The Phantom Grian Arc

Hunter

Grian hurled his trident at the lineup of phantoms diving at him, switching to his sword to finish off the stubborn ones. He watched the counter tick up seven. Nice: that was seven closer to Cubfan. Only fifty-two to go. He glanced up at the sky, daring the horrors that lurked up there to come for him. And they were all too happy to respond.

Grian screamed as a sudden, sharp pain breached his neck. Drawing his sword, he slashed at the phantom that had attached itself to his neck. Fifty-one to go. Feeling his neck, he noticed the two sharp fangs still embedded there, just as he noticed that the world was spinning much more than it should have.

Bracing himself against the glass wall of his hunting chamber, he took stock of the current situation: not good. He was badly injured, and completely out in the open. To make things worse, he felt he was beginning to black out, and he felt oddly lightheaded. Blearily, he typed out a message in Chat:

"Phantom, bite, neck, pain, help."

Hoping that this would be enough to let the other hermits know that something was wrong, he let the pain overtake him, sliding down the smooth blue glass. As he fell into the welcoming abyss of unconsciousness, he thought he heard someone landing nearby.

"Grian? Grian, please... wake up." That was Mumbo's voice. Slowly, Grian opened his eyes. He was in Mumbo's 'home' area. Then he realised: he'd just slept. That meant that he had to pull three more all-nighters to even be able to get one more phantom kill, let alone fifty-one. His one chance at beating Cub had been dashed, just like that.

"I'm here, Mumbo..."

"Grian! Are you alright?"

"Well, my neck hurts a bit..."

"Sorry. I'm not a very good first aider and nobody else was awake at the time. Those fangs are lodged in pretty deep." Mumbo paused for breath. "I'll get someone better at this."

Fumbling with his elytra, Mumbo struggled to take off. He really needed to do something about the lag. Finally able to launch himself out of the entrance, he made his way towards Iskall's ice base. After all, Iskall was a friend of theirs, and surely had some experience in first aid. After all, he was skilled at PVP, and had to know how to patch himself up in a tight situation.

Coming in for a rough landing, Mumbo slipped forward as he hit the ice. Picking himself up, he saw Iskall fogging up the bottom of his hole in the ice. Cautiously, Mumbo made his way to the edge of the ice to shout down to Iskall, but lost his balance, pitching over the edge of ice. Panicking, he opened his elytra.

He relaxed as his wings caught him from his plummet, and he soared gracefully(ish) down to Iskall. At least, until his elytra broke about a meter off the ground. Ouch. The not-so-soft thud of him hitting the ground alerted Iskall to his presence, however, so not all was lost. As Iskall helped Mumbo stand up, he inquired:

"So what brings you here, Mumbo?"

"It's Grian. He got injured while phantom hunting, and I'm no good at first aid."

"Okay. You go to the guardian farm and fix up that elytra, I'll meet you...?"

"Oh. At my house."

"Right. Where?"

"The small round building in my base by the kelp farm."

"Okay." Grabbing some potions of healing, (both the normal and splash varieties) and tossing Mumbo some ladders, Iskall took off.

When Iskall reached Mumbo's base, Grian wasn't in the best state. He'd drifted off, it took too much energy to stay conscious. Gently, Iskall took out one of the splash potions of healing. He cautiously splashed it on his unconscious friend. Wounds magically sealing , the fangs were pushed out by the skin closing around them.

A girl in a hoodie walks past, holding a sign that reads 'time skip'. She then apologises for stealing this gimmick.

A couple days later, Grian was back on his feet. The whole mess had put him off phantom hunting, and he was willing to settle for second place. Staring over the side of his base, he looked to the future. He had so many plans, and now that he knew he could trust Iskall, he had some pranks planned for when Mumbo went AFK.

So much lay ahead, and yet in the here and now, nobody noticed the small red scars on his neck, or the thin green lines trapped around them, waiting to escape...

Well, what do y'all think? I'm thinking of doing a sequel, as well as explaining how stuff works in this timeline.

This story clocked out at a healthy 764 words.

This has been Pi, and I'll see you all at some point in the future!