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The tale of Sisyphus. The Greek myth of a man who was punished to eternally roll a boulder up a steep hill, only for it to roll back down once he gets closer to the top.
“Mweeeehhhh…”
“Come out, you little bastard. Don't hide away from me!”
It has been a long while since Bastard had touched a ray of sunshine since she went to the Nether dimension. Her eyes, now appearing soulless and unusually bloodshot from the lack of rest she had been missing since the start of her mission, dart around the fog of the valley as she desperately searches for any hostile ghasts that might appear in her line of sight.
A few Minecraft days ago, Bastard told the crew that she would be scouting in the Nether for a bit in search of a valuable item. A special music disc, pristine as polished marble, marveled for its upbeat melody and insane obtainability. Unfortunately, getting this object is no easy task since the only way you can get it is by bombing a ghast—a common beast in the Nether known for soaring through the hot ashes of the Nether sky—with its own fireball.
Bastard already knew this fact but took the challenge anyway. The thought of earning the rare disc with her own hands was too satisfying to pass up…
So, she embarked on her journey through the harsh environment of the Nether, and she slowly traversed through the heavy fog of the basalt deltas and the high hills of the soul sand valleys. Each biome she set her foot on would have a ghast wandering along the skies, and she would try to get its attention and swing her sword at the right moment to get the ghast to fall. However, things didn't go to plan, and she ended up failing several times.
By each ghast she passed through, the more her insanity started to drop. Like Sisyphus, she had been trying her best to roll up her own boulder without expecting any end or rest. To her, getting her hands on that music disc went from a mission with a burning passion to an indescribable feeling of eternal torture. But her heart still did not give in.
This leads us to the present, where she cautiously inspects the skies for any incoming fireballs, alert for the position of the ghast that she is currently ‘hearing’ at the moment.
‘I swear I heard a ghast! Where is it!? Where is it!?’
However, the ghast still did not react, and Bastard started to grow more impatient. Opposite of what emotions she felt during the start of her journey, she dreams of going back home to her beloved castle. Compared to the polluted winds of the nether, the sweet scent of cornflowers was rich with comfort and happiness.
Though harboring these feelings would only weaken her will and determination. If she accepts defeat right now, she will walk back to the community center empty-handed. This was her seventh attempt. Failing to kill this ghast properly would mean her failure on her mission entirely.
“HRRREEAAAHHHHHH!”
And her final chance begins now.
Bastard immediately moves to the side and dodges the incoming fireball. She looks westwards to the direction from which the fireball was supposedly shot and immediately starts running towards it.
By then, the unspotted ghast releases two more fireballs and launches them straight to Bastard’s head, but she immediately reacts and charges straight to a blind spot where the ghast cannot see her. Both fireballs miss and instead hit the hot, crimson netherrack and explode everything near it into flamy bits.
Bastard peeks through her cover and finally sees the ghast she's been finding for so long, slowly inching closer to her location. She takes advantage of this and makes a run for it. Soon, more fireballs start blocking her way, but she simply dodges them, blowing up the undisturbed quartz veins behind her into a shower of experience points.
“I’m not letting you get away!”
Now, the current situation has both opponents locking eyes with each other. One is waiting for the other to attack, planning to counterattack. Bastard sprints closer and unsheathes Caliburn, her enchanted sword, from her waistline and makes a stance to deflect the approaching attack.
“KWEHHHHH!”
The angered ghast immediately unleashes a fire charge straight at Bastard. Any normal player would have obviously dodged this attack whenever they're not ready to face such a sudden attack, but not Bastard. She grips Caliburn tightly and, with all her strength, parries the fireball straight to the ghast.
“Take this!”
“Mmmmmrrrrr…”
But despite the close distance, the ghast evaded the attack to the side, and the fireball was launched back into the thick fog behind it.
The foul beast launched volley after volley, as Bastard charges through despite the chaos, her armor scratched but her concentration unbothered.
Bastard prepares to counterattack once more, her legs stiff and disciplined as if she were a warrior focused on battle. The battle isn't over yet. If one of them has to fall, it's going to be the wicked ghast that has been haunting her mental state for the rest of the mission. And so, the duel continues.
“Fwoooshhhhh!”
The ghast shoots a fireball once more. Bastard’s pupils burn a bright crimson flare, reflecting the fireball’s glow as it swiftly approaches her position. Bastard attempts to bounce the fireball back to the ghast that's aggressively shooting through the heavy fog and swings Caliburn with maximum centripetal force.
