Clownpierce

Time was meaningless here. Half the terrain was either the colorless soulsand that always made one walk slower while walking on it, or the blood-red netherrack that served as the walls. The walls because the cities were usually carved into the nether walls like bee hives. It did save resources and when one city was full of people, an obsidian perimeter would be set and a new city would be built beyond that like a grid.

There was no night and day since the nether lacked a sky and instead had an oppressive sweltering atmosphere. If the Overworld was a lush realm with forests, oceans of deep blues and canyons of terracotta blocks, the Nether realm was simply hell. People here died from starvation and some didn't even get to live in the city you thought of as a worker hive in red foundation. Some of the miners lived in the Wastelands.

Enough people had told you escape was pointless. Attempting to make another 2x3 obsidian portal was out of the questions because the guards had trapped the portals signals and escapees were eliminated on sight. The underlying feeling of helplessness stayed, ironically a symptom of insanity.

Friends or allies were usually the only way to collect debris to pay for a ticket into one of the cities, if you were alone the chances of survival were slim. Before Clownpierce had guided you towards one of the functioning prisons with his guard force behind him (after kidnapping you from the Overworld by making one of your buyers unwilling sell you out just to find you), he had offered to just waive you in without you having to labor immediately for debris.

Of course you opted to be stubborn and picked up a stone pickaxe to start fishing for debris while he watched you walk away. You assumed he watched you since he stood there for a few minutes with that mask concealing every expression he could have. Very intimidating which is why you chose to lay low for a month before working on an escape plan.

It turned out to be much harder than expected. This wasn't your first prison experience or your first run being abducted by Clownpierce, like Bowser stealing away Peach. Proton was only a couple of years ago and you treated it like a bad dream of a memory. Honestly you were a known prison escapist among older players, the first generations on the server. It was a pattern of tyrants viewing you as a threat to their plans or people with fixation wanting to make sure you couldn't get hurt. They were never permanent stays.

Having watched the trio you had befriended and earned citizenship with get banned in front of your eye left you crest fallen. All your could do after watching two of Clownpierce's guards push Mae off a cliff was go back to the "cubicle" home that used to house four people. It sent you into a spiral, you barely acknowledged Clownpierce's guards until their shields were right in front of you.

Clownpierce stepped forward from behind the guards to approach. Despite being called Clownpierce, he was adorned in a black and red Jester's garb with the puffed sleeves and a high black collar, he wore dark netherite armor with nether Redstone trims. That infuriating ivory porcelain mask that was probably enchanted to never fracture was staring in your direction, the black eye slits painted as small diamonds gazing at you.

"... I heard what happened to your friend." He sounded better than the last time he had spoken to you, now there was less of a rasp in his tone. Maybe he had been overcoming some cold, why should you even care. "A tragedy, isn't it?" He paused as you blinked. Then you began speaking. A shaky voice from your person rose to a yell. He let you yell at him, accusing his rules of being heartless because Mae had died for nothing.

His voice was too slow like honey, maddening as sinking in quicksand. A tone he didn't often use. "Now let's not get ahead of ourselves, shall we? Just give up. Come on. It's real easy. Just tell me everything. You'll get out safe. It's okay, birdie. You've fought hard enough, it's okay to give up now. I can take care of you if-"