(Chapter 1)

The gentle breeze blows by with the sound of the ocean crashing against the cliff. The grass swayed gently with the wind. Grian laid dormant on the ground, too tired to want to move. His eyes opened halfway as he gazed at his empty surroundings. There wasn't anyone around, at least as far as he could see. He knew he had to keep going, he had to get up. The underlying problem that restricted him, however, was the mental and physical toll that travelling between 3 dimensions entails. He struggled to get up at first, but he was able to settle on his knees. Grian looked around his surroundings, he was placed near the edge of a cliff, with some trees behind him. The builder shakily got to his feet and although exhausted, began to hastily explore the area. It would be best if he could find out if this world spawn was on an island or not and he preferred if it wasn't. And as if the universe hates him, of course it was an island. Grian had already explored the entire island and it was barely midday, eventually deciding to go back to the spawn area. He wasn't expecting anything new, and it was certainly a surprise to see what looked to be a nether portal where he woke up just a couple of hours ago. He kept his distance, just in case whoever came out of the portal wasn't exactly the nicest person.

He waited.

And waited.

And eventually someone came out.

They wore armor and a helmet that obscured their face. They stepped out of the portal frame as they held their head, disorientated from the sudden dimension shift. The two stared at each other for a moment before Grian waved at the stranger, "Hi, you won't hurt me won't you?"

The two remained in awkward silence after Grian spoke, which made him feel even more nervous for even speaking out. The stranger seemed to examine Grian, their curiosity didn't have a sense of malice behind it though, only really pure curiosity. In return, Grian looked awkwardly at them. Their eyes looked to be purple, though he couldn't say for sure as the glass on the helmet was tinted. After all, it could've just been the colored glass that made them look purple. It still gave Grian suspicions though. They snapped their fingers as if everything finally clicked for them and finally broke the ice between them. Grian wasn't expecting someone who was kitted out with armor to sound so kind. "You're Grian, yeah? I'm surprised you got here before me-"

Grian looked confused, was he supposed to know them? "Um. Who are you exactly?"

"Xisuma???" Now this got Xisuma equally as confused as Grian, "Did you not see the invitation I sent to you a couple weeks ago about joining Hermitcraft?"

Wait, what invitation? Grian paused for a moment to recall. The more he thought about it, he finally recalled an envelope, but he hadn't opened it at all. Then again, he hasn't opened any sort of mail for a while. "Oh, oH OH yeah! I remember the invitation!"

Xisuma looked off put by Grian, but he set his feelings aside as he had to go get the rest of the Hermits. He pointed back at the portal, "Right, ok, I'll be right back. Don't go anywhere, I have to get the others!"

Grian nodded and watched as Xisuma walked back into the purple portal. The hum of the portal increased in volume as he did before gradually died down as the admin disappeared. Grian waited, the only thing he could do was wait and listen. Listen to the portal gently hum and hear the distant crashing of the waves. He ruffled his own hair; a lot has happened since he arrived on this starter island, and he couldn't shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen soon though. The worst part of it is that he didn't know who to trust.

Stuck in his scattered thoughts, he didn't even notice that Xisuma returned with the rest of the Hermits. He heard a couple people incoherently talking and collected his thoughts. It took him a moment to process the amount of people that came out the obsidian framed portal and was taken aback. He didn't expect there to be this many people. The majority of these so-called Hermits were human, however there were a handful of hybrids and mobs. A couple he could make out for sure was a slime and a zombie, maybe even a creeper? There was a lot going on and combined with previous events, it only mentally overwhelmed Grian. Amidst the crowd of new people and faces, he was able to spot a familiar one—Mumbo Jumbo. Although it's been a handful of years, how could he not recognize someone as tall, dapper, and also have a moustache like Mumbo? As soon as most of the chatter died down, Xisuma took the chance to overpower his fellow Hermits and introduce Grian.

"Alright everyone! This is our newest member, Grian!" Everyone greeted him, even throwing around playful comments and jokes which everyone enjoyed, including Grian. He was glad to be a part of something as great as Hermitcraft as well as meet new people and an old face. After introductions were thrown around and he got properly acquainted with everyone there, they all went their separate ways, gathering some resources around the island before heading off to a location they wanted to build at. Grian went off into the ocean and found a shipwreck, eventually making it into his starter base. He was planning out potential designs for his mega base but didn't even realize the different districts and the themes each mega base had to follow. After he had come up with some idea of what to build, he learned he was based in the Futuristic District and his mega base plans quickly shifted. He also realized how close he was to the shopping district and was generally glad that he didn't have to fly far for a quick supply run. The only problem was that he wasn't quite that rich yet. Well, it's not like he didn't mind grinding for materials every now and then. After he finalized his mega base plans, he got to work getting the materials, as well as making a platform to build the structure on.

