of my players came to me telling me that one of my players was gone. After a while we figured out that it wasn’t just one of them who was missing, eight of my players were gone. I spent a month trying to find them without any luck but then one day they started showing up again. One by one they all woke up in their beds without remembering anything” The admin started.

“They didn’t even know that they had been gone, all but one of my players. He told me that all of them had been transported to another server, a server where they only had three lives. Apparently it was some kind of game, they had to murder each other to win but there could only be one winner” The admin told him the story.

“Why did only one of them remember?” Fwhip asked.

“We think it is because he won, he was the last person alive” The admin said.

“And you think that is what’s going on here?” Fwhip asked. If so why and how, it didn’t make any sense. “Looks like it” The admin answered.

“And we can’t do anything to help them?” Fwhip asked, they had to murder each other. He couldn't imagine what that was like, all of them were friends. Fwhip couldn’t imagine any of them killing each other, not if they only had three lives.

“I don’t think so, I’m gonna try to search for a solution. Either a way to get them out of there or a way to help them from outside the game” The admin said.

“Good idea, I’ll try to find a way too. If you find anything please tell me” Fwhip said.

“Of course, you tell me too if you find anything. Oh and tell me if people started returning, last time they all came back one after the other” The admin said. “Will do, thank you for the help” Fwhip said.

The other admin left again and Fwhip quickly explained what was going on in a message to the rest. He went back to his computer and tried to find a way to get them out of whatever server they were in.

Days passed and nothing happened, every day Fwhip looked for a solution to get his friends out of the server. A few of the other rulers were watching over the places of the rulers that weren’t there while they waited for them to return.

Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months. Two months went by before Fwhip got a message from one of Jimmy’s villagers, Jimmy was back.

Fwhip shot up out of his chair and flew over to the cod empire as fast as he could. There Jimmy was sitting up in his bed surrounded by villagers who were trying to keep him in bed. “I can’t stay in bed there things that I need to do, Fwhip tell them” Jimmy said.

“Jimmy” Fwhip said, he walked towards the man and hugged him.

“What’s going on?” Jimmy asked

“It’s a long story, but you have been away for two months now. Y- you were trapped in this game, some of the others still are. I’m so happy that you’re back, do you remember anything?” Fwhip asked.

“Haha very funny Fwhip, I don’t know what this prank is but it’s not funny” Jimmy said.

“Jimmy look around, does this look like a joke to you. Do you think that I could have gotten all of these villagers here just for a simple prank. What I’m saying is true” Fwhip said.

“B- but that would mean that I have been gone for two months. my empire, who ran my empire is everyone okay?” Jimmy asked.

“Everyone is fine, Shelby has been keeping an eye over your empire” Fwhip said, typical for Jimmy to hear that he was gone for two months and to immediately think about his villagers instead of thinking about himself.

“Two months, you said that others were still trapped, who else was gone for two months?” Jimmy asked. “Scott, Lizzie, Joel and Pearl. But according to the other admin they should be returning soon, oh I need to let him know that you’ve returned” Fwhip said.

He quickly sent a message to the other admin, telling him that one of his players had returned. The response was almost immediate, the admin thanked him for letting him know and told him that it was about time for them to start returning.

Fwhip explained to Jimmy what had happened according to the other admin. Jimmy didn’t remember a thing, but that didn’t matter to Fwip he was just happy to have someone back. It didn’t take long before he got another message, this time from the ocean empire.

Leaving Jimmy alone Fwhip flew over to Lizzie. He entered her tower and walked to her bedroom, she was already standing up. She was pacing but stopped once she saw Fwhip. “Fwhip, my villagers are telling me that I was gone for two months”

“Yes, you were but it’s all fine. I’m glad that you’re back” Fwhip said, he hugged her and she hugged him back “Is this what happened to Joel a few months ago?” Lizzie asked.

Fwhip let go of Lizze “This has happend before?” Fwhip asked.

“Not to me, but a few months ago Joel just randomly disappeared. He returned months later but didn’t remember what had happened” Lizzie said.

“He’s been there before” Fwhip realized.

He talked to Lizzie for a while before he got a message about Joel having returned. Fwhip went to Joel, Lizzie went with him wanting to see Joel. Lizzie and Fhwip explained to Joel what had happened.

Soon after Pearl returned, leaving the only one to return Scott. Fwhip went over to Pearl and explained the whole thing to her, while he was there he got a message from the other admin. All of his members had returned.

That meant that either Scot was the winner or more people were involved from other servers.
Pearl told him to go to Scott to wait on him at his base. Fwhip listened, he really hoped that Scott had a good explanation. He flew over and walked into Scott’s base right to his bedroom.

Scott was already there, he was laying in bed staring up at his ceiling.

The other admin had warned him about this, he had told him about how emotional his player had been when he had returned. Fwhip walked closer to Scott, he realised that Scott was smiling.

“Scott?” He asked.

“Fhwip I won” Scott said.

“You won? You remember?” Fwhip asked. Scott nodded “What happened?” Fhwip asked. “Well all of us were giving a random amount of lives, I got two but Pearl was nice enough to give me another one. We alliant, later Cleo joined us and we became the three G’s. People started dying and me, Martyn and Ren were the last three. We fought and I won” Scott said

Fhwip didn’t even know half of those names “I’m just happy to have you back” Fhwip said. Later Scott gave a better explanation, Fhwip told the other admin but he didn’t tell the rest any details.

They didn’t have to know that they all killed each other.

Chapter Text

Xisuma swore that he would never let it happen again, but then it happened again. Just like the past two times it had started out like a normal day. It had been a while since the last ‘game’ Xisuma had almost thought that it was over.

But then it happened again.

He got a message from Fwhip, the admin for the empire's server. During the second ‘game’ Gem had come to him telling him about how a few of her friends had disappeared, Xisuma had checked and had discovered that some of his hermits were also gone

Even more than the first time had disappeared.

Xisuma had contacted the Fwhip and explained to him what was going on. The two of the had kept in contact while their friends had been gone. Fhwip had messaged him when his players had started to return.

A message from Fhwip couldn’t be a good thing.

Fwhip: We are starting a new season of empires soon, I had planned to meet up with all of my players to go over the plans. A few of my players have disappeared again, I don’t know if it’s because of the same thing as last year but… the people who disappeared are some of the same people who disappeared last time.

Xisuma: I’ll check if any of my players are missing, but I really hope that this isn’t happening again.

He walked to his laptop and searched for Grian.

No player under this name was found.

“Not this again” Xisuma said out loud. He tried a few more names just to be sure but every time he got the same message.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma took his communicator out again and sent a message to Fhwip telling his what was going on. He then sent a message to the groups chat, telling them what had happened and informing them that they would be having another emergency meeting.

Last time more people had joined the game, Xisuma needed to see who were taken this time. He flew over to spawn and waited for the hermits to arrive.

One by one players showed up, and after a while Xisuma started speaking. “Is this everyone?” He asked. The hermits looked around at each other, they were familiar with the process by now.

Nine people were missing this time Tango, Ren, Scar, Grian, Etho, Bdubs, Impulse, Cleo and Pearl were all nowhere to be seen. All of them had done this before, they could do it. But Xisuma still didn’t feel good about leaving them all there.

“We all know what is going to happen, we wait until they start returning. If you see someone who isn’t here now, send a message into the chat. Stay together with your buddy” Xisuma said.

They had installed the buddy system the first time, no one had disappeared later but the buddy system just gave Xisuma some peace. The hermits were saver together then they were alone.

The meeting ended pretty quickly, this was the third time that they had done this. The third time that they had had a meeting like this. It didn’t get any easier telling the hermits that there friends were gone again.

They never knew how long their friends were going to be gone, that was what Xisuma worried about the most. What if they didn’t return? Xisuma decided to message Fwhip again, if anyone knew how he was feeling it would be him.

Xisumavoid: Nine of my people are gone, how many did you lose?

Fwhip: Less than last time, I lost four as far as I know now. Is Pearl in hermitcraft?

Pearl was one of the people who lived in both hermitcraft and empires. But she wasn’t in hermitcraft, Pearl always told people when she was leaving. She had been on hermitcraft the day before, but if she wasn’t on empires then that meant that she had been in the game.

Xisumavoid: no, she must also be in the game

Fwhip: Yeah, have you found a way to help them yet? I searched everywhere but it doesn’t look like something like this has ever happened before

Xisumavoid: I have been looking everywhere, but I think you’re right. This has never happened before. I haven’t found a single helpful thing

Fwhip: I’m gonna keep looking, let me know if people start returning.

Xisumavoid: Will do

He placed his communicator away again and did his normal routine of searching for his players on his computer. But just like before he just got the same message.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma waited, he couldn’t do anything else so he just waited for his players to start returning. Every day he had his communicator right next to him, just in case someone came back.
Every night he had trouble sleeping, Keralis was still his buddy and he helped a lot. But he couldn’t take the worry away from Xisuma. He kept thinking about Grian when he had first returned after winning.

He kept thinking about how sad and panicked Grian had looked. He didn’t want any of his other players to experience that.

Fwhip had let Xisuma know about the last winner, about how he hadn't been sad that he won at all. He had been happy, he had woken up in bed with a smile on his face. Whatever game they were going to had to be messed up.

“Shashwamy what are you doing out of bed?” Keralis asked, he walked up to Xisuma who was staring out of his window. “Couldn’t sleep” Xisuma simply answered.

“You have to stop worrying about them, they will be fine” Keralis said as he stood next to Xisuma. Keralis leaned against Xisuma, putting his head on his shoulder “Did I wake you?” Xisuma asked.

“The moonlight did, but that’s fine. Why don’t you go back to bed, you need your rest as much as I do” Keralis said. Xisuma nodded and they walked back into Xisuma’s bedroom. Xisuma had placed a bed next to his for Keralis.

They laid down “They’ll be fine” Keralis said before he closed his eyes.

Xisuma doubted it, he didn’t know why but he had a feeling that this ‘game’ was going to end badly. Just as badly as the first game had ended, or even worse.

