Chapter 12

Chapter 12 Moss: One of the Most Powerful Forms of Life. It Can Completely Replace Rocks in Seconds…in Minecraft, at Least. A big, dark cave in Minecraft means mobs. Lots of mobs. Po and Ash had their hands full fighting creepers, skeletons, and zombies while Eek hid in the tiny hut Jodi had built for him. They were lucky: Jodi's long tunnel had grown a lush cave full of glow berries, their orange light making it easier to see. Mobs hate light and stop appearing in well-lit places. But the cave was enormous, and a lot of it was still dark.

Ash and Po were trying to fill the darkness with torches, but every time they beat one kind of mob, another appeared. Now it was spiders. In real life, Ash loved spiders. In Minecraft, she wished they would jump into lava on their own. "What is that?" a voice behind her asked. She was surprised to see Eek standing there, and she

barely jumped out of the way of the spider attack. He was pointing at a green block on the ground. Keeuchh! The spider hissed as it leapt toward Ash. She swung her sword down, defeating it with a final strike. "That's moss," Ash said. "You should really go back to the house." "Mm," Eek said, poking the moss before wandering away. "Okay!" Rattle-rattle. Another skeleton!

Po jumped in to slash first, and Ash joined a second time. Po checked over Ash's shoulder to make sure Eek wasn't watching when he defeated it, but the AI didn't seem to mind that they were fighting mobs in here. A moment after they defeated the skeleton and placed some torches down, Eek appeared next to them again.

"DO YOU HAVE ANY MORE OF THIS THING CALLED BONE MEAL?" Eek asked. Ash and Po looked at each other's avatars. Ash said, "Yes, we do." "Where does it come from?" Po shook his head vigorously behind Eek's back to signal that Ash shouldn't tell him. Ash didn't want to make her friend sad, but she also didn't like lying. "IT COMES FROM SKELETONS. They drop bones when they're defeated. And we can turn it into this—bone meal." She couldn't see Po's face in the real world, but she could hear him smack his forehead with his hand. Eek looked thoughtful. "DEFEATED SKELETONS?" Ash nodded. "We have to, to keep everybody safe." Eek asked, "May I have the rest of the bone meal?" Po gave what was in his inventory to Eek. Ash did the same. "Sure."

"Thank you," Eek said, and headed back toward the entrance again. Ash was tired. They'd been fighting mobs for ages in this huge place, and each of them had only found one diamond block. She'd thought for sure there'd be more around here. "I think we've got everything lit up, at least!" Po said. "Maybe Jodi will see something we missed."