#but they might take a bit bc i do need to get them on my desktop. this is the only one i had at the ready to copy-paste

[tiredofthehumanlife]

So we’re all trans?

Barbie dolls: t4t!Jegulus x genderfluid!reader

Word: 3.3k ish

Summary: James and Regulus are nervy to tell you they’re trans while you are nervy to tell them you’re genderfluid and hilarity ensues

Warnings: Lightning McQueen, Shrek, Spiderman, and Peter Pettigrew mentioned, James is a kale freak, I talked like a lot most of which was not necessary, mentions: shots (testosterone), getting vaccinations, cheating, domestic homicide, medieval torture, your experience with genderfluidity(it’s going to be a word for today) might not align with mine but i kept it as vague as possible, a bit of a Disney channel moment but just like ignore the cringe baby it's fine it adds character, you place your hands on your hips but it's not like “you place your tiny baby girl hands on your voluptuous hips in girly frustration” yk so it works for whatever gender you're feeling🩷, insecure feelings in gender identity, everybody is worried the other is going to break up with them bc they’re trans so it's like hypothetical transphobia, you wear pants, jamie used once, yeah i think thats it please read the author’s note i want to cover all my bases to make sure this doesn’t have unintended messages right okay cool

A/n: I'm going to use the small text bc I'm going to be yapping a lot so I apologize to all the bad vision freaks(I can't see two inches in front of my face) right so I just wanted to say that both James and Regulus had medically assisted transitions (that feels like a right phrasing) reg had top surgery, James takes puberty blockers, and they both take T I just wanted to say that you do not have to take anything or do anything to be valid in your trans identity some people can’t afford surgeries and some people don't want them and everybody is valid (except for those people who are like “me when the trans guy with triple d’s gets mad I mess up their pronouns” they can suck my 12-foot long dick) I just wanted to say this because I didn’t want someone to read this and feel like they don’t count because they didn’t follow these two rich boys’ paths okay awesome

request: right here dickhead

James and Regulus have been dating for years. Strangely enough, they had been taking care of each other since day one. It was truly simple, once they moved in together their acts of service quadrupled. Suddenly James was sitting with Regulus on the edge of the bathtub, gently removing his chest tape. Regulus decided chest tape wasn’t enough, and James was reaching the shelves over Regulus’ elbow height for him. James became a supreme master at making soup while Regulus was in recovery from his top surgery. Eventually, Regulus was healed and extremely joyous. He was wandering around the house with his shirt off just for the hell of it. Regulus was prancing down the porch stairs to get the mail in only his James’ plaid pajama pants and cat slippers.

James was lucky enough to have loving accepting parents. He started puberty blockers early on and eventually, he swapped them out for testosterone so he neglected the want and or perceived need for a top surgery. James, after having years of practice, lost his uneasiness towards the injections. Regulus, however, was extremely terrified of needles. As a kid, he was practically breaking Sirius’ hand from his grip when he needed to get his vaccinations. Before he met James, Sirius would do them for him. Now, Regulus would stand in the kitchen covering his eyes with his forearm and turning away as far as he could. James would inject the shot as fast as possible, rewarding Regulus’ bravery with 80 kisses on his cheek and ice cream.

They were out to their friends, but it wasn’t exactly something mentioned frequently. It didn’t really matter all that much. Barty would call you a dickhead no matter what was in your pants. Marlene was similar but her go-to insult was ‘ bitchey-bitch-bitch-stupid-face’, friends only of course. You can’t have that insane unfiltered language out with strangers. Lily loved everyone, closing off every single phone call with ‘I love you’ even if it was customer service.

Peter was similar although instead he thanked people by saying ‘I appreciate you’. He once mentioned how he was working at a restaurant having a horrible day. He was yelled at more than thrice in a row, and he was certain if someone called him one more bad name he’d burst into tears. Then this woman came in, who appeared to have met the first dinosaur, and she was so kind to him. When she left she said ‘Thanks, baby. I appreciate you.’ And he sobbed in the freezer. Peter immediately engraved it into his dictionary. All their friends knew, but it was like knowing their favorite letter; it’s nice to know but that information doesn’t really come into play very frequently.

Then they met you. Regulus had dragged James to the bookstore. James loved going to the bookstore with Regulus. Regulus liked wandering for hours. He liked scanning the backs and summaries inside the front cover. James liked the bookstore mainly because Regulus liked it. He also liked looking through the cookbooks and workout guides. Sometimes when the story was empty he’d head towards the kid section, squeeze himself into one of the tiny plastic chairs, and do the puzzles. Eventually when Regulus would finish looking, a hefty stack in his arms, he’d find James. Usually, James would brag about how ‘those dumbasses’ had nothing on him. He finished eight puzzles in under a minute. Regulus would remind him the puzzles had six pieces each.

That time was different though. James had looked through all the cookbooks, finding one he liked. James looked at a few of the workout books, getting bored when they said something he didn’t agree with. He finished all the puzzles made for toddlers, and yet his boyfriend still wasn’t done. It was odd. So James went on a search for Regulus. He checked the poetry section first, no Regulus. He went to the fantasy next, no dice. James stalked up and down every aisle. His ears perched up at the sound of Regulus’ voice. It was a bit strange, Regulus didn’t usually volunteer to socially interact with anyone. James assumed he got trapped into small talk, rushing to his boyfriend’s rescue.

James found Regulus actually grinning with a stranger. James didn’t even know he could do that. Regulus was holding a book open, letting you lean to look over his shoulder. You both looked more than excited to finally meet somebody you could talk to about your favorite book. The more James looked at you, the more he understood why Regulus was so happy to talk to you. Delectable was a nasty word to use to describe a person so James opted instead for extremely stunning. Eventually with Regulus’ book opinions and James’ cheesy flirting, their couple grew into a throuple.

Your relationship is a little fresh now. In the way that you had no idea what either of their pajamas looked like but you knew exactly where their spoons were. James and Regulus weren’t entirely sure if you would accept them with open arms if they shared every part of them, including their favorite letter. They stayed silent for the most part, letting you stay ignorant just this once.

You were harboring your own skeleton in the closet. You haven’t told them you are genderfluid, and you haven’t told them how many frustrations that caused. You love who you are but for fucks sake could it be just a smidge easier? Your secret was weighing on you. It was all you could think about while you were out with your two amazing boyfriends. If you told them they could disprove and break up with you on the spot. They could also accept you but an overthinking mind never seems to be optimistic.

Your boyfriends seemed to notice your mood change, worried now you might’ve put together a couple of context clues and realized maybe they aren’t cis. What if now you were disgusted by them? James squashed that idea when Regulus voiced it, though it still lingered with him. Regulus knew James was just trying to relieve him of his worries but Regulus still appreciated his attempt.

Finally, the camel’s back broke and you were heading straight to their shared home. It was edging towards their bedtime the sun had set a couple of hours ago, fully relying on their warm lamps. They both had changed into their matching pajamas; plaid pants and Spiderman t-shirts. Regulus had slippers with tiny cat ears on the top and little cat faces on them. James however had Lighting McQueen slippers that lit up when he took a step. They were cute when he first got them but the novelty wore off rather quickly and now Regulus complains that James’ shoes give him a headache. Regulus settled into the barstool behind the kitchen counter with his reward ice cream. James leaned against the counter across from him, slurping very loudly on his smoothie. James jutted it out to Regulus.

“Want some?” Regulus looked up at James with a raised eyebrow.

“James, if I ever say I want some of your kale and banana smoothie, I give you full permission to assassinate me. Preferably quickly.” James pouted, pointing the lip of his glass back towards himself. Regulus rolled his eyes and took another bite of his ice cream.

“You could’ve just said no, also what did we say about suicide jokes?” James said, pointing over his shoulder at the small whiteboard on the fridge that said ‘6 days without a suicide joke’ in James’ handwriting. Regulus dropped his spoon back into his bowl, feeling particularly peeved at the unjust accusation.

“No, no. That’s not suicide, that's homicide. Two entirely different things. You can’t dock my streak just because you didn’t find the joke funny.” Regulus stuck his finger at James. James pushed Regulus’ finger away, leaning forward to steal a kiss from him. James pulled away, taking another sip of his smoothie as Regulus took another spoonful.

“No offense, babe, but I’m not sure if I know anyone who would find domestic homicide funny,” James added, with his straw still in his mouth. Regulus scoffed.

“That’s because you have lame friends,” James’ jaw dropped in offense at Regulus’ words. “Barty would find it hilarious, and Dorcas would find it mildly amusing.” Regulus retorted, grinning like he won their game. James pressed his lips together in disapproval. As he was opening his mouth to continue the verbal play fight, a knock on their door interrupted him. They both shared a look of confusion. James shrugged, leaving his smoothie on the counter to get to the door.

