𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒅 𝒄𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒕: 𝟒,𝟐𝟖𝟑

𝟔,𝟐𝟗𝟔 𝒘𝒐𝒓𝒅𝒔 𝒇𝒐𝒓 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒇𝒖𝒍𝒍 𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒓𝒚 𝒉𝒐𝒘 𝒕𝒇 𝒅𝒊𝒅 𝒊 𝒘𝒓𝒊𝒕𝒆 𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒔 𝒊𝒏 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒏𝒊𝒈𝒉𝒕

Ren and Stress both stared at each other, nodding nervously. They realised that Xisuma had probably been also listening to their conversation secretly, what a nosy person X can be in some occasions.

"Anyway, we'll also be having our three judges for today. They may not be hermits for this season, but they sure are well respected ones!"

Grian gulped. He doesn't even know what Xisuma was really talking about, and not even Zedaph knew what was about to happen. These two along with Stress were the latest members to bed added, so it was understandable.

"Please welcome, our judges for tonight..."

The stage rose up from the ground, the rest of the hermits went ooh-ed and aah-ed. Suddenly, the silhouettes of each judge appeared. They were also dressed in a formal manner, judging by the silhouette each one hold. Then, the lights dimmed off and the three walked down in front of the hermits.

For the first time, it had felt like Jevin's jaw dropped off the floor. Stress looked away, blushing at the sight of them. And Grian was well, confused but still was freaking out like the rest of the hermits were.

"Etho, Vintage and BDouble will be our judges for tonight!"

BDouble's eyes widened at the hermits looking more shocked seeing him and the rest of NHO back. Doc was panicking, he saw Etho with his one robotic eye. He thought that they would be gone for good. But for all this time, this was the moment where Doc realised that the rest of his NHO crew was actually alive?

"Oh my god, they're all freaking out Etho, very silently actually." Vintage panicked, Etho was getting second hand embarrassment from this alone.

"Why did Xisuma make us do this?" Etho groaned, crossing his arms, starting to grow impatient of waiting for the turtle man to finish what he was saying.

Xisuma then lead the three judges to where they would be sitting and doing taste tests for each cake the hermits would've created. Without any warning, all the ingredients had appeared on the table for each team (because command blocks are a thing).

"Today, each of the teams would be baking cakes for our three guests." Xisuma introduced, reading off the script on a piece of paper. "There are no rules or restrictions, just bake and don't burn the server down."

Everyone glared at Doc, who was known to have at least accidentally burning down his entire base because this Minecraft professional doesn't even know how baking really works.

Etho stood up from his chair, reading out the teams that would be competing against each other for the prize of four shulker boxes of goodies. "So the teams we have for this bake off are..."

"Grian and Mumbo, Iskall and Stress, Convex with Joe Hills and Doc with Ren... " Etho read the three teams out loud, mispronouncing Grian as Grain. The three teams walked to their stations, Joe having to follow along with Convex because he has no idea what was really happening now that NHO were literally standing in front of his feet.

"How did they know that we were going to be together?" Grian whispered into Mumbo's ear, still taking a sneaky look at Etho and Vintage. He recognised the two, they have appeared on the server before with Xisuma and Doc. What was it about them?

Mumbo remembered now once Grian had whispered to him that. "When Xisuma last week randomly interviewed the two of us on separate occasions about, remember when he asked who we could work with the most?"

Grian nodded, peering at the barrels full of equipment and ingredients but still listening to Mumbo nonetheless.

"Exactly."

Over at the judge's table, Vintage was next to call out each team. "Up next we have Wels, Biffa and Jevin, along with False and Cleo and last but not least, Tango with Impulse and Zedaph."

"You could've said Team UGS and Team ZIT." Impulse reminded Vintage, following Tango and Zedaph to their table.

Xisuma, who was ignoring Impulse's snarky comment continued on with a clock on his hand. "You have thirty minutes to bake this cake, all the ingredients will be in the barrels and you'll be using blast furnaces to bake the cakes."

Doc, looking at the ingredients knew that this cake him and Ren were going to have to bake for the prize wasn't going to end well. "Man, we are so fucked Ren."

"I know, I have you as my partner so that makes it even worse." Ren agreed, rubbing his hands together.

Tango was surprisingly good at baking cakes, judging by the fact that he had lived his whole life in a town where his villagers neighbours were good at baking.

