Stream starts in 3.

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“Hellooooo! It’s your boy Michael, and this is Minecraft Week 2. Last week you saw me craft, build and survive through my first night and fight the creepers that tried to break into my house and then I heroically saved—”

“Honey! Are you talking to yourself again?” a loud, piercing and all too familiar voice interrupted me from outside my bedroom door.

“No, mom!” I yelled out. “Don’t come in! I’m streaming on Twi—”

My mom, ignoring my very simple instructions, burst into the room, and quickly scanned the room to gauge its dirtiness level. Dirtiness level 3 is being grounded for a day. Dirtiness level 2 is a long and loud yelling session. Thankfully my room is currently at dirtiness level 1, which is act as usual, but display slight disappointment at me.

“Ohhhh. You’re making one of those internet videos.” She smiled brightly and strolled into the room.

“Mom, wait, you’re getting in the video—” I tried to stop her.

But she was already on it.

My mom grabbed my webcam, brought it up to her face, and looked right into it. I glanced at my stream and my mom looked like a fish staring out of a fishbowl. She took out a Windex bottle from her mom utility belt and sprayed the webcam. She then took out a clean towel hanging on the belt and wiped the cam clean.

“There, now you’ll look all handsome in your video,” She declared proudly.

“Mooom….” I sighed as I ended my stream.

I wasn’t too upset because there were only three viewers, and I think one of them was a bot. Hopefully, they come back when I start my stream again, even the bot. I mean as long as it’s boosting my view count, I don’t really care if my viewers are man or machine.

“You know, all your internet friends watching you would really like it if you kept a clean room in the background,” she advised me as she set everything back in her belt and started to clean around the room.

“I know, I was going to get to it.”

“Tsk tsk,” my mom shook her head as she found my green creeper hoodie wrapped around my lamp like a snake. I waited patiently as my mom finally finished.

“I trust that you can take care of the rest,” My mom pointed towards a pile of laundry that I hadn’t put in the closet yet.

“Yes, mom, I’ll make sure my room is clean for the three people watching my stream. Or were watching my stream,” I muttered.

She looked around the room one last time to see if there were any other messes for her to clean up.

“Love you, Michael,” she said as she walked back out of my room.

I quickly double-checked to see that the stream was definitely ended.

“Yeah, love you too, mom,” I replied.

“Oh, and Michael?” she added as she began to close the door behind her.

“Yeah?”

“Good luck!”

So yeah, this is me. Michael. An average 13-year-old boy, doing average things, with an average stay-at-home mom and an average life. At least that used to be true. In fact, none of what I told you is true anymore. Everything has changed.

Let’s start at the beginning. I used to be a pretty famous Twitch Streamer—people would even recognize me on the streets. Granted, I’m assuming I was famous based on me having three average viewers per stream. I also had one YouTube subscriber, and yeah, to be honest, only one person ever actually recognized me on the streets, and he was indeed my childhood best friend—Liam.

Okay, I guess I was a pretty unknown Twitch streamer, but whatever, that doesn’t really matter. Let’s just get to the part that matters. Let’s get to what happened that fateful night.

So back to the past me, after my mom left, I cleaned my room completely lest I incur her wrath again and she ruins another stream. I folded all my clean clothes, tossed the undies in the laundry hamper, and sprayed enough Febreze to make myself gag.

My mom has been known to attack a room with the mop and bucket sometimes. So, I made sure to spray the floors down while I had the chance. The final touch was arranging a few books on my desk so that they gave the illusion of me having read them.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

When I was done, I went back to my computer and cracked my knuckles. It’s go time.

“Okay, time to start it up again,” I said out loud as I went through the steps to start my stream up. Login to Twitch, make sure I’m archiving the footage so I can upload to YouTube later, start Minecraft, and send out a tweet to my dozen followers that the stream has begun—#BestMinecraftStream.

DING! My phoned beeped.

I looked over at my smartphone as it weakly buzzed. It was a hand-me-down from my dad and it’s ancient. Like they probably made this back in the stone age. It definitely weighed like a rock. It’s so old that I think my dad used it back when he was a kid. But I’m not complaining, it’s better than nothing, and I can play Minecraft: Pocket Edition on it!

I opened the phone to find a text from my best friend—Liam.

LIAM: What happened to your stream? I was watching!

I sent him a reply:

MICHAEL: My mom…anyway I’m starting it up again. You should hop back on. Today’s stream is going to be sick!

I put the phone back down and saw that Minecraft had finally loaded up. I pressed the start streaming button and it was showtime. Little did I know that my life was about to change forever.

Stream starts in 3

2.

