'Oh my goodness, Scott... is he ok? Grian... is he...?'

A gasp as Grian woke, falling out of Scott's arms and onto the floor, injuries receding from the new world he was unhurt leaving.

'Grian- you're alive...'

'We need to go. Now. Find everyone else who's alive and run.' Scott insisted as Impulse helped Grian to his feet, the two hugging for a moment. 

'Is Hermes ok?' Was the winged hermit's first concern.

'He's fine.'

'Get him and go. And tell the others while you're at it... Scott, you need armour and weapons. I... don't have much here...' It took a moment for Grian to find his ender chest, but soon did, putting it down and searching for anything he had... there, a Did You Die box equivalent for if he ended up losing all of someone's stuff. He handed it to Scott, just as the hoard came from above. 

Scar landed, with Cub just behind. Scott gave Grian a glance, new sword out to fight. 

'You can't beat us. We're not giving up...' 

'Heyyy Scott... long time no see... Your crazy ex has been missing you.'

'Yeah... I saw enough of Pearl through there. She killed Oli.'

'And Pix?' 

'Ren got him.' Scott explained, glancing at Grian. 'I don't know what happened then...' 

Right then, the rest of the survivors appeared... Hypno, Keralis, Wels and Stress. Impulse was probably still running away with Hermes through some secret exit. Scar stepped back. 

'Grian- what happened? All Impulse said was we needed to run...'

'Empires is lost, I'm the only survivor, these two have just arrived.'

'We mean you no harm.' Regaining confidence quickly, Scar approached. Wels pointed his sword at him, stepping in front of the others. 

'Get out of our base.' He demanded. 'Or I kill you.'

'Wels, Wels, Wels if we wanted to hurt you everyone here would be vexes. We came to offer friendship instead.'

'Yeah, no... that didn't really work in Third Life, Scar.' Scott retorted, crossing his arms. 'I just got this armour from Grian.'

'We come to offer friendship and alliance against Ren.' Cub added, eyes narrowed as he joined Scar. 

'What?' 

'We have decided to have no part in Ren's little kingdom, and plan to kill him if he comes back through the rift. Which requires us to be by the rift so just let us through and everything will be alright.'

'Why do you hate Ren?' Grian questioned. 

'Because he's forcing us to do what he wants.' Cub replied, anger seeping into his voice. 'Against our wills.' 

'Then why didn't you come sooner?' 

'Because Scar thinks I'm more likely to listen to him.' Grian answered quietly. Scar didn't need to nod to confirm it.

'Well?'

'Brian doesn't get to make decisions for us any more.' Keralis interrupted Grian before he could even speak.

'Keralis, Scar's his friend.' 

'Scar's everyone's friend.' Shot back Wels. 'This affects all of us. Grian doesn't get to sacrifice anyone else away.' 

'I've had too much experience with Scar in the Life Series pretending he'd going to be your friend. I'm vote no.' Scott was first to answer. 

'I don't know, man.' Sighed Hypno. 'The moment Ren does come through he'd going to be straight back under their control whatever his intentions actually are.' 

'Scar's our friend. And Cub is too... we can't just stop them from being happy.' Stress voted

'Yeah, Cub's here too.' Said Scar very unnecessarily. 'Don't forget about Cub.'

'We can't trust him.' Wels argued. 'We can't trust either of them.'

Grian still hadn't spoken, and Keralis hadn't either, but didn't have time to as their communicators buzzed.

Rentheking joined the game

Inthelittlewood joined the game 

They all backed away as the rest of the Emperors came through, notably excluding Shubble, Oli and Pearl... Jimmy... Joel... Sausage... and Pix last, with new ender-dragon wings, tail and scales. 

'Man, I missed Hermitcraft.' The king smiled. Wels glared at him. Scar stepped behind Cub. Scott stared at Jimmy, tears in his eyes as he blinked. Keralis and Stress exchanged a glance. Grian glared at them. 'Hey, everyone.' 

'Why are you here?' Scar couldn't hide the fear in his voice.

'Because this is my home, dude... do you mind that I brought a couple more friends with me?' Joey gave a small wave, one hand on his trident. Next to him, Katherine gave a smile, wielding her own giant axe.

'Get out.' Wels was the first to speak. 'Get out of Hermitcraft or I'll kill you.' 

'Killing me will do nothing... and try not to raise your voice too much. Sausage doesn't like a lot of noise.' 

'Sausage... if you can still understand us, Hermes is safe.' Stress called. Whether from the noise or the comment, the warden looked over. Grian stepped in front of her, slowly pulling out his sword. But his gaze was fixed on Scar, not Ren. The vex was clearly fighting Ren's control, holding Cub's hand as he tried to hold onto his sanity.

'I vote to let Cub and Scar join us.' He muttered. The others looked over at him. 'Hypno? Wels? Scott? Any of you changing your vote?'

'I agree with Brian and Stress.' Keralis added. Ren was watching them, curious. 

'It's equal. I'm Scar's second best friend, so I get the final vote. We ally with Cub and Scar.' Grian decided. No one could argue loudly, at risk of angering both Sausage and him, but Wels narrowed his eyes

'They said they'd kill us!'

'They haven't killed us yet... look at Scar and tell me he's doing this for evil means...' Grian looked to where Scar was standing, unmoving, with his eyes closed and head down. Cub seemed almost as bad, pale, standing close to Scar. 

'Fine.' 

'Well? Am I allowed past?' Ren brought everyone back to attention. 'Or do I have to show you how strong my new friends are myself?'

Cub looked over at Grian, who gave a small nod. 

'We're getting impatient...' Joel warned, clearly excited for the imminent bloodshed.

'No.' Wels glared back. 'Go back to your new world and leave us in peace.'

'Fine. I hate to do this... attack.'

The army attacked. Wels ran at them, instantly knocked to the ground by Lizzie. Scott joined him, pulling her away, but was caught by a blow from Joel's gold sword before he could succeed in anything. Cub and Scar started shooting arrows at Joey and Katherine, who were forced back slightly, but not much, Joey's trident hitting Scar directly in the arm. Grian backed away as Pix approached him, dragon's breath at his fingers, eyes glowing purple. Stress and Keralis went for Fwhip and Jimmy, forced back in seconds, Keralis killed by just one explosion. Instant carnage, instant realisation there was no option but to run. 

'GET OUT!' Grian yelled, before getting shot at by Sausage, stunned for a moment by the blast. Cub was desperately protecting the badly-hurt Scar, shooting arrows and vex magic at Katherine as she ran to get them. Wels was defeated, pinned by the victorious Lizzie. Martyn, as before, was staying out of the fight, while Ren yelled encouragement from a safe distance. Grian took to the air, joined by Pix, taking in the rest of the fight. Keralis was trapped by Sausage inside the base, Stress soon joining him as Jimmy killed her. Cub and Scar fled, out of the cave itself. Scott was still desperately fighting Joel, yelling with pain as his arm was broken. Hypno tried to lure Sausage away from the secret base with arrows, but nothing worked. There was no way they were going to win here... 

Grian started to fly away, but Pix caught him, dragon hand grabbing his own. He turned and slashed back with his sword, shooting out the cave and as far away as possible. 

It can always get worse... :)