"This is going to be a piece of cake!" Tango said in an enthusiastic tone, Zedaph and Impulse highly aware that Tango was the only one that's skilled at doing this out of Team ZIT.

Stress anxiously stood there, she was in a lot of pressure to make sure that the deal between her and the architects was going to work. What if this plan doesn't work? What if Iskall would think I'm an idiot? No Stress, don't think like that you idiot!

However, those thoughts of anxiously began to decay a little when Iskall gave her a warm smile.

"Do your best Stress! We can win this, for Sahara!" Iskall encouraged, pulling a thumbs up to Stress. This made her feel a lot better, Iskall was the person she needed to win, not just for Sahara.

Cub examined each of the ingredients on the table, Xisuma sure did provide them with stacks of them. Coco beans and wheat, yet Joe was still theorising to Scar about how this was a cover up. Scar doesn't seem to mind though, Joe was known for his bizarre behaviour and sense of humour which is what Concorp strives for.

"Wels, you better be good at baking all of this or I'm not spending any diamonds for your blocks." Jevin sneered at Wels. Those two practically acted like they were a married couple at this point. Biffa sighed at the knight and slime, putting his hands on their shoulders.

Xisuma took a closer look at the hermits who were at their stations. He was satisfied, this was he was planning for. All the hermits having a "friendly" baking competition for shulker boxes of who knows what's inside there anyway.

"Does anyone have any questions?" BDouble asked, making sure everyone wasn't confused about the simple set of rules.

Joe raised his hand up, his team was on the far left in the middle row. "Is this a scam or-"

"No questions answered." Xisuma interrupted, BDouble was caught off guard by how Xisuma was able to handle it so easily from Joe Hills himself.

"In the count of three..."

Grian braced himself, focusing on what the teams were going to bake.

"Two..."

Iskall shivered, looking at how intimidating Team ZIT was. If they happen to win, Sahara won't be able to get what they needed.

"One..."

Etho and Vintage looked at each other, two concerned expressions on their faces. The note block automatically played, a high pitch tone. This was the start of the bake off.

"GO!"

Once Xisuma had yelled that in his loudest voice he could make out, the hermits were already opening up their barrels to every possible ingredient they could find.

Mumbo grabbed the eggs, cracking each one of them in a bowl. Beforehand, Grian and Mumbo had planned on baking a pound cake. While Iskall thought that was a stupid idea, having not been in London for a while, this was the only recipe Grian and Mumbo knew how to bake.

"Are you sure this is going to attract Etho and Vintage easily...?" Mumbo murmured, cracking each egg into the bowl. Grian held the flour and sugar, pouring it with the cracked eggs.

"Xisuma is an English man, I think." Grian recounted, some of the flour blasted on his red sweater, covering it with white dust. "He'll sure like this cake, Mumbo!"

Few seconds after Grian and Mumbo had already stirred up the batter, a loud crash rang both their ears. Turning around, it was Iskall and Stress.

Firstly, Stress was of course in a rush to finish this in time. But Iskall was also messing up as well. Whenever he tried to crack an egg, it'll either miss the bowl for no reason or spill on the floor, slipping maybe Doc and Impulse over by accident.

Stress' face turned red, forcing herself to ignore Doc's use of swear words when he slipped on one of Iskall's crack eggs. "Dumbass! Stop laughing, we'll both lose if we keep laughing over Doc falling over!"

Iskall couldn't help but laugh at Doc's priceless reaction, Ren rushing over to Doc to help him clean up the yolk that was on his pants. "It's too funny, Stress!"

Right next to their station was Team UGS, the underdogs for this competition. Biffa hasn't really been talking to Jevin and Wels for a month and it was much more awkward as expected.

"What if my slimy goo that I keep dripping out of my hands would go onto the batter?" Jevin asked, his team still couldn't figure out how this could work.

"Just use gloves instead." Biffa insisted, having an idea of using the colour dye Xisuma had provided. Those colour dye should give them extra points for creativity.

"Let's get to work, remember that it's all about getting that winning spot!" Wels babbled to his teammates. "We're going to make a cake that would impress two thirds of the NNO!"

Biffa and Jevin both nodded, agreeing that this was the only way of keeping Wels motivated enough to help them with this. Jevin saw this as another opportunity to flirt around with Wels, seeing how the two of them got a crush on each other.

