Preface: In this story, Taylor Hebert gets dropkicked into the world of Minecraft prior to the locker, gaining all the capabilities of a Survival player. That said, this is Minecraft when it's taken seriously as an actual universe, rather than Minecraft adhering totally to video game logic. As such, the world will not be cubical and boxy all over, nor will it be heavily pixelated. Villagers meanwhile are actual people who actually arm themselves to try and get through the constant nightly monster raids, rather than cowering in their homes and hoping the local Golem takes care of everything; sadly they don't have the Crafting superpowers that they'd need to fortify their villages to the point of impregnability by the next night.
That said, anything doable in vanilla Minecraft can also be done in this version, though the methods may differ somewhat to account for this being a universe that's actually being taken seriously. As an example, pistons can still be used to construct a flying machine, however they will be a source of thrust rather than just shoving the machine around in one meter steps. Similarly, Enchanting is a fair bit less random, Redstone machines can be miniaturized much more effectively, and there's nothing stopping someone with a sizable supply of Gunpowder, Iron, and Flint from making themselves a Blunderbuss.
On a story beats note, this story will be partially told in anachronic order, alternating between chapters in Brockton Bay taking place after Taylor's triumphant return, and chapters in Minecraft, showing how Taylor got that way.
It was my first school day after winter break, and against my better judgement I'd actually got some hope that Emma would stop making my life miserable, since she'd been letting up a bit before the break.
This hope was immediately dashed before I even made it to Winslow, and the reason had nothing whatsoever to do with the trio of bullies after me. No, that blame laid squarely on Uber and Leet having obstructed traffic with a rectangular frame of some black material, while also dressed up in medieval-looking armor. I stood gobsmacked as one of them pulled out a microphone and said "Residents of Brockton Bay, welcome to Uber and Leet's pig zombie defense minigame! Waves of putrid porkers will come out of that portal as soon as we light it up, and whoever takes down the most will get a prize! Ready, set, go!"
Immediately, I turned around to leave, only to be confronted with a transparent, shimmering force field keeping me and a few dozen other pedestrians contained. I heard that infuriating voice again shouting "Of course, leaving before the fun even starts is strictly prohibited."
Turning to look again, the rectangular frame was now filled with something glowy and purple, which immediately spurred a reaction best described as "ALL the NOPE!". This only intensified when shambling, rotting creatures started walking out of the portal, each wielding a golden sword in one hand.
There were screams of panic and fear for a few moments before it quickly became apparent that despite their horrific appearances, the pig-faced zombies were pretty much just wandering around aimlessly and not really bothering anyone. I figured that since the undead pigs weren't really bothering anyone and no-one wanted to take the first shot, Uber and Leet would get bored soon and shut off the force field. So I went back to walking down the street towards Winslow, figuring I might as well go back to what I was doing. Big mistake.
Turns out that Leet (or was it Uber? Hard to keep track through their armor) was none too happy about how the pig zombies weren't bothering anyone, and decided to take out his frustration on the nearest one by smacking it in the face while shouting something I didn't hear over all the guttural grunting. Immediately, every single pig zombie whirled around to face the villain, and the entire mob started charging at them, swords at the ready. Though the undead pigmen were careful not to poke me with their swords as they charged, I still got shoved to the side as they passed. I got a brief glimpse at the portal as I was pushed into it, then my entire field of view went purple.
When I could see clearly again, I was somewhere else entirely. The air was hot like there was a fire nearby, the rock was red and soft beneath my feet, and I could clearly see lavafalls in the distance, along with a ceiling to wherever I was. Then I heard a high-pitched, keening cry followed by a sound like a firey explosion and whirled to see where it came from.
For my troubles, I got a view of a white flying tentacled creature the size of a weather balloon, and a ball of fire streaking towards me at distressingly fast speeds. I ducked and the fireball soared over my head, exploding behind me. The soft red rock I'd been standing on gave way, and I fell, dropping straight towards a glowing orange sea of lava. I didn't have time to process what was about to happen before I was suddenly immersed in agonizing pain.
A few seconds later, I was dead, but strangely I could still see things happening around where I was. Almost immediately I felt like there was an option to keep going, and I immediately grabbed onto that certainty like a lifeline.
The ocean of lava containing my mortal remains vanished around me, and abruptly I found myself in a completely different location. Looking around, it was clear I was in some sort of building, albeit one that had seen better days. Cobwebs were all over the place, the whole place was dusty, and looking around it was immediately clear that the door had been ripped off its hinges. There were also several bookshelves, each of which had a few books on it. I also noted that there was a torch mounted to the wall, casting light across the room. Rather incongruously with the rest of the building, it was still burning.
Immediately looking for any possible distraction from the fact that I'd just fallen in lava and died, I immediately set about investigating the bookshelves. Looking a bit closer, the faded tags at the bottom identified one of the bookshelves as being fiction, and the other two as being nonfiction. Looking closer at the nonfiction section, there were a selection of titles such as "A treatise on the construction and use of interdimensional portals", "Practical implications of the World Curse", "Known Realms of Existence", "Practical self-defense against the undead", "Basic Metallurgy", "Wilderness Survival", "Redstone Engineering for Beginners", and "Practical Enchantment and Potioncrafting".
Well, the titles themselves weren't all that weird, but their inclusion in the nonfiction section definitely took a bit for me to accept. Still, it was pretty clear I wasn't exactly in Brockton Bay any more. Frantically crushing any thoughts that this might be some sort of dying hallucination, I settled in to read.