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I spawned on the border between plains and savanna, which indicates a relatively warm climate. This also meant there were sufficient trees to begin with but not too much that the area was unappealing.

To the east is a small beach and an ocean, while to the northeast I find the silhouette of a plateau.

I quickly chopped down a nearby tree and then headed towards the plateau, hoping for a mountain biome such as the stony peaks or jagged peaks where I would find abundant exposed iron.

For a moment, I doubted whether the plateau led to anything of interest. I surveyed the landscape but found nothing except for more plains, savanna and ocean.

To the north, however, was an even larger hill. It could potentially lead to a mountain biome, so I continued towards it.

Of course I wouldn't forget to craft a set of stone tools. This was Hardcore so I won't be surprised if a burning baby zombie appeared from a random crack in the ground; I needed better preparation in this much more hostile world.

I avoided venturing into any ravines as well.

As I continued up along the ridge, this showed up:

A frozen peaks biome, I believe. It wasn't particularly desirable for iron mining as thick layers of snow and ice would be in the way, but it probably would make for a nice spot to settle nearby. (Spoiler alert: I found one at the end of this update.)

I was also slightly intrigued as a warm biome (in this case, the savanna) was bordering a frozen biome. Surely it should be a stony peaks biome instead? I did find some iron at a small cave entrance, however.

And here we have another pair of iron ores. This was why I loved mountain biomes so much besides the fact that they offer magnificent vantage points.

There was in fact a stony peaks biome, but it was tiny. I did mine my first coal though.

And ... this mountain range was really vast. There were mountains as far as the eye could see. This definitely made a contrast to my island world where the mainland consisted only of flatlands and small hills.

There was in fact a biome I didn't enjoy trekking through: the snowy slopes biome. Here's why:

Yes, I completely forgot a pair of leather boots. And to make matters worse, the sun was setting. So I stumbled through the powder snow before mining out a small shelter under one of the summits. What a dramatic end to Day 1.

So as night fell and monsters began to spawn, I created a temporary base out of my cramped shelter. When you place the furnace next to the crafting table, it feels like home. Kind of.

Without further ado, I began to smelt the iron and then crafted an iron pickaxe and a bucket. I didn't even have enough wood for a shield!

I decided to wait the night out by going strip-mining inside the mountain, hoping to come across even more iron for a set of armor. I only managed to find a singular emerald and some coal, though.

Eventually, the sun rose and the second day commenced. I didn't take out the torches of my strip mine in case I came here again.

I headed to a small "crater" amongst the towering mountains, mining any nearby iron or emeralds along the way.

There wasn't really much, so I scaled another mountain peak and continued up. Then ...

The worst mob to encounter on the top of a mountain is certainly a creeper, as the terrain makes it considerably difficult to eliminate it. Thankfully, I survived the explosion and took minimal damage. I had zero food, however, so I ought to descend the mountain. But first, I wanted to gather even more iron so I would hopefully have a full set of armor by the end of the day.

Eventually, it was time to head back down. I surveyed the mountainous landscape one last time. What a grueling trek it was.

I was quite close to touching the clouds as well.

But oh well, hopefully I will have plenty of opportunities to return in the future when I am better equipped. For now, I really needed to return to a grassy biome, be it plains, savanna or even forest. Instead, I was rewarded with ...

I couldn't believe my eyes. That was the largest cherry grove I have ever seen, and if I settle somewhere down there it would also offer a fantastic view of the frozen peaks behind. The thing was, I actually preferred to establish my base in a plains biome adjacent to a cherry grove, and not actually in it, so the cherry grove might even be a bit too large. But it was nonetheless a spectacle. I mined my last bits of iron before heading down, careful not to take any damage.

And of course there just has to be a snowy slopes biome in the way. I noticed that snowy slopes biomes seem to generate much more frequently than other mid-altitude biomes such as spruce and cherry groves unless the peak biome is the stony peaks; in that case, meadows are the most common. I don't know if this is just a coincidence.

And yes, I couldn't resist the iron.

I finally made it down the mountain itself, but I was still at a considerably high elevation considering the vastness of the cherry grove. It was more like a forest, actually.

I believe the bottom of the slope would be a nice spot for a base and potentially a villager community. But now I had only one goal: survive.

As night fell, I hunted for a sheep to shear, but there was only one and it yielded only two blocks of wool. Yet another night to wait through. One more and phantoms would start spawning.

Miraculously, the two pieces of rotten flesh I had didn't give the Hunger effect, which meant I was able to heal a little bit. But it was inadequate and I ought to find more food and start a small farm the next day. For now, I started smelting up the iron.

And there just has to be one plank missing ...

So ends the first update. Hopefully, I would be able to survive when I leave the shelter the next morning because I do hear a lot of mobs outside. If I do, the third day will be a lifesaver.