And as the minutes went by, the hermits were already up to their cake batter making. Cub and Scar eventually got the hang out baking a cake, seeing how they also got themselves an automatic cake farm.

Joe, not aware that he had baked cakes with his daughter before didn't have a clue of how to really do anything here in general. It took a full minute before he realised how many eggs he had to crack to make the perfect cake.

Concorp was simple. If you want people to like what you bake, you gotta keep things simple and unique. That's why they choose to bake the classic cake. Topped with sweet berries and a creamy frosting, Scar and Cub were sure to win for this round. Unless, Joe messed things up either by purpose or accident, no one really knows for sure.

"Falsey, I don't think we'll be able to have time for this..." Cleo was frustrated, still pissed at Joe for joining up with Convex instead of her and False. "If only Joe was here..."

False took a peek at the Concorp station, Joe spilling all the milk on Scar's jacket. She giggled, assuring Cleo with comforting words. "Even if this is all for the prize, we'll still have each other to be with at the end of the day."

Cleo was blushing, she always had a soft spot for the sweet and badass False.

"And besides, Joe is bad at baking. All of us are, but I know you can do it Cleo." False held the bowl that Cleo was struggling to stir, as they both worked together to mix in the cake batter together.

"There we go, that's what I'm talking about!"

You're so adorable, Falsey. Cleo thought to herself, smiling at the thought of giving her a celebration hug if they both win this.

"Alrighty then, Miss False. Let's beat those hermits' asses!"

False smiled, seeing Cleo in determined was such a good sight.

"That's the spirit!"

Etho tapped his fingers onto the table, he was watching all the hermits at the same time. It hurts his brain each time he saw Grian made yet another flour mess, but damn it was so entertaining.

Vintage and BDouble were also at the table, Xisuma explaining the new changes of the server and how Grian was the reason for a prank war.

"So you mean to tell me that adorable red sweater boy was the reason for a war?!" BDouble spat out. "Golly, he looks like someone who can't even hurt a fly!"

"If I learnt one thing about this whole server's existence is to never trust anyone but yourself." Vintage chuckled, sipping a shot of beer.

Xisuma focused on the hermits a little more. Some were already up to the baking part of all of this, including Iskall and Stress who've been bickering about trying not to make this a laughing matter.

In the meantime, Ren and Doc were already stuck. Doc having slipped over way too many items, some bizarre like powdered sugar and bamboo (Etho was surprised by how Doc was getting more clumsy), Ren wanted to give up.

"Man, I told you not to slip over too much!" Ren rebuked with a little anger out of his voice. "You got me more worried about your injuries rather than the prize itself."

Doc wiped off the cream on Ren's chin, he was sweating like crazy. "I think I'm more worried that I would be falling for you even more, eh?"

Ren shushed him, covering Doc's mouth with his hand. "T-Thanks, you're even cuter-- I mean, what?"

Etho's snickering could be heard from behind Ren and Doc's table. How adorable! Those two had something between each other. I knew this server was something else unlike last season's one. Etho speculated in his mind, revisiting the server wasn't so bad as Vintage made it out to be.

"Oh, now Etho knows!" Ren hit Doc with his rolling pan, embarrassed that Doc had just flirted with him, no regrets taken. "Maybe if you stopped flirting with me, we would've been done!"

"Admit it Ren, you like it when I do flirt with you." Doc winked at Ren, wasting so much time flirting with his lover was either a habit or just dropping hints that Doc had some sort of sweet sport with the diggity Ren dog.

Ren was flustered, pouring the icing sugar in a piping bag. "Have to admit, you do get me with some of your pick up lines you kept telling me last night."

"Two minutes to go!" Xisuma blurred out, the timer was ticking faster. It was only a matter of time before they would have their cake be ready to present... or maybe not.

Impulse decorated his team's cake with icing based of Team ZIT's palette colours. He liked the idea of baking cakes, even though he's average at almost anything.

Tango looked up at the timer. "Shit, we have only two minutes left."

"WHAT?" Zedaph choked. "Okay thank god we're up to the decorating bit but, how are we done so fast?"

Impulse pointed at Tango, test testing the leftover batter to see if it was good for the judges' taste buds to be satisfied.

"He's even eating the batter, what a madlad." Grian commented on Tango eating the raw batter which would have poisoned him by the time Grian had said that.

"Our pound cake looks... okay?" Mumbo said in an uncertain tone. "It looks kind of burnt though."

