Grian's POV

Present Time

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When Grian woke up, he immediately noticed three weird things:

One, he was dreaming. That wouldn't usually be that odd, but usually he didn't know he was in a dream until after it was over. So, this was a bit of an abnormality.

Two, everything was on fire. It wasn't very hot, as usual for dreams, but it was extraordinarily bright and all in his face. He wasn't exactly a stranger to everything being on fire, but usually he had context for what 'everything' was. Currently, he appeared to just be standing in empty space, devoid of anything but flames.

Three, [PLAYER_ID:NOT_FOUND] was there. Now, Grian had absolutely no idea who that was. Not a single clue, other than the fact that he was standing there, right in front of him, staring at him. Never mind the fact that he was an amorphous blob, or that his voice sounded like the garbled shrieks of a thousand cats screaming at the top of their lungs underwater. This was definitely [PLAYER_ID:NOT_FOUND].

The intangible being in question approached Grian and smiled (can shapeless forms of pure energy smile? He did). "Hello, Grian!" He greeted. Grian didn't know how he could understand the language, given that it was completely incomprehensible. "Been a while, hasn't it? Anyway, could you stop by the Shopping District for me? I just need a couple pieces of string and a grenade. Thanks!"

Then, he disappeared. Grian just stood there, thousands of questions stirring in his mind. Who was [PLAYER_ID:NOT_FOUND]? Where was the Shopping District? What's a grenade? Before he got any of those answers, he was engulfed in flames and subsequently woke up.

When he woke up (for real this time, not in a dream), he was not, in fact, in the little hut he made for himself the previous evening. He blinked away the sleep from his eyes, his dream quickly dissipating into nothingness, and looked around. Oh. He was hundreds of blocks in the air and rapidly increasing in altitude. Following, frantically building up with spare dirt, was Wels, who was apologizing at the speed of an auctioneer. "Ahh, sorry, sorry! Doc was trying to show us how to make a really fast flying machine and it got out of hand!"

Grian's immediate takeaway was, "In my house?"

"Not important, but yeah!" He was panting slightly as he began to start whipping pebbles out of his inventory at an apparent lack of remaining dirt. He was actually managing to gain on the machine, which would have been pretty impressive, Grian thought, if he wasn't a probable accomplice to this situation. "We, ahh, placed a bunch of water at the bottom if you want to just jump off!"

Actually, this was quite funny. Grian sat down on the bed and dangled his legs precariously. "Did Doc cite a reason why he decided to test this on me? If it's because of the villagers, I already said sorry, and a zombie would've gotten them soon enough anyway," he pouted. "And it was like three months ago, so it's past the statute of limitations for him to accost me about it."

Wels, who had managed to catch up, now leaped from his tower of dirt and cobble and landed on the bed. He sat down, crossed his legs, and shook his head. "Actually, it was because the sun has been up for ages, and you were still asleep, so you were ripe for the pranking." He held his hands up innocently. "Don't shoot the messenger. But," he continued with a slight frown, "I'm a bit worried. Are you feeling alright? You went to bed before storytime last night, and you slept for like, half a day! Are you feeling okay?"

Grian shrugged. He hadn't thought about it much, actually. "I think so? I don't think I'd slept in several days," he admitted. Cue a flashback to him being bombarded by skeletal creatures while merely trying to set up shop. "Maybe that's it? Eh, nothing I haven't done before, am I right?"

Wels chuckled. "You're right on that account. Still, you've seemed different lately."

"I'm right on th-? But you- oh. Right." Grian had almost forgotten that Wels still retained all of his memories. It was weird, having someone else know so much about you that you don't even remember yourself. He didn't know how he felt. "So...What other kinds of things do you remember?"

Wels got thoughtful at this. He was quiet for a moment, pondering, then said, "Well, for starters, there were more of us. Etho, Ren, Tango, Stress-"

Grian interjected, "I don't know about those other folks, but I did meet Stress!" Wels cocked his head and looked like he was going to question that statement. "She just hung back in Scar's world to stop it from collapsing, or something," he explained.

