Part 16: A lesson in humility, and a killing spree

Boxter and I survived the night without mishap in the very-safe cave he and his horse sense had picked out for us.

The morning, however?  Lots of mishap.

The trouble started with a dangerous bit of overconfidence on my part.  You see, I had been spending a bit of time messing about with terrain generation in Minecraft (BiomeTerrainMod woo!), and since my goal was mainly to see how the terrain had come out, I consequently spent time exploring the newly-generated worlds with the difficulty set on "easy".  Yes, you're right.  It made me soft. 

Result: The urge suddenly took me to do another leg of my journey northward in search of the fabled Pegasus, and to do the journey right away.  I knew I should wait to restart my computer since it had been lagging quite a bit, and maybe do a practice day in some non-essential saved game just to remember what caution feels like.  But, although it had been more than a week since my last leg of the journey, I found that I didn't want to start on the journey after rebooting and practicing - I wanted to start now.

I started up Minecraft.  I started the save game.  I appeared in the cave with Boxter.  Hello, Boxter, yes, yes, and look, it's morning, so I'll just break away a bit of the ceiling so I can exit the cave - hmm, I faintly remember that roaring sound from somewhere.  Ah, yes, a lion.  Hello, lion, and let's see, I'll just get out my bow and - oops, not a cobblestone block, a bow, and - oops, fumble fumble AAAAA

The lion jumped at me, and, as I fumbled for my sword, killed me in a few swift bites.

I only got one picture during the pitifully brief battle:

I think this is an extreme closeup of the lion devouring me.

Respawn.  Huh.

I decided this day didn't count.  I blamed lag, I blamed my own unpreparedness, but in the end I really just didn't want it to be over already.  I restored from the backup that I had made approximately a minute earlier.

Hello, Boxter.  Strange, um, dream just now, eh?

Boxter just stared at me.  He knew.  He probably remembered everything, and was standing there  dumbfounded at the extreme ineptitude of the human he was traveling with.

I in turn had begun to fully realize the magnitude of my own lack of skill, and to become worried about the depleted state of my supplies, and of my armor.  I had maybe two porkchops left.  An empty bowl that used to contain mushroom stew.  A pair of metal shoes, and a dented metal hat.  And about fifty zillion blocks of cobblestone.

I decided to take a day to resupply.  I gave Boxter a haystack to keep him calm and content throughout the day and most importantly to keep him from investigating the ceiling too closely (the last haystack had worn off when I opened my game, even though I hadn't ridden him). 

Boxter settled down to recite six-digit primes or whatever it is he does all day, and I crept, very cautiously this time, to the entrance and began to clear my way out.

Block.

Blockblock.

Peeeeek

There was nothing outside.  I carefully bricked up the entrance to the cave (no posh windows this time, Boxter, apologies) and marked it with a cobblestone pillar.

 

Boink.

Then, I drew my sword.

I killed a pig.

Hey, pig.

I killed a boar.

Evilevil boars.  They bite back.  Tisnae natural, I tell ye!

I killed another pig.

That's the other entrance to the cave, the one that Boxter found yesterday.

I killed a tree-cow.

Muahahaaa you cannot escape so easily

I killed a valley full of cows.

Party's over.

All this I did while running in tight circles around the cave where Boxter was, because I was terrified of losing track of the cave.  I lose track of things easily, especially in thick forests with no distinguishing landmarks, and I could all too well imagine wandering in increasingly desperate and misguided loops around the countryside forever, if I ever lost sight of the cave.

At one point I did a panicked double-take, upon catching sight of this:

Aaa!  Boxter!

Did Boxter break the Spell of Haystack and go wandering around the countryside?  Would I spend the rest of the afternoon chasing him down and attempting to convince him to go back in the cave?  Do haystacks not work anymore?

Closer inspection revealed that it was in fact an unrelated dark brown horse.  I stood watching the horse for a while, hoping to see it do something wise or profound or helpful.

Note the lack of frantic concern over creepers and spooky cows, or the need to pursue a rather-illogical single-minded northward quest.

The horse merely chilled contentedly in the shade of a birch tree.  I stood watching the horse for a while before concluding that its particular brand of wisdom wasn't particularly suited to helping me in my pegasus quest.



I resumed killing things.

For example, this lion, which I saw at a distance and promptly filled full of arrows because I am afraid of lions now.

Danger!

Finally I ran not out of things to kill, but out of daylight, and retreated (after a few moments' panic when I was convinced I'd lost track of the cave after all) to safety for the night.

Hurryhurry brickbrickbrick