Monday, November 5, 2012

Part 23: Land of the Big Scary Caves

In the morning, there were scary shuffling sounds on the roof of the Horse Mahal, so when I broke the glass, I ran extra-far to escape the ravening hordes that massed on the roof.

Apparently, the ravening hordes consisted of a single bluebird.  Maybe it was a particularly ill-tempered bluebird?

That bluebird does seem to have its eye on Boxter, though.


 I retrieved Boxter, and we set out into the wilderness again, slipping and skidding on the snow.  There were relatively few animals about this morning.

Flowers, snow, and waterfalls.  And best of all, hardly a tree.



In fact, the first animals we saw (other than the bluebirds) was another horse party.  These looked like they were having fun - two minihorses splashed in the water while a full-size horse shuffled about on the shore.  And somehow, one of the minihorses had ended up high on a floating island.  Was this a pegasus-perpetrated prank?  If so, the pegasus had cackled and flown away, leaving the minihorse to stay up on the floating island or else take a pixel-raising plunge into the deep water below.

The work of the mythical pegasus?

I was running low on pork chops after my series of bear encounters and ceiling encounters yesterday, so when we came upon a peaceful plain, I dismounted and proceeded to wreak carnage with my sword.

Doomed.  All doomed.  Muahahaaa

One of the cows attempted to hide behind Boxter, but didn't quite blend in.  And fortunately, Boxter seemed pretty calm about the whole thing, placidly remaining put while I did my scary lion impression.

Yes, cow.  I see you.

Racing across an expanse of open water, we came across this scene.  Evidently, one shark had spawned above the ice, and one had spawned below it.  Things seemed to have worked out better for the below-the-ice shark.
I didn't bother to collect the shark teeth.  Evidently, they're completely useless in this version of Mo'Creatures.


 I started scoping out caves as possible shelters - compared to pens, pits, and cliffside hollows, things seem to work out best on average when we stop for the night in a cave.  Boxter has finally drilled this lesson into me.

This shot was taken when we stopped to admire an impressive gravel-floored cave, and a lion nearly got us.


I have another shot of the lion MUCH closer, but mostly hidden by the bow I'd raised apparently in self-defense, hoping to, I don't know, distract the lion or something.  Since I can't shoot a bow from horseback.

Later, we found an even mightier cave - based on majesty alone, I might have been tempted to attempt to stop there for the night.  It was so pretty... but the floor was partially water-covered (danger of sharks from below), and the top of the cave was too large to close up in a reasonable amount of time (danger of creepers etc falling from above), and the back of the cave held unknown scary depths (danger, very much danger). 

Oooooo.... how very mysterious

The matter was decided when a bear took up residence.  Definitely too scary.

Annnd bear.  I'm out.

We found a slightly smaller cave, but it was still much too deep and scary and wide-mouthed.

Dark and scary.

This cave was so large and scary that nearby horses were already fleeing in terror.

Run away!

And this cave, though temptingly containing iron and coal, was slightly smaller but still scary and looked difficult to secure.

Containing iron and coal, but still dark and scary.

Finally, as sunset was nearing and I became increasingly desperate, we came across a shallow rabbit-hole of a cave, barely skimming below the surface.  It would have to do.

There was a bit of difficulty when Boxter took for the hills while I dismounted to ready a haystack for him.  But I eventually chased him down, rode him as far into the cave as I could before we got stuck (half a block), and slapped a haystack on him.

The Goldilocks cave.

Then I proceeded to start laying glass blocks to seal up the opening.  It was starting to get dark, and I was acutely aware of the depths of the unexplored cave behind me, so I sort of shoved the glass blocks anywhere at random until this spot at least was no longer scary.  It probably ended up looking something like a modern art museum.

Hey, at least it's zombie-proof.

I found a spot where the cave skimmed up above the surface again, and I made it into a skylight.  I might regret this later in the night.

I'll just have to try not to look up through the skylight in the middle of the night.

The back of the cave turned out not to be too scary after all.

Annnnd.... safe!

Proceeding back toward the front of the cave, I found Boxter where I had left him when I'd put a Spell of Haystack on him: bouncing.  It seems if he gets the haystack when he's midbounce, he'll continue to bounce incessantly all night.  As if the haystack not only freezes his position but also his energy state: excited versus ground state.  Tonight apparently I had an excited-state Boxter.

And I couldn't help but feel sorry - he was bouncing in such a way that every bounce slammed his horsey head into the dirt.

Bounce splutch bounce splutch bounce splutch


Splutch.

I took a few moments to clear the dirt away, somehow miraculously managing not to hit him with my shovel or end up on his back.

bounce bounce bounce

Well, that was better, anyways.

A bit more dignified.

Next I determined to roast the pork chops I'd collected during the day, only to find that - due to having built the Horse Mahal lasts night - I was actually so short on cobblestone that I couldn't even make a stove.

Yes, that's right.  I mined for cobblestone.

Oh, look!  Cobblestone!  Hooray!

Boxter continued bouncing till morning.

Bounce bounce bounce



2 comments:

  1. So. Do you think anyone else in all of the blogosphere uses tags of "horse interband transitions," "horse phosphorescence", and so on?
    As usual, I enjoyed the tale

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  2. It would appear that someone else has used the phrase "horse phosphorescence", since there's a thoroughbred horse named Phosphorescence. But if you google it, you will find that I'm the only one on the entire internet who's used the exact phrase "Horse interband transitions". I feel proud.

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