Feng had a lot of time in his world, a lot of time meant him, mining for three days straight without any break, he has not gone to the surface in a while.
In his inventory there were some minecraft ores—Mostly copper and Iron and a dew diamonds—and some tinkers constructs ores.
"Day three," Feng muttered, chipping away at a vein of Ardite he'd stumbled on near a lava pocket. The warm orange glow of the molten rock cast long shadows across the deepslate walls. "I have enough copper to build an entire apartment complex, and somehow I still only have eight diamonds."
He stared at his inventory with the quiet resentment of a man who had done everything right and been rewarded anyway with iron. Again.
The Tinkers Construct ores had been a pleasant surprise though. Manyullyn wasn't going to forge itself but he'd need to get to the Nether for that—Cobalt and Ardite were only the beginning. What he'd gathered so far was enough to start a basic smeltery, which meant the moment he surfaced, he had a project.
That thought alone was enough to keep him going another twelve hours underground.
He turned a corner, torch in hand, and came face to face with a zombie. It groaned.
Feng sighed, already raising his sword. "You are the seventeenth zombie today."
It lurched forward. He stepped aside, let it stumble past, and put it down with a single clean swing. Bones and rotten flesh dropped at his feet. He pocketed the flesh with the same energy of a man collecting mail he didn't want.
The rotten flesh pile in his inventory was becoming a problem. He had no dogs to feed yet and throwing it away felt wasteful in a way that irritated him on a fundamental level.
"I should tame more wolves," he said to no one.
The cave gave no response, which was expected. What was not expected was the faint sound of water somewhere below him—not the ambient drip he'd long since tuned out, but a steady current. Moving water.
Feng crouched and pressed his ear to the stone.
Definitely moving.
He straightened up and began digging straight down, which every experienced Minecraft player knew was a trap, and which Feng did anyway because he had a totem of undying and frankly he was curious.
Three blocks down, he broke through into open air and dropped.
He landed with a splash.
The chamber below was massive—carved not by game generation but by something deliberate, the walls too smooth, the angles too intentional. A river ran through it, narrow but fast, feeding into a deeper pool where bioluminescent lichen cast everything in pale green and blue. Copper veins ran in long decorative lines through the stone like someone had gilded it.
"Huh," Feng said, standing in ankle-deep water and looking around. "That's new."
His interface didn't flag anything unusual. No hostile mobs detected in range. No structural warnings. The chamber just... existed. Quietly, unexpectedly, like it had been waiting.
He walked to the edge of the deeper pool and peered down. The water was clear enough that he could see the bottom, and sitting on it, half-buried in gravel, was a chest.
Feng looked at it for a long moment.
"If there's a curse on that," he said, beginning to strip off his armor so it wouldn't drag him down, "I'm going to be so tired."
He dove.
The water was cold even through the game's sensory simulation, and he swam down fast, reaching the chest in a few seconds. He pried it open underwater, the interface materializing the contents list in front of him in glowing text.
Inside: six diamonds, a book titled Sharpness IV, two gold ingots, and at the bottom, something his loot tables had absolutely no business generating.
A single netherite ingot.
Feng stared at it.
He grabbed everything and swam back up, breaking the surface with a sharp exhale. He climbed out, sat on the stone floor dripping, and held the netherite ingot up to his torch.
In the corner of his eyes, there were slight tears. "Has notch smiled upon me today."
Bur as he said that, he heard the sound of hissing near him and the sound if something about to go off. Feng did not hesitate.
He threw himself sideways the same instant the creeper detonated.
The explosion swallowed the chamber in a white flash and a concussive boom that shook loose chunks of stone from the ceiling. Feng hit the water rolling, the blast catching his legs and shaving him down to three hearts in a single hit. His ears rang with that flat, empty tone that always followed close-range detonations.
He surfaced, coughing, the netherite ingot still clutched in his fist.
The crater where he'd been sitting was substantial. The chest was gone. Most of the gravel bank was gone. A section of the copper-gilded wall had caved in, leaving a jagged wound in the stone.
Feng lay on his back in the shallows, staring at the bioluminescent ceiling, breathing.
"Three hearts," he said, very quietly. "I have three hearts."
He stayed there for approximately four seconds, which was the exact amount of time it took for the adrenaline to metabolize into exhaustion and then into the specific low-grade fury that came from almost dying to a creeper for the second time in what felt like a thematic pattern the universe was committing to.
He sat up. Ate a cooked porkchop from his inventory. Then another. His health bar climbed back to full with the unhurried patience of a system that had no opinion on how he felt about it.