"Oh, right, I see. Still; there are so many more of us." He paused for a moment, then laughed, a strained, upset kind of laugh. "You know, for the longest time I thought I was going insane. When I first wound up in that world with Beef, Cub, and Zed, I spent an entire day looking for everyone else, talking in chat, the works. Hels wasn't talking to me, and the other three didn't know who anyone was and thought I was nuts.

"One second I'm in my base, and the next I'm in a completely new world with only four of my friends, absolutely nothing I recognize, and a looming sense that I might've lost it." He paused, and Grian noticed that he was staring straight up. "It was like when Mumbo disappeared, but times twenty."

Grian cocked his head. "Mumbo?" He had never heard that name before.

Wels stared at him for a moment. Something in his eyes dimmed. "...Okay." He coughed, and Grian had the sudden feeling like he had done something wrong. Was it that important? "Right. Anyway, I almost gave up on it and accepted that I was delusional. I settled in with the others and just pretended that I hadn't known them for years already. And then you guys showed up and I was proven right! Always glad to know I'm not insane." He gave Grian a thumbs-up. It was only slightly convincing.

That's nice, Wels, but now Grian was starting to wonder that about himself. "It's probably weird still, right? The only person still having all their memories other than you being-"

"-being the only person I don't know!" Wels exclaimed, standing up. That wasn't where Grian thought this was going. "This Cultie guy shows up, sounds almost exactly like Mumbo, looks almost exactly like Mumbo, seemingly remembers everything, but is somehow not Mumbo?!"

Grian was so shocked by Wels's sudden change in demeanor that the 'looks' bit went right over his head. What didn't go right over his head, though, was Wels's helmet's plumes bursting into flames, his suit charring, and his eyes clouding over with crimson. His voice turned...different...as he seamlessly continued talking—screaming—at the sky.

"Ah, but don' talk ta Hels about any o' this! If yer so anxious fo' Hels to get his mem'ries back, ya think ya'd mention it afterwards , righ'? Say, 'Hey Hels, ya get yer mem'ries back? How ya feelin? Recognize him as the guy that ruined our lives, maybe?' No? Didn' think so. Ya don' actu'lly care 'bout me, ya just wanna make me act like how ya want me to. You're just a cowa-"

"Wels?"

It seemed that Wels(?) suddenly remembered that he had company, as he looked down at the very confused Grian. "Oh. Yer here. I don' think we've met in this life yet," he said, at a significantly lower volume. "The name's Hels." He extended his hand and Grian hesitantly shook it. It was warm. Almost painfully so. "And I don' think I was meant to tell ya any o' that. Eh. Don' care." And with that, the flame sputtered out back into feathers, the dark melted back into bright silver, and the red all but disappeared from Wels's eyes. He then slumped over and fell right off of the bed into the clouds below.

Grian stood there for a moment, positively gobsmacked, before following.

He landed wobbly in the water after a disorientingly long time of falling to see Doc, Iskall, and Gem crowding around Wels. Pearl stood off to the slide, watching with an indecipherable expression etched on her features. She looked in Grian's direction and motioned him over. "Grian, what exactly happened up there?" She asked, tilting her head slightly. Her voice had the same tune that it did when she and Grian were working as Watcher and Rememberer.

"Oh, he was ranting about something and then all of a sudden burst into flames!" Grian explained dramatically, with a mimed explosion as flourish. "And his voice changed, and he almost seemed like a different person," he continued. It was the weirdest thing. And he had seen weird things.

Pearl nodded, no doubt taking internal notes. "Did he refer to himself differently?"

Grian blinked. That was an odd question. Just as Pearl opened her mouth to continue, Grian said, "Oh! He did. He said he was-"

"Hels?" Pearl interjected.

A beat. "Yeah..? How did you know...?"

"Yeah, how did you know?" Said Wels, whose group had stopped conversing. Wels walked over. "Have we met?"

Gem too turned to Pearl, her face one of surprise, or was that panic? Pearl, all eyes now on her, quickly explained, "Look, that's my whole job. To know things. And I'm good at my job." She raised her hands up slightly.

