Swap

Extra 3 | Flying Lessons

WC: 1457

Bit of a lighthearted extra this time, though we do get some character development in both Mumbo and Grian! I'll talk about this more in the lore chapter (which is after this one), but, for now, I'll just say that their story is far from over.

Enjoy!

»»————-　★　————-««

"Let's try this one more time. This time, with less plummeting and more gliding."

Grian, Iskall, and I were seated on top of NPG's base, right at the very top level. I had my Elytra on. So did Grian. Iskall was seated to the side, watching us. Next to them, there were stacks of bundled rockets. Grian and I were covered head to toe in gunpowder. With the amount of rockets off to the side--and how many we'd already used--you could tell it had been a long day of flying.

And we weren't done yet. I lit the end of a firework and prepped my wings, gesturing for Grian to follow suit. "C'mon."

Grian groaned but begrudgingly spread his own Elytra. "Can we take a break? Or, better yet, can we stop completely?"

"I told you. You can't navigate Hermitcraft properly if you don't know how to fly. You'd have to carry around stacks and stacks of blocks."

"Heck, NPG's base can't even be navigated without Elytra!" Iskall chimed in. "The higher levels, at least."

"Exactly," I continued. "It's much easier to learn how to fly in the long run."

"At the rate I'm going, I'd honestly choose the blocks," Grian groused.

"No more of that!" I rocketed straight up, into the air, looking down expectantly at Grian as I floated midair. "One more time. I promise. Then we can be done."

Grian muttered something under his breath that I couldn't hear before lighting his own firework and shooting straight up into the air clumsily. It was so different from the smooth takeoff I was used to getting from NPG, and that wasn't the only problem we had to deal with.

Grian couldn't steer properly in the air. He couldn't get enough speed with his rockets before losing control. He ended up slamming into the concrete walls of NPG's-but-now-his base more than he spent time flying in the air. At the very best, he could glide along slowly, but that wasn't going to be very fast for traveling in the long run.

He demonstrated his crappy flying skills as he flew towards me, wobbling in midair. He finally reached me after 15 seconds of slowly gliding, then spent another 10 trying to figure out how to hover without moving. Finally, though, we got there.

Though I wasn't having a lot of hope for how this last run was going to go.

Nevertheless, I stayed optimistic. "So! We're gonna try something different this time. Instead of flying straight ahead, I'm gonna have you fly straight down."

Grian choked in surprise. "Are you joking? I'd bellyflop into the water and break every bone in my body!"

"No, but, see, the problem you're having with flying right now is that you can't control the direction you're flying in. If you fly down, you don't have to deal with that!"

Iskall cleared their throat from where they were watching us from NPG's base. "Erm, that's...slightly flawed logic."

Grian shook his head vehemently. "No way. Unless you want a Grian-shaped splat as decoration in this base."

"C'mon. I told you, this is the last time. Remember? Let's go all out."

"God, I hate you," Grian muttered under his breath, but he obligingly tilted downwards. He started to fall, gaining speed as he got closer to the ocean below.