Episodes 1 - 6: Page 1

Episodes 7 - 11: Page 2

Episodes 12 - 14: Page 3

Episodes 15 - 20: Page 4

Episodes 21 - 25: Page 5

Episodes 26 - 27: Page 6

First and foremost, after ensuring that it was daytime by mining out the roof of my "shelter," I gathered all my essentials (the crafting table, furnace and singular torch that made my hole less grave-like) and quickly left. There was a creeper in the distance and a skeleton began shooting at me under the shade of the cherry trees, but I managed to escape before any significant damage could be dealt.

I have survived the tedious morning of Day 3. I was out of wood, so I began chopping down a cherry tree on the edge of the grove and proceeded to collect every single dropped sapling and stick. It was only the beginning of an adventure (hopefully), so even the most basic resources will come in handy. Especially as I was planning to build my own cherry tree farm instead of just chopping down the whole forest.

With a quarter stack of logs, a dozen saplings and multiple sticks obtained from a single tree, it was time to continue. I descended the slope, leaving the cherry grove behind, and noticed a second frozen mountain with a large area of snowy slopes and miniature peaks.

There was of course no way I would forget about my bed issue, so I was quick to locate a nearby sheep and sheared its wool.

I then went on a hunting session, smelted some meat and had a quick picnic in front of the mountain range I had traversed on my first two days in this world. And now, I have finally acquired some decent food.

Time to move on. There was no way I was climbing more mountains without a pair of leather boots.

By sunset, I managed to find a secluded sunflower plains valley amongst the cherry grove which would make for a potential location to settle. Not shown in this picture but there were also mountains nearby, although technically the valley and the surrounding grove were situated on an enormous plateau since the altitude here was around Y=100. Which led to one issue: a water source. But I'll get to that later.

As I trekked towards the sunflower valley the next day, I noticed a partially concealed pool of lava. Better not fall into that if I come back, although this would make for a lava farm since I've noticed quite a few dripstone caves nearby.

There was in fact one right across the valley. I believe they tend to generate in areas with higher continental values, so perhaps further away from the ocean?

And here's the first picture of where I plan to establish a base:

Moving on, I travelled towards the mountain shown in the last picture and found a high altitude meadow with giant birch trees (snowy as their leaves overlapped with a nearby snowy slopes biome). This was definitely tree generation I have never noticed before and it just appeared slightly peculiar.

And there's two more:

Continuing on, I saw my first village. That meant I was definitely settling around here. This would provide ready access to emeralds and potentially enchanted books, armor and weapons before I finish the slightly tedious process of curing zombie villagers.

I passed a dripstone ravine with some iron just below the surface, but again, this was hardcore and I just didn't feel like taking the risk.

I took some final pictures of the frozen peaks, meadow and cherry grove together.

I came across a smaller ravine with more exposed dripstone as well as a river in the distance. Perfect. The water was just there, waiting to be collected, but I didn't have a bucket yet.

There was yet another dripstone cave with exposed iron, but a creeper appeared out of the blue so I was quick to leave. No point taking chances; I would find more iron elsewhere.

The village was apparently situated near more mountains. There was definitely a pattern going on here.

Upon closer inspection, the village was actually situated between two river cliffs; this meant traversing it would be rather challenging and the villagers could easily die of fall damage; furthermore, it was likely that Drowned zombies would attack any villager that wandered too close to the river, especially at nighttime.

Situated above the village was a mountain grove and jagged peaks. That's pretty much all the mountain biomes (I think?) covered in four days and would definitely be useful for the All Biomes Explored advancement. I wasn't heading up there for now, though, as I had more important business at hand: seeing what the village offered and establishing a secure base. (And yes, more dripstone cave openings.)

After taking some fall damage, I finally made it to the bottom of the cliff. Time to gather all the haybales. It wasn't as if the villagers would use them anyway. Speaking of villagers, during the whole time in the village I only spotted a single villager at the bottom of the cliff and two more on the mountainside near the spruce grove.

To end Day 4, I looted the blacksmith chest. More iron. Perfect.

Day 5 was here; the first thing I noticed in the morning was that the pigs and sheep have escaped the village barn and died in the lava. Poor animals. Thanks to the lava for the already cooked food though. No more wasting coal on smelting / cooking minimal items.

I headed back up, across the meadows and to the cherry grove. I forgot to mention that I loved the warm colors of grass and water in cherry groves opposed to the standard green and blue, respectively, of typical temperate biomes.

I set up a makeshift base, smelted more iron and collected some wheat seeds and dirt blocks for a potential farm. I didn't want to terraform the sunflower valley too much.

The evening soon arrived, marking the end of Day 5. I had now acquired the bare necessities, particularly a bed, so survival in this much more hostile world would be considerably easier. I would probably be encountering pillager patrols later if I didn't settle in the valley soon and light up the surrounding area. And since I'm trying to post shorter updates, I'll leave it here; the rest of what happened later would come soon.