Wels cocked his head, apparently not satisfied by this answer. "So you know about him? Me and him, I mean?" He suddenly seemed very uncomfortable. "How much do you know?"

"Enough to recognize that that was what happened," she replied.

"Do you know why he's been...like this?"

"I-"

Before she could respond, however, Wels changed again. His plumes burst into flames, his armor blackened, and his eyes turned red once more. This was Hels, as Grian understood. "Don' answer that," he growled, and promptly turned around and left.

One could hear a parrot chirp in the silence that was left.

"Soo..." Iskall said at last. "I'm gonna go work on a project now. Good morning, Grian, by the way." And then he ambled off like nothing had happened at all.

This was a weird way to start his day. Also, Grian just realized that that was the first time he had slept since he was in Scar's world. Maybe that's why he had like seventeen phantoms barraging his door the previous night. Also maybe it was why he was so tired. Nice.

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No one's POV

Present Time

[World IV]

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Cleo, Cub, Beef, and Zedaph sat around a campfire, chowing down on various Snacks. Over dinner, the four had been chatting about several topics of varying interest, but the conversation turned low as people couldn't think of other things to talk about. Cleo, in between sips of the remaining broth from her soup, glanced around at everyone as they either focused on eating or fiddled with their communicators, and eventually cleared her throat.

"So...are we going to ignore the other people that were here? And the fact that Grian managed to leave the world by himself?" She bounced her leg as she spoke. "Because-" She took another sip. "Because I personally would love to figure out how to leave." She took yet another sip. "No offense, of course."

Beef set down his mutton. "What do you mean, no offen-" He began to say, but Cub interjected before he could finish acting offended.

"I was just thinking that! I'm certain it must have something to do with these," he said, standing up and pointing to the band on his wrist. It lit up, with a holographic display showing recent messages reading in backward text about some farm or another.

Cleo sat up, looking perplexed. "Our communicators?" She asked. "What are you talking about? What do they have to do with anything?"

"Well, if you poke around and touch enough buttons, there are other options other than chatting that you can do," he explained. His voice continually increased in speed, volume, and pitch as he spoke. "Commands—though that counts as chatting I guess—other functions, and one that says 'Worlds'. Think that's a good place to start." He has walked over to Cleo and showed her how to access the screen on her own communicator.

She navigated through the menus, the light glow from the communicator illuminating her face with an electric blue. "Oh, I see it," she muttered and selected an option labeled exactly as Cub had described. "What the..." A list popped up with selections. They were all named different things: 'Cubfan135's New World,' 'FalseSymmetry's New World', 'Docm77's New World', and... Cleo stopped scrolling. Her face paled—well, it got slightly lighter of a green—as she stared at the screen. "I- that's..."

Cub nodded. "Yeah."

Even an outsider could read exactly into their brains, as clear as if they had said it out loud. "HermitCraft."

There's something interesting that happens when people think about things they haven't in a long time. One can see it from the outside, even. Their eyes freeze, like they're a deer facing down a car. Their hands go limp in their positions. Whatever word they were saying dies out on their tongue. Sometimes they sit down. Sometimes they fall down. Sometimes they don't get back up.

Luckily, that last bit was not the case for Cleo, but the other events certainly happened. And once she broke out of her paralyzed prison, her fingers became blurs as she tap tap tapped on the screen of the communicator, trying to make something happen.

"Bear- No- Cub (that's your name), we have to go back. We- we have to," she insisted, jumbling all over her words in her haste. "I don't know what Cultie was going on about, but it has to do with this." She almost looked like she was pleading. It would be somewhat pathetic if it wasn't just so understandable.

And then, after a few more button presses and sharp gasps,

ZombieCleo left the world

Cubfan135 left the world

This whole conversation was basically ignored by Zedaph and Beef. No, they were focused on something else entirely. "....It's back," came a whisper from Zedaph.

In the forest just beyond the camper vans was a shape. It was dark; one couldn't see what the shape was. But it just stood there. And then, with a snap and a few rustling leaves, it disappeared.