After a while Xisuma fell asleep, he dreamt that he was in a world where he had to murder his friends, just like Grian had described the games as. He couldn’t do it and was murdered instead, he woke up in a cold sweat and decided that he had done enough sleeping.

He got up and walked to his computer, he did the same thing he had done every day since his hermits had gone missing.

Grian.

No player under this name was found.

goodtimeswithscar

No player under this name was found.

Impulsesv

No player under this name was found.

Tangotek

A map appeared, Xisuma shot up. Tango was here in hermitcraft. Xisuma ran back to his bedroom, “Keralis, Tango is back I’m gonna go to his base to check up on him” Xisuma said he got a “What?” Back from Keralis.

But he was already gone, he had to get to Tango.

He had been gone for a month, not two months this time. He flew in the dark but was there in no time. He ran inside and saw Tango laying in his bed, he took a chair and sat down next to him.

He didn’t want to wake Tango yet, he deserved a few more hours of sleep. Xisuma just sat on his chair and waited, he had waited a month, he could wait a little longer.

What Xisuma did do was sent a message to Fwhip, the man was probably asleep but he would want to know. He decided to wait until morning before he sent a message to the rest, he knew his players.

They would immediately go over to the house of a person who was gone and wait for them there. Kinda just like Xisuma was doing now, Xisuma ignored the irony and sent the message to Fwhip.

Xisumavoid: One of my players returned.

He put his communicator away again and waited, he waited and waited. He saw the sun get higher and higher as it lit up the room, and woke up Tango. Tango opened his eyes and turned to his side.

Xisuma chuckled, Tango must have heard him because his eyes snapped open. He made eye contact with Xisuma “Did I do something wrong?” Tango asked.

“No, don't worry, another game started. You’re the first one to return” Xisuma said. “Another game, I thought that those would be over by now. Who is still there?” Tango asked as he sat up.

“Impulse, Ren, Grian, Scar, Bdubs, Pearl, Cleo and Etho. But this time you were only there for about a month, usually you’re there for two. I hope that that means something good. Is there anything you remember?” Xisuma asked.

Tango shook his head “Nothing just like all the other times”

“I expected that much, let’s hope that the rest starts appearing soon” Xisuma said, he took out his communicator and let the rest of the server know that Tango had returned. The rest started splitting up, going to the houses of the people who hadn’t returned yet and waiting for them.

Xisuma’s communicator went off, Fhwip had replied to his message.

Fwhip: One of my players returned too, around the same time that you sent that message apparently. It’s weird they usually don’t start returning this soon.

Xisuma: I know, I hope that this is a good thing.

He was about to put his communicator away again but he got another message. Doc sent him a message, Ren was back too.

Xisuma turned to Tango “Ren’s back too, is it okay if I go to him?”

“Of course, let me know if you find out what happened this time” Tango said, Xisuma nodded and flew away. He flew to Ren’s house, Doc and Xb were already explaining to him what had happened.

“Hey Ren, how are you?” Xisuma asked as the people in the room looked at him. “Fine, a bit annoyed that this happened again. Did you find a way to stop this yet?”

“Sorry no, but I’m working on it” Xisuma said, he would love to tell him that he had a solution for all of this. But he didn’t.

Xisuma stayed with Ren for a while until he got a message telling him that Grian and Scar had returned. He couldn’t go to both of them, luckily that had their bases close to each other. Xisuma went to Grian and then Scar, both of them didn’t remember a thing.

He left them again with Mumbo and Cub when he got a message that Etho had returned. Xisuma went over to Etho, the Bdubs and Impulse and then he went to Cleo’s. None of them remembered a thing.

He sent a message to Fhwip, the only person that he was still missing was Pearl. But she could spawn in at empires too.

Xisumavoid: How many people are you missing, I’m only missing Pearl but she could also spawn in empires, is she back yet?

Xisuma flew over to Pearl’s base just in case she would respawn there. He got an answer from Fwhip.

Fwhip: I’m missing one more person, Scott. He’s the one who won the last game. Pearl isn’t here, but I have someone waiting at her bed in case she respawns here.

Xisumavoid: Good, I have someone waiting for her too. But I’m also just going to her house myself.

Xisuma landed at Pearl’s base and walked in, Gem was there waiting for her to return. Impulse was there too, Xisuma didn’t really expect anything else, the three of them had grown quite close this season.

“How did you get Zedaph to let you leave?” Xisuma asked Impulse, every person who respawned after one of the games had to stay in bed for at least a day. Xisuma didn’t know what their body’s had gone through but they needed rest, even if they didn’t want it.

“I kinda snuck out, but I wanna be here for Pearl. We were together last time” Impulse said. “You were only together last time because you had been having a sleepover when you disappeared” Xisuma said.

Pearl spawned in.

She looked around and.. started screaming. “Get away! don’t hurt me” She said, she stood up and jumped off her bed, never taking her eyes off the three of them. “Where’s Tilly?” She started looking around.

“Pearl you’re back at hermitcraft” Impulse said.

“I think we have found out who won” Xisuma said.

Impulse walked closer to Pearl, Pearl pulled out a sword and held it out in front of herself. She wasn’t angry though, tears were making the way down her face. “okay, okay I won’t get any closer’ Impulse said.

He stopped and looked at Gem and Xisuma. “Pearl, why don’t we calm down for a second. We promise not to hurt you” Xisuma said softly. Gem and Impulse nodded.

Pearl started shaking her head, tears still falling out of her eyes. Gem walked up to her and pulled her into a hug, it had been a stupid action given that Pearl was still holding a sword. “It’s okay Pearl, you’re safe now” Gem said.

“It’s not okay, I killed them and they want to kill me and and- Scott” Pearl said, she hugged Gem back. Impulse walked closed to the two but Pearl pushed Gem behind her and held her sword out to Impulse.

“You! You won’t hurt anyone else I care about” Pearl said.

“What? Pearl I would never hurt anyone, mostly not anyone you care about. Come on it’s me Impulse, you know me” Impulse tried, but Pearl didn’t move one inch.

“Hey Pearl, why don’t you tell us what happened? We want to understand” Xisuma said, he didn’t move any closer to her.

“We- we were in a game, we had three lives” Pearl started, that part Xisuma knew “But we shared our lives with someone else, with our soulmates. Everyone had a soulmate, Impulse was paired up with bdubs, I was paired up with Scott. But Scott didn’t want to be my soulmate, he left me, he left me all alone” Pearl stopped to wipe away some tears.

“He left me for Cleo, but it doesn't matter because I found Tilly. Tilly became my soulmate. We stayed together the whole game, until everyone started attacking and I had to team up with Scott. But I didn’t want to team up with Scott anymore, I killed Impulse. Me, Scott and Cleo and Martyn we were the last four. I fought them and won, me and Scott were the only two left. He- he blew himself up” Pearl finished.

Gem walked in front of her and pulled her into a hug again. Pearl dropped her sword and hugged Gem back. Xisuma looked at Impulse, they seemed to be thinking the same thing Pearl had been all alone.

Xisuma didn’t know this Scott, he knew that he had won the last game but that was about it. He didn’t like him though, he left Pearl all alone.

It took some time before Pearl trusted the rest again, but she got there. Xisuma told the hermits what they needed to know, that Pearl had won and that in this game the lived were shared.

He only told the people who had been in the games that there was more, that Pearl was sad and angry at them for the events that had happened during the game. It was hard for the rest to apologize for something they didn’t remember doing, but all of them apologized.

Xisuma didn’t know a lot about it but apparently Scott and Pearl also made up in empires.

Chapter Text

Another peaceful day that turned into a day of panic. Xisuma was building a new section of his base when he got the message.

Fwhip: It happened again, four of my players are missing. The same four that went missing last time

Xisumavoid: I’ll check on my players, I can’t believe this is still happening. This is the forth time, it’s insane

Xisuma walked inside and sat behind his computer, he opened it and did the same thing he always did.

Grian

No player under this name was found.

Goodtimeswithscar

No player under this name was found.

“Again and again, when will this nightmare stop” Xisuma thought, he took out his communicator again and sent a quick message to Fwhip.

Xisumavoid: A few of mine are gone too, it looks like we’re doing this again.

Then he opened the hermitcraft group chat.

Xisumavoid: It looks like another game if happening again, emergency meeting.

Xisuma flew to spawn and waited, every time someone arrived at spawn he let out a breath of relief. He didn’t want any new people to be sucked into those games, not after what had happened last time.

Half an hour later he started the meeting, it looked like no one new would be added to these ‘games’. Impulse, Pearl, Etho, Grian, Cleo, Scar, Tango and Bdubs were all gone.

“Hello hermits, we all know why we’re here. Unfortunately another ‘game’ has started and some hermits have been taken again” Xisuma started, he could see the concern on the faces of the rest growing.

“Pearl, Impulse, Etho, Grian, Cleo, Scar, Tango and Bdubs are all gone. By now we know what to do, buddy up and stay together. This time I would appreciate some help with trying to stop these ‘games’” Xisuma said.

“I have been trying to stop the games but I can’t find a way” Xisuma hated to admit it, but he needed help. The hermits that kept being taken needed help “Anyone who knows a way to stop them please inform me”

That was the ending of the meeting, hermits went to their buddy and left. Some promising Xisuma that they would help him search for a way to help the other hermits, he was grateful for that.

He went to Keralis and together they went to Xisuma’s base. Xisuma did the same thing he did every time, he searched for the hermits on his computer. If there was a way that any of the hermits were still on hermitcraft he needed to find them.

He searched for all of them but kept getting the same message.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma gave up, resting his head in his arms on the desk. He hated feeling helpless.

Gem was in Doc’s base, she had buddied up with Doc after she had arrived in hermitcraft last season. She had been worried about Pearl and Doc had been a great friend during that time.

They had decided to team up, together they shared their concerns. Gem was always talking about how worried she was about Pearl, mostly after the last game. Doc usually talked about Ren, he was always worried that Ren wouldn’t return.

At the end of the last game Doc had gone to Ren’s place while Gem went to wait for Pearl.

Gem was laying on the couch in Doc’s house, the place where she had been sleeping while they waited for the rest to return. They were watching a movie to distract themselves, it was already quite late.