It's just another day on the Hermitcraft server. A couple days after building up his mega base, Grian discovered that his old friend Mumbo was nearby as well. It was almost as if they were supposed to meet up and catch up with what each other have been doing for the past number of years. Grian wasn't even sure how long it's been since he's actually seen Mumbo. Of course, they communicated with letters for a short while, but that eventually fell out of style as Grian got caught up with his own things. He figured on visiting his friend in a bit, just after he finished building up with whatever white concrete powder he had left in his inventory. A stack and a half ran out very quickly though, especially against the scale of this giant base. Grian looked around, his eyes gazing around the glistening water as he tried to locate where Mumbo's base was. Once he did, he glided down to his mess of a storage—his beginnings of his chest monster—and looked through all his chests until he found what he needed. He stopped for a moment before he checked to see if his friend was AFK, which Mumbo was. A mischievous smile drew to Grian's face as he ran over to his anvil to complete the last step of his planning time. Once he finished up everything, he took flight and headed over to Mumbo's beginning of his base. Grian glided above the water, looking for the name tag that read, "Mumbo Jumbo," anywhere. It took him a minute or so but he eventually did and landed near his unsuspecting friend. He waved his hand in front of Mumbo just to make sure he's really AFK and placed down a dispenser facing his friend's face. Grian placed a lever on the side of it and flicked it, almost bursting into laughter seeing the shimmering Grian head plop onto the tall redstoner. He smiled brightly and quickly got rid of any evidence, soon using a firework to fly away and back to his own base. As he landed by his chest monster, he couldn't help but laugh a little and couldn't wait to see Mumbo's reaction when he got back. For now though, it's time to get back to building! He scoured through all of his chests; he really should get some sense of a storage system going. Grian couldn't find much, only finding a small amount of sand and gravel in his mess of a storage and sighed as he had to go out and gather for a bit for some white concrete. Though, it's not that he minded, there were just some days he didn't want to do this. Also, insta-breaking sand and gravel was kind of zen.

Once he got what he needed, he returned back to his unfinished base and crafted a handful of stacks of white concrete powder. He flew up to where he left off and continued to build up the thick white concrete circle that he calls the beginning of his base. He expended whatever concrete powder he had from his little grinding session and poured water over all of the powder, watching it all satisfyingly turn into solid concrete. Grian jumped off and glided around the perimeter of his base, admiring what he built up already. He decided to attempt to reach the halfway point since it was almost midday and there was still daylight to burn. Opting out of sand and gravel gathering, he decided to stop by the shopping district to buy the concrete powder he needed with his diamonds. As he was gliding over, he caught sight of what he believed to be a shadowed figure on the cliff that almost overlooked his own base and stared for a moment. He had to focus on where he was flying towards but soon looked over at the cliff, only to find it gone. Was it just a figment of his imagination? Whatever it was, it clearly didn't spell out anything good for him in the future but he'll cross that bridge when he gets there.

Grian landed in the middle of the shopping district, his elytra closing as he did. He walked along the main pathway before he finally arrived at the shop he wanted, and was cut off by a familiar voice just as he was about to step in. He couldn't help but laugh at the sight of his tall redstone friend with Grian's shimmering head attached. In response, Mumbo only lightly commented, "Hah hah, very funny."

"But it is! Have you seen yourself Mumbo?" Grian questioned in between his laughter. It was seriously a sight to behold.

"Have I seen-oh of course I have! Why do you think I know it was you who did it?"

"Because I'm a prankster?"

"... Fair point you got there," Mumbo was defeated for a few moments, exaggerating his apparent sadness. "When did you even get a curse of binding book—better yet, where did you get one?"

Grian moved around Mumbo in a playful manner, "A prankster never reveals his, uh. Pranks?"

"Do you mean a magician-"

"Do I look like magic to you?"

There was a soft pause between the two of them before Mumbo answered, "Yes, actually."

~ • ~

The small child was staring at the redstone door, a bucket of water placed precariously above it. If the door were to open, the person coming through would be dumped instantly with water. Grian waited for his first friend and only friend to come through the door, excited to see Mumbo's reaction and the end result of his little prank. A muffled noise of a button click followed by pistons moving and soon opening the door revealed Mumbo Jumbo who always looked so professional for no other reason than it was just his style. He walked through the door and was quickly dumped with the water prank that Grian set up, which brought a careless laughter from the latter. Mumbo looked up at the bucket that dripped with the rest of the water and followed a rope that kept it suspended in the air, where it then ran through the wall. He looked back at Grian with a perplexed look on his face, "How can you make something like this work but NOT understand how redstone works?"

"Because redstone is hard Mumbo?" Grian responded, his laughter quelling, "I'd much rather stick to building, that's much easier than learning how redstone works."

"Redstone is just so simple once you understand how everything works though??"

"I void your response."