Grian stopped from what he was doing, dropping the icing on the floor. "It's... BURNT?!"

"What is up with everyone shouting today?!" Iskall started to rant, that was enough for Stress' ears to become blocked because of Iskall's voice. His and Stress' cake was surprisingly in good condition, the only thing that he considered to be underwhelming was the way he frosted their cake with blue icing, it was almost as messy as the diorite texture.

"One more minute to go!" Xisuma was beginning to sound like an announcer, bringing Python and TFC down as well. He requested them to also do a mini cake test, just in case the cake was going to make Etho or Vintage choke on it by accident. TFC, well he was at least getting paid and Python just wanted to know if he could trust this server for providing him with unlimited food, if all means baking cakes if golden carrots ever run out on this server.

"Do we get participation points if we finish this off?" Joe frowned, tapping his feet out of boredom.

Scar and Cub were finishing off their cake, the scent of sweet berries and classical feel of the cake that Concorp was used to smelling each day while visiting their farms.

Cub then sighed out of relief. "You'll sure win this one, Joe."

The timer had stopped and the note block began to play repeatedly. This indicated that the baking time was over. Etho, BDouble and Vintage were surprised just by seeing the progress everyone had made in just thirty minutes in total time.

As Xisuma rung the note block again, Pixl and Zloy had both walked into the catastrophe mess. Zloy jumped, almost dropping his bag onto Pixl's boots.

"Holy shit, Xisuma wasn't kidding!" Zloy shuddered, hiding behind Pixl's back.

Pixl was delighted by the smell of baked cakes. "That's another episode of the recap we have to do again!"

Calling up each of the teams, Xisuma became nervous that they would end up tasting awfully terrible.

Who cares, Evil X isn't here to ruin my day anyways. Xisuma shrugged as Grian and Mumbo both walked to the judges' table with their pound cake.

Tasting the almost burnt cake, Etho had almost spat it out but didn't want to be rude so ended up swallowing it. Vintage and BDouble seemed to like it, the two never been to England before nor have tried pound cake.

Next up was Ren and Doc, which the rest of NHO were excited to see back. However, when they saw the cake, BDouble froze out of shock. It was... a dick cake?

Doc with the help of Ren attempting to guide Doc into not burning down the server baked a dick shaped cake? TFC bursted out of laughter, this was Doc's apology gift for NHO? Especially for Etho?

"Presentation on point, but the cake was actually good." Xisuma complimented, trying not to smile like a complete idiot because Doc was immature.

"Keep it PG next time, Doc." Vintage joked, giving a fistbump to the mad scentist. Doc missed having his fistbumps with Vintage, he really missed them in general.

Doc smiled, looking upwards at the three members of NHO. "Why thank you, my fellow NHO friends."

After that, Concorp featuring Joe Hills was the next team to judge for. Etho was pleased to see that a team had made an actual normal cake, the typical cake you can craft. Smelled like Concorp and capitalism.

There weren't any comments made, it was a simple cake everyone had at least once tried. BDouble was a bit picky, he didn't like the berries so he asked Vintage to eat the berries on top for him.

Then came Team UGS. Biffa's hands were clenching on the plate of hot mess that his team had created. Wels by accident spilled a potion of fire resistance, which burned Xisuma's mouth instantly. Aside from how spicy it was, Vintage still complimented it for Biffa's effort of decorating it.

"All that matters is that we all are back together again." Biffa said, his head high out of confidence. Jevin wished he could say the same.

"We did have some awkward moments but Jevin did especially well." Wels chimed, making Jevin go redder.

"Hold on, slimes can blush?" BDouble interrupted, his mouth still full of the UGS' cake.

Jevin stepped away from Wels and Biffa, suggesting that Jevin doesn't like admitting his crush on Wels.

"Aw, he's cute when he's like that." Python boasted, his attempt of stirring up more heat between him and Wels.

It worked, Wels was narrowing his eyes towards Python out of jealousy. Despite all of this, Biffa was still able to calm the storm down.

Team ZIT was up next, they went for the chocolate cheesecake. Tango was proud of it, having been learning from his fellow villagers about the basics of cooking. Both Etho and Xisuma seemed to enjoy the flavour of it and in minutes, the cheesecake was already eaten whole.

"I didn't know the hermits could bake so well." Etho said, shaking with laughter.