When the movie was over Doc stood up “I’m gonna go to bed, I’m exhausted” Doc said, “Good night” Gem said, she laid down fully covering herself with her blanket “Night” Doc said as he turned the lights off.

The room was fully dark now, Gem closed her eyes but didn’t fall asleep. She kept seeing Pearl the last time that she had come back from the ‘games’ She just kept seeing how scared Pearl was.

Her brain kept imagining what was happening to Pearl at that moment. Would she be fully alone again, having only a dog to keep her company. Was she safe? Did she even have a place to stay?

Those thoughts were on her mind as she fell asleep.
The next time she opened her eyes she wasn’t on the couch anymore. She was in a dark room, there was nothing in the room and she couldn’t see anything. “Geminitay” Gem heard a voice from behind her.

She turned around, in front of her was a creature. Their body was covered in eyes, all the eyes were looking at the same thing.

They were all looking at her.

“One of your friends can’t make the game, but the game must go on. You will be subbing for them. You will look exactly like them, you’ll have to act like you’re them. If you tell anyone that you’re not them, we will have you and your little friends erased. No respawn will save you then” The creature said.

“Did I make myself clear?” The creature said.

“Who- what are you?” Gem asked, she wanted to sound brave. She wanted to sound like she wasn’t scared, but she was terrified. Her question was so soft that she had barely heard it herself.

“You don’t have to worry about that” The creature said, pain erupted from within Gem. She fell to the ground, her whole body hurt “Don’t ask questions girl” The creature said.

The pain stopped “Don’t tell them that you are you, from this point on you’re not you. Remember that and remember the pain that you just felt, that will be worse if you tell anyone” The creature said.

It walked towards Gem and cupped her chin. It smiled, or at least it looked like it was smiling before it snapped his hand. Gem wasn’t in the dark room anymore, she opened her eyes. She was laying in a bed in some kind of stone building.

She sat up and looked around, there wasn’t a lot in the building. There were three beds and a few chests. There was also a big table in the middle of the room, there was food on the table.

“Good morning mom, since when do you sleep in?” Bdubs asked, wait Bdubs? Bdubs looked different, he was missing a tooth and he had a black eye. His clothes were different too and he was wearing a bandana. “I-” Gem started but she had no idea what to say.

She couldn’t say anything about her being Gem, but if she wasn’t Gem then who was she. She looked at her outfit, she didn’t need the outfit to realize who she was. She was green, zombie green, zombiecleo green.

She was Cleo.

“Uhm are you okay?” a different voice asked. Gem looked at where the voice had come from. It was Scar, he too was wearing a different outfit. He looked awesome but this wasn’t his hermitcraft skin Gem realized.
She wasn’t in hermitcraft anymore, none of them were.

She was now part of the game.

“I- yeah I’m fine” Gem said, she stood up trying to look like she had been in the building before.

“Are you sure, you sound different?” Bdubs said.

As long as they didn’t realize that she was actually Gem she should be fine. “Yeah I just have a cold” She couched to make it more believable “And I seem to have forgotten some things, must be because of the cold” Gem said.

“Oh, do you need to lay back down? We can protect you like the bad boys protected Grian, or well better. Don’t worry we will make sure that you won’t get kidnapped or killed” Scar said, he looked genuine but Gem had no idea what he was talking about.

“No, no I’ll be fine. I’m just gonna take it easy this uhm” Gem thought what was this “Today, I’m gonna take it easy today” She had no idea how long she would be here. She didn’t even know where the real Cleo was, the creature had said that they just couldn’t make it to the game.

What was going on with the real Cleo?

“Okay, maybe you got Grian’s sickness. We don’t have a lot planned today anyway, you can take it easy. But tell us if you’re really not feeling well, we know how much you like to hide your pain mom” Bdubs said.

There was that word again, Mom. Why was he calling her mom? Cleo and Bdubs were almost the same age. “Yeah tell us mom, no one will judge you for not feeling well” Scar said confirming Gem’s next question, he called her mom too.

“Yeah I will, don’t worry” Gem said.

Gem didn’t leave the building, instead she went mining. This was still minecraft no matter what game they were playing it always involved mining. She had no idea what she was doing or where she was going but she found her way.

She went into the mine and started mining.

When she got a few diamonds she walked back to the building, she gave Bdubs some diamonds but then heard some noises coming from outside. Bdubs walked outside and she just followed, outside were Jimmy, Joel and Grian.

The three of them were also wearing different outfits, Bdubs was already having a conversation with them. Gem didn’t understand a thing they were talking about, bread bridge? The nosy neighbours? The mean gills? It sounded like they were talking in code.

Grian looked at her “Hello” She said. “Hi? What do you think about all of this? Aren’t you meant to keep him” Grian motioned to Bdubs “In check?”

“I- yes?” Gem said, was she meant to keep Bdubs in check?

“Are you okay? You sound and are acting a bit weird” Jimmy asked. Before Gem could answer Bdubs did “She has a cold, she’s nursing a cold”

“Yeah an uhm amnesia cold” Gem said, she had to find a way to make it believable that she was Cleo. But she wasn’t Cleo, amnesia could change a person right? “An amnesia cold?” Grian asked.

“Yeah you haven’t heard of it? It’s pretty common” Gem said. “Yeah, how have you never heard of an amnesia cold?” Bdubs said.

Gem was glad that Bdubs was going with it. She stayed with Bdubs while he talked to Joel, Jimmy and Grian. But after a while they left and Scott and Martyn came over, they talked for a bit.

With they talked for a bit Gem meant that Bdubs was talking while she stood next to him being quiet. “Are you okay Cleo, you’re usually not this quiet?” Scott asked. “She’s nursing a cold” Bdubs said before she could answer.

“Seriously? Will you be able to play today?” Scot asked, concern on his face. “Yeah I’ll be fine” Gem said. “Are you sure, you don’t sound too good” Martyn said. “Yeah, I’m fine” Gem said.

Scott and Martyn left, Gem let out a breath of relief. But she could see someone else walk towards them, Etho. Gem walked inside, it was hard acting like she was Cleo.

“Dad” Bdubs said as he walked towards Etho, “come, come in. Cleo I know that you hate him but he’s welcome right? After the nice family dinner we had last week everythings alright right?” Bdubs asked.

He didn’t give her a change to answer as he took Etho inside. “Hello Cleo, are you okay?” Etho asked “Yeah, but I still hate you very much” Gem said, she didn’t know if that was the right thing to say but Bdubs just told her that she didn’t like him.

“Oh you’re actually sick, you really don't sound well. You sound kinda like, uhm someone I know ugh I can’t think of her name” Etho said, Gem started panicking.

Nobody could find out that she was Cleo, she would be killed. Gem remembered the pain that the creature that put her in, he hadn’t even touched her. She didn’t know what it could do, but she was sure that it could erase her just like it had said.

“Cleo? Cleo?” Etho said while waving a hand in front of her face. Gem snapped out of it and blinked at him. “Are you okay mom?” Bdubs asked, Gem just nodded. Scar walked towards her, when had he walked inside? “You’ve gone all pale, come sit down” Scar said, he put a hand on her back and stirred her towards the table.

She sat down “I’m gonna get you some water” Bdubs said, Scar took a seat next to her and looked at her with concern. “I’m gonna leave, you probably don’t want me here” Etho said, nobody protested so he left.

Bdubs returned with the water and handed it to her, he too took a seat. Everything would be fine and everything was fine until the door opened again. Bigb and Pearl walked into the room.

They also took a seat at the table, they started talking with Scar and Bdubs but Gem didn’t say anything. She was barely even listening until she heard Pearl talk, Pearl wasn’t Pearl. Gem knew Pearl, that wasn’t her voice.

But Gem did know the voice, it was Lizzie.

Gem made eye contact with ‘Pearl’ “Have some steak guys” Gem said, she just needed to show Lizzie that she wasn’t Cleo. Maybe Lizzie knew what was going on, ‘Pearl’ tried to get some steak and she made eye contact with Gem.

She knew.

They couldn’t let anyone know that they knew, but they knew.

The conversation went on, apparently ‘Pearl’ was a prisoner here. Gem didn’t even try stop ‘Pearl’ as she ran out of the building. Gem stayed in the building until there was a birthday party, she went and gave some diamonds as a gift.

It was all going fine until tnt started falling from the sky, Gem didn’t get killed but the explosings brought out something in her. She wanted to kill, it didn’t matter who, she just needed to kill someone.

Bdubs, Scar and her walked back to their base, ignoring whatever death messages appeared in chat. Gem didn’t need to know. “Oh Cleo, how long have you been red?” Scar suddenly asked.

“Red?” Gem asked, what did he mean with red.

“yeah those are two red eyes if I’ve ever seen them. Oh this is great this means that you can kill people” Bdubds said. Gem didn’t know why but that made her happy, she wanted to kill. She wanted to kill Etho.

“Where is Etho?” Gem asked, “Okay, mom is back! He’s probably at his tower” Scar said “Take me to him” Gem said, Scar started leading the way while Gem followed “Wait no don’t kill dad.

They arrived at a tower, Etho was at this tower. Gem spotted him and started attacking. Every hit felt better then the last one, she had a smile on her face as she hit him one final time before his body disappeared.

Gem looked at the death message, she had killed someone. She turned back around and without saying a word walked back to her base. No not her base, Cleo’s base. Bdubs and Scar followed her, she walked inside and said “I’m tired I’m going to bed”

Scar and Bdubs let her, not saying a word. In the silence it didn’t take her long to fall asleep.

Doc opened his eyes. He didn't know when he had closed them, but he was happy that he had fallen asleep. He stood up and walked to his living room, he expected to see Gem still asleep on his couch.

But she wasn’t there.

It was still early, all the other mornings that she had stayed at his house she had still been asleep by the time Doc had walked downstairs. Doc looked around his house, she wasn’t there. He sent her a message asking her where she was.

He heard her communicator go off, it was on the coffee table. Doc knew that it was probably nothing but he got worried, Gem wouldn’t just leave her communicator if she was going somewhere.

Doc send a message to Xisuma.