Come morning, I observed my surroundings and was ambushed by another creeper. It was just there, a few blocks away, coming for me. Maybe it had spawned in a nearby cave and somehow pathfound to my makeshift base? Or maybe it just spawned nearby because it was too dark? The thing about living in the mountains is that it seems to be difficult to determine the exact time of day, as in, you can't tell the exact moment you can just go to bed since you can't see the sunset.

I was somehow able to kill the creeper. I actually surprised myself, since they tend to explode when I'm dealing with them in hilly terrain.

I then set out from the makeshift base, making my way along the mountain pass, which was dotted with azure bluets. To the west (?), there was a large river surrounded with oak forest as well as exposed dripstone on the side of a cliff.

I headed downhill towards the river, where I filled two buckets with water for my infinite water source.

As I went back up, I wasn't looking where I was going and:

Luckily, it was just a hole in the ground and not an actual cave. (If it had, things could have gone disastrous.) Nevertheless, I really needed to pay attention from now on.

I went back through the cherry grove and located the sunflower valley, where I set up a temporary infinite water source and planted down a few cherry saplings.

I spent the evening lighting up the base. It wasn't actually well-lit, but it should be enough to prevent mob spawning nearby. Not necessarily pillager patrols, though, those annoying things I will have to begin looking out for.

Over the next few days, I worked on the wheat farm, grew and chopped down some more trees as well as built the infinite water well.

I finally finished the farm, just in time to greet my first wandering trader!

I already had a few spare emeralds from mining, so I bought two moss blocks, because why not? It would definitely come in handy for future garden-themed builds.

In the meantime, as I waited for the trees to grow, I decided to start bringing back some animals, particularly cows, for a pen or potential barn. There was only one cow in the near vicinity, so I needed to head out further, into and beyond the cherry grove.

As I left the flourishing pink forests behind, I spotted a village in the distant plains. As well as ... cows, but they're not shown in the picture.

Beyond the village was another cherry grove plus another section of the massive mountain range I had traversed on Day 1. From what I could see, the mountain range ended in a long snowy ridge that gradually descended into the cherry grove. If only I could find these things in Bluehaven as well.

Upon entering the village, I demolished several piles hay bales and "harvested" several carrots and potatoes from their farms.

There were no blacksmiths, but I did find two stone masons, a fletcher as well as a cartographer. While I was here, I also grabbed some extra exposed coal, breaking my iron pickaxe while doing so.

The house chests contained even more emeralds, saplings and potatoes. Unfortunately, my inventory was full, so I had to leave out the apples. Oh well, I can just come back next time.

And of course, more exposed iron. That's just what I needed!

As I explored the village, I found this floating house whose occupant was trapped in a tiny ravine. I wonder what they had done to deserve this? Luckily for them, there were no cave entrances, and therefore no zombies or anything like that, and for me, more exposed iron!

I also had loads of sticks in my inventory, so I made an extra emerald before leaving.

And I wasn't alone.

Heading back up my cherry grove, I found this ravine with a lava flow. Better be careful around here!

Somewhere nearby, I also mined more iron, thereby breaking my stone pickaxe. And it's never a good idea to not have a pickaxe on you at all times, so I crafted a new one.

Upon arriving back at base, I tethered the two cows to a singular fence post and put all that lovely extra iron in the furnace.

And so ends Episode 3! We've made pretty good progress these past few days, acquiring plenty of food, coal and iron, purchasing from a Wandering Trader and even discovering two villages (though the first one is rather messed up) plus plenty more cherry groves and mountains for further exploration. My goals for now are to build a small but secure starter house, set up more crop and animal farms and starting mining for diamonds.

The only inconvenience I have as of now is having my base being enclosed by mountain biomes (specifically cherry groves and snowy slopes), which means I might encounter infested stone underground without realizing it. Although I could just turn on F3 while mining, I would love to acquire a Silk Touch pickaxe soon so silverfish won't be a worry.

We can only wait and see what happens next.

First off, I replaced the unsightly cobblestone "wall" I had built last episode for the cows with a nice, large 7x7 pen where the animals would flourish. Well, while they're alive, at least. Once both cows were safely in, I bred them, making the advancement.

I built an identical enclosure adjacent to the one for the cows, where I led in two sheep.

I didn't build enclosures for chickens and pigs as that would require some extensive terraforming of the valley and I had other plans in mind, such as redesigning the wheat farm, as the idea with the stripped cherry logs by themselves didn't quite cut it. I was going to need some acacia wood for this, so I planted down two saplings and waited for their growth, during which I also slightly modified the looks of the well.