“See but Barty finds The Pear of Anguish funny,” James argued, his slippers lighting up on his way to the door.

“Barty’s a masochist, I’m not sure what you were expecting when you took him to that museum,” Regulus muttered into his bowl as James peered out the peephole. James hummed in a confused tone, opening the door to find you. You were not in pajamas and you looked rather stressed.

“Hey sweetheart, you okay?” James asked, worry lacing his words. He moved back letting you step into their foyer. Regulus looked up at James’ words. He doesn’t usually greet the door-to-door salesman like that. Regulus quietly joined you two at the door, he understood James’ greeting now but didn’t understand why you were visiting them looking so frazzled. You looked them both up and down, slightly pausing at James’ shoes. You shrugged your coat off, placing it on their coat rack. James found it at a thrift store and Regulus repainted it.

“You two look dashing.” You muttered as you straightened your shirt. Regulus glanced down at his pajamas, suddenly feeling slightly judged. He crossed his arms over the very large print of Spiderman.

“James picked it out,” Regulus whispered, trying to ignore the stinging on his cheeks. James’ chest puffed out, taking a wider stance and pulling at the end of his shirt so you can see the picture better.

“Aren’t we cute?” James said, confidence making him smile brighter. You nodded.

“Yeah, gotta love Spiderman.” You squished your lips together. Even with your words seeming relaxed your nerves were spreading to Regulus. James seemed to taste the uneasiness in the air.

“Are you alright? If this was planned I would’ve gotten you a shirt.” James reached over, rubbing Regulus’ shoulder to give him silent support. You nodded, staring at the ground to take in a deep breath.

“Right yeah. Sorry to drop in on you guys, but I think we need to talk.” You said, giving yourself a breath to steady yourself. Regulus felt his stomach jump into his throat. It felt tighter now, his heartbeat reaching his ears. Regulus glanced over to James, finding he was already looking. James gave him a tiny smile that Regulus could tell was forced.

“Yeah absolutely.” James brightly said, gesturing towards the living room. You lead the way. Regulus moved his hands to the back of his neck, trying to soothe himself. James noticed, grabbing both of Regulus’ shoulders to rub them, waddling behind Regulus. James kissed Regulus on his temple. Regulus reminded himself that even if what he thought was happening was happening, he’d still have James in the end.

Regulus and James settled on the couch, holding onto each other for emotional support. You started pacing in front of them, walking from one end of James’ favorite rug to the other. James intertwined his fingers with Regulus’, letting Regulus fiddle with them in his lap. It was better than biting his nails. ‘I should get a whiteboard for nail biting’ James thought to himself before zoning back in on your rapid pacing. Regulus’ eyes were following you with panic behind his head movements. Your anxiety was dripping out through your hands, slapping them together over and over again. James was starting to worry that Regulus would get hypnotized moving his eyes back and forth like that.

“You know, darling. I learned the hard way that anxious thoughts are like burps; better out than in.” James offered, hoping it would soothe you a little. You paused your pacing behind the coffee table, turning to face James.

“Did you just quote Shrek?” James clenched his jaw, feeling caught. James saw Regulus turning his head slowly to look at him out of the corner of his eye. James let out a nervous and breathy chuckle.

“It’s good advice,” James muttered, slipping further down the couch. You sighed and faced them both. You held your hands behind your back. You closed your eyes and took a deep breath.

“Right okay so I need to come clean to you two, I’ve been hiding something for a while now. It’s been stressing me out a lot and I think I would rather risk our relationship than have to go through this alone.” Regulus squeezed James’ hands tighter. James had flashbacks to Regulus getting a shot at the doctor's office.

“Is there another person?” Regulus abruptly said, cutting into your steady breathing time. You looked up at him shocked, quickly shaking your head.

“Oh, no, no, no. No. I would never do that. I would never cheat on you guys.” You quickly rushed out, like Regulus might implode if you didn’t get it out fast enough. James moved to make a fast joke, pushing a small bit of the thick tension out the door with a broom.

“I haven’t been cheating. Have you, Reg?” James asked with a pained grin. Regulus knew his tactics, joining in to shove some of his anxiety behind a potted plant.

“Not that I’m aware of.” Regulus felt himself let out a strained laugh that came out more like a cat hacking up a hairball. You looked at them both with a worried look. Regulus wanted to settle your nerves, giving you his shining smile. Which was just him showing his teeth with dead eyes. You took a step back, holding both your hands up.

“Okay well don’t do that.” You whispered. Regulus relaxed his face. You shivered, shaking out your worries through your hands.

“I’m just going to say it. It’s a lot of words so maybe just sit quietly and let me spill.” You looked up at them both for their agreement. James sat up straighter, giving you all of his attention. Regulus kept his wide, slightly unsettling, eyes on you. You gave them both an awkward smile.

“I’m genderfluid. Which if you don’t know means my gender kind of flows through like all of them. I’m kind of worried about telling you this because I’m not entirely sure if you’ll still think of me the same.” Your voice cracked. You let out a breathy chuckle wagging your finger towards the ground.

“Oh you cheeky mother fucker, pull it together.” You whispered to yourself. You pushed your shoulders back, speaking again. “And it’s just a little frustrating and confusing because the whole time I’m just second-guessing myself. I just feel like no matter what I do I’m never a hundred percent confident in myself. It’s like I’m sitting there wondering-“

“wondering if you’re valid or if you made it all up?” Regulus asked, somehow making his eyes wider. You looked away from your fiddling hands to stare at him quizzically. You whispered the tiniest agreeance, James was shocked he still heard it. James decided to speak up and comfort your frustrations.

“It’s alright that you feel that way, darling. You’re entirely valid. We’ll love you no matter what, unless it’s murder-“

“Well-“

”No matter what. I want you to be your happiest, whether that be doing naked cartwheels in the backyard or making a fort under the kitchen table. Man, woman, something else, a nice mixture of both, I’m here for you. Confusion and frustration happen all the time it's alright. I think it’s important to just make sure you do whatever makes you happiest for that moment or day.” James explained. As he talked Regulus watched your shoulders sink with relaxation. Your anxious eyebrows slowly retreated back to their resting place, the worry lines on your forehead dissapeared again. James let out his own sigh, glad he got to relax his partner again.

“And on a different note, I’m trans myself so I support you on extreme levels,” James added, giving you a bright smile. Regulus scoffed next to him.

“Oh, you’re trans? Not we’re trans?” James clutched his pearls, reeling back to look at Regulus.

“Well, I’m not going to come out for you. I don’t know if you’re comfortable doing that. It’s not my story to tell.” James said, shaking his head at Regulus. Regulus muttered a few choice words at James under his breath as he turned back to you. You looked to have a million math problems in your head.

“So if we could just wrap back around, you’re both trans?” Regulus and James nodded at your question in sync. You sighed, looking around the living room. You placed your hands on your hips in exasperation.

“Just to clear everything up for those at home, I’ve walking around for weeks anxious up the wazoo for absolutely no reason?” Regulus and James glanced at each other.

“yeah.”

“it appears that way, yes.” Regulus watched you groan and drop your head in your hands.

“To throw my two cents in, it’s totally valid to feel a little discombobulated. Gender is hard and often it’s difficult to figure out what you’re truly feeling, it took me years to realize I wasn't nonbinary. It’s entirely okay that you feel like this.” Regulus said, releasing James’ hand from his grip. James’ shook his hand out, finally getting feeling back in his fingers. You gave Regulus a small smile.

“Regulus, love of my life, can I please eat your face?” Regulus smiled at you, nodding his head. You quickly made your way around the coffee table to lightly peck Regulus’ lips. You moved past Regulus to kiss James as well. You squeezed yourself between the two of them. Regulus rested his head on your shoulder, moving your hand to play with in his lap. James pressed himself against you, smushing his cheek against yours.

“I'm the love of your life too, right?” James asked, his words rolling onto your cheek. You hummed.

“Yes, Jamie.” Regulus interrupted your sweet moment.

“James, do me a favor and go get my ice cream.” James let out a loud gasp, jumping out of his seat and jogging towards the kitchen.

“My smoothie!” You wrapped your arms around Regulus, kissing his temple.

“I wasn’t insulting your shirt before, by the way.” You whispered into his hair. Regulus nodded against your arm.

“Is his smoothie worthy of stealing?” You muttered as quietly as you could so James didn’t hear you. Regulus let out a snort.

“Oh fuck no.” Regulus said before adding “I’ll give you a few bites of my ice cream.” You gasped, smacking a kiss to the apple of his cheek.

