Poems and writings

Talking about hearthomes

I realised I never really talked about my hearthome in this blog, at least not in depth. So, why not start now? I’m trying to write more essays, anyways. I call myself a writer, so I might as well honor that title.

Watchers origins, from what I know, are… A bit strange. There’s not really a consensus on when we were created, and even though I don’t really have a past life, I have memories and a hearthome, so that should be enough. We date on the first minecraft versions, because there were so many bugs on those updates that someone needed supervising. Thus we were born. To supervise and watch and guide and guard. We are not really… born. Although I was a hatching once, and then a fledging, we are created. Kinda like the greek myths on human creation, when Prometheus created humans with mud and clay, watchers are more or less the same. Our code is written, and then we are given a form.

There’s two ways a watcher is born, that I know of: Whether is created by other watchers, them writing the code and creating a hatchling from scratch… Or by transfiguration, that is, by taking an already created human body and forcing its code to change. I (Moss) was made by this last method, I was born human. From what I know, Orion was born a watcher. Watchers, full watchers, are kinda… rare, these days. I don’t know if they are going extinct or what, and I don’t know if there are more out there. I’ve met other watchers on this app, which I’m grateful for, but I know that, as a species, there’s not many of us, and never were.

My theory for this is that nowadays updates patch so many bugs and errors that we aren’t really… Needed, anymore. Our world was created solely by one person, the Creator, but he needed help. He needed us. And we were useful, for a while. The developers themselves have learned from their past mistakes… For them, it’s just a game. Not for us. Not for me. So now we aren’t needed. Even the community, those players for whom this world was a game, too, have grown, have changed. They create their own rules now. They change the game’s core, something that, to me, is fascinating and exciting. That was what the world was created for. To create. For them, not for us. I know other watchers who wouldn’t share my opinion on this though. For them, the player should not be in control.

But let’s keep talking about hearthomes. Watchers live in the Deep End. There’s a lot of levels on The End: There’s the Main Island, where the dragon and various endermen hang out; there’s the Outer Islands, where there’s ships and cities for shulkers, endermites and endermen (where chorus fruit grows and the majority of endermen live); and then, out in the limits of the void, long after the world stops generating… There’s the Deep End. Players and other creatures (aside from watchers, of course) don’t have access to this place.

Here our Cities, Archives, and Nests were built long before The End was accessible to the player. Long before the 1.0 update, when The End was added. A civilization more complex that anyone could’ve dream of, floating above the Void. The only way to access them is flying, so there’s no bridges or pathways over the void.

Whereas the End is completely barren, our civilization is full of life. Buildings, trees, temples, ships all floating above the Void. Watchers pride themselves of not having attachments, so there’s no “houses” per se. Watchers don’t really sleep and the fledglings don’t really have rooms, but there’s always nests scattered around. Even though I say “fledglings” that’s only a term for a watcher that was recently created or born, it doesn’t have anything to do with age.

The Archives were our pride and joy. Beautiful, beautiful places with endless knowledge, organized neatly in rows of books and writings. Full of information on updates, mobs, players, dimensions… Future and past. Every update that was shown to players had to pass before us, too. Updates that wouldn’t come out, too. Scrapped dimensions, mobs… We knew it before it happened. Some of them had to be eliminated. They were to dangerous, corrupted worlds, destroyed the creativity we- I so long want to keep.

It was empty, it was cold, but it was home. It was private. It was ours.