"Are you only saying that because you're trying to be nice to everyone rather than being the bad guy?" Doc corrected, smirking at his remark.

"Probably."

"At least you were iffy about Grian's cake."

"There's something about him and Mumbo I don't understand."

Vintage joined along with Doc and Etho's conversation. "Yeah, me too. Mumbo seemed way too close with him."

"Not surprised at all." TFC suddenly uttered to the three's thoughts, taking another bite out of Team ZIT's cake.

Lastly but not least, Stress and Iskall along with False and Cleo were up the last teams to present their cakes to the guests.

False and Cleo presented to them a layered rainbow cake, Xisuma adding points to the creativity they had putting a rainbow inside of a vanilla frosting covered cake.

"Eh, messed up some of the frostings parts." Cleo recited, noticeability stuttering mid-sentence.

False nudged Cleo, crossed arms. "That was okay! I'm sure we did well." Cleo could tell how much False cared about her, despite this only being a competition.

Stress gave the last cake to taste test. It was a black forest cake, a last minute idea in which Iskall had to process what was really going on.

It smelled like heaven. Vintage's favourite cake was Black Forest Cake so this was going to give Iskall and Stress the higher points.

"My god, this is a five star dining right here!" Vintage beamed out of excitement of tasting his favourite cake. "Iskall, I'm surprised of how well this cake is baked."

"You should give the credit to the snow queen herself, Stress." Iskall corrected, holding Stress' hand. It was now their thing, to hold hands when they are feeling anxious or nervous about something.

After a few minutes of decision making as to who would win the baking tournament, Xisuma called out all the hermits to meet him and three out of the four of NHO to the main hub.

"You all did extremely well to our surprise." Xisuma addressed, in an optimistic way. The hermits were shocked by how he didn't have any negative reaction, even though half of them probably burnt at least their cakes.

Etho stepped up from his position with an open posture. "I've been incredibly proud at what friendships you all have created due to this server."

Vintage and BDouble nodded, they had never seen Mumbo interacted with anyone else excessively until Grian joined in the server. Stress has been working on her relationship with Iskall, they both have improved on communicating well even with minor mistakes.

"And now, we shall announce the winners of the Bake Off Competition." TFC smiled faintly, Python holding an envelope, sealed with a sticker of a diamond.

"The winner of this bake off tournament goes to..."

(who will win this tournament? comment below here !)

-

"EVERYONE?"

TFC's tone of voice shifted quickly, as the hermits became confused. Iskall was of course pissed off that this was probably a scam but turns out...

"I just wanted to bring the server back to light I guess with the help of Etho, Vintage and BDouble." Xisuma admitted, putting his head down in shame. "So instead of one team winning and the rest losing, I'm giving everyone a set of shulker boxes."

"But X, wouldn't that been too expensive for you?" Mumbo said abruptly.

"Guess my heart is way too big-"

As X was able to say something, Biffa hugged him tightly. Biffa's jacket was covered in flour dust but god it was disgustingly adorable seeing him like this. Xisuma smiled, So Biffa knew why I was doing it, huh? Or, maybe it's how I'm giving free shulker boxes of goodies for him.

Grian sneakily ate a slice of the pound cake, sharing it with Stress, Iskall and Mumbo. Iskall then swirled Stress around, as Vintage and Etho decided that it would be more fun if they added Swedish music on. Tango was on the stage with Impulse and Zedaph, singing to old 2000s songs because that's what friendships are for.

Ren was sitting down on the floor, sighing. Doc walked up to Ren, held out his hand as an offer for another dance. Ren couldn't say no to this either and to have a bit of fun with his best friend and lover.

Meanwhile, False and Cleo were already sharing a few drinks with BDouble, Wels, Python, TFC and Jevin - casually laughing about how they were taking this too seriously and at the end of the day? This was supposed to be Xisuma's plan, not to start a war like Grian did but to bring back times where Xisuma realised how much he loves the hermits.

Pixl and Zloy sat down from a distance, having kept away from the smell of burnt pound cake. They toasted a glass of champagne and shared a quick kiss on the forehead.

"You're right Zloy, guess all the hermits fell for Xisuma's plan." Pixl prompted, Zloy's face buried into his chest.

Zloy giggled. "It wasn't really the plan of making the hermits fall for it."

"It was more of...?"

"Bringing the hermits back together?"

"Yep."