Somewhere deep in a forest that definitely wasn't on any map. Okay, that was obviously a lie, there was a map.
Anyway, it was past midnight, day six.
Alexei reeled in his line as a handful of experience orbs flowed into him, pushing his level back up to 1.
He immediately spent it.
His level dropped to zero, and in front of him, the crafting interface expanded from 2x2 to 3x3.
This was one of the key differences between regular items and MC-ified ones. A normal crafting table required you to physically place materials in the right pattern, and there was no interface to reference recipes. You just had to know them.
The old crafting table, the one he'd used for days, had gotten soaked and filthy during his mining expedition. He'd scrapped it without hesitation. This new one was clean, remotely operable through the interface, and indestructible.
Much better.
With a thought, he arranged eight MC-ified cobblestone blocks in a ring pattern within the 3x3 grid.
A moment later, a fist-sized stone furnace materialized in his hand.
"Finally I can see in the goddamn dark."
This furnace had been hard-won. Six days of struggling, dying, and digging through nearly a kilometer of dirt to find cobblestone.
He placed it beside the crafting table and loaded it up, assimilated silkspore logs in the smelting slot, regular wooden planks as fuel. No point wasting the good stuff on fuel when trash would work fine.
A warm glow flared to life inside the furnace, flooding the small treehouse with light.
He stepped closer, examining his creation. Despite the fire burning merrily inside, the furnace itself had no heat. He could touch it, even stick his hand directly into the flames, and feel nothing.
Just like the crafting table, its visual style had shifted from blocky game graphics to realistic textures. In the firelight, he could see every rough detail of the stone surface.
The sudden light, and the noise of him moving around, seemed to agitate whatever was outside. The scratching sounds intensified.
He ignored it. Let them dig. He had two meters of solid wood between him and them.
What mattered now was testing the furnace's smelting speed.
And... it was slow. Painfully slow. Probably because he was using non-assimilated fuel.
"Whatever. I'll just fish while it works."
Seven string, and he'd finally be able to sleep like a civilized person instead of on a hard floor.
He cast his line. The bobber settled onto the water.
Then came the waiting.
Twenty minutes later, the bobber plunged.
[Leather Boots ×1]
"Huh. Not bad."
The durability was low, but that didn't matter. He deconstructed them immediately and used the leather to craft new gear.
A moment later, he was wearing leather pants.
He'd also gained two spare pieces of leather, which he immediately converted into a helmet.
"Much better," he muttered, adjusting the new pants. "Tired of the wind blowing straight up my ass."
He continued fishing, falling into the familiar rhythm. Cast, wait, reel, repeat.
[Tropical Fish ×1]
[Raw Cod ×1]
[Raw Cod ×1]
[Raw Cod ×1]
[Saddle ×1]
"Oh? Something useful?"
A saddle. In vanilla Minecraft, it was a treasure item with no crafting recipe. Maybe they updated it in version 1.21.6, but he hadn't had time to play that version, well, he wanted to, but now he was in another world… Anyway, with the More Crafting mod added, there was a recipe, which meant it could be deconstructed.
He moved the saddle to his main hand, it was surprisingly small, barely palm-sized, and focused.
"Deconstruct."
The item vanished, replaced by components.
[Leather ×3]
[Lead ×2]
The three leather pieces, combined with his two spares, were just enough for another helmet. The leads could be broken down further into four string and a slimeball.
That was another wool block done. Only three more string needed.
"Getting close," he said to himself, casting again.
Behind him, the furnace continued its steady glow. The fuel would last until morning at this rate.
[Raw Cod ×1]
[Raw Salmon ×1]
[Raw Cod ×1]
[Pufferfish ×1]
[Raw Salmon ×1]
---
The hours blurred together. Fish, experience, repeat. By the time the furnace fuel finally burned out and the treehouse plunged into darkness, he'd gained a nautilus shell and a tripwire hook.
The nautilus shell was part of a set, eight of them plus a Heart of the Sea could craft a conduit, which would give water breathing and night vision in a huge radius. Pure fantasy for now. He'd only ever crafted one conduit in all his years playing Minecraft.
