Look me in the Eyes

It's all a game to you

This used to be a peaceful world. The sun would rise and set on fields of nodding flowers, on hushed and shadowed forests, on open-mouthed caverns and on ancient mountains that reached the sky. The animals that wandered these lands moved without fear, the villagers that had been settled since time immemorial were free of labor and fear, and we...were not afraid of the gazes of men.

That all changed almost four hundred years ago, when the first strangers came to these spread-out lands. They began quietly enough, digging out resources from the caverns and building themselves homes in seemingly random locations. That was before the hunts began. Before they realized that almost everything in this world was a resource, that they could re-purpose whatever they laid their hands on to their own desires. And then they struck.

My kind had not even been long in this land. We had come, secretly and with much shyness, through the Ender Portals to see what this place was like. We had gone to the strangers and tried to communicate, tried to see who they were. None of my people returned from those visits, and though I was not yet spawned when all these events occured, my soul burns with rage for their loss.

Their eyes. Their beautiful, powerful eyes. The strangers took them, plucked them out of the dead faces of their victims and infused them with fire so they could spread their violence and bloodshed to my home. Of course we fought back. But we have no weapons. We've never needed them. And these people...these strangers, they carry swords. They wear armor. Their bodies are strengthened with potions. We never stood a chance.

But they did not kill us all. Gradually the fighting slowed, though it never went away. And we had our own victories, to be sure. Many of the strangers fell to our strong hands, to the crude weapons some of the other beings fashioned from wood and string and feathers. To the click and boom of Creeper lives, blindly sacrificed in the name of rage and loss. We had our victories.

But by then it was too late. Our numbers had gone so far down that we feared for our existance. We all retreated to shadows, coming out only under the cover of what darkness we could. And slowly we began to rebuild.

In the meantime, the strangers had also retreated, but not in fear. They had gone back to building, to mining, to enslaving random villagers at will. They were simply taking up other pursuits. We were confused. So we ventured back out again, sending forth spies and scouts to see what was happening. Maybe a third of them returned, bearing conflicting tales of indifference or aggression, of the strangers absorbed in tasks we did not understand the purpose of. Some were building empty cities. Some dug far under the earth, in search of...what? Some of them merely explored this world, gathering only what suited their fancy. Others fought each other.

And then we realized. None of them took us seriously. We weren't a threat, hardly even prey. Our deaths were a passing fancy, a hobby they indulged in when they wished. Our world, our lives, were mere games to them. They were toying with our fates. So we called them Players. And as time went on, the name began to fit them more and more. Their numbers grew and their influence spread, and still they hardly heeded us, except for when they wanted our parts for resources.

It was during this span of time that the dead came. Long-forgotten corpses began to rise from the shadows, from the earth. Growling, groaning zombies and clattering skeletons with their bows and eternal arrows. They burned in the sun. No one knew where they'd come from; perhaps the witches, struck with inspiration like the lightning that had changed their souls, had learned to raise them. But they came, with arms outstretched and with death in their hearts against all Players they ever found. Not one of them harmed another mob, though they would attack villagers, perhaps because they were human too. The Players killed them as easily as they killed us.

So we have lived, in this existance of vague terror, ever since. Players continue to be unpredictable, attacking when they please, for whatever purpose and design they wish. We continue to observe them, and each species of mob continues to deal with them in accordance with justice or vengeance or fear. Creepers, their mouths frozen in their silent, everlasting screams of rage, scuttle about in search of some Player they can take down and end their suffering alongside. Piglins remain in the Nether, where they gradually build up laws of gold and peace, hoping to survive that way. And we...we watch. As long as a Player does not look our way, all is well, for they will not kill us if they do not see us. But stare into our eyes, our precious, powerful eyes, and we will strike you down with all the force of our ancient pain.