"You can't just- ok, ok that's fine," Mumbo rubbed the bridge of his nose. Sometimes Grian could be a little prick, but more often than not he was a great friend. Sure, he was stubborn and probably sheltered, but Grian is as Grian as he could be and that gives the young builder a unique sense of charm. He crossed his arms and looked down at his friend, the two remained in silence for a minute.

"Hey so Mumbo," Grian started speaking, only to pause to gather his thoughts, as if he was actually concerned with how he spoke for once, "As much as I like hanging out and stuff just-"

Mumbo's face instantly held a concerned expression for his friend but waited for the builder to finish speaking his thoughts. Grian was waving his hands around as if he could just draw in the words, he needed to his mind but he eventually continued, "I think we can't keep just meeting like these sometimes? Like, you're busy with your own stuff and all and then my parents are telling me about things they have planned and all, I just don't think we would be able to keep meeting up?"

He sounded unsure of himself but was concerned about what Mumbo thought. Was he going to be happy? Indifferent? Grian knew him for all these years and still couldn't tell how Mumbo could react to certain things and information. Mumbo kept to himself for a moment as he tried to process and understand what Grian had just told him. He seemed a little upset about it all but remained understanding.

"That's fine. I mean, we could always write to each other, yeah?" Mumbo asked, as it was the first thing that came to his head.

"Yeah, yeah, we could try that!" Grian perked up, a smile on his face as he realized it's nothing to despair about anymore. Why couldn't he come up with a solution like that when the news came to him from his guardians. "I can't believe I didn't think of that."

"I can."

"Wh-rUDE?"

Mumbo laughed at Grian's response, which eventually dragged the latter into the laughter. Their last moment together before they part ways for uncontrollable reasons or another.

~ • ~

In the storage system of the Guardian farm of Xisumavoid, the admin of the server stood in the middle with a piece of paper. He stared at the paper with apprehension, almost crumpling the paper as he read the letter over and over again. The main thing that troubled him was the fact that it was written in Galactic, a language thought to be fully out of practice in recent terms, unless associated with a particular group of people. He thought this server would be hidden from them and he pondered how to go about this new problem without drawing the attention of the other hermits and especially Grian. The armored hermit paced around his base and folded the paper before he grabbed his fireworks and flew out of his base. He landed in the shopping district and walked around as he looked for JoeHills, his old friend and fellow hermit. Xisuma wasn't on edge or off put in any way. Sure, he was tense and possibly stressed, but at this point with 5 different integrations of Hermitcraft ever since he took over the role of admin of the server from GenerikB, when didn't Xisuma look stressed? Well, it's not like he's too stressed either way, he learned how to manage it over the years and especially with his rascal friends. He held the folded paper tightly in his hand as he continued to look for Joe, as well as avoiding Grian in the process. Thankfully for him though, the new Hermit was being distracted by the recently pranked Mumbo Jumbo. After he combed through the shopping district and failed to locate the poet, Xisuma decided to fly around and hope that he'd come across Joe one way or another. As if the plot heard him, he was able to spot Joe on the ground and landed in front of the poet, almost crashing directly into the dirt. The poet helped up Xisuma and was just about to ask the admin what's happening, Xisuma pressed a folded paper into Joe's hands, which led him to open the paper and was met with the sharply written Galactic.

Joe looked between the paper and the admin. He could read some of the characters himself, but others were just lost due to the horrible handwriting. He kept trying to figure out what it said only to shake his head and looked to Xisuma for help. In all honesty, he was surprised that Xisuma could even read handwriting like this combined with the Galactic symbols actually made Joe's head spin for a little bit. The admin shook his head and began to roughly translate the letter for Joe, "It says, 'I don't know if you trust me, but we've taken a player. Someone you might remember and I don't want to help them. You can look after him, I know your server is safe.' There's more, but it's nothing else really important."

Joe gradually digested the information as he looked at the writing again. With any past experiences he and Xisuma both had with this suspected character, Joe obviously had a fair reason to be skeptical. "The watchers? But I thought we managed to stay out of their sight?"

Xisuma began to walk back and forth in front of Joe and he shook his head again. "No, no, that's not what I'm worried about. I'm worried why they took Grian."

"Grian? How does he play into this? I thought he was just a new hermit you invited?" Joe curiously questioned.

"I'm not quite sure actually. He was already there on the starter island when I connected the portals from 5 to 6, but I just assumed that it was because he saw the letter." Xisuma attempted to answer Joe's question, taking the letter from the poet's hands, "But as I looked at him, he was roughed up, probably shaken as well. Something happened beforehand and the letter that he sent only proves my point."

"Is there-is there something you think we could do?"

"Probably not now. There's not enough information. And let's just keep things under wraps as well as enjoying Season 6," Xisuma assured, yet looking to the sky, he continued his train of thought, "Though we might have to keep an eye on Grian for a bit."

(Word Count: 3.2k)