The tripwire hook, though, that was immediately useful. He'd fished one up last night too.
Two tripwire hooks deconstructed into tw iron ingots, two sticks, and two planks.
His first iron ingots in this world.
He didn't hesitate. He immediately crafted a shield.
The moment it appeared in his off-hand, he felt safer than he had since arriving here. More than the leather armor or the stone tools. A shield meant he could block attacks instead of just dying and respawning.
He walked back to the furnace and opened it.
The fuel slot was empty. Five charcoal sat in the output slot, just enough to craft twenty torches.
When he crafted them and held one, it looked similar to the game version, slightly blocky but rendered with realistic textures that didn't seem out of place.
Unfortunately, it didn't emit light while in his hand. He'd have to place it on a wall.
The treehouse was small enough that one torch lit everything.
The flame burned without producing heat, just like the furnace. And naturally, it wouldn't burn out.
"Now those can actually grow," he said, looking at the wheat seeds he'd planted days ago.
With proper lighting, his tiny indoor farm would start producing. One less thing to worry about.
He returned to the furnace and loaded all thirty-plus raw cod from his inventory into the smelting slot.
Time to finally have cooked food.
While the fish cooked, he sat back down at his fishing spot, preparing to cast again...
Scritch-scritch-scritch.
He froze.
Something was wrong.
Based on the light filtering through the cracks in his sealed entrance, dawn had arrived. Maybe an hour ago.
The scratching should've stopped by now. Every other morning, the creatures left as soon as the sun came up. But not only had it not stopped, it was getting louder, like whatever was out there had decided dawn was go-time instead of retreat-time.
"Well. Shit."
This fight was happening whether he wanted it or not.
He wasn't going to lie to himself, he was nervous. Since arriving in this world, the only things he'd killed were bugs. His respawn point was outside. If he died in here and respawned out there...
But he had a shield now. Leather armor. Stone tools. He wasn't completely helpless.
He switched the shield to his off-hand, pulled out his stone axe, and moved to the wall.
"Alright. Let's see what you've got."
Thunk-thunk-thunk.
As his axe struck the wooden blocks, the scratching outside suddenly stopped.
For a moment, there was complete silence.
Then footsteps. Multiple sets, converging on his position from different directions.
His heart hammered in his chest. He kept mining, counting down the seconds until the block broke.
Twenty-eight. Twenty-nine. Thirty.
Crack.
The block vanished into his inventory.
Early morning light poured in, dim, but bright enough to see clearly.
"Oh, you have got to be—"
Three wolves stood about thirty meters away, each the size of a male lion. Their fur was dark gray, almost black, with manes of longer hair around their necks that had a faint greenish tint.
But that wasn't the weird part.
Each wolf had a glowing blue horn jutting from its forehead, pulsing with what could only be described as magical energy.
Their fangs were massive, protruding from their mouths even when closed. Drool stretched in long strands, dripping onto the ground and sizzling where it landed.
The lead wolf, bigger than the other two, with scars across its muzzle, was doing something that made Alexei's brain short-circuit.
Wind was swirling into its mouth, gathering like a vortex, condensing into something solid.
"No. No no no—"
"AWOOOOO!"
The howl split the air.
The wind projectile launched.
It was the size of a bowling ball, and it was aimed directly at Alexei's face. His body moved on instinct. He raised the shield.
KANG!
The wind orb exploded against the shield, detonating into a violent gale that whipped through the entire treehouse. His clothes snapped and fluttered. Loose items scattered.
But he was fine, not even pushed back a step.
The shield had absorbed the entire blow without taking damage. In Minecraft, only axes could break shields. Apparently, that property had carried over to this world.
Which meant as long as his shield held, he was basically invincible from the front.
"Holy shit... Using my iron on this was definitely the right call."
Alexei didn't wait to see what they'd try next. He immediately sealed the entrance again, placing a block back in the gap.
He wasn't stupid enough to go charging outside to fight three lion-sized magical wolves just because he had a shield. Being invincible from the front didn't mean shit when the enemy could circle around and bite your ass off.
And these wolves could shoot wind bullets.