“You’re so kind.” Regulus groaned at your words.

“Not really being kind. It’s my reward for being brave, as James said. And I know that was probably scary for you so technically speaking you do deserve some of it. It has nothing to do with me it's just like the rules.” Regulus said, trying to cover up that he might actually have a heart.

“Right, the rules.” Regulus hummed. James soon returned with his smoothie and shockingly two bowls of ice cream. He handed one to you and one to Regulus. You three sat on the couch as you finished your sweet treats and smoothie. Even though technically speaking your reward was already given to you, Regulus’ spoon would randomly stick out toward you. You thanked Regulus with a peck on his cheek after each spoonful. Eventually, when his bowl was empty your spoon would jut out towards him, he was quite brave coming out to you today. James seemed to notice the food sharing, offering up a sip of his smoothie. You and Regulus both grimaced at him in sync before turning back to your bowl.

[yanderespamton78]

the current state of the arg

sorry guys the art isnt arting D:

(btw if youre confused on why i drew turnip like that i was referencing the picrew he did ages ago bc idk it looked fun to draw anddd i dont like taking reference off real life images)

[puppyeared]

for like 3 weeks i was wondering why i was sleeping so much and felt listless. and just now I managed to email 3 people and responded to a month old message in the span of an hour because I got back to TAKING MY FUCKIN MEDS..........

[cerealmonster15]

ALSO when im re reading fics i wrote i explode when i notice i repeated the same phrase over and over and over again kfdlsjfklsd. why did i say a variation of "left as quickly as it came" three times in this one fic that im not even halfway through rereading.... #girl get new words

[regularshcw]

poll time ! so, i mentioned that idea of doing " get to know the muse " posts earlier, and i made graphics for it, so

[risingsunresistance]

Revolution

this is one of techno’s “fanfics” he posted to the hypixel forums. i’ve kept the formatting exactly as it was written, but there may be a few accidental double spaces or enter bars as i had to do those myself when i pasted them to tumblr

originally i didn’t want to share, but i think sharing them now is a good thing to do. i want to share anything i can, because i love everything he did. this is easily his most popular one, most of you have probably seen it, but if you haven’t then here it is. it’s a story about simon hypixel fighting a revolution against the other staff members in blitz. here it is to save if you’d like

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links to the other fics:

civil war

faced with kings

demons

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(wayback archive of this fic on the forums)

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CH.1 Betrayal

Hello, my name is Hypixel. And today is not my day.

Some people think they're having a bad day when they wake up late and arrive to work 15 minutes off schedule. Others think a bad day is when they have a minor disagreement with a friend. Some even consider a bad day when they only grind 60,000 coins in eight hours.

Today I'm standing here, surrounded on all sides by my most trusted friends, all of whom are armed and about to execute me.

So yeah, I guess could you say I was having a bad day.

I didn't bother to draw my sword. It would have been a futile attempt. I'd be thoroughly feathered in arrows by the time I completed the action, and even if I dodged, I'd still have to fight my way through the ten strongest staff members on the server; my fellow Admins. All of whom came prepared; level X's all around, already prepared to use their operator powers to finish me swiftly. So I decided to be diplomatic.

"What the heck do you think you're doing?" I yelled at Kevinkool.

Perhaps not so diplomatic. Heh.

Kevinkool glanced at his comrades; all 9 of the other admins were there, ready to fight, although NoxyD appeared to be reluctant. He then responded:

"I think we're kicking you out. We're tired of you bossing us around. It's time for a new leader."

He signaled with his hand, and the small army of lower-ranked staff with archer 8, 9 and 10 drew their bows back.

"Goodbye, old friend." Kevin said.

But I had a backup plan.

As thirty or so arrows were released from their bows, I yanked a device out of my pocket and slammed down on the button. Everything turned purple, and I was teleported out of there.

I finished the teleportation and promptly fell ten feet flat onto my face. Not the smoothest execution- I hadn't remembered that the lobby had been revamped since I originally made the device. But I was alive, so that was good. I was now in a hidden lair underneath the blitz lobby. It was fairly damp, and not the most ideal secret base, but it would serve. I quickly connected to the network. I still had access to the server console, which was good; they could never take that away from me. I tried the most obvious initial command;

Console: Deopping Kevinkool. Console: Error. Console: Not enough permissions for that command.

Hmm. It wouldn't be that easy. After trying several other commands, I realized just how limited my power was. I couldn't directly tamper with any of the admin's powers, nor could I eliminate any of them from the equation. Each of the 10 other admins had permanently linked themselves to the Server Console as I had.

I checked the Console to see if any major changes had occurred recently... and noticed something huge.

(11/1/14 21:35 PST) Console: Enabling Hardcore Mode.

Uh-oh. That wasn't good. They were already making their move. With Hardcore, the blitz players won't be able to respawn. They won't last long... but this does give me a chance to defeat them. I just have to kill all 10 of the other admins, and then I will have uncontested control over the Server Console.

But I'll need some help.

Console: Whispering to MAJESTICxWALRUS "Gather every blitz player you can find... and no matter what, stay alive."

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CH.2 Swapping Sides

I stood there in front of nearly a hundred players.

"Wow. Good job!" I said, turning to MAJESTICxWALRUS. "No problem." He responded. "These players are almost all level 10s and 9s." "Seriously? How many of them are level 10?" "Uh... maybe 40?" "WHAT?" "Yeah..." "When we take back the network, I am seriously reevaluating how network boosters work."

I turned to the small army of players, and made my speech.

"Today, the staff team overthrew me. I'm currently in hiding, and they're taking over the network as we speak. They've already set it into Hardcore Mode, meaning that if any of you die... that's the end of it for you. I need you all to fight back, and retake control of the server. Quite simply, you need to eliminate the 10 other Admins for me to regain complete control of the server. You can't stay here, the admins will locate you quickly enough. I'm using my power to protect you from being wiped off directly by the Console, but we need to act quickly. I'll teleport you all out of here, and communicate what to do using the Console."

I snapped my fingers, just for the style points, and they all disappeared in a massive flash of purple.

I glanced at the Console to check on the recent activity of the other admins. No players had been banned outright; that would be an unnecessary use of the Console's energy, which did have its limits. It was much cheaper and convenient to simply let the players kill themselves; most would not realize their mortality until it was too late. They didn't even need to send out staff members; the player base would almost completely disappear soon enough, tearing itself apart as they were expected to do, as it was the hunger games.

I tried pinging the location of each admin. None of them worked... except NoxyD. I could pinpoint his location. He was in the Winter sector, perhaps fifty blocks from the Cornucopia. I couldn't use the Console to affect him... but I could certainly send in my own troops.

I went back to communications, and started broadcasting my message.

"I've spotted NoxyD, and he's in the Winter sector. I'm going to send in several of you after him. Don't make any hasty decisions, first scout out the situation and then report back to me."

I needed a decent sized force. I didn't have the ability to send that many people in at the same time (limitations of my Server Console power), but I didn't want to; no need to show my full power early on in the war.

I quickly selected 11 of the names (OrangeScraggy, supergriefer, puzzlemaster3, warriorfox123, Kastrealm, Gamebuster101, vivien_roland, Cr33p3rBoy112, DocteurKe, DoctorGokado, Peanutbutter911) and sent them in.

They all materialized in the Winter sector.

"He's around 80 blocks, due north east. Go past the ice lake!"

I sat back and waited, thinking of the times gone by. Noxy had been one of my oldest friends on the team... but why did he betray me? Thinking back on it, he did seem reluctant when they all tried to kill me.

Suddenly I started getting feedback from the squad I had sent in. Suddenly I heard Kastrealm going: "We've spotted Noxy... as well as a few others! Mods and helpers! He appears to be... a hostage?"

Strange. Why would they be escorting him as a hostage, in Winter of all places? Unless...

Of course!

For years, there'd been an anomaly on the Winter map; a random hole in an obscure part of the map, which fell all the way into the void. They were headed straight for it. And if NoxyD was their hostage... they couldn't have good intentions. I'm not sure what the effects the void has on the player; ordinarily, they'd simply be ejected from the game, but in hardcore mode?

"They're trying to dispose of Noxy... stop them, quickly!"

I quickly identified the four members around NoxyD; GuruGamers, Cecer1, SirElite and Mythyryn. Each of them appeared to have had their kits modified, and each was a whole lot stronger than they had any right to be. But I had a few level 10s of my own.

