A Minecraft Adventure

A week ago I began playing a sandbox game called "Minecraft". A game where your nomadic character is free to do what he wants - you can freely build houses, explore dungeons, caves and other terrain. You control the character and you can use his abilities to build structures. The key element in the game is the use of blocks. These blocks are the main ingredient used by the player to build anything ranging from simple houses to towers built with defensive brick walls. 

Anyway, my adventure reached a climax yesterday. (I used the term "a climax" because it's still just one of my adventurous endeavors.) One morning, I left my tower base (it has 5 stories) and ventured off to the east. I went through the eastward tunnel I dug, and after reaching it's mouth (a small shed in the overworld), I went out and closed the door. Behold, a large and unexplored plains! I kept walking to the east, bypassing wandering sheep, trees, ravines, and grass. Then I reached the sea and crossed it. 

Upon crossing the sea, I entered a different biome full of tall trees and grass (and sheep, again). I kept walking forward, leaving behind some traces such as sand pillars and torches seldomly. When nightfall came, I switched to "peaceful mode" in order to continue travelling without having to fend off hordes of monsters. 

(In the real world, I saved my game and took a break. This would later on cause something.)

When morning came, I continued walking and behold - a new sea complete with lily pads. I tried swimming to the other side but I realized how far I've already wandered off. So I swam back to the shore and walked back. However, when nightfall came, I realized that I've went to the wrong direction as the torches I planted the night before were missing. I tried looking around but behold, no traces of light anywhere. (I was still in "peaceful mode".) I walked and walked, and when morning came, climbed a mountain in an attempt to look for my house. (Beside's having a very tall pillar above my house, I also made a very tall pillar of light in an adjacent mountain.) 

Nothing. No sign of my house. So I kept walking and walking until I reached a snow biome. Then it rained. I realized how hopeless my attempts to explore and look for my house. I decided to make a compass (a compass would lead me to my original spawn point). Since I have no materials for such device, I tried to dig downward to mine some redstone. While I was digging, I fell into a deep, underground abandoned mine. I explored this mine and found valuable things like ores of gold and iron, lapiz lazuli, emerald, diamond and, at last,  redstone. Along the way, I also took some fences and built a small crafting table near a ledge. There I built a compass, and used "pillar jumping" method to get out of this very deep abandoned mine. After plating 64 blocks of cobblestone (therefore the mine is 64 blocks deep, more or less), I reached a ledge and, from there, dug my way up. After finding a layer of dirt with water dripping, I dug towards a different direction. After digging the last block of dirt, finally! Sunlight! I finally got out of that mine.

Lava I found in the abandoned mine.

I hurriedly walked towards the direction where my compass was pointing. I bypassed mountains, desert biomes and seas. Then, when nightfall came, I finally reached my original spawn point marked with a chest and three torches. I didn't know that the game gave me a chest when I first spawned. (When I first began playing, I didn't see that chest and immediately wandered off.) 

From my spawn point, I'm no longer a lost nomadic soul. I know where my first (now abandoned) house was. I walked towards it and seeing the tall sand pillar with a torch on top renewed my hope. I finally reached my first house. When morning came, I walked towards my current house in the plains just on the outskirts of the desert biome.

Finally, upon reaching home, I rested.

Aftermath:

The next day, I decided to build a huge arrow in the sand that points to my current house. (Since the compass would only lead me to my original spawn point)