Episode 5 opens on the "GopherCraft UHC Season IV" title and the four team cards, then cuts back to the bottom of the ladder shaft, where the new obsidian frame is waiting. Sayulily stands by the ladders at 15 health. Someone has the flint and steel, gets told "you can do the honors," and counts down from three.
A secret portal
The other side is not much of a welcome. The portal sits on a ledge with "holes everywhere" and lava that has not updated yet, so the first warning is to watch where you walk. Should they tell the server who was first into the Nether? "No, it's a secret." "It's a secret to everybody."
They set up right away. A furnace goes down to cook pork chops, a crafting table follows, and doors go up to keep the room "ghast proof."
A lava welcome mat
A quick look around turns up no fortress close by. So the plan changes: trap the portal as it is, in case someone else ever links to it. They put a back wall behind it so anyone arriving has to step out the front, then pour lava on the floor beside it. Anyone who comes through "might burn up."
While they dig a tunnel out, the chat stays busy. FriarNurgle posts "woohoo mushroom biome!!!", Sayulily answers "Coolest seed ever," and Scoti_Garbidis writes "THank you, don't kill me." Gopherboy earns the Monster Hunter achievement. The Tab list still shows 11 players.
A fortress across the lava
Then someone spots a pillar in the distance. It is a Nether fortress. Getting there means crossing open netherrack over lava, with wither skeletons and blazes called out nearby, so they back off and build an elevated cobblestone path instead. One teammate leads, another plays "rear guard," and everyone watches for ghasts.
Inside, they talk in whispers. A skeleton goes down in a dark hallway, and zombie pigmen keep spawning in. Water is no help here, and "everything in the Nether is fireproof," so the defense is walls: little "blaze blinds" on the sides of the path.
Blaze rod
It works. "We got a blaze rod." The blazes move faster than anyone expected, though, and someone ends up on fire. Health is slipping, and there is not enough gold for golden apples, so the talk turns to potions and to a cauldron to jump into. Three iron makes it. The "100 Minutes" server message lists 11 players. Steel_Douglas earns two achievements, and Scoti_Garbidis adds that "steel has had some bad lag."
Nether wart and the way home
Next on the list is Nether wart. A few paths dead-end, and "if only we had a bow." Down a set of stairs, they find it. They grab the soul sand and the wart and leave the cauldron behind, since the water cannot come with it. A zombie pigman wanders close: "don't look at him funny."
There is one gap in the brewing plan. Nobody has plain sand for glass bottles, but the base is in a desert, so there is "tons" of it on the other side. In chat, TopStiGearGaming asks "is anyone at spawn?" and Virii333 answers "uhmm.. nope" and "no one here."
They follow a marked path back, take up the lava to get into the portal room, and plan to put it back once they are in. The "120 Minutes" message still lists 11 players, BasketMC, FriarNurgle and Sayulily among them. The episode ends there, with Basket alive in the Nether portal room and Sayulily at 6 health.