"Seventeenth zombie," he said, tucking the netherite ingot carefully into the most protected slot of his inventory. "One creeper. Eight diamonds before. Six in the chest. That's fourteen total." He paused. "And one netherite ingot that a chest in an underground river with no business existing just handed me."
Despite the near death experience, Feng was satisfied with the haul...now he just needed to go up to the surface.
Feng looked up.
It was not going to be a fast ascent.
-----
A day later, Feng mined up from the ground and stepped into the night of Minecraft. Mobs were everywhere and a few phantoms were also flying above him.
He quickly got rid of them with a bow he has made along the way and some arrows he obtained from crafting and killing some mobs.
His house remained the same and as impressive as it looks, he still was not satified with it. His plan to build a castle required an immense number of resources since he was in survival and it would also require him to travel and obtain some materials not normally obtained.
His XP bar has already reached close to forty from all that mining and killing. He could probably get a new mod. "Show me the Mods Tab."
The interface flickered and a holographic panel materialized in front of him, organized into tiers.
[MODS TAB]
Available XP: 38 Levels
TIER 1 — LOW COST (5–10 XP)
Quark — World enhancement. New blocks, underground biomes, ancient tomes. [6 XP]
Farmer's Delight — Expanded farming, cooking mechanics, new crops. [5 XP]
Waystones — Craftable fast travel points. Bind and teleport between marked locations. [7 XP]
Storage Drawers — Bulk item storage. Stackable drawer systems. [5 XP]
TIER 2 — MID COST (12–18 XP)
Ice and Fire — Dragons, sea serpents, cyclopes.
Tameable fire/ice/lightning dragons. Dragon steel. [15 XP]
Ars Nouveau — Spell crafting, glyphs, familiars, magical automation. [14 XP]
Create — Mechanical contraptions, rotational power, automated factories. [16 XP]
Alex's Mobs — Expanded wildlife. Rare drops. Some tameable. [12 XP]
TIER 3 — HIGH COST (20–30 XP)
Apotheosis — Overhauled enchanting, powerful bosses, enhanced loot. [22 XP]
Twilight Forest — Entire new dimension. Progressive boss structure. Unique materials. [25 XP]
Botania — Flower-based magic, mana system, passive automation. [20 XP]
TIER 4 — PREMIUM (35+ XP)
Eidolon — Dark ritual magic, summoning, soul manipulation. [35 XP]
Electroblob's Wizardry — Wand-based spell system. 200+ spells. Wizard towers. [38 XP]
[Note: Tinkers Construct already installed. Dragon Mounts flagged — redundant if Ice and Fire is purchased. Mods interact with existing world generation retroactively.]
Feng read through the list twice. His eyes lingered on Ice and Fire for exactly three seconds before sliding down to Twilight Forest, then back up
.
"Waystones," he said immediately, almost reflexively. The ability to teleport between marked points meant he'd never have to spend five days on a boat again. That alone was worth the seven XP on principle.
He tapped it.
[Waystones installed. Craftable waystone recipe added to interface. One Waystone has been placed in your current village.]
"Efficient," he muttered approvingly.
Then his eyes drifted back up to Ice and Fire. Tame-able dragons. Dragon steel. An entirely new material tier sitting at fifteen XP with twenty-three levels still in his bar after Waystones.
He was going to the Nether anyway. He was already committed to netherite. The Wither Queen was apparently watching him and planning some kind of grand judgment about whether he deserved a title he never asked for.
Adding a dragon to that situation felt less like escalation and more like appropriate preparation.
He tapped it.
[Ice and Fire installed. New hostile mobs are now active in your world. Dragon eggs have a chance to generate in high-altitude and underground nests. Fire dragons inhabit warm biomes. Ice dragons inhabit cold biomes. Lightning dragons are rare. Taming requires the relevant dragon's egg and consistent bonding through growth stages.]
"Hmm...i wonder if i can get the superhero mods, it would be funny to have an infinite supply of Kryptonite or just obtain the flash's ability and troll him.
The interface flickered for a moment, processing the query.
[SUPERHERO MODS — SEARCH RESULTS]
[Superheroes Unlimited — Suits granting various hero/villain powers. Kryptonite craftable. [28 XP]]
[Note: Powers granted by this mod function within the Minecraft world only. Kryptonite and other crafted materials CAN cross into the material world as physical objects. Powers CANNOT. But if it is a mod that give powers, like Origins or magic, then it can be brought out or if it is a different super hero mod.]
Feng sighed, well he couldn't get everything could he. Well he can still obtain some other mods later, he was now more interested in building a forge.