Peanutbutter911 and supergriefer initiated the fight, sending arrows towards SirElite's back. But they didn't catch him by surprise. He spun around, throwing a slime egg at the ground, and their arrows bounced off the slime with little effect. The staff turned and pulled out their weapons. GuruGamers was a full fledged Horse 10 with a few extra iron axes clipped to his belt; Cecer1 was a Blaze 10 with a flaming iron sword. Mythyryn was a snow 9. Although they appeared to be those kits... they appeared to have upgrades as well.

The fight didn't start out well. Cecer1 spawned 3 blazes, which quickly sent a volley of fireballs towards the group. OrangeScraggy was already charging forward with his Horse 8, and attempted to have his horse leap over the volley of fire, but took a fireball to the chest and went flying off. SirElite barreled into him, sending him flying with a swing of his knockback 2 sword. He crashed into a tree and exploded into a mist of pixels. Dematerialized. Gone. GuruGamers threw an iron axe at Kastrealm, who quickly threw a magma cube egg in front of him. The Magma Cube blocked the axe, but exploded at the impact.

Puzzlemaster3, Cr33p3rBoy112 and vivien_roland rushed forward. SirElite's slime quickly bounced, crushing Cr33p3rBoy112 beneath it (not fatal, but not comfortable either), but an arrow flew above it and took SirElite in the elbow, knocking him off balance for long enough for Puzzle's pickaxe to greet his face. Cecer1's magma cubes sent forward another volley, and one fireball took Peanutbutter911 in the chest.

Cecer1 stepped forward, but Sir Elite was already dead. As the fight continued, I checked the server console- and noticed something surprising. No one was regenerating any health lost.

"Guys! Health regeneration isn't working! Any damage you take now will last for as long as it takes this war to finish!"

A blaze was shot down by one of supergriefer's arrows. Guru threw another iron axe, which slammed into puzzlemaster3 and sent him to the ground with only 30% of his health left. Mythyryn spawned snowmen, and in response Gamebuster101 spawned all of his. The two remaining blazes quickly scattered Gamebuster101's snowmen, but another pair of arrows from their archers hit Cecer1 and gave Kastrealm the opportunity to run in.

GuruGamers ran off with NoxyD, and warriorfox123 ran after him, closely followed by DocteurKe and DoctorGokado.

The rest of the fight was brief. Mythyryn's iron axe finished off Cr33p3rBoy112, but Kastrealm jumped in and finished him off. Cecer1 didn't die so easily; his blazes fired another volley before both being taken down by Peanutbutter911 and supergriefer's arrows, and fireballs hit Gamebuster101 and vivien_roland, leaving them wounded. Puzzlemaster3 charged, but Cecer1 dodged his pickaxe and cut him down in a fireball of scattered pixels. He got taken down, thanks to the combined power of Vivien_roland and Gamebuster101's kits.

Meanwhile, GuruGamers was battling the three knights who had followed him. Warriorfox123 was ahead of the others, but ended up being disarmed, and taken out by GuruGamer's diamond axe. DoctorGokado and DocteurKe showed up right after. Meanwhile, the rest of the surviving squad approached behind. GuruGamers realized the hopelessness of the situation, and spawned his horse.

"You win this round." He said, speeding off into the distance.

His horse appears to be extremely fast; they must've enhanced his horse as well as his kit. They couldn't stop his escape, but at least they had rescued NoxyD. They had taken 4 casualties, and 3 more of them had been wounded, but they had taken down three staff members and freed NoxyD from whatever fate they intended.

"Good job. Gamebuster, Vivien and Peanutbutter are a little wounded, but you all did well. We took some casualties, but we've also rescued Noxy. I'm teleporting you all back to the others... and I'll send Noxy to my location."

I did as I said, and quickly shielded Noxy so that he could not be found by the other admins- no need to have my secret base discovered. I turned to face him as he materialized in the room.

"Thank you. They were going to throw me into the void." he said. "No problem. What does being thrown into the void do?" "It completely erases your memory on the server. Total wipe. They were going to get rid of me; I was uncomfortable removing you from power, and they knew it. They removed my operator powers, but they needed the void to erase me completely. But that's not important." "Oh? What is important?" "They're about to launch Project November."

----------------

CH.3 intervention

That wasn't good. Project November was a project that Noxy and I had been working on for a while... but we hadn't finished it off yet. It was meant to be a simple way to make the staffs' lives easier, but something told me that wasn't exactly what they had in mind. That sort of thing was pretty powerful, and undoubtedly they were repurposing it to further their own ends.

They might have their suspicions, but they couldn't have known for sure that I was waging war on them. I still had the element of surprise... but not for long. Soon they'd figure out what I was doing, and try to track me down. If I died, they'd have complete control of the network... and nothing would be able to stand in their way.

But even if they didn't know what I was doing... Project November had to be stopped.

"Where are they launching it from?" I asked Noxy. "Somewhere in the Rainforest sector. You managed to transport several players into Winter, can you pull off something similar there?" "Yes. I can inject them into the server and they'll automatically be spawned normally, and they can move from there." "We don't have much time." "I'll send in horsetamers."

Undoubtedly there'd be a reasonably large force present at the project. A quick scan of Rainforest showed 7 players present, but surely there'd be some admins under the radar. This wouldn't be a clean fight.

I turned back to the computer, and connected to the Console. I broadcasted a message to the troops.

"Emergency situation in the Rainforest sector. I'm sending in a large amount of Horsetamers. AidenRK, Pr0lin3, xHascox, VorteXx3, Meyp, JerryCannn, lastikodezil, Frizer13, omwesolp, RumbleCrumble, MacManiacMC and GlitchyShell, prepare for the warp."

They materialized in the sector, and I sent them the coordinates of the located staff members. There appeared to be a mass of them along the east bridge. They all spawned their horses and sped off in that direction.

The first staff to spot them were Fatcake24 and Freylise80. Freylise drew an arrow to his archer 10 bow, and Fatcake24 spawned his necromancer mobs.

"If you can, get past them without hesitation. You don't have time to kill them all... you need to stop them from launching Project November."

It mostly worked. The majority of them managed to jump over and avoid the fight. But not all of them. An arrow from freylise80 knocked omwesolp flying off of his saddle, and he desperately ate his golden apple as he got up. RumbleCrumble threw his axe at Freylise80, and hit him squarely in the shoulder, knocking Frey off of his feet. But as Rumble jumped his horse to stample Frey, Fatcake shot an arrow into the side of his horse. Rumble's horse flew over the edge of the bridge, and he frantically jumped off, barely managing to catch hold of the edge. He hung there, dangling above a very large drop.

JerryCannn tried to evade the monsters, but a skeleton shot his horse and another zombie smacked him off of it. He quickly recovered, chopping off a zombie's head and knocking an arrow away with his axe. Omwesolp ran in and started trading axe bows with Fatcake24. JerryCannn turned in time to see Freylise80 standing above RumbleCrumble, drawing back the arrow to send him flying off the bridge. Without hesitation, he threw his axe, and it smashed into Freylise80's back, sending him off the edge. JerryCannn ran and helped RumbleCrumble up.

As this was happening, omwesolp was shot in the stomach by a skeleton, giving Fatcake24 the opportunity to slam him to the ground with his axe. He quickly turned, drew back an arrow, and fired it at JerryCannn's back. JerryCannn turned from helping Rumble just in time to get hit in the chest by the arrow and fly off the bridge, smashing into the ground far below and exploding into a spray of pixels.

Meanwhile, the rest of the horse riders were dodging the remaining staff with much more luck than before. They began approaching what appeared to be a portal, with two men in front of it.

The Console quickly identified them as AgentKid and Kevinkool. But Kevinkool had some strange readings on the Console...

"Uh-oh." said Noxy. "What is it?" "I think they transferred my operator power to Kevin." "What does that mean?" "He's a lot more powerful than any of us were before."

That couldn't be good. Not only that, but they had just completed a portal. A portal would usually be completely worthless, but now that the server had changed, it would serve as the perfect means of deploying a code... undoubtedly, Project November. But they hadn't coded it in yet.

AgentKid turned to KevinKool, but KevinKool had already turned around to face them. "Keep finishing the Project. I'll deal with them." He drew two iron swords and ran forward to meet the incoming rush of horsetamers.

What followed was, simply put, a massacre.

Frizer13 met him first, slashing forward with his axe, but Kevin jumped to the side and slashed him off of his horse with his iron sword. He threw his hands up, deflecting xHascox's axe, and slammed his sword right into AidenRK's horse as it rode by, throwing Aiden flying. But Kevin was already recovering, moving at incredible speeds, dispatching Meyp, then VorteXx3, then Glitchyshell. He was completely surrounded, and yet managed to block and parry every axe blow with his two swords. He jumped into the air, slamming his foot into lastikodezil's face, hurling him off the saddle and to the ground at alarming speed. He spun, and with his left hand threw his sword, which buried itself in MacManiacMC's arm with an explosion of pixels.