The new idea with the farm was to reorientate the stripped cherry logs so that the top and bottom sides would be unexposed. This also required replacing the four corner stripped logs with stripped wood (crafted from four stripped logs). I then placed acacia fencing on the cherry logs / wood before finishing the design by surrounding the whole farm with stone brick stairs.

Now with that done, it was time to go exploring. I didn't have any redstone for compasses nor sugarcane for paper, which meant I couldn't begin mapping just yet. And speaking of mapping, I would love to start as soon as possible as I've never really explored the Overworld much since I began playing the game; I spend my time mostly on building or making super slow progress on stuff like mining for Netherite or raiding structures. That also poses a slight problem: I'm reconsidering the mapping expedition I planned for my other world, since I'll otherwise just be doing the same thing on both worlds and I don't see the point in that. (Besides, I've already done a bit of mapping on the other world and there's not really much to see besides oceans and flatlands. This one is so much more fascinating.)

Back to work: I acquired some leather, crafted and put on snow boots and headed up from Sunflower Valley in a westerly direction towards one of the nearby frozen peaks.

Great view from up here!

I continued heading west along the mountain massif which ran parallel to the route I took to the messed-up cliffside village. I only realized this because I noticed the jagged peaks situated above it. (If you zoom in to the left of the image, you might only just make out the silhouette of a house.)

And here's the view from below the clouds:

I headed down and decided to loop back to Sunflower Valley via the Cliffside Meadow Trail, which the path I took to the messed-up village will henceforth be known as. Despite being a lovely meadow dotted with all sorts of flowers, it was a pretty dangerous place, with numerous deep ravines to fall into and small surface caves where monsters could spawn (and escape).

But I eventually made it back to base, where I immediately left to head up the snowy mountain to the northeast for a second exploration session.

Some pleasant views from up there as well:

Note another small sunflower plains biome on the northern side of the cherry grove plateau in the top-center of the picture:

The snowy hill led to another frozen mountain massif where some goats were joyfully prancing around.

I made my way up the slippery ice to the highest summit, careful not to stay still for too long and get rammed (and potentially knocked off the mountain) by one of them. At the top, I noticed a flower forest hill. Great, I now have easy access to pretty much all the flowers in the game!

Turning around, I saw this:

Well, that's a pretty big mountain range! Heading down from the summit, I stepped onto some powder snow and made this advancement:

I trudged my way through the powdery snowy slopes, avoiding hostile goats and hidden ravines, until reaching the next summit, where I found the frozen peaks abruptly transitioning to stony peaks with a small spruce grove in the middle.

I headed down into the pictured grove, where I chopped down a spruce tree and collected three saplings.

Looking into what was apparently a large valley, I found a vast expanse of forest.

On the other side of the mountain massif was a small snowy mountain with a massive waterfall. I was somewhat surprised that it didn't have a peaks biome on top despite going all the way to cloud level.

I spent some time in the stony peaks, mining strips of calcite as well as loads of coal and iron, the latter granting us nearly unlimited access to lanterns.

I then headed into the valley, where I chopped down my first birch tree, acquired some saplings and found a pack of wolves. Good thing no pigs or sheep were harmed!

Climbing back up the stony peaks, here's another view of the snowy mountain, which didn't turn out to be small after all.

With a completely full inventory, I decided it would be best to return to base since I was coming back anyway once I start mapping. This time, instead of trekking across the mountain massif, I went around it, across the plains and through cherry groves. The moment I noticed the cherry groves and sunflower plains, I knew I was approaching home.

And here we are!

Upon arriving, the first thing I did was to put all that raw iron in the furnace.

I chopped down a cherry tree that had somehow grown while I was away, and then encountered my first thunderstorm, which I was quick to sleep through. These things are literal nightmares in Hardcore.

Come morning, I started work on the potato farm and planted down the two birch saplings since I would likely be using birch planks for part of my house, and then I realized, after 30 days, I still didn't have proper shelter! For some reason, I seem to rarely prioritize house building early game.

One of the birch trees grew with a bee nest, which is useful, I guess, as I'll have easy access to candles as decoration for my to-be-built house.

And then ... disaster struck.

I always knew this was coming, but it gives me a total jumpscare every time they just appear out of the blue when I'm minding my own business.

While I was considering my moves (I would probably fight them if this wasn't Hardcore), two of the pillagers began approaching, so I quickly built a small wooden shelter just in case things went terribly wrong. I ducked into the shelter, and then they got really close. I saw this as the opportunity to strike.

How did it go?

I hung up the illager banner as an ominous warning for future patrols not to mess about at my own base.

Well, that wasn't too bad. Probably because the patrol separated themselves so I wouldn't have to fight the four of them together. Thanks for that! (If you read the subtitles, even the bees were buzzing happily at their defeat.)