BOOM!
“Urgh.”
But the ghast’s fireball did not directly aim at Bastard. No, it was more precisely firing at the ground next to her.
Bastard takes cover from a nearby hill and tends to recover the health that she lost from the earlier blast. Despite wearing a full set of enchanted diamond armor, such protection isn't completely immune to the element of fire. Her face was decorated with multiple light scratches and a few serious abrasions. Blood was also dripping out of her trembling hands, partially evaporating from the fire that was still latched onto her aching body.
The pain of battle surged through her bones, but the boost of adrenaline kept her going. After all, she has experienced pain far worse than this . She grabs a bundle of cooked porkchops from her inventory and munches on a few pieces to regain her strength.
Sooner than expected, she feels a lot better than before, just a few moments ago. The wounds on her cheek and forehead magically closed up, and the burn marks around her body were essentially reversed, returning to their original form as if nothing had happened to her skin at all.
After regaining her strength, Bastard picks up Caliburn again and begins to physically prepare herself to face the ghast again. She peeks around her cover to analyze the situation ahead.
‘Goddamnit, it’s getting away!’
The ghast, who had just blasted her off the battlefield just a minute ago, had turned its back away from the direction Bastard initially fought against it and was fleeing away into the fog ahead.
Bastard had to think of a solution fast, or the ghast would fly away out of range, and all this hunting would be for nothing. She readied her ankles and properly tightened the buckle of her diamond boots. And before you know it, she was sprinting through the wastelands with all of her might. If this was her last run, she was going to give it her all.
She spots the ghast flying to the summit of a giant nether hill, but getting there would require her to get around a vast lava ocean to even reach the location. Therefore, she was currently dashing to the best of her stamina to get to the area in time. Despite the heavy armor, her speed continued to accelerate, using her hardened determination as fuel for her drive.
Many unexpected variables tried to stop her from getting to the hill. A group of piglins–another common inhabitant of the Nether dimension–spotted Bastard and attempted to fight her back. Their gold-plated chestplates made their presence a lot more intimidating as they started to load their crossbows with their sharp, flint-tipped arrows, but Bastard didn’t care. Her mind only cared for one thing and only one, and it’s to kill that stupid ghast and snatch herself the disc she’s been striving for so long.
“Twang!” “Twang!” “Twang!”
But now with the presence of the piglins, it only made her goal of getting near the ghast much harder. One, two, three… No, a barrage of arrows was swiftly fired in the direction of where Bastard was currently spotted.
“HAGHHHHH!”
Her legs felt numb, but she continued to bolt through the shores of the lava oceans with focus, and by sheer luck, none of the arrows were able to hit her, and instead sank to the deep bottom of the lava ocean to melt.
She eventually reaches the hill in time and begins climbing up to the summit. She reaches for her bundle of porkchops again and chomps up a piece to regain the stamina from her extremely tiring marathon. Still, even after regenerating lost hunger and energy, her legs still feel like they’re going to fall off eventually.
‘Damn it.’
Compared to her other attempts at killing a ghast, she had gotten close to beating it this time. She was not going to let the enemy get away, and she was not going to go home with her time and sleep wasted.
She sees the piglins from earlier trying to chase her up the hill, but what flooded the hill below was a herd of zoglins–the piglin’s counterpart. Their presence, much to the piglins’ disgust, was able to cut off their pursuit, and they were sent off running.
Bastard smirked as she looked at this. She stares at the top to see the ghastly creature quite literally above her. Now, it’s just her and the beast once again. She strengthens her resolve, grips Caliburn once more, and glares at the ghast with burning rage.
And like Sisyphus, despite the struggle, she continues to push her boulder closer and closer to the top.
“RAHHHH! I’m over here, you rascal!”
“KWEEEHHHH!”
The ghast recognizes the familiar figure and immediately shoots more fireballs in response. Bastard charges to the top of the hill while each of the ghast’s fireballs continues to miss, narrowly missing her every time by a few blocks. Though with each passing fireball, the blast range continues to inch closer to Bastard’s behind. Finally, Bastard reaches the summit, and the ghast predictably launches another fireball directly into her.
This time, Bastard did not try to deflect but instead rolled over to the side and used her shield to block the blast damage. She knew that she wouldn’t have enough time to deflect the attack, so she evaded it instead and moved to a more secure position where she could parry the fireball easily.
“Fwooooshhh!”