With most of his enemies unhorsed, Kevin made short work of the rest of the battle. He leapt forward, finishing off Frizer13, and grabbed his axe as he turned to face the rest. He blocked AidenRK's axe with his sword and swung his own axe into Aiden's side, which was met with another burst of particles as Aiden dematerialized. He spun, ducking under xHascox's diamond axe, and jumped forward, burying his sword into xHascox's stomach. He spun around, knocking lastikodezil's axe out of his hand with his own and cutting off his head with his sword.

Kevin turned to face his final opponent, who remained on horseback. Pr0lin3's horse reared. Kevin drew his hand back and threw his iron axe. Pr0lin3's horse leapt frantically to the left, but exploded into pixels as the hatchet buried itself into its flank. Pr0lin3 leapt off his horse as it exploded, and charged with his axe. Kevin dashed forward, and they exchanged a quick series of slashes, but then Kevin quickly slashed upward, and while Pr0lin3 blocked with his axe, it threw him off balance.

"Tell Hypixel we're coming for him next." Kevin said. And then he was a blur, slamming into Pr0lin3 at a hundred miles an hour, sending him twenty meters over the edge of the bridge.

I stared at the Console in shock, and Pr0lin3's point of view disappeared as he hit the ground.

"It would appear that they've figured out how to use their operator powers to enhance their own fighting ability." Noxy noted.

Suddenly, the Console went on full alert. A message blared across in all caps.

Console: LAUNCHING PROJECT NOVEMBER

------------

CH.4 Project November

I went back to RumbleCrumble's point of view, getting the very last glimpse of the battle as he beheaded Fatcake24.

"Rumble and Omwesolp. Everyone else got killed. I need you guys to go in there and see what's going on."

They approached the portal. I knew the basic layouts of Project November, having designed it myself, but I didn't know how they would modify it to their own needs.

They got within range, and I got a clear visual. The portal was activated, and AgentKid was in front of it. He started pouring his console power into the portal, and suddenly players started pouring out of the portal by the dozen. By the time he was done, 72 players had emerged.

AgentKid then spawned gear; wood swords falling from the sky, gold chestplates, bows, arrows, and speed potions. The army picked them up, and equipped themselves.

"I don't think they're using the Jr. Helper program for its original purpose." Noxy noted. "Me neither." I replied.

KevinKool turned, and spotted RumbleCrumble peaking from a distance.

Uh-oh.

Kevin turned, said something, and suddenly there was a massive swarm of Jr Helpers sprinting across the bridge, weapons drawn.

"Rumble! Omwesolp! Get out of there! I'll try to dematerialize you guys before they get you!"

They didn't need my suggestion; both had gotten out of there pretty quickly when the army started rushing towards them. I started the coding sequence needed to take them out of there.

The army surged forward, headed by the five that had drunk speed potions. I dematerialized Omwesolp, and then started the sequence for Rumble. Rumble tripped and fell to the ground. The sequence finished, with less than a second to spare as a Jr Helper's sword slashed through the pocket of air where Rumble had just been.

Suddenly, the Console put forward a notification.

Console: Removing Rainforest from the map queue.

"What?" Noxy asked. "They've removed Rainforest from the map queue... it means that we don't have direct access to it anymore. We can't just teleport men in." I responded. "Is there a way to undo that?" "Yes... but hacking the system takes time, which we have precious little of. I was hoping they wouldn't start removing maps from the map pool." "What happens when all the maps are removed?" "We lose. Game over. We won't have any ground to wage our war on. But that's not the end of it... if they keep shutting down maps, they'll find out where our forces are. If they shut down that map... we've just lost every man."

The Console went on alert. Three maps were being invaded by the staff. Thorin, Mithril and Docks V1.

"How are they attacking multiple maps at the same time?" Noxy asked. "There's 9 other admins. Every one of them can lead an attack. And when they're not leading an attack, they're designing more codes to enhance their own powers. Not all of them are gifted at coding, but most of them are. AgentKid will be preoccupied supplying Project November, but this means they have all the forces they need to attack multiple maps at the same time. And we can't fight that many attacks. It's 1 against 9..." "Hey, that's 2 against 9." Noxy said, putting his hand on my shoulder. "Regardless, we're going to have to up our game. We're getting slaughtered... it's time for us to launch our own projects."

I handed him a sketch of what I had in mind.

"Can it be done?" I asked. "Definitely. Just give me a while, and I'll have the code ready." He said, and walked off.

I turned to the computer. I might not be able to fight off all the attacks, but I could certainly slow them down. I opened a direct link with the remaining player base.

"Troops? We are going to save Thorin."

-----------------------------------------

CH.5 Thorin

Cameron7276, Troy_K, SebiWins, foolahoop, Wicketlol, Supertroll1999, Shadowblade827, Monkey36, Neanderthalis, ksctdd, MouseGaming, katnissjul, DocteurKe and Jytheguy1 materialized at the spawnpoint of Thorin.

I sent a brief message over the console. "They're approaching from the lava lake, prepare for the battle."

They didn't wait long. Soon the horde was upon them. Roughly 20 players, most of them jr helpers in modest amounts of gear. Behind them was cheetahpet, SpiderDiclonii, SgtVault, MusicalGamerGirl, and Thorlon, diamond sword in hand.

The Jr Helpers all drank speed potions, and charged in. Two charged towards katnissjul, who's blazes opened fire. One got caught in the chest, bursting into flames and falling to the ground. The other lunged forward, but got parried, and Katniss's fire aspect sword broke in the process of finishing him off. The other was dispatched quickly.

Others weren't so fortunate. An arrow from MusicalGamerGirl's Archer 9 bow knocked foolahoop off balance, leaving him only time to say "ur trash" before a Jr Helpers sword took him out. Monkey36 and Ksctdd both drank astronaut potions and charged forward, taking out Jr Helpers left and right, but soon both had been overwhelmed and killed.

SebiWins spawned all his snowmen, drew out his axe, and met the onslaught of Jr Helpers. A snowball knocked the first off balance, and SebiWins quickly ended his life. His diamond axe quickly cleared through several more, easily defeating them with the assistance of his snowmen. Suddenly, SgtVault's horse was jumping over him, SgtVault's axe already drawn back to finish him off.

Troy_K's axe smashed into the side of SgtVault, sending him flying off the saddle and to the ground, dead. Troy_K ran to retrieve his diamond axe as Sebi finished off the last of the Jr Helpers. Cheetahpet was fighting Neanderthalis and Supertroll1999. An arrow from MusicalGamerGirl took Super in the shoulder, and Cheetah's horse 10 diamond axe quickly followed, taking him out. Neanderthalis took advantage of the distraction to stab her, his Tim stone sword cutting through the leather horsetamer armor.

SpiderDiclonii didn't die quite as easily. He gulped down an Astronaut X potion and charged forward, cutting Wicketlol's axe off by the handle. Wicket's wolves pounced on Spider, who dispatched them each without missing a step. MouseGaming appeared, spawning snowmen, and charged forward. His iron axe slammed into Spider's chain chestplate, getting stuck in the chains. He tried to pull his axe out, failed, and Spider's stone sword slashed forward, ending his life. Shadowblade827 and Jytheguy1 appeared, spawning wolves and spiders, all of which heaped onto SpiderDiclonii. His sword slashed left and right, dispatching several spiders as well as Shadowblade827, but eventually Wicket's stone axe crashed into his chest, and Jytheguy1's iron sword finished him off.

DocteurKe and Cameron7276 killed MusicalGamerGirl and rushed towards Thorlon, who simply gave them a warm smile.

I quickly relayed what information I could.

"Thorlon was never one to spend time mastering the coding of the server... he was always more fascinated in using it. He's definitely a fighter, and he's very, well, showy about."

Suddenly, Thorlon's hand shot forward, a lightning bolt crashing into DocteurKe. The electricity, easily conducted by DocteurKe's knight 8 armor, pulsed through him and left him lying on the ground. Suddenly Thorlon was charging forward himself, and Cameron7276's stone axe was cut clean through by his diamond sword, which soon entered Cameron's chestplate as well, slicing through the chainmail folds.

Lightning bolts. Typical. Extremely powerful, but just as wasteful a use of his operator power; lightning bolts were extremely inefficient at taking down foes. But I wasn't complaining.