"Aowh, not again-" Beef started but was cut off by Zedaph zooming past him and into the woods. He followed.

How peculiar. Or not. Who's to decide?

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Cleo's POV

Present Time

[Hermitcraft S-?]

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ZombieCleo joined the world

Cubfan135 joined the world

The world Cleo and Cub arrived in barely deserved to be called by that name. It was hardly a world at all. If anything could be wrong here, it was. The sky was gray. And not with overcast clouds; there wasn't a single cloud in the sky, actually. And, now to notice it, everything was gray. The ground, the sky, the water. Everything but the occasional tuft of grass, vine, or flower was just...gray. They were all different shades, sure, but colorless nonetheless. It was like Cleo and Cub had stepped into an old-timey television. Cleo had, in fact, never been so grateful to be so pigmented, especially when looking at the rest of this 'world'.

There wasn't even much there to look at. Anything that might have been something at some point seemed to have long decayed, melted away. Cleo didn't even know that was possible. How in the Nether can obsidian (or at least she thought that was obsidian, it might've been black wool for all she knew) melt? Even the grass (??) beneath her feet just felt...wrong. It felt like wading through a huge puddle, the way it squished unnaturally under her boots. Ew.

Cleo rubbed her eyes. Something must be wrong with her vision, she reasoned. Because it looked like there was nothing beyond maybe 30 blocks in any direction, save for a very deja vu-inducing, sorry-melty-looking gray collection of camper vans. In the center, tending to a small patch of things that might have been flowers once, sat what looked like it could have been a person. At least, that's what Cleo thought. It was so far away and also melting that she couldn't tell.

"Hey, Cub, are you seeing this?" Cleo turned to Cub, who was marveling at a single green blade of grass in the gray sea.

"This isn't at all like what I remember," Cub marveled as his hand passed directly through that blade of grass.

"To be fair, we don't remember literally anything about this."

"Yes, but I feel like this is different than how we left it," he explained. "I may be wrong, so feel free to correct me, but has any other world you've been to been melting?"

She glanced at her communicator. There hadn't been any new messages since they had arrived. "No. You're right, this is way too weird to be normal," Cleo mused.

"That's because this world is rotting," came a voice from behind the two. Cleo and Cub both nearly lept three blocks into the air at the voice. "Welcome back." It definitely wasn't a normal voice. It was too smooth.

The two investigators turned to the source of the voice, who turned out to be the figure that had been tending to the flowers. Cleo wouldn't go so far as to call this...thing...a person. It was just as grey as everything else in the world, and just as goopy too. It was dripping, literally from everywhere; its hands, arms, legs, dog ears (dog ears?), tail (tail???), everywhere. Atop its head sat a crown of flowers, but they looked more like decaying polygons than anything. It was decidedly not the prettiest thing Cleo had witnessed all day. It then smiled and waved, its goopy hands looking way too similar to flippers for Cleo's liking.

And yet, as much as Cleo was positively revulsed, she was also so, so intrigued. This was definitely the most interesting thing she had seen all day. It seemed that the surprises just kept coming, now, didn't they? It was all she could do to not run up and ask what in the worlds was wrong with it.

"It's nice to see you again," the figure continued.

That's when its last two comments clicked in her brain. This person, figure, whatever, remembers her and Cub. But before she could ask about that, the aforementioned Cub brought that up himself. "Do we know you?"

The figure faltered, its smile fading. "Oh, I- Huh. I didn't think you were gone so long. Time flies," it responded sheepishly. "But that's cool. Hi." It waved again. "I'm RenBob, an old friend of you Hermits."

Cleo cocked her head. "Hermits?" That didn't ring a bell.

Well, it didn't ring a bell with her, at least. Cub looked like this person just shot his puppy right in front of him. "Of course- HermitCraft, Hermits- I remember!"

"Nice job for you, genius," Cleo said, exasperated. She hated being out of the loop. "Mind sharing with the less fortunate?"

"Cleo, that's what we were called back then," Cub explained, hectic. "Hermits."