The ghast prepares for another attack, and Bastard, too, gets ready to counterattack. She burrowed her hand into the bundle again to snack on more pork, and she regained her stamina once more. She was ready. Whatever will happen next, she will be ready to face it with courage and eventually get her reward. She will be able to finally rest her boulder on the top of the slope and get her well-deserved rest.
“Mmmmrrrrrr…” “Fwoooooshh!”
But when the fireball was successfully launched to her location, she didn’t act to launch it back. All she did was evade the fireball and watch the ghast’s figure in disgust. Why didn’t she attack at the right time? Did something cross her mind while she was dueling with it?
All those questions could be answered by just one look at the scene Bastard was currently viewing with her own two eyes.
“HRRREEAHHHHHH!”
“What the f*ck?”
The ghast, who was just up in the sky a few moments ago, was now fully submerged in the lava ocean she crossed from earlier. Bastard, seeing this, would have to be careful, because if she killed the ghast while it's bathing in the lava, she wouldn't be able to retrieve the disc, and it would instead burn to a crisp in the lava.
‘Oh, come on. Why are you hiding in the dang ocean!? Come over here, you coward!’
So, she decided to switch up her strategy; she would try to make the ghast appear out of the lava and try to lure the ghast into the nether wastelands, where it would be safe to drop the disc. She raises up her shield as she carefully approaches the lava ocean with caution.
“HRRREEEAAAAAHHHHH!”
“There you are!”
The ghast quickly springs into action and launches a fireball through the lava. Bastard easily blocks the attack and tries to lure it out of the vast ocean in front of her.
“Come on, come on. Get over here!”
The ghast continues to charge in a few more fireballs, but Bastard stays determined and swiftly evades the attacks with ease.
Eventually, the ghast soars high up in the air and out of the lava and starts to move closer to Bastard’s location.
“Yes, that's it!”
It was working. She baited the ghast out of the lava ocean and will now be able to engage it in an area that is rather safe to fight on. With hope shining again once more, Bastard’s confidence boosts to an all-time high. She attempts to climb up the hill again, hoping to finish the battle that she's been struggling to end for the time spent.
But as the tale has foretold, once you roll your boulder to the top, it is expected that you will eventually roll back down.
“Fwooooshhhh!”
“What!?”
As Bastard didn't waste a second focusing on running to the top, she forgot to parry the incoming fireball in time. The projectile crashes directly into Caliburn’s sharp blade, slicing the fireball in half, and an incredible amount of energy begins to launch Bastard many blocks up in the air before dropping her straight into the lava ocean where the ghast was hiding earlier.
As Bastard slowly accelerates into the lava beneath, she glared fiercely at the ghast’s silhouette slowly fading into the fog as she tried to regain her composure from the damage. She believed in herself that she had the advantage and had the situation under control, but she had let herself forget the risks that followed too easily, that this quest was not something to be taken lightly.
Throughout her journey, she finally understands that getting this rare music disc is not a simple task, as for the past few Minecraft days–if she ever kept count, even if she did her very best in subduing these ghasts all over and over again, she still wouldn't be able to kill the ghast with the method it requires. Was it because she wasn't skilled enough? Or maybe because she didn't try her best to make it happen?
Negative thoughts flow through Bastard’s mind as it continues to emotionally drain her sanity. Her mental state is on its last reserves, and the fatigue gathering in her head gives her the feeling that if she stalls the fight for any longer, she's probably going to lose herself.
“Ooooohhhhhh.”
But was giving up an option? She had placed all this effort into killing this one ghast, and now she's going to let the run end here?
Written in the Greek tale, every time Sisyphus nears the top with all his strength, the boulder will eventually roll back down. But despite his futile efforts, he still chooses to continue pushing anyway. An excellent example of the sunk-cost fallacy, but you have to admit—his determination, driven by his desire to succeed and get back to the realm of the living, is indeed admirable.
The myth mirrors Bastard and her situation. She believes her odds of getting the music disc were extremely low, but she wasn’t going to give up yet. Not when she had spent all of her time painstakingly playing cat-and-mouse for her reward. She’ll try to continue fighting, even when the risk doesn’t justify the price.
Well, why can’t she just withdraw now and do it another time? She has every reason to take a break, and she definitely didn’t need to push further for it.
Only if she were still mentally and emotionally stable, she’d probably decide to quit now and try again next time. But after everything she’s been through since the start of her quest, it’s clear that she is not willing to let it go…
As long as she isn’t left empty-handed. As long as it makes all the time she spent worthwhile.