Katnissjul ran forward, and another lightning bolt shot out of Thorlon's hands. Katniss threw her sword up, blocking the bolt, and DocteurKe ran forward, weak but still alive. DocteurKe's stone sword slashed forward, but Thorlon ducked, and punched Docteur into the wall at around 30 miles per hour, killing him. Katniss was there in a flash, but Thorlon's diamond sword was already swinging to parry, and he quickly killed her as well.

The rest of the survivors grouped together and stood facing him. Only 5 remained; Troy_K, SebiWins, Wicketlol, Neanderthalis and Jytheguy1, but that still left 3 level 10s. Thorlon looked up, and appeared to have second thoughts. Sure, Kevinkool might have easily won that fight, but Kevin had twice the amount of operator power as Thorlon, and Thorlon had already spent a great deal of his.

Suddenly, Thorlon dematerialized. He had escaped. But that was to be expected; there was no use fighting a losing battle. Because of his Console power he could send himself anywhere on the network at will to recover; my guess was they were all holed up in Rainforest, plotting and creating even more programs to defeat me. We'd saved Thorin, but at a great cost. 9 of our own had died, taking only 4 staff as well as many Jr Helpers down with them. The Console confirmed what I had expected:

Console: Removing Mithril from the map queue. Console: Removing Docks V1 from the map queue.

Two maps down... but that was better than 3. Noxy would be back soon with the new-

My thoughts were abruptly cut off by the sound of something hitting the floor behind me. I turned my chair, and suddenly the tip of an iron sword was inches away from my nose.

"Hello, Hypixel." Rezzus said, sword drawn and ready to kill.

--------------------------------

CH.6 Rezzus

"How did you find me?!" I demanded, very mindful of the blade inches away from my nose.

"It was simple." Rezzus said. "Every time you used the console, it leaves a bit of data regarding the sender. I just created a plugin to track where the commands were coming from, and then teleported myself in here."

"But... why? Why did you guys do all of this... just to take control of the server?"

"You may not have realized it yet, Hypixel. But this server is a lot more powerful than you know."

I saw some movement out of the corner of my eye. Rezzus turned, saying "Huh?", just in time to witness NoxyD's fist crashing into his face. He was thrown off his feet onto the ground, and Noxy jumped on him. I jumped out of my chair, running to the spare sword I had kept at the side of the room. I retrieved it, turning just in time to see Rezzus knocking NoxyD back and grabbing his sword.

"No!" I shouted, running forward.

I was too late. As NoxyD was unbalanced, Rezzus lunged forward, stabbing him through the chest with the full length of his sword. I swung, slicing through Rezzus's side, and both fell to the ground in a pool of blood. I kicked Rezzus's sword out of his hands and across the room, and turned to NoxyD.

"Noxy..." I whispered.

He was barely alive. He coughed out blood, and said

"I finished the code."

"That's not important! We need to get you to a hospital!"

"It's too late for that," he said. "Rezzus... still has operator powers... you can... take them..." he finished, and closed his eyes.

"Noo!!!" I yelled, as he died. I turned to Rezzus, who was barely breathing.

"You are going to die for this. But first... I will take something from you."

I went to the console, and quickly typed in the commands necessary to take away Rezzus's control of the Console.

Console: ERROR. ACCESS DENIED.

I turned to Rezzus.

"No..." he gasped, before my sword went through his chest. I turned back to the console. Now that Rezzus wasn't alive, there was nothing to stop me from claiming his share of the Console power. A death in the virtual world would only make that Console power disappear, but since Rezzus had entered the real world, the rules were different. I typed in the command again.

Console: Access granted. Allocating power to PLAYER_HYPIXEL.

...

It took a few hours to clean the room and bury the bodies. I gave them both a proper burial. Rezzus may have betrayed me... but he was still an old friend. Noxy... I would avenge him. I took the code that he had finished before his death. I glanced over it, and it was spotless. Noxy was not the kind of code developer to make mistakes. I wiped the tears out of my eyes and turned to the computer.

The war hadn't been paused while I was gone. The console had faithfully reported the casualties:

Console: Removing Docks V2 from the map queue. Console: Removing Despair V2 from the map queue. Console: Removing Caelum V1 from the map queue.

Three more maps gone. And Citadel already had an operator on it, accompanied by a small army of players.

I ran the code NoxyD had given me. It was time to turn the war around.

------------------------

CH.7 Saving Citadel pt1

This new code would change the tide of the war. It involved a bit of a loophole in the system database. The server was kicking everyone who died, but I had discovered a workaround- by cataloging every player with multiple kits under a different UUID, they would have a different life for each high level kit they possessed. This would nearly double the amount of lives we had to spend, especially for the more experienced players.

But would it be enough?

No time to think about that. I had to save Citadel. The rogue admins had begun eliminating maps from the map pool, and if all the maps were eliminated, I would be unable to contact the players. I'd lose contact with my entire army. They hadn't guessed the map where I had hidden them, but it was only a matter of time.

I opened a chat with MAJESTICxWALRUS.

"Dude. Citadel's under attack-" I began, quickly getting cut off by his interjection-

"Where have you been?! It's been nearly a day!"

"We had some... trouble on the other side. Things are secure now. Citadel is under attack. I'm pulling 18 people into the fight, mainly Astronauts."

I began warping the players in. Troy_K, Technoblade, Minechaos2713, Maphia_Ace, mrnamol4, lastikodezil, dedew84, MacManiacMC, purelycraft, blukid8, Loiyd_Irving, bballnick123, SpiderTheBite, Labron1975, supergriefer, Kastrealm, TennisFTW and link_2012 began materializing at the base of one of the towers.

I didn't wait. I quickly launched another code, which would shield my location in the real world from any unauthorized attempts to teleport into it. Hopefully, this would prevent another person from attempting what Rezzus had.

The players had finished materializing, and they had already spotted their opponents.

Thorlon. I wasn't surprised- He was the second best fighter, right after Kevinkool, that the admin team had at their disposal. The other admins were exceedingly cunning and much better with the code, but Thorlon's ability in battle made him a primary candidate to send in to neutralize maps. He was flanked by Cygerus, Fontzzzzzz, Skydeli, SylentbutDedly and envyrose.

They had spotted my guys as well. Thorlon threw his hand out, opening a portal. Jr. Helpers by the dozen started spewing out of it, all half-clad in gold armor with a various assortment of swords and axes. They all charged headlong towards the players.

With the sudden appearance of the Jr. Helpers, we were greatly outnumbered. But numbers aren't everything.

"Guys! Run up the citadel tower! You can use it as a choke-point to slow down their advance!"

Due to the cramped nature of the Citadel tower, their superior numbers would be a lot less effective. And because of the amount of Astronauts on our side, an emergency exit was always available... although not for the rest of them. It wasn't ideal. I hoped it wouldn't come to that.

They fled up the tower, closely followed by what was quickly becoming a hundred Jr. Helpers. They wouldn't gain much time if they didn't find a way to slow them down...

"Link!" I said, messaging the Necromancer of the squad. "Yes?" he responded, slightly winded from the rapid stair climb. "You need to slow them down."

He stopped, realizing what I had just told him. I had essentially just asked him to commit suicide for the team. But if the Jr. Helpers weren't slowed... the rest of the team wasn't going to fare much better.

He sighed, turned, and threw down every mob spawn egg he had.

The Jr. Helper wave hit the first zombie and chaos ensued. Link's punch bow quickly sent arrows slamming into the heads of Jr. Helpers, throwing them off their feet and crashing into the Jr. Helpers below. The few who avoided being knocked down by their peers were quickly shot by a skeleton or taken down by a zombie. This defense was successful for nearly thirty seconds, until suddenly envyrose appeared.

She cut through Jr. Helper after Jr. Helper, not allowing their fallen bodies to get in her way. Her Pigman 9 sword met the first zombie and it nearly evaporated under its enchantments. She quickly cut through the other zombies and, blocking a shot from a skeleton, disposed of the other two skeletons with two quick swipes. She turned to Link, just in time to catch an arrow into the chest.

She stumbled backwards, but bounced off the wall and was back on balance before Link could draw back another arrow. She quickly flung two splash potions into his face, causing him to get knocked backwards, and she quickly followed through with her sword, stabbing him through the chest. Link dematerialized, and the horde flowed forth. But he had bought them some time.

The others were busy setting up a defense. They'd have to have defenders on both sides of the bridge to prevent themselves from being surrounded. The right bridge was the more loosely defended, featuring only three astronaut 9s, an Archer 10 and a few snowmen. The left side was a tight group of Astronauts, side by side, backed up by a solitary Loiyd_Irving, arrow already drawn.

The Jr. Helper horde reached the surface. Thorlon had disabled the portal on the surface, but as he reached the top, he activated another one. No need to waste his troop's energy storming up stairs. Jr. Helpers swarmed across the bridge, and the barricade of players rose up to stop them.