Docm77: Hey it’s probably nothing but could you look where Gem is? She slept over at my house but now she's gone and she left her communicator behind.

It only took a few seconds for Xisuma to respond, it worried Doc. It was early in the morning, Xisuma should be asleep. But that didn’t worry him as much as Xisuma’s response.

Xisumavoid: I’m coming over, my computer can’t find her. It’s giving me the same response as it does with all the missing hermits.

Doc started to panic, how could Gem have disappeared? He sat down on his couch and waited for Xisuma to arrive which didn’t take long. “Doc, what happened?” Xisuma asked. “I- I don’t know, I went to bed yesterday night, she was laying on my couch. This morning I got out of bed and now she’s gone”

“That sounds like how the other hermits disappear when they go to the games, but she isn’t a part of them. Why would she get taken now? The games have been going on for a while” Xisuma said.

“How do we get her back, she can’t stay there” Doc said. “I- I don’t know” Xisuma admitted. “So she’s stuck there?” Doc asked, she couldn’t just be stuck there like all the others right? This wasn’t something normal, this hadn’t happened before.

“I’m gonna text the other admin, see if any of his players have disappeared too” Xisuma said as he took his communicator out. Doc was lost in thought just thinking about what could have happened to Gem.

He hoped that she was taken to the same place where the others were, she would at least be safe there.

After a while Xisuma returned “One of his players is gone too, but she has been in the games before. He also doesn’t know why they have been taken this late” Xisuma said. Doc waited the rest of the day.

Xisuma left after a little while, but Doc stayed on his couch not taking his eyes off the spot where Gem had been. The place where she had disappeared from. He stayed there, he refused to fall asleep.

It was the next day now and Doc was still staring at the spot, until Gem just appeared. It looked like she had just respawned after a death. Doc shook her awake, Gem opened her eyes and looked terrified “He’s gonna hurt me, he’s gonna kill all of us” Gem said.

“Woah calm down Gem” Doc said “Who’s gonna kill us, do you remember where you were?” Doc asked. Gem looked at him for a few seconds, scanning his face “Yes- no, I went to a dark room. There was a creature there, he told me that I had to sub for someone who couldn’t make the session” Gem started explaining.

Doc quickly send a message to Xisuma about Gem being back before he turned his attention back to Gem “I don’t remember anything about the game, but I know that I was there” Gem said.

She explained the exact thing to Xisuma when he arrived. She described the person to Xisuma and Doc, they were horrified by what she was telling them. A few days later the others started returning.

Bdubs, Tango, Scar, Cleo, Grian, Etho, Pearl and Impulse. But none of them remembered what had happened this time. Xisuma texted his admin friend but none of the people on his server remembered the game either.

Had there been no winner?

Doc didn’t know anything about these games, but he did know that this game had been different.

Chapter Text

Xisuma was walking around the server, it was almost the ending for this season and Xisuma wanted to take all of the beautiful buildings in. He walked to the shopping area, it was strangely empty.

He took out his communicator, was there some kind of event going on or something? It was afternoon so there should be people in the shopping district, there were always people here. He sent a message in chat.

Xisumavoid: where is everyone? The whole shopping distinct is empty

Docm77: Empty, the shopping district? Those words do not go together.

Rendog: I think everyone is dead, there is no other explanation.

Xisuma laughed at that, but then he remembered another reason why people could be gone. “Not this again right?” Xisuma thought he went home, his thoughts kept telling him that it was happening again.

He got home and took a seat behind his computer, he typed in a name and took a deep breath before pressing enter. He closed his eyes, too scared to see the truth. After a few seconds he opened them.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma cursed, it had happened again. He still hadn’t found a way to stop this from happening, so he messaged Fwhip. He hated to be the one to tell him this, he hated to be the one to have to tell the other hermits about this.

Xisumavoid: It’s happening again

By now Fwhip knew what that meant, it was basically the only thing that they talked about anyway. He saw that Fwhip had responded but ignored it, he opened the main chat instead.

Xisumavoid: Emergency meeting, it’s happening again.

He flew over to spawn, by now he didn’t even have to think about where to go. His body knew the way, his thoughts were somewhere else while he flew.

The last game had been bad, Gem and one of Fwhip’s players had been brought into the game after it had started. They reappeared as soon as they had disappeared, just like the other hermits without any memory of what had happened.

But Gem had remembered meeting some creature, a creature that was covered in eyes. Xisuma had no idea what it was, but whatever it was it must have been terrifying. Gem had nightmares about it for months.

After the last game hermits had started to reappear, but none of them remembered a thing. Neither did anyone on Fhwip’s server. This meant that nobody had any idea of what had happened.

Xisuma landed at spawn and took a seat, everyone already knew what this was about. Hermits started arriving, they looked at him but didn’t say anything. Their faces asked the question, Xisuma nodded.

He could see there faces go over to concern because of his simple nod.

Just like every other time Xisuma started the meeting half an hour after he had arrived. He told the hermits that it had happened again and did a headcount, but more people were missing now.

Grian, Scar, Pearl, Cleo, Tango, Impulse, Etho and Bdubs had disappeared just like last time. But Gem and Mumbo were also gone now. Ren was still here, while he had been gone the last few times.

“It looks like the games have taken someone new, Gem” Xisuma announced. “Doc you were paired up with Gem the last few times this happened. But Ren didn’t get taken this time, are you okay with being paired up with him now?” Xisuma asked.

Doc nodded, he had felt guilty when Gem had disappeared last game. Nobody blamed him for it but he did blame himself. “Stay with your buddy and if they disappear, notify me immediately” Xisuma said.

It wasn’t a comment towards Doc, it was just to make sure people stayed with their buddy. The hermits split up and Xisuma went home with Keralis, he sat behind his computer and did his little routine.

Geminitay

No player under this name was found.

She was really gone, she was now part of the game too. Xisuma had hoped that she had just gone to empires without telling anyone, but this message proved that she was really gone.

He searched for all the other hermits too but he kept getting that same message, just like all the other times it had happened.

No player under this name was found.

Xisuma stood up and walked to his living room where Keralis was laying on his couch. Xisuma laid down next to him and checked his communicator, he should probably reply to Fwhip.

Fwhip: Just checked, four of my players are gone. Lizzie is gone now too, what about Gem and Pearl are they on hermitcraft?

Xisumavoid: Both are gone, I think that Gem is part of the games now too. Did anyone new get added from your server?

Fwhip: Lizzie but she has been in a game before. Besides her, the same people who disappeared last time disappeared now.

Xisuma had met some of the rulers from empire, they had gone over to empires a while ago. Xisuma had talked with a former winner Scot, but nothing had come out of the conversation. Scot had known as much about the games as Grian or Pearl.

He had given up, he had spent countless nights trying to stop the games somehow. He had searched websites and asked whoever he could ask. He researched the games, the winners, the kidnapping and the creature that Gem had described.

But he hadn’t found anything.

Now he really felt useless, he just lay on the couch next to Keralis. It didn’t take long before Xisuma’s eyes closed and he fell asleep. He slept bad while his hermits were gone so he every minute of sleep was welcome.

Days passed, weeks passed and nothing happened.

Nothing happened until Xisuma woke up to a message from Doc.

Doc: I can’t find Ren, I think it’s happening again.

The message woke up Xisuma up very quickly, he got out of bed and ran outside. He was still in his pajamas but he didn’t care, it couldn’t happen again. Xisuma flew over to Doc’s base, he arrived in record time.

“What do you mean he’s gone?” Xisuma asked, there was no time for a hello, how are you. This couldn’t be happening again, Ren was done. Ren was free.

“I’m sorry, I- he was here one second and then he fell asleep. I literally watched him disappear, he just- he’s gone” Doc said, he had tears in the corners of his eyes. Xisuma hugged him, trying to calm him down.

“It’s okay, it’s all gonna be okay. We’ll get him back just like we got everyone else back” Xisuma said. He led Doc over to his couch and the two sat down “I’m the worst buddy ever, both of my buddy’s are now in the game” Doc said.

“You’re not the worst buddy ever, you’re a great buddy. You are the one who noticed that Gem and now Ren were gone, and you messaged me immediately just like you should. There is nothing you could have done to stop this from happening” Xisuma said.

He stayed with Doc for the rest of the day, he messaged the rest of the hermits asking if one of them might have disappeared. Fortunately the only person missing was Ren, Xisuma couldn’t lose any more people to these ‘games’

At the end of the day Xisuma was still there, he decided to stay over. He didn’t want to leave Doc in the state that he was in now. Xisuma knew Doc, Doc saw the other hermits as his family. And now two members of his family had disappeared in his base.

Doc and Xisuma sat on the couch, waiting for Ren to return.

Just like with Gem, Ren returned the next morning. He just spawned in, before Xisuma could do or say anything Doc had Ren wrapped in his arms. Ren woke up and looked around in a panic, his eyes landed on Doc and he relaxed slightly.

“I’m back” Ren said silently.

“Yeah you’re back and I’m gonna make sure you never leave again” Doc said, he hugged Ren even tighter. Xisuma knew that Doc wouldn’t be able to keep his promise, but he could hope.

“Ren, I’m sorry to interrupt this moment but do you know what happened?” Xisuma asked. “I- I was back in the games. I don’t remember why or how or even what happened but this weird creature told me to be someone else and to not tell anyone that I was Ren” Ren said.

“The same thing happened to Gem, did this creature have eyes all around it’s body?” Xisuma asked. Ren nodded “It was really weird” Xisuma didn’t know what this creature was but he was done with it.

He stood up “Ren are you feeling okay, nothing weird?”

“I’m fine, just tired” Ren answered “Doc, stay with Ren take care of him. I’m gonna find out what these creatures are” Xisuma said before leaving.

He flew back home and got back behind his computer, if anyone knew anything about these creatures it would be his brother. He didn’t want to ask him, their relation had been a bit rocky. But he didn’t see another option, he needed to know who these creatures are.

He needed to know how to stop these creatures.

Xisumavoid: What do you know about creatures with eyes all over their body?

He waited and stared at his screen, waiting for his brother to respond. After an hour his message had been seen. Xisuma’s heart started beating faster when evilXisuma started typing.