And here's a good place to end. I haven't made much progress in terms of base development, but we'll get to that next episode, as well as continuing to explore the villages, finish building our animal and crop farms and possibly start mining for diamonds.

I took a slightly different route to the village this time, traveling across the foothills of our mountain range and weaving around the cherry grove, and found a fairly large but shallow ravine along the way. There was no escaping these dripstone caves!

I initially believed tulips were unique to flower forests, but not anymore. At least, that was the first time I've seen them generating in plains biomes.

Upon arrival at the village, I made my way down the river gorge, taking a little bit of fall damage as always. But that was only the easy part: I now had to scale the sheer cliff on the other side, the one with most of the houses. After spending considerable time mining the stone and shoveling the dirt on the side of the cliff, plus lots of pillaring up, I finally made it ...

... to about a third of the way up the cliff. Where this poor villager and cat were stuck together on a tiny, one block wide ledge!

About two thirds of the way up was a cleric's house. I found no cleric, so I gladly took the brewing stand to save up on blaze rods. Notice a stone block that somehow generated inside the house.

While I was down at the river, I had slashed a salmon with my sword, which I generously fed to this stray cat that had been roaming around near the spruce grove, a biome full of hazardous powder snow. It only took one attempt to tame! That was what we call incredible luck.

I also found a house with a chest full of wheat seeds and a bit of coal, the latter of which I restocked on.

There wasn't much after that, so I grabbed some extra carrots and potatoes from the two village farms before leaving.

Heading down was also tedious, requiring some diagonal jumps between ledges and block clutches, but nothing too dangerous here apart from the instance when I nearly fell off one of the tiny ledges. Although that wouldn't have been fatal, there could've been a skeleton in some nearby cave to end the world (literally), and I decided it was best not to take any chances.

Back at Sunflower Valley, I chopped down a cherry tree as my wood supplies were running dangerously low. The picture below shows only half of the saplings I obtained from that single tree. If things kept on going like this, I would need to start putting some in the composter to conserve storage space.

Next, I headed down to the river in the Southwest, where I shoveled up a stack of sand and harvested my first sugar cane, the latter of which I would require to start enchanting. I also gathered some clay for bricks, should I wish to include decorated pots in my builds, and seagrass for apparently no reason.

Heading back up, I found another dripstone ravine.

Back at Sunflower Valley, I deposited the useless items (such as the aforementioned seagrass) in the overflowing double chest, put on my snow boots and headed northeast up the mountain massif from last episode, for it was time for some stone mining!

And here's another dripstone cave opening.

Outside the mountain massif, I found a savanna plateau, flower forest and ocean. I knew we weren't that far from the sea after all.

Looking back, I find a tiny cherry grove with only two trees plus a nice sprinkling of pink petals.

I continued heading along the massif until reaching the stony peaks, which was where I would mine for stone, although I was constantly distracted by nearby ores. Well, except for coal. I also revealed a small cave entrance while mining the pictured iron, although I quickly left when a mob went out.

Just to be safe, I returned to the frozen peaks, where I watched a magnificent mountain sunset and slept through the night.

But come morning, I simply couldn't resist the iron, although I really should stop mining ores until acquiring a Fortune III pickaxe.

The stony peaks were just absolutely filled with ores. There's three emerald ores in this tiny area:

After acquiring roughly two stacks of cobblestone, I headed back to base, experiencing my first snow along the way.

I then shoved all that raw iron in the furnace. Just how many more lanterns will we be able to craft now?

(Well, about a stack).

After all the iron was smelted, I invested in a whole coal block to smelt the cobblestone. I didn't want to waste a single bit of that precious fuel, so I placed a hopper above the furnace where I put all the cobblestone in.

And then ... those things appeared.

*Sigh.*

I fought them, just for the sake of doing so.

And unlike last time, it went terribly wrong. Here's what happened.

I blocked their first arrows with my shield, which was desirable, but then, when I started attacking, I began to take heavy damage. Not only did I time my shield usage poorly, they were also shooting at different times, and at that point I was down to only three and a half hearts.

But at least I survived. And they did not. Still, that was a very close call. Should I just avoid fighting pillager patrols without diamond armor from now on? It's not like they drop anything useful anyway. Well, apart from this crossbow which contained an arrow in it:

While I was wandering around, processing everything that had happened, I stumbled upon another small cave entrance right next to my base. I really wished they weren't so common.

The bee that spawned when we grew that birch tree several days ago had now despawned / escaped, which was a shame. I scraped off the last bits of honeycomb before breaking the bee nest and later chopping down the birch tree itself.

After that, I completed the carrot farm. Well, that took long, but at least we won't have any food issues anymore.

With that done, it was time to construct the mining hut, which I planned to use stripped spruce logs and stone bricks for. I wasn't able to grow a giant spruce tree as I only had three saplings, so I instead grew a small tree, chopped it down and prayed it yielded more than one sapling.