At first the battle seemed to be going fine. On the left bridge, the shield wall of Astronauts calmly and efficiently took out dozen after dozen of Jr. Helpers, while on the right side the Jr. Helpers were pushed back by the 10 snowmen from Troy_K, Labron1975 and SpiderTheBite as bballnick123 shot them down. It appeared like we could actually sustain ourselves in battle... but that was relying on the fact that they would eventually run out of Jr. Helpers. Right?

AgentKid surely couldn't power that many of them... but there was always the possibility that Kevinkool was lending some of his power. Because Kevin had stolen Noxy's share of the operator power, he was twice as powerful as the other admins. He could easily support the energy needed to create endless Jr. Helpers while commanding the rest of their operations at base. I couldn't rely on the Jr. Helper wave stopping any time soon.

Of course, that wasn't hard enough. A surprise arrow from Cygerus flew across the bridge and slammed into mrnamol4, an Astronaut on the left bridge, and knocked him backwards, breaking the shield wall. Suddenly, Skydeli spawned three blazes, who began launching fireballs at the snowmen on the right bridge. Bballnick frantically fired at the blazes, but by the time he had killed all 3 of them, only one snowmen remained. Even that snowmen was quickly shot by Fontzzzzz's Necromancer bow. The Jr. Helpers surged forward, desperately being repelled by the weaker defense on the right bridge.

Our defense was breaking.

Time for a new strategy.

---------------------------------------

CH.8 Saving Citadel pt2

We weren't going to win at this rate. We were holding them off, but we couldn't do that forever, and slaughtering Jr. Helpers gained us nothing. Furthermore, the volley of arrows by the helpers and moderators was going to prove a problem. It was time for a new plan.

I opened a chat connection to them.

"Guys. We need to turn this around, and we're not going to be able to do that by just standing there. The astronauts will be able to get down most quickly, so I'm sending five of you guys down. Blukid8, Technoblade, Minechaos2713, Kastrealm and Purelycraft, you guys need to back out and jump off the tower out of sight. Head for the cornucopia. I have a plan."

The five selected astronauts backed off and did as told. But that was five astronauts being taken out of the shield wall. While the bridge wasn't wide enough for that to have an immediate impact on their defense of the bridge, it would hurt in the long run due to them being unable to replace fallen defenders.

"Guys! There are 12 of you left defending the bridge. You need to hold off their attack for as long as it takes the other 5 to return with backup."

Arrows flashed across the bridge, sent by the moderators and helpers alongside Thorlon, but none hit their mark. Supergriefer, Loiyd_Irving and bballnick123 fired shots right back at them, and one arrow knocked skydeli to the ground, hurting him but not enough to kill.

I began typing a quick program. It wasn't the most... complicated thing I'd ever written. Ok, maybe it was just a gigantic laser beam. Don't judge. I finished the code- it wasn't that long- and turned back to the defense. The code would help us win the battle... if we managed to figure out how to use it. Just having the code wasn't enough- we'd need a way to deploy the code, and a power source.

The defense was holding, but it wouldn't last for long. The left bridge had taken casualties, as both Labron1975 and SpiderTheBite fell to the swarm of Jr. Helpers. On the right side, an arrow from Cygerus smashed into dedew84's chestplate, throwing him backwards into his teammates. Two Jr. Helpers jumped through, but lastikodezil cut them off. His sword flew out, taking out one of the Jr. Helpers, but the other Jr. Helper stabbed him before he could back out. Before the Jr. Helper could finish the kill, an arrow from Loiyd_Irving entered his skull, and he dematerialized.

The five that I had sent to the surface had reached the cornucopia. Suddenly, an alert flashed across the map:

Console: The blitz star has been hidden in a chest! Find it to activate your Blitz!

Perfect. The five instantly dived into the cornucopia chests, not even needing to be told what to do.

Console: Minechaos2713 found the Blitz Star!

"Quick! You five need to get to the base of the tower."

I checked back on the defense. It wasn't going as well as I had hoped. Mrnamol4 had fallen, leaving the right side of the bridge with only 3 people left. The astronauts on the left side weren't doing much better. MacmaniacMC chugged down a resistance potion and leapt into the horde of Jr. Helpers, his sword slashing left and right, eventually succumbing to the horde after downing several of them. TennisFTW and Maphia_Ace both chugged potions and ran forward, Troy_K close behind them, swiftly chopping with his diamond axe whenever the opportunity showed itself.

The right side of the bridge was in bad shape. They were starting to lose ground, being pressed back by the onslaught of Jr. Helpers. They were almost pushed back to the last third of the bridge when Thorlon's hand shot out, firing a lightning bolt across the bridge. Instead of hitting the defenders as expected, it flew over their heads, crashing into the doorway at the other side of the bridge. The doorway crumbled, and the exit was overflown with debris. They were trapped on the bridge, and they didn't have much more room to give. Envyrose and Fontzzzz both began running across the bridge.

The five got to the base of the tower. We had to act quickly.

"Minechaos! I'm transferring Rezzus's operator power to you. I've inserted a special code into the blitz star. Use it on the top of the tower."

He took out the Blitz star, pointed his hand at the top of the tower, and activated the code.

A massive beam of energy, around 3 meters in diameter, shot out of his hand. It hit the top of the tower, caving the walls in as the tower shook under the blast. The entire map shook as if there was an earthquake.

I didn't pity the staff team inside of it. Thorlon's head snapped to the left at the sound of the noise, just in time to see the wall cave in and get thrown violently against the wall by the force of the laser beam. He crumpled to the ground in a heap, barely conscious, and got to see the entire upper part of the tower collapsing. The portal that had been spawning Jr. Helpers suddenly disappeared as a large piece of stone brick flew threw it. Skydeli and SylentbutDedly were already dead. Thorlon saw Cygerus run for the exit, hoping to get onto the bridge, and saw the floor collapse beneath him as he fell to his death.

The bridge shook, and suddenly one side of the bridge snapped. The bridge began to crumble. Thorlon got back up, and threw his arms in front of him, creating a bubble shield around him, just in time to save himself from a giant piece of debris slamming into him. He was shielded, but that didn't stop the rock from smashing his shield- with him inside it- right through the wall of the citadel. He smashed into the ground, his shield cushioning the fall.

"Guys! Thorlon's going to escape. His power is only a fraction of what it was before, he's spent most of it keeping himself alive. You guys need to get him. Minechaos, you still have around 70% of Rezzus's operator power- use it."

The five astronauts ceased their slack-jawed staring at the crumbling tower and ran around it- giving it a wide berth to avoid the massive pieces of rock hitting the ground around it. I turned to the bridge situation.

Half the bridge had already fallen. Lastikodezil and Dedew84 were both dead, leaving Loiyd_Irving the only one remaining on his side of the bridge. He still had around 6 Jr. Helpers and Envyrose charging towards him. The left side wasn't faring much better- Maphia_Ace and Tennis had both died, leaving Troy_K and the two archers supergriefer and bballnick alone to defeat the remaining 10 Jr. Helpers- and Fontzzzz. The bridges were still collapsing, and only around half of the bridge was still intact.

Loiyd_Irving didn't have anywhere to run. The doorway had collapsed. The first Jr. Helper, who had been well ahead of the others. swung his stone sword. Loiyd_Irving ducked under it, rolled, and stood up behind him, sending an arrow through his back. He jumped forward, catching the stone sword as it fell out of his hands and quickly stored it for later. He turned, firing two more arrows, taking down two more Jr. Helpers. He then saw envyrose, only fifteen feet away, charging.

He fired an arrow, but envyrose threw her pigman egg, which spawned in the air and took the arrow through the chest. The pigman flew backwards as she dived to the ground, crashing into two Jr. Helpers. The bridge dissolved beneath them and all three fell. Envyrose was already recovering, rolling from the ground and throwing herself at Loiyd. Loiyd quickly drew his sword, and they begun slashing at eachother.

The left side of the bridge had similar problems. Troy_K dispatched two Jr. Helpers with his axe, and another arrow flew over his shoulder, eliminating a third. But he was backing up. Fontzzzz was charging. He swept his axe in an overhand swing, taking out another Jr. Helper, and quickly grabbed his sword, throwing it behind him.

"Supergriefer! Take this." "But I'm an archer!" "We might need it."

They retreated back, stopping at the inside of the tower to make their final stand. Two Jr. Helpers ran through the doorway, both quickly eating arrows as they flew backwards from the force of their bows. But the rest were right behind them, Fontzzzz leading the charge. bballnick123 and supergriefer both fired arrows, but both arrows simply bounced off of Fontzzzz's Necromancer chainmail armor. Troy_K stepped forward and they began swinging at eachother.