EvilXisuma: Why would I tell you anything about them? And why in the world would you need to know anything about them?

Xisumavoid: Some of my players have a little run in with them. Plus you own me, just tell me what you know.

EvilXisuma: Fine, I don’t know much about them but they are called watchers. They are powerful creatures, if one of your hermits made one of them angry he’s in trouble. Watchers always get their revenge, a while ago they even destroyed a full server of people.

Xisumavoid: Is that all you know

EvilXisuma: This is all that I have heard about them

Xisumavoid: Thank you

Xisuma put his communicator away again, after all this time he finally had something. He didn’t know how much this would help him but he had something to do. The next few days he spent searching for anything about the watchers.

He found a drawing of what they were supposed to look like, it looked exactly how Ren and Gem had described them. Xisuma searched and searched, but he couldn’t find any information about watchers kidnapping players to put them in games.

EvilXisuma had been right though, watchers did like getting their revenge.

The website was full with ways to avoid the watcher, ways to escape them. There were also a few people who worship the watchers, weird people. Xisuma searched and searched but no one ever talked about stopping the watchers.

Xisuma was behind his computer again when he got a message from Fwhip.

Fwhip: One of my players has returned

Xisumavoid: That’s early

Fwhip: It’s not ,she’s been there for at least a month.

A month, a month had gone by? When did a month go by? Xisuma checked the date, Fwhip had been right a month had gone by. Xisuma stood up, he had been glued to his computer for god knows how long.

He took a shower and when he got out he saw that he had gotten another message from Fwhip and a message had been sent to the groupschat.

Fhwip: Another player has returned.

Cubfan: Mumbo’s back

Xisuma left his base, he flew over to Mumbo’s base. It didn’t take long before he arrived, he knew by know that Mumbo wouldn’t remember anything. But Xisuma just had to see him with his own eyes.

“Again?” Mumbo asked as he saw Xisuma walk into his room. “I thought that I was done, why did I have to go back” Mumbo said, Xisuma couldn’t imagine what it was like for the hermits who didn’t remember a thing.

One night they would just go to bed and then when they woke up months had gone by.

Xisuma knew that some of the hermits had gotten scared of falling asleep thanks to these games. He didn’t know how to help them, he wished that he could promise them that everything would be alright.

But everything wouldn’t be alright.

They could disappear at any time, it was a terrifying thought. Xisuma stayed with Mumbo for a little while, Cub was staying in Scar and Grian’s base waiting for them to return. Xisuma didn’t have enough hermits for all of them to be waiting at a base.

Mumbo didn’t remember a thing, but he did know that he was exhausted. Xisuma sat next to him on the bed while Mumbo went to sleep, Mumbo was using Xisuma’s lap as a pillow. Xisuma didn’t mind, it was reassurance that he was still there.

Back on empires things weren’t as good, Fwhip had gone to Lizzie’s after one of her villagers had told him that she had returned. The last time Lizzie had been part of the games Fwhip had gone to her base to see her passing around.

This time she was still in bed, just staring up at her ceiling. “Lizzie?” Fwhip asked, she looked like how he had found Scott when he had won. But Lizzie wasn’t smiling, tears were streaming down her face.

“The void, the void Fwhip” Lizzie said

Fwhip took a seat on Lizzie’s bed, he put his hand on her forehead. She must be delusional or something, Fwhip hoped that it was from a fever and not from something worse. She didn’t have a fever but she turned to look at him.

“Hi Lizzie, are you okay?” Fwhip asked.

“Will you come to my sleepover?” Lizzie asked her voice barely above a whisper “Uhm sure” Fwhip answered, Lizzie shot up and hugged him “Nobody came to my sleepover” Lizzie said, she started sobbing. Fwhip just held her, waiting for her to calm down.

She ended up falling asleep hugging him, when she woke back up she didn’t remember what she had been talking about. She felt fine, at least she said that she felt fine. Fwhip asked Lady Katherine to stay with Lizzie while he went to the next person who had returned.

Jimmy.

Fwhip flew over to his base and entered it without knocking. Jimmy just like Lizzie was laying in bed, but he wasn’t crying he was smiling. “Hey Jim, are you okay?” Fwhip asked. “The curse is broken” Jimmy said.

“What do you mean? What curse?” Fhwip asked, but Jimmy just repeated his sentence “The curse is broken, the curse is broken”

Fhwip threw water in his face, he didn’t know what to do with Jimmy. He wasn’t responding and he didn’t react to anything that Fwhip did or said. The water seemed to help, Jimmy shut up.

“Jimmy?” Fwhip asked

“Fwhip? Why are you here did- did it happen again” Jimmy asked, Fwhip smiled he was glad that Jimmy was back to his normal self. Jimmy just like Lizzie didn’t remember anything.

Fwhip sent a message to Xisuma, maybe his players were having the same reactions.

Fwhip: My players are acting weird, they are acting normal again now. Is this happening with your players too?

Xisuma had just come from Bdubs base when he got the message from Fwhip, he didn’t know what he was talking about. Every hermit was acting the same way they always did when they returned. That is exactly what Xisuma responded.

He flew over to Gem’s base, she had just come back, according to Doc. Xisuma flew inside through a window and walked to Gem’s bedroom. She was sitting up and saw Xisuma walk into the room.

“I’m part of it now, aren’t I?” She asked, Xisuma nodded.

He stayed with Gem for a little bit but soon got a notification about Pearl having returned. He went over to her house and went over all the hermits, the only person missing now was Scar. Did that mean that he was the winner, or was there no winner again.

Xisuma flew over to Scar’s base after making sure that Pearl was alright. Xisuma waited next to Scar’s bed, he waited and he waited. But Scar didn’t return, until he did. But he didn’t show up in his bed.

GoodtimeswithScar had joined the game.

Xisuma flew over to spawn, that is where he saw Scar. “Scar! How are you here? What happened?” Xisuma asked. Scar stood there staring in front of him, staring at nothing. “Scar?” Xisuma asked.

Scar finally looked over at him “I- I won” Scar said.

Xisuma took Scar to his base and got him into bed, Scar looked exhausted. He was covered in wounds and was dirty, it was different from every other person who had returned. No other player had returned hurt, they had all woken up looking the way they had looked before they had disappeared. Scar fell asleep almost immediately.

When he woke up he explained what had happened to Xisuma. There was a game and every week they would get a task that they had to do within a day. If you succeed at a task you got prizes. But if you didn’t succeed your task you would be punished.

In this game you apparently didn’t get any heart back if you lost them. Scar didn’t tell Xisuma a lot but Xisuma was starting to understand why Scar looked like that. But what he didn’t understand was how the injuries had been brought back to hermitcraft, Scar had a theory.

“Because I didn’t die”

Chapter Text

Almost a year had gone by since the last game, Xisuma was exactly starting to believe that it was over. Everything was great, they had started a new server and they had invited two new hermits. The season had started and everyone started on making their bases.

Xisuma thought that it was the change in servers, that the watchers couldn’t get his hermits from here. But he was proven wrong in October of 2024, when his players started to disappear again.

Just like every other time it had started out like a normal day, until someone noticed that something was wrong. Until someone noticed that something was missing, someone was missing.

And from there they would discover that multiple people were missing and that another game had started. Another period of worrying about their friends safety started.

This time it was Zedaph who realised that people were missing, he had flown over to magic mountain and seen nobody there. None of the seven people were there, Zedaph even looked inside their buildings. But the whole place was abandoned.

Zedaph had texted Xisuma about it, who immediately dropped what he was doing and got behind his computer. “No, no we were done with this. This is not happening again” He mumbled as he turned his computer on.

He typed in a name, his fingers doing it without him even having to think about it. Grian, he searched.

No player under this name was found.

GoodtimeswithScar

No player under this name was found.

“So this is happening again, it isn’t over” Xisuma thought, he thought that he was done with the watchers. That all of this was over, that his players had been punished enough. But clearly it wasn’t over.

Xisuma stood up and sent a message into the group chat. He got some responses that summarized his thoughts perfectly. Just like him the other hermits were done with this, they had even started searching for a solution themself.

Everyone knew why they were at the emergency meeting, everyone was looking around for their friends, hoping that they weren’t taken this time. After Gem had been taken last time people knew that there was a change that they would be taken too.

Xisuma looked around and held his usual speech, buddy up and don’t leave each other's sides. And if you know something or if someone disappears to tell him.

It looked like no one new was added, Joel was already in the games and Skizz was too according to the previous winners. Both of them had been there before, they had never returned to hermitcraft afterwards though.

Xisuma went home and searched for the hermits on his computer just like he did every time. He knew that it was probably just a waste of time, but he couldn’t not do it. What if he did find something, he had to try something.

But this time just like all the other times he got the same message.

No player under this name was found.

“It’s okay shawamy, you’ll find them one day” Keralis said from next to him. Xisuma was thankful for Keralis, he didn’t know what he would do if Keralis would also be taken into one of these ‘games’

“thank you, Keralis” Xisuma replied, Xisuma spent the rest of the day searching for information over the watchers. He had searched for them before many times actually, but it was the only thing he could do to make himself useful.

After a few weeks, Xisuma got a message Mumbo had returned. Xisuma flew to him base, he sat with Mumbo for a while and even stayed the night. Every time that Mumbo returned he hoped that it was his last time in a game.

But every time that he was taken into one of these games again he was proven wrong. It broke Xisuma’s heart to see the disappointment in his face every time he returned. A few days later Xisuma woke up to a message from Zedaph.

Zedaph: Skizz is back too

Xisuma went over to Skizz, the man had been confused at first. But this hadn’t been his first time that this happened. This was just the first time that he had someone telling him how much time had passed.

“When it first happened I thought that I was going crazy, after the first few games I told Impulse. I thought that he was going to call me crazy, but instead he told me that it was happening to him too” Skizz explained.

Xisuma listened while Skizz told him the whole story, he hadn’t even thought about the people who aren’t in big servers. The people who went to bed one night and woke up months later without even realizing it.