It did! I then planted down the four saplings, praying that it grew into an actual spruce tree instead one of those "pine tree" monstrosities. Well, nope.

At least that should give us way more than enough logs. I began to chop the tree down, but I remembered that this was Hardcore mode and it wouldn't hurt to add a hay bale cushion in case I accidentally fell off the tree. To be honest, these things have happened to me before. Well, not on Hardcore mode, and I didn't die as I was only halfway up the tree, but still, better safe than sorry.

Before I began chopping down the tree, I made a temporary 1x1 pool of water where I planted down the sugar cane from earlier.

After the tree was removed, I obtained four saplings (despite the tree only having a tiny clump of leaves on top) and finished building the mining hut.

It was time to go mining!

I was having initial luck with coal as I mined a staircase down to sea level in a southerly direction. The plan was that I would keep on mining at sea level for a while. That was only to avoid any infested blocks, since they generated underground in mountain biomes.

I was mining into a lot of caves as well, mostly dripstone caves, so I had to keep going up and down in some places. There were lots of copper, although I only mined a little bit to conserve inventory space.

Funnily enough, I also mined into the floor of a massive ravine, indicated by the cherry trees above! This also allowed me to safely obtain a pointed dripstone block which would be essential for lava farms.

After a while, I continued mining a staircase down, revealing another cave.

Along the way, I set up several supply depots when my inventory became full. It mainly stored excess stone, granite, gravel, copper, etc.

At around y:30, I found my first lapis lazuli, which was great as I could start enchanting right away once I acquired diamonds.

I didn't come across any silverfish the whole time, so I suppose I was now in the plains. I was able to find two veins of iron ore before finally hitting deepslate.

And yet another cave, right at the deepslate line.

I then began mining in an easterly direction to avoid the pictured cave before swerving south again, then east again when I found yet another cave. I also took the opportunity to shear some glow lichen, although I probably would never need it.

Although deepslate was tediously slow to mine with a stone pickaxe, I eventually made it to y:54, where I would start mining for diamonds (I didn't go lower just to avoid the lava danger).

But then ... I heard a sculk sensor click. So I was in a Deep Dark biome? Welp.

I quickly blocked off the pathway, headed up and mined down in another direction, but I heard sculk sensors as well, so I went back up and mined down in a third direction. After all, the last thing I needed was to have a Warden spawning adjacent to my tunnels.

But the sculk sensors continued clicking. Thankfully, there were no shriekers nearby. Imagine I actually summoned a Warden!

I then heard zombies ahead of me, and believe it or not, I was relieved, as that meant I was leaving the Deep Dark biome! But when I saw this, I realized it was not the case.

I have actually found a dungeon. My first ever dungeon on a survival world. It would've been exciting if I wasn't in a Deep Dark biome, as I was constantly worried that the zombies would set off any nearby shriekers.

I killed the zombies from my safe spot, carefully "block-walked" over to the spawner and surrounded it with torches to prevent further spawns. I then checked out the two loot chests:

Unfortunately, my inventory was really full at this point, so I disposed of some excess stuff like the deepslate, tuff and singular arrow. I took the gunpowder, string, coal, iron, seeds and one music disc (the three music discs were all labelled 13, so I assume they're the same).

After that, I continued mining down but in a direction perpendicular to the dungeon, should I use the spawner to build a zombie farm in the future. I came across my first redstone:

I then thought I heard a sculk sensor click very nearby. I crouch-walked, just to confirm by seeing if I would make the Sneak 100 advancement.

When I did, I was rather disappointed. If I was to go diamond mining at the right y-level, there would be no avoiding the Deep Dark biome, since there were mountain biomes pretty much everywhere around where I was.

I headed down to y:58 in a different direction, where I carefully began to branch mine for diamonds. I managed to find them after some time.

It was a vein of at least eight diamonds. I say at least because I only mined five of them, three for a pickaxe and two for an enchanting table, and left the rest as they were. To save time, I won't be coming down here again until I have acquired a Fortune III pickaxe.

It took a good few minutes getting back to the surface, where I crafted a diamond pickaxe and headed to the lava pool at Sunflower Valley, the one we found in Episode 2. I then mined 14 pieces of obsidian: ten for the Nether Portal and four for the enchanting table.

I deposited the enchanting table in a new chest (the double chest in the potato farm is now full, which means I'll have to build a storage area soon) and was greeted by my second Wandering Trader on this world.

Besides the leads, however, he didn't offer anything of particular interest. The saplings were rather expensive and I felt like it was a better idea just to go exploring for them. And did he really think he could fool me into buying those cherry saplings, given all the cherry trees surrounding the valley?