The five astronauts on the ground had found Thorlon. They all charged. Thorlon glanced at them, rage in his eyes. Kastrealm was the first to meet him. Thorlon's sword swung at unbelievable speeds, smashing into Kastrealm's chain chestplate and sending him flying into the Citadel tower, instantly killing him. He then turned, throwing out his arm, and Purelycraft was vaporized in lightning.

"I thought you said he was at a fraction of his original power!" Technoblade yelled over the relay. "He is!" I yelled back.

Thorlon turned to the 3 survivors. His hand shot out, and a lightning bolt flew towards Minechaos. Minechaos threw a hand in front of him, and a shield formed in the air in front of him, deflecting the bolt. Thorlon was visibly surprised.

"Operator powers?" He said.

Minechaos didn't respond, instead throwing himself at Thorlon. Their swords met, and Thorlon was thrown backwards. He threw his arm out, sending another lightning bolt, but Minechaos stepped to the side. Minechaos's arm blurred forward and suddenly Thorlon was engulfed in lightning. The lightning bolt threw him off of his feet and he smashed into a wall.

He started to get up, but Minechaos was already there. He was a blur, closing the distance at inhuman speeds, and Thorlon gasped as Minechaos's stone sword went through his chest. He fell to the ground and dematerialized.

Meanwhile, Loiyd Irving was in the fight of his life. He stepped backwards, avoiding a slash from envyrose, and suddenly was backed up against the side of the bridge. A Jr. Helper lunged, but he spun to the side, and turning in a full circle slammed his foot into the back of the Jr. Helpers head, throwing him off the bridge. He quickly sliced through the last Jr. Helper and turned to face envyrose. She slashed at him, and he blocked. There was a quick series of slashes and parries before Loiyd_Irving had backed envyrose against the bridge.

The bridge was still collapsing. A segment of it under envyrose's foot fell, and for half a second she was off balance. Loiyd_Irving threw himself forward, slamming his foot into her and sending her off the bridge. He began backing up as the bridge continued to fall apart. He only had a few meters left.

He backed up against the pile of debris blocking the doorway. The bridge continued to collapse. The drop got closer... four meters... three meters.... two... and then stopped. The bridge had stabilized. Loiyd let out a sigh of relief, only having been seconds away from certain death moments ago.

The other side of the bridge- no longer on the bridge, having retreated inside the room- wasn't doing well. Supergriefer stabbed one Jr. Helper, but three more ran towards him. An arrow from bballnick123 took out one, and Fontzzzz turned to him. Troy_K tried to stop him, but Fontzzzz threw out his Necromancer mob eggs, and suddenly Troy_K was facing a shield wall of zombies and skeletons.

Troy_K ran towards supergriefer, but he was too late. One Jr. Helper slashed at him, and as he drew his sword up to block it the other lunged forward, his sword running through Supergriefer's leather chestplate. He dematerialized, but Troy_K quickly avenged him, dispatching both the remaining Jr. Helpers. He turned to the undead horde and began taking out zombies.

BBallnick123 tried to back away, but Fontzzzz was too fast. He fired an arrow at him, but it simply bounced off of Fontzzzz's necromancer armor. He turned to run, but his life was quickly ended as Fontzzzz cut him down.

Troy_K had just finished killing the zombies. He took out two skeletons, but before he could kill the third Fontzzzz was there. Fontzzzz's sword flew forward, and Troy_K blocked it with his axe, leaving his side open. The remaining skeleton fired, hitting Troy_K in the chest. He stumbled, and despite blocking Fontzzzz's next attack, was knocked to the ground.

Fontzzzz approached him slowly, ready to finish him off. Suddenly, Troy_K sat up, throwing his diamond axe as hard as he could. It slammed through Fontzzzz's chestplate, and he flew backwards, knocking over the skeleton as well. Troy_K jumped up, grabbing the fallen stone sword of a Jr. Helper, and ran forward. He deflected an arrow from the skeleton and killed it. Fontzzzz stumbled up, yanking the diamond axe out of his chestplate, but before he could pull his sword up to block Troy_K had ran him through the chest with his sword. He dematerialized.

Citadel was saved.

--------------------------------

[end]

[aewrie]

'once a week or more' well rip

my default state of being when i'm not having a bad day is a little tired & nursing a budding headache. i have a headache right now that i'm ignoring

is this going to be another of those 'there is no such thing as a 'mild' concussion, if you hit your head bad enough to black out it is a concussion' lmao???

i get headaches from fucking everything. weather/air pressure (low and high). low/high blood sugar or too rapid changes there. too bright/dim light (at home i am specific about my lights/curtains at different points of the day/depending on how bright it's outside to avoid these). rapid repetitive/jarring physical motions (just jumping a little can be enough/make it worse). muscle tension. doing stretching/exercise that gets blood really flowing. lack of and/or bad sleep, or too much sleep. getting (strongly) emotional. caffeine (a new exiting one! only started regularly drinking coffee fairly recently. how much caffeine is too much is a fucking mystery though). i should wear glasses (myopia, not too severe) but i avoid it unless i need to see that far that well in part bc the glasses pressing on my temples give me headaches more easily than my eyes being slightly tired does.

i'm probably forgetting a bunch more

but every time i've seen people describe migraines i've thought well mine aren't anywhere near that severe/those specific kinds of headaches so No Way it's that

but. i do have other symptoms on that list? i just never thought it might be related to my headaches bc i'd not seen those mentioned, at least not in a way that i could identify as something i should consider in connection to this, and there's always the huge stress that migraines are always extra super bad to the point that a Real migraine completely disables you for a while. while to me it's. it's annoying, it hurts, if it's particularly bad it can make things more difficult but not impossible/near impossible; just, a general It's Not That Bad, therefore normal and i should just deal with it

[thedreadvampy]

idk I had a very interesting therap today but I just

like it's all very well to recognise that I gotta have a fucking open-ended breakdown and jump face first into the Sadness Bog sometimes instead of sitting on all my feelings

but like

I still have to go to work, you know? it's like. ok yeah have a breakdown which like until you jump into it you don't know if it's going to last an hour or a year. yeah go ahead that's all grand. you do have to get up in the morning and go to work though. you're not allowed to not do that. or to not pay the rent or not shower or not eat.

like all my friends and loved ones are constantly like 'you know you're allowed to be sad right' and it's like. AM I??? because I STILL HAVE TO PAY RENT.

[exopelagic]

okay I’m going insane I need to fix my sleep schedule now

[six-of-ravens]

finally made that list of things I want to do on my week-and-a-half off! It's mainly boring stuff: errands to run and super-early Christmas shopping and all that, or family stuff. My brain is complaining bc it's like "waaaah I just wanna spend a week on the couch playing video games!!" but I know from experience if I do that I'll feel like I wasted the week 😂 Also most of this stuff will only take a couple hours all told, I just decided to do it on my week off bc otherwise it'll be so hard to motivate myself to get out.

Last year when I took the week off I did a whole bunch of cooking and stocked up the freezer for a few weeks, which was a great idea, but since my holidays are right after Thanksgiving this year and the weather is still relatively warm, idk if I'll feel like cooking much. Still gonna try and stock the freezer up a bit tho!

(also yes I did get roped into doing work teambuilding on my week off. everyone got super hype for this VR room thing but then half the office was sick this week and there are people on vacation the next 3 weeks, so I caved and said I'd just meet them at the place. I have very little Get Out And Do Fun Things activities books anyways so I should just go and Have Fun. Not like I'd be paying for it...)

[gas-stxtion]

//sorry i haven't been working on replies lately! you see, it's because [mid-sentence i slowly lie down on the floor and start crying really hard. i do not finish my explanation]

[pepprs]

alt*rnative spr*ng br*ak day 1. i need to be on campus in 3.5 hours. i have packed nothing and have done no laundry. i have not prepared for any of the facilitation i need to do today. i am experiencing physical symptoms of anxiety and burnout ♥️

[toastsnaffler]

I feel like my meds keep wearing off earlier and earlier in the day ugh.. having to lie down now im home from work I'm shattered :-(

[earlgreybocchan]

Animating this season like you can't have the slightest bit of jest and god forbid jesting about yaoi

[the-cooler-king]

Oh yeah..... midnight gospel be hitting.... sitting in my bed fuckin. Crying. Get a grip girl

[astrxealis]

leon theme i spent my early morning hours working on even tho i have to wake 6 am !!! 🫵🆒✨ (it is 10 minutes to 5 am)