“Hey Skizz, do you remember the fourth game?” Xisuma asked, the fourth game the one that no one seemed to remember.

“The one before this? No, Scar won that one didn’t he?” Skizz asked. Xisuma looked at him confused “Skizz in how many games have you been?” Xisuma asked.

“Uhm, five counting the one that I just returned from” Skizz replied. “There have been six, counting this one. The first one, won by Grian. The second one, won by Scot. The third one, won by Pearl-” Xisuma started but Skizz interrupted him.

“Wait, when did Pearl win a season?”

“The third time, and then the fourth time we don’t know who won. I thought that maybe you won that one. Last game, the fifth one was won by Scar” Xisuma explained.

“I guess I wasn’t in one, but no I don’t remember any of the games” Skizz said. “Must be someone else who isn’t in hermitcraft or empires” Xisuma said, he didn’t know the winner from the fourth game, but he hoped that that person had someone with them when they respawned.

If their respawn was as bad as Grian’s or Pearl’s, Xisuma didn’t want to think about someone waking up like that all alone.

Days passed but nobody returned, one day Xisuma woke up. He walked to where Skizz had been sleeping, but he wasn’t there. Xisuma looked all around the house, but he couldn’t find Skizz.

He flew home after making sure that Skizz really wasn’t at his base. He walked to his computer and typed in his name, Skizzleman

No player under this name was found.

How was that possible, he had returned why had he disappeared again. Xisuma got his communicator out and texted Cub who was with Mumbo.

Xisumavoid: Hey Cub, is Mumbo still with you?

Cubfan: I was about to message you about that, he’s kinda gone.

Xisuma typed Mumbo’s name into his computer, he took a deep breath before he pressed enter. But the truth was undeniable when the message popped up again.

No player under this name was found.

Xisumavoid: I was afraid of this, Skizz is gone too. It looks like both of them have been returned to the game for whatever reason.

Cubfan: How is that possible?

Xisumavoid: I don’t know, but I don’t think we really know anything about these games. New things keep happening, we have to be prepared for everything.

There was nothing Xisuma could do to get Skizz or Mumbo back, he hated not being able to do anything. Xisuma returned to Skizzes base, waiting for him to return. Xisuma sent a message to Fwhip about the whole situation.

But none of Fwhips players had returned yet, there was no one to disappear after appearing again in empires. All of those players were still in the game.

Xisuma’s eyes had closed, he hadn’t been sleeping well these past few days. But he couldn’t let himself fall asleep, not while Skizz and Mumbo were still gone. Not while another player could return, not when that player could disappear again. But Xisuma almost lost the battle against sleep, but he got new energy when Skizz returned.

He was right in front of Xisuma, sleeping peacefully. It felt like the past twenty four hours hadn’t even happened. Like Skizz had never disappeared for a second time. Xisuma messaged Cub, Mumbo was also back.

Xisuma looked at Skizz for a while before he fully fell asleep, his exhaustion taking over. It wasn’t until sixteen hours later that Xisuma woke up again. He opened his eyes and Skizz was gone again, panic rised in Xisuma’s chest.

He got up and walked downstairs, Skizz was there cooking something. Skizz looked over at Xisuma “Hey X, did you sleep well? You looked like you needed the sleep so I didn’t wake you up”

Skizz looked okay “Skizz you- you were gone again” Xisuma said. Skizz stopped what he was doing “What do you mean gone again?” Skizz asked, chuckling nervously “You- you disappeared again, you were gone for all of yesterday, do you not remember a single thing?” Xisuma asked.

“I- No, I fell asleep here and woke back up here” Skizz said.

“That is weird, when Gem or Ren were brought back to the games they talked with a watcher before they entered the game. The only thing that they remember is their conversation with the watcher” Xisuma explained, confused. Why had he been brought back into the game? Why didn't he have a conversation with the watchers.

“What’s a watcher?” Skizz asked

“It’s a creature, Gem and Ren both interacted with it when they were taken into the game for a day. I think that the watchers are the ones who are taking you all to those games, but I don’t know how to stop them” Xisuma admitted defeated. He hated that he didn't know how to stop the watchers and save his players.

Xisuma stayed with Skizz for a while longer but days after he had disappeared for a second time, Skizz disappeared for a third time. Cub informed Xisuma that Mumbo had disappeared again too.

Things got even weirder when other hermits started appearing. It all started out as normal Xisuma got a message about someone returning, Scar this time. Xisuma went over to his base and quickly got a message about Impulse returning.

He went over to their bases, to make sure that they were okay like he did every time. But this time wasn't like other times, a few minutes after Impulse had returned he disappeared again. He hadn’t even been asleep at that point, he was sitting up and then just fell forward and disappeared.

Impulse hadn’t been the only one, Scar had also disappeared again. Xisuma got a message from Fwhip, the players that had reappeared were disappearing again too.

Other people started returning, Gem, Etho and Bdubs. But all three of them only stayed for a couple on minutes before disappearing again. It was driving Xisuma crazy, he tried to get to the hermits before they disappeared again.

This kept happening until everyone returned out of nowhere.

Everyone was texting Xisuma, he had no idea where to go. Everyone was back, everyone except one person.

Joel.

Joel hadn’t returned yet, Xisuma went over to Joel’s base and waited for him. It didn’t take too much longer before Joel too returned. He sat up in bed, Xisuma didn’t know what to say. But he didn’t have to say anything as Joel started celebrating.

“I won, I blooming won” Joel said, a big smile on his face. “Joel” Xisuma said as he put his hands on Joel’s shoulders “Could you please explain what happened?” Xisuma said, desperate for answers.

“We spawned at this place and we had six lives, once a week for a day a wildcard would be active. The wildcard would do something, like like the first time we could become really big or small. I teamed up with Gem and I became the last Green and the last yellow and then eventually I was the last red” Joel said, sounding proud.

Xisuma was just happy that Joel didn't have a traumatic experience like Grian or Pearl did. Even though it was kinda disturbing to see someone happy to win. But that didn't matter at the moment, Joel was okay so it was time for some answers.

Joel's explanation hadn't been much of an explanation “Joel people started disappearing and appearing again here, do you know why?” Xisuma asked.

“Yes, I think so. One of the wildcards gave us superpowers. Mumbo and Skizz were already gone, but Cleo’s power was to resurrect them. The last wildcard was all wildcards and people kept resurrecting the death. That included every person who died during that session” Joel said, he was smiling but his smile disappeared "I- we had to fight the people that just died. We had to fight people who we had just killed. Bu- but I won, I won" his smile returned, but Xisuma could see that the games had broken him too.

“I won, I won fairly. I have to go to Gem, she’s gonna be so happy” Joel said, he got out of bed but Xisuma blocked his path.

“She won’t remember anything” Xisuma said, Joel stopped moving his smile disapearing once again “I won, but nobody remembers that I won”

“Yeah” Xisuma said, Joel sat down on his bed, he started explaining more of the game in detail. He talked about all the wild cards and about how people died. Xisuma listened to him, until Joel fell asleep.

Xisuma told the basics of the game to Fwhip and the other hermits. Xisuma hoped that this was the last time that something like this would happen, but he doubted it.

Chapter Text

Xisuma walked through Gem's base, a bowl of soup in his hands. Poor Gem had been sick for at least a week now and it didn't seem like she was getting better. The woman claimed that she was feeling better but her voice still sounded awful. Xisuma wanted to hug her every time she spoke.

And so after a week Xisuma decided that it was time for him to bring her some soup, hoping that it would help her. He'd sent her a message that he was coming but he'd gotten no response, there was a big chance that she was just sleeping though.

Every person that Gem had spoken to in the past few days had told her to rest, maybe she had finally listened. 

Xisuma arrived at her base and used his foot to knock on the door. "Gem, It's Xisuma. I brought you some soup" he called out, no response came but Xisuma had expected that much. He waited for the door to open but it didn't, he kicked the door again a bit louder this time in case Gem just hadn't heard. 

No response.

After a third time Xisuma gave up, he placed the bowl on the ground and flew up into the air. He flew in through a window, looking around the dark room for Gem. She wasn't there, he kept walking through the house calling out Gem's name. Eventually there was one room left, the living room. So that is where Xisuma went. 

In the living room it was clear that someone sick had been living there, but there was no sight of the sick woman herself. The couch had at least three blankets draped over it, wrappers of medicine and cough drops lay spread over the ground and table, mugs with tea bags lay over the table and the tv was still on some random movie. 

A chair was placed next to the couch, a communicator on the little side table next to it. But it wasn't Gem's communicator, it was Impulses. But he wasn't there either. The house looked abandoned, Xisuma took out his own communicator, a sense of dread came over him, he quickly messaged the rest.

Xisumavoid: Has anyone seen Gem or Impulse? 

Responses came quickly, but the responses that came weren't the ones that Xisuma had been hoping for. Nobody had seen them. But there also seemed to be a lack of responses, especially from Gem's neighbours. If anyone could have seen them it would have been them, and yet none of them had answered. 

Not Grian, not Skizz, not Joel, not Tango. 

The only magic mountain person that responded was Mumbo, but he hadn't seen Gem or Impulse either. The names of the people who hadn't answered scared Xisuma, he walked out of Gem's house and fired some rockets, speeding off back towards his own base. Soup long forgotten.

When he arrived he immediately walked towards his computer, turning it on and opening his searching program. He typed in the first name, took a deep breath and did a little prayed before he hit enter. 

No player under this name was found. 

The dreaded message came and Xisuma could just feel tears in his eyes at the frustration and fear. Once again it was happening, once again his hermits had gone missing. Xisuma typed in every name of every hermit and soon discovered that it were Gem, Impulse, Tango, Skizz, Ren, Bdubs, Etho, Cleo, Pearl, Grian, Scar and Joel were all gone. 

At least nobody new was taken, at least Mumbo didn't have to go through one of the 'games' again. But twelve of his players were gone, twelve of his players were taken once again. Xisuma wondered how long it would take before any of them would snap because of the games. 

It was only the winners that remembered anything that had happened, but that didn't mean that the others weren't affected by everything that had happened. They'd wake up and be scared that time had passed, they were horrified by the things that they had heard about these 'games'. Every day they would be scared that they would just be taken. 

