Chapter 5

Chapter 5 THE KIDS ARE IN TROUBLE. MAKE NO BONES ABOUT IT! Jodi's mind was reeling. Ten seconds ago, she had been so happy. She thought there had been a horse! She had immediately started thinking up sweet horse names and trying to remember if anyone had a saddle in their inventory. Now she and her friends were running for their lives from a skeleton horse and its creepy, arrow-shooting rider. A lot could change in ten seconds! "I'VE GOT THIS," Morgan said, and he pulled his beloved diamond sword from his inventory. Jodi held her breath as he charged the rider and took a

mighty overhead swing…. And his sword bounced harmlessly off the skeleton horseman. "Oh no," Jodi said. Being unable to harvest resources was one thing. But if they couldn't harm hostile mobs, they were in real trouble. The skeleton horseman took aim at Morgan. At such a close distance, Morgan was an easy target. The arrow struck him, and he fell back, flashing red as he took damage. "OUCH!" he said. "That…that isn't fair!" In the gloom, Jodi saw movement. A figure

stepped from a nearby copse of trees. And then another appeared from behind a broken stone pillar. She couldn't make them out until a sudden bolt of lightning provided a moment of light. There were three of them now. Of course! she thought. The lightning spawns two additional skeleton horsemen. And now they were all converging on Morgan. "THAT'S REALLY NOT FAIR!!!" he complained when he saw the two additional adversaries. Ash had darted forward. She grabbed Morgan by the shoulder and pulled him back. "Worry about what's fair later!" she said. "RUN AWAY AND LIVE TO COMPLAIN ANOTHER DAY!" "Up here!" Harper said, and she led the others up what was left of the castle's central staircase. Jodi waited long enough to make sure Ash and Morgan were coming; then she turned on her heels and ran after Harper. It was a long staircase, but not long enough. Soon the five of them had come to the stone platform at the very top of the tower. They stood in the open air, rain all around

them, and realized they'd arrived at a dead end. The horsemen wouldn't be far behind. "What do we do?" Po cried out helplessly. "WE CAN'T HURT IT!" Morgan placed a cobblestone brick on the ground. "Look! We can't break bricks, but we can still place them," he said. "WE NEED TO PUT UP A BARRIER. We can build a whole room around ourselves." "No, stop!" said Harper. "Think about it. IF YOU BUILD A ROOM AROUND US AND WE CAN'T REMOVE IT LATER, THEN WE'LL BE STUCK. Anything we build now is permanent!" "What do we do?" Po cried again, more desperate this time. "Jodi!" said Ash. "Any ideas? TELL ME YOU'VE COME UP WITH SOMETHING." Jodi's eyes went wide. "Me? Why me?" Ash stepped up to Jodi. Everyone else was panicking, but Ash looked eerily calm. "It's what you do best, Jodi. YOU THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX." Ash's belief in her made Jodi feel a little calmer.

She focused on the problem. Outside the box, she thought. Outside the box… "That's it!" Jodi said. "We don't want to box ourselves in. WE WANT TO BOX THE BAD GUYS IN. Build a box!" As she spoke, their skeletal enemies emerged from the staircase, leaping right into the middle of the platform. The riders' focus was still on Morgan. "I'LL KEEP THEM BUSY!" Morgan said, running back and forth. His attackers tried to follow with their bows, but Morgan was too quick. While the skeletons were distracted, Jodi and the others leapt into action. They stacked blocks as quickly as they could, as close to the horses as they dared. By the time the skeletal riders noticed what was happening, the blocks were too

high to jump over. Jodi made a little staircase so that she could reach over the skeletons' head. She placed a final series of blocks on top—a lid for their box. She hopped back a few steps to admire their handiwork. It looked like a squat chimney made of a variety of mismatched bricks. "IT ISN'T PRETTY," Jodi said. "But it got the job done." "It sure did!" said Ash, and she gave Jodi a fist bump. "Good thinking, Jodi." "I can't believe I almost trapped us in an inescapable room," Morgan said. "It's like I have to learn a whole new set of rules." "It's temporary," Ash said. "WE JUST HAVE TO FIND THE EVOKER KING and get him to put everything back the way it was." "Uh, guys?" said Po. "I think I found him." Jodi followed Po's gaze over the side of the tower. There, in the distance, was a familiar sight: the obsidian words that the Librarian had once built as a warning: Beware the Evoker King!