To finish off, I built two more enclosures for the chickens and the pigs. While I was in the cherry grove searching for the pigs (that took a rather long time), I came across this dripstone ravine. Unfortunately, the picture itself wasn't very well taken as I was slightly concerned that I would get pushed into the ravine by a random animal passing by.

But I did complete the farms eventually, although the Wandering Trader decided to live with the sheep instead of enjoying the spectacular landscape around him. I'll need to build a barn for the animals soon.

So here we are, at the end of Day 56! In summary, we've finished building all the farms and found our first diamonds. It's slow progress, but still progress. The only concern I have for now is the risk of strip mining in the Deep Dark, as there seemed to be no way out of that biome. I'm wondering if I should just trade with villagers for diamond gear instead of continuing with my originally intended approach (mining, in other words).

But we won't be returning to the mines anytime soon as I would love to enchant my diamond pickaxe with Fortune III before collecting the rest of the ores we found. Not only that, I still needed to start building my house as well as a nice, large barn for the animals. That's probably what I'll focus on in the next episode, as well as some minor revamping here and there.

I decided that they were far enough away to be considered non-threatening, and thereby didn't go after them. The pillagers eventually disappeared into the cherry grove anyways, and for that I was grateful, although I did wonder why they always aim their crossbows at each other while idle.

But now that I had completed my morning routine of farming, it was time to get started on building our first home! I was planning on a two-story house similar to the one on my survival world, including a balcony and chimney, but with a slight change in block types and extra depth on the outside.

I headed through the cherry grove, keeping an eye out for the aforementioned pillager patrol, and located the patch of tulips we found in the plains at the beginning of last episode. I grabbed two white tulips which would serve as exterior decoration and started back to the valley just as a thunderstorm began.

I hurriedly brought out my bed and slept through the storm before any monsters could spawn.

The next morning, I was greeted by a Wandering Trader that had spawned at one of the numerous cave openings near my base.

There wasn't really anything super desirable on sale, and I had limited emeralds, so I left the trader as they were.

The following day, construction commenced, marked by the appearance of another pillager patrol (and again, I left them as they were).

And another one, while I was building the kitchen.

And yet another one, while I was designing the front of the house.

And, wow, another one, while I was finishing up the kitchen. Luckily, all of the patrols so far posed minimal threat, which meant I didn't have to kill anyone.

I haven't mentioned that it did take a considerable amount of time gathering the resources required for the house, mainly wood, as I didn't have a proper tree farm yet due to the rather hilly terrain surrounding the base. This meant that the development of the base itself, potentially into a villager community if I managed to survive for longer, would be hindered by its location in the valley, but I'm sure that could be worked around. Maybe a bit of terraforming, but that'll be saved for later.

I eventually finished the first floor of the house, which meant I could finally put my beloved wooden pickaxe in an item frame to display its importance to this world.

All the while, I had also been breeding cows and harvesting leather to complete the enchanting table setup. The process was far quicker than on my previous world as the animal pens were so much larger.

As I was heading back home from the farm, I was ambushed by a burning zombie that had spawned in one of the nearby cave openings and escaped. I dealt with it and searched for the corresponding cave, which I quickly covered up.

I then made some finishing touches to the first floor of the house, including adding a fancy glazed terracotta wall separating the kitchen from the living room.

Next, I grew and chopped down some giant spruce trees, built the frame of the second floor and completed work on the balcony. I adopted a checkerboard stripped oak and stripped birch log pattern, something I thought of recently.

As I was filling in the walls of the second floor, I encountered my eighth pillager patrol on this world.

Initially, I deemed them non-threatening, but then two of the pillagers wandered into my base, which I found unacceptable. Since I now had a house (well, an uncompleted one, although it was still good in terms of shelter), I decided to snipe them from my only recently built balcony and see what would happen.

This happened:

I think the reason they could see me through the doors was because I had placed them in such a way that the door was considered "open" by the game when it was closed, and vice versa. I did this mainly to prevent zombies from breaking in, but I suppose everything has their disadvantages. On the other hand, the pillager didn't even shoot at me, maybe because the door was still technically in the way?

So, what happened next? I went outside and killed the pillager, since it had separated itself from the rest of the group. I then sniped each member of the patrol in turn, killing them with my stone axe once they came down to my house. New patrol removal technique! In the long term, however, this would cost lots of arrows. I did acquire my third Ominous Banner though. One more and the Banner Stand would be complete.

Back to work! I finally finished the second floor of the house, and that's as high as it would go. I may plan to add a small storage space as part of the "attic," but that would just make everything feel ... cramped.

And here's the completed first floor, since I did make some minor modifications to it after starting work on the roof, e.g. adding the carpet and rearranging the crafting table and chests.

But now, for the long-awaited part: the exterior of the house!