Take into another one of these 'games'.

It was still worse for most of the winners though, even the ones that were happy to win were traumatised. Joel had seen most of his friends die before they returned as zombies to kill him, that alone had given him plenty of nightmares. There were times that someone would playfully hit Joel only to cause the man to have a panic attack. He would actually fear getting murdered by his friends. 

Scott, one of the empire's people had been happy to win too, it had looked like he was fine at first. But later it turned out that he wasn't fine at all. He'd be scared that others would kill him, every time someone would die he would immediately be there to check that they would really be back. He saw friendly pvp battles as wars. 

Years had passed since then, most of the winners from the first few games had recovered enough. But every time they got sent back it was a huge setback. 

Empires had ended, people had split up. Despite this Xisuma was still in contact with Fwhip, even though he wasn't the admin of his players anymore he was still there for them. At the moment he wasn't in a server with anyone else, but Xisuma still informed him of what was happening. 

He also messaged friends of the people that were usually in the 'games'. Most people were aware of what happened, Xisuma and Fwhip had reached out to as many people as they could in their search for someone who could help. At the moment nobody knew what to do yet. 

Xisuma messaged Lizzie, praying for her that she wasn't dragged into another one of these games. As far as he knew she was on a server with Jimmy and Scott. They had always been taken to these games, Xisuma could only assume that this time wasn't an exception. Xisuma's fingers flew over the screen as he typed a message.

This news was awful and Xisuma knew that the second he hit send he would know whether or not she was in there too.

Xisumavoid: Hey Lizzie, hope you're doing well. I won't cut around it, I think another game is going on. I'm missing some of the people that are usually involved. Mumbo is still here but the rest is gone. 

Ldshadowlady: Not another one, I'd really hoped that it was over. I'm missing three people, Scott, Jimmy and Martyn. 

Xisumavoid: Martyn?

Ldshadowlady: Martyn in the little wood, ever heard of him?

Xisumavoid: No, maybe this will be his first game. Another person added. I've never heard of him but maybe one of the others would recognise him once they return.

Xisuma and Lizzie chatted for a bit, mostly trying to calm each other. But Lizzie soon had to leave to inform the rest of her server of what had happened. Xisuma placed his communicator back on the table, he stared at the screen of his computer. The words were still there 'no player under this name was found' a sigh left him.

He got up soon after that and called a meeting of his own. The hermits already knew what was going on by now, Xisuma barely had to explain anything. Really the meetings that were kept were just to see who were taken. Duo's were made before the group split up again, Xisuma could practically feel the worry in the air. 

Keralis placed a hand on Xisuma's back as Xisuma stood there. He was still standing in the place where he had told the others what had happened. He had been staring at the others as they left, watching the place in front of him get emptier and emptier until only he and Keralis were left. 

"Let's go home" Kerlalis said before they left. 

If you asked Mumbo what the weirdest thing that ever happened to him was, he would choose for the thing that happened today. Today he had woken up in some sort of pyramid, he'd hit his head against a stone ceiling. Not exactly what he had been expecting from that morning. 

He didn't recognize the place that he was and soon realized that he wasn't himself at all. Once he started paying attention to his surroundings he noticed the smell of fire. His hand went over to rub his aching head while he looked around for the fire. 

The second his hand hit his hand he realized where the fire was.

At first he panicked, running around the room screaming his head off. "Tango? What's going on?" a voice from somewhere suddenly came. Tango? Mumbo looked down at his clothes, that- that definitely wasn't his normal suit. Was he… Oh no!

Oh, no, no, no, no.

Not again. 

Mumbo looked at the ladder on the opposite side of the room "Buddy? Are you okay?" Impulse asked, Impulse with sparkling green eyes instead of his brown ones. Mumbo wanted to let himself fall to his knees and scream, but he didn't, he couldn't. Instead he slowly nodded "Yeah, of course I'm okay. Why wouldn't I be okay?" He asked with a smile that he hoped was convincing. 

"Well I heard you scream" Impulse said, looking around the room. The man was holding an iron sword, it looked like they were still early in the season. Mumbo had heard of people getting added to a day of the 'game' after the second time that it happened Xisuma gave quite the speech about it.

"Maybe I was screaming out of joy" Mumbo said, shrugging and walking down a ladder. The ladder led to a space that was filled with wheat for some reason, Mumbo walked out of the door. He froze and slowly turned around at the heat radiating from behind him. Lava. 

Lava everywhere!

Had they already been pranked? Why would anyone do that? And what was wrong with the world? "Yeah, weird right? Everything changed overnight, the world apparently is going to keep doing that" Ren said from behind Mumbo, Mumbo nodded not really knowing what to say to that. What did he even mean? 

Mumbo soon figured out what it meant, there were a lot of things missing. Mumbo tried to ignore it, all he had to do was stay alive. If he just did that he would be fine, the next morning he was going to wake up in his own bed again. Mumbo let out a sigh, he couldn't wait until he was back in hermitcraft. 

During the day Mumbo toured around the world, the very weird world with interesting buildings. Some buildings were made out of strange materials, there was this big hole over at the villie's base. Or maybe it was the willy's or the silly's. Mumbo didn't know anymore, he'd heard almost every combination possible. 

Mumbo soon realized that it wasn't just the buildings that were looking weird. There was something wrong with some people too. Bdubs looked less happy, his usual smile was gone. Joel was looking a bit green in the face. Pearl was emo for some reason. Scar had a man bun which looked surprisingly good on him. Jimmy was a knockoff captain America and Scott wore some sort of cat onesie. 

As Mumbo said, weird. 

But he ignored all of it and acted like everything was normal. According to Xisuma the watchers wanted you to act like the person, so that was what Mumbo was going to do. Or well he was going to try at least. During this 'game' the boogeyman curse was back, a curse that Mumbo had been having nightmares about. 

Mumbo didn't remeber the boogeyman curse, he would have to win this 'game' for that. But he had heard the winners talking about, heard the nightmares they had. Thank void Mumbo didn't end up being the boogeyman, that meant that he didn't need to kill anyone. But it did mean that he wasn't safe from someone else coming towards him and killing him instead. 

Mumbo was going to try and keep Tango alive, wherever the man was. In Xisuma's speech he mentioned that they didn't know what happened to the actual person. Not even the winners of the seasons knew what happened. As far as they knew nothing had happened to them, they only realized that something had been off when the games were already done. 

At first Mumbo tried to just do whatever Tango would do, but he soon realized that he had no idea what Tango would do. He walked around the server, sat in some random hot tub. During his time in the hot tub Jimmy kept sending him weird glances. At one point he suddenly said "That aint Tango" 

Mumbo froze at that, already mumbling excuses. The others in the room looked at Jimmy as if he'd gone inside, that seemed like a good thing at least. But Jimmy kept insisting that he was not Tango, no matter what Mumbo said. Eventually he left the man, not wanting him to say anything to anyone else. 

At the moment it looked like it was just Jimmy that was suspicious, that was bad enough. Stupid Jimmy and his love for real Tango. After almost getting caught Mumbo decided to go into the mines, at least there no one could be suspicious about him. But down in the mines he soon realized that he wasn't alone, Grian was there too. 

No harm in just talking to the man, right? Maybe he could tell Grian that he wasn't Tango, or no- he shouldn't tell him, but maybe he could show him in a different way. That wouldn't break the watchers rules, he would be fine. "Hey Grian" Mumbo said, he digged into two stones and smiled "I think I hid my diamonds right here" 

Once he said it he looked over his shoulder with a grin, looking at Grian's reaction to the diamonds that he had hidden there. Grian stared at it, his eyes went wide. The man started looking between the diamonds and Mumbo before he shook his head "It's not the same, it's not you. It's not you" Grian said before turning around with his back towards Mumbo. 

He started mining into another direction away from Mumbo. 

Had he not realized what was going on? Wasn't he happy to see him? "Grian-" Mumbo began, but Grian shook his head again and just kept going. He started talking about getting diamonds instead, hitting the rocks in front of him over and over again like some sort of machine. 

Mumbo ran in front of the man to try and get his attention but it seemed like Grian didn't realize. His pickaxe went straight through him, straight through his heart. A single scream left Mumbo before he fell and respawned in Tango's bed. A sigh left him and soon Impulse and Ren came running towards him asking him what happened. 

But Mumbo ignored it and just lay down, he wanted nothing more than to wake back up in his own bed. 

Soon Mumbo fell asleep, ready to wake up back in hermitcraft. But that wasn't what happened. Instead he woke up in a black, black room, all alone. He stood up and immediately took a few steps back when he saw what was in front of him. A creature completely black with eyes all over their body…

A watcher. 

According to Xisuma both Gem and Ren had seen one when they had been transported to the games. They hadn't come to Mumbo yet, until now. "Mumbo Jumbo" the person said, the voice seemed to be coming from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. 

Mumbo didn't get too much time to think about the voice though as he was suddenly lifted into the air. "After that speech that your admin gave over us I thought that everything was clear. When you're in the game as someone else, you can not tell anyone else. And yet you did" They said, their grip on Mumbo tightened. 

They weren't holding him with their hands, but it still felt like their nails were digging into Mumbo's body. "Two players noticed" they said, pain started exploding through Mumbo's whole body. It felt like he was burning and freezing at the same time. "I'm gonna give you one more chance, and you better not mess this one up" 

"Do you understand?" they asked, their voice was now going through Mumbo's skull. It brought him pain just listening to it, tears started streaming out of his eyes. "Do you understand?" the watcher asked, Mumbo nodded as best as he could. 

He was dropped to the floor, he stayed there for a while just listening to his own breathing and trying to calm down his beating heart. When he looked back up the watcher was gone and Mumbo was all alone. He stayed in that dark room for a while, but he had no idea how long he was actually there. 

All he knew was that he fell asleep and when he woke up he wasn't in the black void room anymore. Instead he was in a building made out of weird materials, he looked around the room. Mumbo forced himself to stand up, he'd been there before, in that building. It was the base of the rejects. 