Those thoughts are the reason why getting out of the sunk-cost fallacy is not easy. There’s no one to tell her that, unfortunately.
The best we could hope for as the readers is if Bastard can win this battle, even if she doesn’t understand that continuing won’t do her any good.
After all, this whole ghast-killing, nether-loathing journey has led her to this moment.
And as her body plunges into the lava, the ghast could only watch from afar, silently mocking her and her futile efforts to obliterate it. After watching her body get fully consumed by the lava, it turns in the opposite direction and attempts to fly away from the chaos.
Meanwhile, around the scene of the lava, a flask with glowing orange liquid emerges out of the highly viscous lava, exploding its contents throughout its blast range. Soon, a figure raises their melting arm out of the magma—its form eventually reversed back to normal as they continue to walk towards the rocky, gravelly shores.
“I'm… not letting you get away like last time.”
The unidentified figure shakes the cooling lava out of her enchanted diamond sword and effortlessly resheathes it into her scabbard.
‘Heh. Thanks for the potions, Aqua,’ the fire resistance potions that she borrowed from Aqua the Dealer proved to be very useful in her recovery, as she was able to get out of the lava without getting any major injuries.
She remembered the look Aqua gave her. Not amused. Not cocky.
Silent. Like they knew she'd need them.
She makes a smug face as she looks at her unaffected body, the potion’s effect of fire resistance protecting her from the burning heat of the nether.
Now, with an incredible buff backing her up, Bastard swims into safe ground unharmed and readies herself for a third engagement.
‘Ugh. I’m not finished yet.’
After a moment's rest, she scales up the hill once more. Her shaking palms gripped through the scorching netherrack slope with any remaining ounce of energy she had left.
The more she climbed, the more the landscape ahead started to reveal itself, and there appeared the figure of the ghast from earlier, slowly disappearing into the fog. So close, yet so far. All she needs is a little boost of energy, and she would be able to—just barely—get closer and continue the fight.
Clack, clack, clack…
Her footing starts to become steady; the sound of her diamond boots rattles as her speed gradually increases the closer she gets to closing the distance. There was no time to replenish the energy spent. If she looks away even for a second, she’ll lose sight of the ghast, and everything will all be for nothing.
“Cough, cough… tch!”
But she was starting to reach her limit. Her lungs start to grow sore from all the cardio she’s been doing in this one heck of an environment. Her insides feel like they’re burning, possibly from all the smoke and ash her body has been accumulating over time.
Clack, clack—chk!
In the next moment, she halted her march forward. Her feet didn’t move a single inch for a few seconds. Her eyes, which were once fixated on the enemy, began to shift her sight somewhere else. Why did she stop in her tracks? Was something in the way again from killing it for the umpteenth time? Or did she finally decide to stop fighting and go home?
No, it’s not any of those. She’s only just getting started.
“Mmmrrrrrrr…”
Meanwhile, the ghast, oblivious to the situation happening from afar, manages to flee away from what’s left of the battlefield.
It peacefully floats into a desolate space of the nether wastelands, an area full of piglins and zoglins, and rests in a small lava pool to cool down after everything that has happened previously.
And the ghast just sits there, letting its guard down like it had never had a conflict to begin with in the first place. Of course, this was a fatal mistake. It gives the hunter a fighting chance to catch their ignorant prey. To others, it was like a clueless rabbit hopping in the forest as a hawk silently watches over it.
SWISH!
A strange glowing orb emerges from heavy fog and lands in the ghast’s line of vision. From the spot where the peculiar object had reached, a light purple smoke quickly splashed through the area, and a silhouette of a certain someone came into view.
“HHRREEEEEAHHHHHHH!”
“Fwoooooooshhhhhhh!”
The hawk expands its claws once again
The frightened ghast attempts to launch a powerful fireball attack at the figure, but they are immediately able to evade the attack, hitting a group of armed piglins from afar and killing them. It tries to float back up, but a heavy force pulls its body back into the ground. It turns to see Bastard, holding it down using her fishing rod, Rodrick Baitman, and prepares to counterattack with her sword.
No matter how hard the ghast tried to resist, Bastard would always react back and drag it closer. A high-stakes tug-of-war game is in the making. Their only option would be to launch another fire charge and try to break free from the struggle, but this is exactly what Bastard wants.
“Fwooooooooshhhhhh!”
A powerful surge of energy gathers up inside their maws and generates another fireball, directly aiming at Bastard’s face. She immediately takes action to deflect it, but just like last time,