He sat back against the wall, thinking through his options.
"Maybe... the wooden boat sealing technique?"
It was a classic Minecraft exploit. Mobs couldn't path through boats properly, so you could trap them by placing boats around them. Whether it worked on magical wolves from another world was anyone's guess.
But it was worth trying.
He pulled out some MC-ified wood, crafted three boats, and moved toward the entrance. Time to test a theory.
He mined the block sealing the entrance.
The instant it vanished, massive jaws shoved through the opening, snapping toward his throat.
"SHIT! SHIT! SHIT!"
His stone sword was already swinging before his brain caught up, slamming down on the wolf's skull.
A stone sword crafted from two cubic meters of cobblestone plus wooden sticks weighed at least five tons. Calling it a crushing blow would be an understatement.
The wolf didn't stand a chance.
CRACK.
The wolf's skull didn't just break, it exploded, fragments of bone and brain matter spraying across the treehouse floor. Blood fountained from the neck stump, mixing with chunks of what had been the wolf's head seconds ago.
A torrent of glowing experience orbs erupted from the corpse along with the gore, flooding into Alexei and shoving his level from 0 all the way to 6, with the bar more than halfway to 7.
Sixty-plus experience from a single kill.
"Bozhe moy..."
He definitely hadn't meant to hit it that hard. The wolf had just scared the shit out of him, and he'd reacted on instinct.
Warm brain matter oozed across the floor toward his feet. The smell hit him a moment later.
His stomach turned.
"I haven't even lived here a week and my treehouse is already a crime scene."
Though technically, it only counted as a crime scene if a person died in it. Monsters probably didn't count, right?
---
Outside the treehouse, the two remaining wolves stared at their packmate, who had stuck its head inside to bite the prey, shuddered violently, and then started twitching occasionally.
But the prey inside was just a tree-dweller, wasn't it?
Soft + lives in trees + digs holes + smells good = tree-dwelling prey.
They couldn't be wrong.
Unless...
Was it eating without sharing?
The twitching... could that be from how good the prey tasted?
The more they thought about it, the more sense it made. That bastard was hoarding the kill.
Unacceptable!
The two wolves exchanged a glance, then moved as one. Each bit down on one of their packmate's hind legs and yanked.
The corpse, along with half a crushed skull still leaking fluids, flew backward, and crashed to the ground more than ten meters away.
A wave of blood-scent exploded from the opening in the tree.
Both wolves' eyes turned red.
That bastard. It really had been eating alone.
Their minds filled with images of the soft, sweet prey inside. They didn't even notice their packmate was dead. They didn't care about the shattered skull or the amount of blood.
The alpha didn't hesitate. It shoved its head straight into the opening.
---
"Oh, come on—"
Inside, Alexei had exactly one second to register the second set of massive jaws lunging at his face before survival instinct kicked in again.
CRACK.
[Level 6 → Level 10]
[Experience Gained: 108]
---
Outside, the last wolf stared fixedly at the opening where the alpha had disappeared.
Drool poured from its mouth, pooling around its paws. It licked some of the blood that had splattered onto its fur earlier.
Hmm. Familiar taste. Like... like packmate blood.
Could it be that only the prey's flesh tasted good?
That would explain why the alpha was twitching too. The meat must be incredible.
The wolf's mouth watered. It wanted to taste it. But it didn't have the guts to steal from the alpha. That was a death sentence.
It could only hope the alpha would be merciful, and leave some scraps. A bone, maybe. Some of the stringy bits.
---
Inside the treehouse, Alexei stood in a rapidly expanding pool of blood.
His entire body was screaming danger signals. The adrenaline crash was making his hands shake.
Watching his own death replays had never felt like this. As a disembodied soul, he couldn't smell anything or feel anything. Death was just abstract.
This?
This was visceral.
Chunks of flesh and brain matter covered his floor. Blood was still fountaining from the second corpse's neck, turning his treehouse into a wading pool. The smell was overwhelming.
"Ugh—"
He wasn't squeamish about killing. He was getting fumigated by the stench. He tried pushing one of the corpses with his stone sword. It didn't budge.
"Are you kidding me?"