Mumbo looked down at his clothes, trying to figure out who he was. But if he was being honest he had no idea, he didn't recognize the outfit he was wearing. Mumbo walked up to the roof where he found the rest of the rejects, Jimmy, Bigb and Skizz. But no Joel. 

"Morning Joel" Jimmy said, looking over the edge of the roof. "We uhm seemed to have moved to some sort of cliff. It's like the world wants us to die" he joked, Mumbo didn't pay attention to what he was saying. All he had really heard was the first word, Joel. That must be who he was. 

"Morning my fellow rejects because I am definitely a reject" Mumbo said, this time nobody could know that he wasn't actually him. Today he wasn't Mumbo, he was Joel. "Hey, you sound taller today" Skizz said, Mumbo chuckled awkwardly "What?" he asked, already panicking internally. 

"We're on a cliff dude, look at how high we are in the sky" Skizz said, motioning around them. Only then did Mumbo actually look around and see that he was right. They were really high up in the sky "How has this happened?" he asked, taking a few steps away from the edge. 

Today he was going to have to do better, he wasn't going to get Joel killed. Soon that dreaded message appeared 'The boogeyman is about to be chosen' Mumbo held his breath as the countdown began. Not the boogeyman, a sigh of relief left Mumbo. It seemed like his friends also weren't boogeymen, at least if they were speaking the truth. 

The day went by in a blur and even though he did die in a fight with Scott and lost all of Joel's armor the day went fine. Most importantly nobody seemed to realize that he wasn't Joel. 

That night Mumbo went to bed more scared than he ever felt. Here in the game he was surrounded by his friends, he was surrounded by people that cared for him. Even if they didn't know that it was him. They might want to kill him, but they were all friends. If he fell asleep he wouldn't know where he woke up, or as whom.

All Mumbo could do was hope, hope that he would wake up in his own body. 

And luckily this time he was right. 

When he opened his eyes he immediately saw Xisuma, Keralis and Zedaph. The three of them were sitting around him, Xisuma and Keralis on chairs next to his bed and Zedaph on the end of his bed. The man had fallen asleep, his head was leaning against the wall behind him in a way that didn't look too comfortable. 

A smile appeared on Mumbo's face nonetheless. 

He was back on hermitcraft, he was home where it was safe. He wasn't in that dark room anymore, he wasn't in the 'game' anymore. "Mumbo" Xisuma exclaimed, immediately hugging him. Soon Keralis joined the hug and when they woke Zedaph up, he too wrapped his arms around him. Apparently he had been gone for three weeks. 

Mumbo explained that he had been dragged into the game to play as Tango and later as someone else. He didn't remember anything from the sessions themselves but the watcher had made it pretty clear. Back in the actual world Zedaph, his buddy for whenever one of these things was going on, had noticed that he was gone. 

After he noticed, he immediately notified Xisuma. They had been really worried about him after he didn't return. The two had been waiting for him this whole time, wondering what might have happened. Mumbo wasn't sure if he wanted to know what exactly had happened, the things that he did remember scared him enough.

It didn't take long before the rest started returning too, it all started with Tango. The man came back and just like every other time didn't know what had happened. Xisuma was used to this by now, all of them were. It was now just a matter of time before the rest would come back too. 

After Tango, it actually took a few more weeks before the next person returned. Ren, and a few days later Pearl. After that it started going really fast, Etho, Joel, Skizz, Bdubs, Scar, Impulse, Cleo, Gem and eventually Grian. Xisuma tried to get to all of them, making sure that every single person had someone there with them before he left to go to the next.

But once Gem came in Xisuma almost immediately sped up to Grian. He remembered the last time Grian won, it wasn't pretty. Xisuma flew into Grian's base, right into his bedroom. The man was already sitting up in bed, Mumbo stood next to him. "Xisuma" Grian began, Xisuma tried to speak but found that he was out of breath.

"You good man?" Grian asked, Xisuma nodded. He took in Grian's appearance, he wasn't crying like last time, he actually seemed fine. "Did-" breath "You win?" Xisuma asked, basically breathing the words out. Grian slowly shook his head "It must have been someone else" Mumbo noted. 

Xisuma nodded "All the hermits have returned, it must be someone in Lizzie's new world. Wait" he said, pulling out his phone to ask. What he found was not only the answer as to who had 'won' this game, but also who won the fourth. 

Lizzie hurried from house to house, trying to find the missing and see if they returned. She had been anxiously waiting for a while now, and a lot of hermits had already returned. But none of her people had returned yet, that was until she came to Scott's house in Meriport.

There he was, peacefully sleeping in bed. Lizzie wondered if he had 'won' again, but when he returned and questioned why she was there she knew that he hadn't. This was the first time that Lizzie had to go around searching for her people, the first time she had to inform them of what had happened. 

The first time it had just been Joel who went missing and neither of them knew what had happened. The second time she had joined him, the third and fourth time it was on Fwhip to tell everyone. The fifth and sixth time Lizzie had also been gone. But now she had her own world, now it was on her.

When she opened this world she had known that this was a possibility, she knew that this could have happened. She just hoped that it wouldn't, that her server was actually safe. The past few weeks had been hard on her, she spent her time worrying, waiting and trying to keep the others sane. 

But now, after all that waiting, her people were returning. 

After Scott, Jimmy returned. He too had no idea what had happened, Lizzie knew that that meant that there was only one person left who it could have been. Martyn. Lizzie sped over to his house, not bothering knocking on his door as she walked in. 

Martyn was already awake when Lizzie entered his bedroom, the man sat up in bed. He was looking around, looking confused, his eyes met Lizzie's. "Mar-" Lizzie began, but she wasn't able to finish her sentence. "Echoes ripple" the man started, his voice deep and a bit scary. Lizzie froze in place, she opened her mouth to say something but the man continued. 

"Counting more. Ancients lurking, by our door. Refute their reach. Let not in one or feel our wrath. Our will be don't underestimate connection, fractured, parallels, imperfections, threads entangled bind you all. Seek not to see and heed our call" then he trailed off, his eyes never leaving Lizzie's. 

For a few seconds the room was completely silent. 

And then those seconds ended. 

"M-martyn, are you okay?" Lizzie asked carefully, she barely understood the words that the man had said, wondered if they meant anything at all. Maybe winning had driven Martyn mad. Slowly Martyn nodded "I won Lizzie, I won the game" he said, his voice back to normal. Lizzie nodded "Again" Martyn added, making Lizzie forget what she was about to say.

"W-wait, what do you mean? What do you mean again?" She asked, Martyn finally looked away from her. He stared at his hands as he talked "I've been through this a few times now, I never know when it's about to happen but this wasn't the first time. I don't remember any of these things, the first three times that it happened I was convinced that I was going mad" 

"But then the fourth time came around and I- I remembered. I remembered because I won" Martyn said, Lizzie was shocked. She pulled out her phone and quickly messaged Xisuma, figuring that the man would appreciate this information. "Tell me about this time and that fourth time that you spoke about" she said, pulling a chair close.

It sounded like they were gonna be here for a while.

"The fourth game was… something. Instead of lives like we had this time we had twenty four hours to live. Every episode we had a boogeyman, that means that we have to kill someone. You see these games we have to kill everyone unt-" Martyn said but Lizzie shook her head "I know, I know Martyn. Joel has gone through this every single time, I've gone through it myself too" 

Martyn looked at her with big eyes "Wait, you have?" He aksed, Lizzie nodded. She took a deep breath to try and calm herself down "Yes, unfortunately, I was there the second, fifth and sixth game. I'm not sure what's worse, being here on the outside having no idea what's going on in there. Or waking up here having no idea what happened the past few months she said.

"I've never been on the outside of one of these things" Martyn said, he started telling more about these 'games'. He told Lizzie about everything that happened during the fourth game, about the chaos that had happened, about how Grian, Cleo and pearl had gotten sick during it. 

Lizzie remembered only one thing about the fourth 'game', the fact that she had been in it for one full week. She didn't remember anything about that game, but she remembered the watchers. With some of the hermits, mainly Gem, she had figured out that she had been 'playing' as someone else. 

Martyn kept talking, telling about the last three people. He talked about how he had killed both Impulse and Scott, he talked about how bad his bloodlust had been. After this he started telling them about this new 'game' the game everyone just came from. 

A game where they were brought back to the past and every single week were brought further back to the present. Martyn talked about the boogey curse, about a kill that took eight lives, at one point he talked about Tango's death. He apparently had been killed three times in a row, first by anvils falling out of the sky, then he withered away and eventually he was hit by lightning.

Nobody knew what was going on at first, but it apparently had been because he hadn't killed anyone as the boogey. It was a punishment, torture. Martyn talked more, telling Lizzie about every single death until the last one, his. As he talked Lizzie informed Xisuma, typing as fast as she could. 

Eventually Martyn stopped talking and Lizzie asked "What did the words mean you said when you came in? Did they have to do something with the game?" 

When Maryn didn't respond Lizzie looked up from her phone, the man was staring at her with a questioning look on his face. "What are you talking about?" he asked, Lizzie placed her phone down. "The random words you said when I came in here? Something about Echoes rippling?" she asked, but Martyn just shook his head. 

He really didn't know what she was talking about.

Lizzie sent everything to Xisuma, maybe the words meant something. Lizzie hoped so, Lizzie hoped that they could somehow be used to get everyone out. Eventually Jimmy and Scott came over with questions, Maryn started answering but Lizzie couldn't help but notice how he wasn't telling them everything. Maybe it was better that way.

With what felt like a heavy weight Lizzie made her way out, she messaged Joel to come over. The man did, not even ten minutes later they were cuddling in her house. "How can we make this stop Joel? I don't want to go through this again, I don't want to see you go through this again" she said, a tear slipping out of her eyes.

Joel caught the tear and wiped it away before pressing a kiss to her forehead "It's gonna be okay, we'll figure out a way to make this stop. Come on, nobody can control us for long" He said, Lizzie leaned in more against him. She knew that she should be with the others, but she needed this. 

Lizzie wondered why she hadn't been taken this time, she wondered how this 'game' worked exactly. But she was glad that she hadn't been taken, she had been a bit busy during this particular game.