"Back when?" Just spit it out already! The suspense was killing her.

"Back when we were in HermitCraft."

Usually, this is when something would click inside Cleo's brain and she'd have a whole montage of memories flashing before her eyes. Unfortunately, she was not so lucky. She stared blankly, anticlimactically, back at Cub. "Yeah....I don't get it," she admitted.

Cub deflated a little. "Aw..."

"Hold up, everybody, hold up," said the figure, who apparently went by RenBob. "What is all this talk about forgetting HermitCraft entirely? What happened to Season 7? Or have you gotten to 8 yet?" It was not chill anymore. In fact, it looked very not chill, which was very creepy when combined with its meltiness.

"Something allegedly happened to our memories, and we got scattered," explained Cleo in the bluntest way possible. "So says some rando in a cloak that claims to be besties with us. Know him?"

RenBob shook his head. "No...but, scattered? All of you?" One of the 'flowers' on his crown melted into his face. "Is Ren okay?"

Cleo looked at Cub.

"RenDog?"

Cub shook his head.

"Oh," RenBob said. "I'm sure he's fine."

Those who were not fine, however, were Cleo and Cub. Because, all of a sudden, Cub winced and grabbed his hand. Cleo jumped a bit and looked down. It was glowing. Oh, that's not good. That meant that Cleo didn't have much time until-

A searing pain shot up her forearm. She was expecting it, sure, but it still hurt like a witch. She bit back a gasp and reached in her inventorial pouch for something to wrap it with, but there was nothing there. Right, whenever she switched worlds she didn't get her stuff with her. Agh.

Now, Cleo and Cub weren't what one would call particularly relaxed about these stabbing, burning pains in their limbs, but they were used to it. In contrast, RenBob was completely caught off guard. "Woah! Dudes, what is that?"

Cleo tried to explain through gritted teeth, but Cub, whose scar was significantly smaller, was more able to speak comprehensibly. "This happens every night-" Apparently it's night here? "-and it-"

He was cut off, however, by RenBob just grabbing the both of them: Cleo by her arm and Cub by his hand. "Hey-" Cleo yelped, but stopped when she noticed something odd. Her scar had stopped hurting.

RenBob jumped back, letting go of the two. "Woah, dunno what that was, man! I'm sorry," he said, but Cleo was engrossed in staring at her arm.

The goop (which was still gross) seemed to be seeping into the scar. As it did so, the scar began to close up, fading away like it wasn't even there in the first place. In its place left nothing, just an arm. A similar phenomenon was happening with Cub's hand, a marvel that the two stared at for at least a minute. Just like that, they were gone. All those months of pain every night, and they just disappeared. It didn't feel like anything.

Cleo looked back up, studying RenBob. He looked positively flustered. "Aaaaaaaa-" Well, it didn't seem like he knew what was going on any more than she did. But was she about to complain? Nah. She quite liked not being in pain.

"How did you do that?" Cub asked.

"I have no idea, man. It just sorta...happened?" The goopy man suggested with a shrug. His tail (Cleo was still processing its existence) flicked with thought. "Maybe it's a new thing. Been awhile since I've seen anyone."

"Fascinating."

Cub continued to grill RenBob about various inquiries, including but not limited to: Why are you so goopy? (It's a long story.) Why is everything else also weird and disgusting? (That's an even longer story.) Why didn't he just leave? (Easy answer this time, he can't.) Meanwhile, there was something nagging Cleo in the back of her mind. This RenDog person that RenBob mentioned. Cleo knew who he was. She had to talk to Cultie about this later.

Oh yeah, also the magic scar removal.

-(Author's Rambling)-

I promised myself that I would post the next chapter before the end of April and. Well. Technically I did? (In my time zone, at least!) Remember that one vague mention of RenBob like in chapter thirty something of Unrec? Yeah I wasn't expecting it either but he kinda just broke in.

Anyway, always lovely to share more content with you all! I'm super excited about the next few chapters. :)

Until then, though, see you in the next one, my little Readers!

Promise out!