He could wield a five-ton stone sword one-handed. But a one-ton wolf corpse? Immovable object, meet unstoppable force, except the unstoppable force apparently had weight restrictions.
Game physics were bullshit.
The wolf's neck was still spurting blood like a broken hydrant. At this rate, his entire floor would be submerged.
"Screw it. New plan."
He started digging sideways, opening a new exit on the other side of his treehouse.
With a shield, fighting one wolf should be manageable.
---
The last wolf heard digging sounds coming from the other side of the massive tree.
Its face lit up with very human-like excitement.
Another prey! There must be another tree-dweller trying to escape!
And since the alpha was still busy enjoying the first one, it wouldn't mind if it claimed the second one for itself, right?
It trotted around to the other side. The moment the new opening appeared, it shoved its head straight in.
Time to catch this prey by surprise...
CRACK.
---
"ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!"
[Level 10 → Level 13]
[Experience Gained: 80]
The world went quiet.
Alexei stood in the new opening, shield in one hand, blood-covered stone sword in the other, staring at the third wolf corpse with its head caved in.
"These goddamn things are not smart at all."
They'd seen their packmates stick their heads in holes and die. And what did they do?
Stuck their heads in holes.
He looked at the three wooden boats still sitting in his inventory.
"I made these for nothing."
The wolves had been that stupid.
Well. Not stupid. Dead. He'd killed the stupid right out of them.
After a moment's consideration, he kept the boats anyway. Maybe they'd be useful later. You never knew.
As for the corpses, those were getting assimilated immediately.
Wolves that could shoot wind attacks... he was curious what kind of loot they'd drop.
He expanded the opening, checked for more threats, and approached the nearest corpse. Its fur was surprisingly soft but tough underneath. Still warm, since it had just died.
He placed his hand on it and pushed experience in.
The moment the XP finished flowing, the entire wolf, along with all the blood it had spilled, burst into pixelated smoke and vanished.
The blood pool instantly shrank by a huge margin.
[Level 13 → Level 8]
[Tempest Wolf Hide ×1]
[Bone ×2]
[Tempest Wolf Meat ×3]
"Not bad."
Losing five levels was acceptable for that haul.
He noticed something interesting about the drops, too. Unlike regular blocks that fell to the ground, these items hovered a few centimeters above the floor, slowly rotating.
Curious, he pulled out two logs, one MC-ified, one regular, and dropped them.
The regular log thunked to the floor.
The MC-ified log floated gently.
"New knowledge acquired."
He collected the loot and checked his crafting menu.
Besides unlocking bone meal recipes, nothing new appeared.
"I'm such an idiot."
He'd forgotten. Without a crafting table open, he could only see 2x2 recipes. Anything more complex wouldn't show up.
He glanced at the blood-soaked floor of his treehouse and decided to assimilate the other wolves first. Clean up this mess before he did anything else.
He moved to the alpha wolf, the one whose head was still wedged partway into his treehouse, corpse twitching occasionally.
This one was noticeably larger than the others.
[Level 8 → Level 1]
[Unformed Core (Wind Aspect) ×1]
[Tempest Wolf Hide ×1]
[Tempest Wolf Meat ×2]
[Bone ×3]
Seven levels for that one, quite expensive.
But the core, that was new. Some kind of magical item, probably.
He pulled it out to examine it.
It looked like a marble, perfectly round and transparent, with swirling patterns inside. Cool to the touch. Otherwise unremarkable.
"No idea what this does. But it's definitely going in the 'mysterious magical shit' pile."
The last wolf was a problem.
He definitely didn't have enough XP left to assimilate it. Based on the pattern, he'd need at least five levels, and he was sitting at level 1.
If he relied on fishing, it'd take six or seven hours minimum to grind that much experience.
Still, maybe he could do a partial payment? Put in what he had now, top it off later?
Worth trying.
He approached the third corpse and placed his hand on it, pushing his remaining experience in.
Nothing happened.
The XP just bounced back.
"So assimilation doesn't support installment plans."
He stared at the corpse for a long moment, then back at his blood-soaked treehouse.
"Fishing marathon it is."