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“Hellooooo! It’s your boy Michael, and this is Let’s Play Minecraft Week 2. Last week you saw me craft, build and survive through my first night and fight the creepers that tried to break into my house, and then I heroically saved the day by killing them all, but my house was damaged by some dumb creeper blowing up right in the middle of it. So, I guess we’ll start out today by fixing up my house,” I explained to my 2 viewers that joined my stream. I guess the bot didn’t come back.

Hopefully, more people join as I keep playing. I’m glad Liam is here, at least. Otherwise, I would be playing for only one viewer, and that’s always awkward.

I controlled my character to walk down to a nearby tree and started violently punching it to get wood out of it. If that sentence made no sense to you—you probably shouldn’t even be reading this. But as any Minecraft fan would know, punching trees is classic Minecraft.

As I tediously punched the tree, I wondered if any of this was really worth it. No one is ever going to watch my stream. Well, except for some random person or two that usually show up and, of course, my best friend, Liam.

What’s the point of doing anything when no one cares or even knows you’re doing it?

Would basketball players still play basketball if no one was watching? Would movie stars still act in movies if no one showed up in the theaters? Would teachers still teach if no one was paying attention?

Well, I think that last one happens all the time, but still, it all felt so very pointless.

I wish all of this was worth something or meant something.

I wish it wasn’t all for nothing.

Just then, as I was having my Minecraft midlife crisis, I saw an odd villager just staring at me on the corner of my monitor.

All villagers look odd, with their large chubby nose, but this one was odder than the rest. It was fat. It’s pretty hard to be fat in a game where everything is made out of equivalent sized blocks, but this guy was literally pushing the art style of the game to the limit.

“Wow, did you guys see that?” I asked my two-person audience as I walked over to the villager. “Wow, this is such a cool bug. There’s no village anywhere. Where did he spawn from?”

Villagers tend to only spawn in villages. Having a villager spawn in the middle of a forest out of nowhere is a very weird glitch. It’s not like I was using any mods.

I circled the villager; it wasn’t moving at all. He just stood completely still.

As I looked at it closer, I got spooked by a loud thunderous sound. It sounded like it came from both inside the game and outside my window at the same time.

“Woah,” I said as it started raining, in the game and outside together. “That was freaky.”

The clattering of rain drops on my window and the rain inside the game sounded so alike, the sounds seemed to merge together.

“Well, what do you guys think? Should I shoot it with an arrow?” I asked as I opened my inventory and equipped my bow.

“No.” I heard a faint voice hidden in the thunders of the game and the ones raging outside my room. I quickly removed my headphones and looked around. No one was here, but I could have sworn someone said that.

“Mom?” I said, wondering if she was the source of the voice. “I—I cleaned my room…”

There was no reply. My mom was probably still in the kitchen, making my lunch for tomorrow. But then, where did the voice come from?

Did that sound really come from inside the game? I wondered as I slowly put my headphones back on.

“Did you guys hear that too?” I asked into my mic, “Was that from the game?”

I remained really quiet to make sure no one replied this time. I probably just imagined the voice. I mean, it’s pretty loud with the rain and thunders.

I checked the chat on my stream, only Liam answered my question.

LIAM: Hear what?

“Nevermind…” I sighed and went back to playing the game, “Where was I? Oh yeah, the glitchy villager.”

I looked back at the villager, but I wasn’t feeling right. Everything looked darker, like the lights in my room had turned off, but they hadn’t. I could hear loud thumping in my ears, they sounded like drums, but I realized it was my own heartbeat.

I heard a voice from behind me, clear as day. It didn't sound like any voice I'd ever heard before, not even my mom or my dad’s. In fact, it didn’t seem to be coming from anywhere in particular, more of just being everywhere all at once. It was like a light humming that went along with the drums of my heartbeat.

I could feel sweat dripping down my forehead. Was it sweat?

It feels like rainwater.

I shivered as a cold breeze went through me.

Did I leave the window open?

I clicked the left mouse button to charge my bow right at the glitchy villager. Okay, let me just shoot it, and then I’ll end the stream and…

Wait a second.

I didn’t click on the left mouse button.

I pushed my arm back on the bowstring and felt the strain of the string demanding to be released on my fingers.

I felt raindrops dripping on my face.

The wind brushing my hair.

A wet soggy feeling on my feet from standing on wet grass.

I felt my eyes dilate to adjust to the darkness of the night.

I surrendered to the strain of the bowstring and shot the arrow out, but it missed its target as the villager was no longer there.

I put the bow down and noticed that my hands were now rectangles. I looked around and confirmed my suspicions—this isn’t my bedroom.

This is Minecraft and I’m in it.

Worst of all, it’s night, and I can already hear the monsters growling around me.