I'm actually very satisfied with the finished build. I would go as far to say that it is my "best" house in the game so far, considering that I was never good at building houses. At least the windows are a bit nicer than the ones on my survival world.

While I was taking the screenshots of the house, I also noticed an enderman scrambling around the frozen peaks. I initially considered looking him in the eye and obtaining a quick ender pearl, but I later decided otherwise for obvious reasons.

After that, I harvested more leather, not only completing my enchanting table setup but also reaching Level 30! It was time to enchant our Diamond Pickaxe and pray, just pray that we'd get Fortune III.

Efficiency III as a guaranteed enchantment? I'll take it, but I'm still hoping for the best...

Oh.

Well, we did get Unbreaking III, and Silk Touch is definitely desirable as I could now safely mine underground in mountain biomes without releasing silverfish from infested blocks. So overall, I'm still satisfied. It could've been much worse. Like if we only had Efficiency III.

But now, it was time to get started on our next building project: the animal barn. I'm mainly going for oak and birch wood here, with a bit of acacia on the edges. And if you're interested, another pillager patrol.

At this point, I decided to install a pair of iron doors with buttons. Honestly, seeing the pillager stare at you through the door at you was somewhat creepy.

And speaking of pillager patrols, you guessed it! I was interrupted once again.

This time, I deemed the pillagers as posing a "considerable threat" given their proximity to my house, so, it's sniping time again! Pillager at the door ... perfect...

I went outside and killed him, accidentally harming an innocent sunflower while doing so. I could tell he had Piercing on his crossbow as his arrow went straight through my shield.

I wasn't able to obtain another Ominous Banner, however, as the leader somehow disappeared, as did one or two of the other pillagers.

Since my inventory was full of eggs at this particular time, I set up a barrel specifically for storing eggs, rather than a mixture of eggs, honeycomb, sugar, etc.

The next day, I was greeted by a Wandering Trader! Wow, that took long. I've had twice as many pillager patrols as Wandering Traders so far. Specifically, it was my fifth one, and I was excited to see what he offered.

Sea pickles and dripleaves? I'll take them!

I then had him stay in my boat, as I did not want the Wandering Trader wandering around, attracting the pillagers' attention. The pillager patrol six pictures ago, the one that spawned far away while I was at the farm, had still not despawned. It had appeared at around Day 115, but was still there by Day 130, walking around in circles. I'm quite confused about the despawning rules of pillager patrols, as they usually seem to despawn within minutes. And yes, I know, we're making painfully slow progress. I'm just wondering how everyone seems to manage to build a massive base, kill the Ender Dragon and acquire a full beacon in 100 days. It's incredible to even think about.

And we're still at our base, observing the spawning and despawning of pillager patrols. Yup, we've got a new one here.

Time for the usual sniping and having them come to us:

Since I now had Silk Touch on my pickaxe, I smashed the windows and meleed the pillagers from the safety of my house. That also completed my Ominous Banner collection.

As I sauntered back to the uncompleted barn, I realized that the Wandering Trader and one of his llamas have ... been shot by the pillagers. They were gone, and the surviving brown llama was standing nearby, grieving. Welp, that's one of my biggest fails on this world so far!

Between Days 130 - 132, two more pillager patrols spawned to the east, and the old one still hadn't despawned, even after the two new patrols did. This was getting peculiar. I did take a shot at one of the pillagers from the former, but there was no response from anyone. The old patrol did turn on Stand Ground mode though, i.e. standing still and staring at you from the distance.

The next day, they finally disappeared.

Meanwhile, I finished building the roof of the barn, which consists mainly of birch wood with acacia on the edge. The animals now have shelter!

And so ends this update! This has been a pure base development episode, so we didn't really make much progress towards "winning" the game, although I'm not planning on doing that anytime soon. What I did need was to start a villager community as soon as possible in order to prevent pillager patrols from spawning. I did consider bringing home some of the villagers from the second village (the one in the foothills below a cherry grove), but that would potentially require a railway line spanning a few hundred blocks, and I didn't have the resources for that yet. What I might do instead is to cure two zombie villagers that spawn near my base, but that would be difficult without a mob farm, which, unlike on my survival world, I am not planning to build as it would ruin the mountain scenery. I would also have to first acquire blaze rods from a Nether Fortress to get started with brewing potions.

I'll probably soon get started with some small mapping trips, as I now have plenty of iron and redstone. If I do, I'm considering setting the zoom level of the map to either Level 3 or 4. On my old world, I used Level 3 and was satisfied with the results, but I'm wondering if I should go a step further this time.

And in terms of base development progress, I'm looking to start a designated tree farm as well as expand my sugar cane growing site, perhaps into a large pond with decoration, since I had bought sea pickles from the poor Wandering Trader who had been shot by the pillagers. Speaking of decoration, I'll likely visit the flower forests we found last episode to acquire unique flora.