Herta and Silver Wolf followed Fu Zhu's gaze and saw the wood and stone that made up the villagers' houses. Both of them fell into a contemplative silence.
Seeing that they weren't speaking, Fu Zhu thought they didn't know how to gather resources in MC. Taking up his role as a guide, he walked forward.
"Watch closely. Wood is a basic material. As temporary Steves, you can break it with your bare hands. Stone is different; you'll need at least a wooden pickaxe to break it and get the drop."
Fu Zhu began punching a log pillar at the corner of a house. After a few hits, he broke off a cubic meter of it. He then picked it up, turned around, and showed it to Herta and Silver Wolf.
"See? Just like that. Got it?"
The corners of Herta and Silver Wolf's eyes twitched. Neither of them knew quite what to say.
"No... that's not what we were talking about..."
Fu Zhu couldn't help but frown. He felt his explanation had been perfectly clear, and Herta was a genius from the Genius Society, after all. How could she not understand such a simple concept?
Silver Wolf might not be a member of the Genius Society, but she was a genius hacker. She shouldn't be like this, either.
"Then I'll demonstrate the crafting process."
Fu Zhu had no choice but to turn back and punch a few more logs from the house. He then broke them down into planks and crafted a workbench. Step by step, he meticulously demonstrated the entire process of making a wooden pickaxe.
"See? This is a wooden pickaxe. With this, you can mine stone."
Fu Zhu swung the wooden pickaxe and struck the wall. When he knocked loose a block of cobblestone, a villager's face was revealed in the resulting hole. The villager just stood there in the opening, staring blankly at Fu Zhu.
?
Seeing this, Herta and Silver Wolf couldn't help but gulp. From the very beginning, their greatest fear had come to pass!
What did he mean, "resources are everywhere"? This was a villager's house! Tearing down someone's home to make your own tools—wouldn't a person be struck by lightning for doing something like that?
---o---
Fu Zhu crafted two more wooden pickaxes, walked over to Herta and Silver Wolf, and shoved the tools into their hands, urging them on.
"What are you two spacing out for? Get digging! I'm here as a guide, not a slave. The most I'll do is demonstrate how it's done; I'm not going to dig the materials for you."
Herta and Silver Wolf took the pickaxes, hesitating as they glanced at the villager staring out from the hole in the wall. Whether it was their conscience or their social standing, both prevented them from doing something like tearing down someone else's home to make tools for themselves.
Fu Zhu came up behind them and gave them a push. The two stumbled forward and had no choice but to walk up to the house, pickaxes in hand. They looked at the villager, who was staring right back at them from the other side of the wall.
Even Herta felt a little embarrassed and averted her gaze, starting to tap at the stone wall with her pickaxe.
Silver Wolf, on the other hand, muttered to herself nonstop, "I'm a Stellaron Hunter... I'm supposed to be a villain..." After thoroughly brainwashing herself, she began to chisel away at the villager's wall without a shred of guilt.
Seeing that the two had finally gotten on the right track, Fu Zhu nodded in satisfaction and turned to look at Screwllum.
Screwllum had been standing in the same spot the whole time, projecting a virtual screen in front of himself that displayed a series of photos.
"Screwllum, what are you doing? Aren't you going to research this world?"
Fu Zhu curiously walked over. Standing beside Screwllum, he glanced at the photos on the screen and found the content to be somewhat familiar.
It was clearly footage of him using various MC items on the Herta Space Station, including a photo of the Trailblazer and March 7th using a boat to restrain an Anti-Matter Legionary.
"These photos..."
Hearing Fu Zhu's voice, Screwllum snapped out of his trance. Fearing a misunderstanding, he quickly explained.
"Fu Zhu, please don't misunderstand. This isn't secret surveillance. There are simply cameras everywhere on the Herta Space Station. These photos were just extracted from the recordings."
Seeing Screwllum's flustered look, Fu Zhu smiled and waved his hand. "It's fine, I don't mind. Since I used them openly, I'm obviously not afraid of people seeing them. I just don't understand what you're looking at these for."
Seeing that Fu Zhu wasn't angry, Screwllum breathed a sigh of relief and explained, "I intend to replicate the various tools you've used. This might allow me to gain more insight."
"Alright then. You do you."
Since Screwllum had his own plans, Fu Zhu didn't say much more. He turned and walked away so as not to disturb their research. He, too, had things he could only conveniently do inside the Simulated Universe.
He had tried it before. Although he couldn't use commands to enter Creative Mode and obtain various items and achievements in the Simulated Universe, he was still able to bring things from the Simulated Universe back to the real world.
That point alone was his biggest gain from this Simulated MC session!
There were many things that were impossible to do in reality that he could do with impunity in the Simulated MC.
"So be it... I'll build a mob grinder and an iron farm first!"
---o---
With these two structures, whatever Fu Zhu wanted to do next would become much more convenient.
If conditions allowed, he was even planning to craft a few other SlashBlades to acquire their unique sword skills.
Jingliu's sword techniques were certainly impressive, but they required too much manual input. The skills from the SlashBlade mod were much simpler and more mindless; the speed at which he could unleash them depended entirely on how fast he wanted to, not on how fast his hands could move.
However, both of these structures required a large number of blocks. The first thing he needed to do now was to gather a massive amount of blocks.
Since time was short, Fu Zhu didn't have any particularly good options for gathering blocks. So, he walked out of the village, planning to directly use dirt, leaves, and cobblestone to build the mob grinder and iron farm.
With the Vein Miner enchantment, collecting blocks was an incredibly simple matter for Fu Zhu.
He took out his pickaxe and struck the ground. An entire section of blocks was instantly cleared, causing Fu Zhu himself to fall into the resulting hole. Fortunately, it wasn't a long drop, and he only lost half a heart of health.
Not far away, Ruan Mei, who had just escaped the pursuit of the Iron Golem, noticed a large patch of ground suddenly disappear near the village entrance and walked over curiously.
Peeking over the edge, she saw Fu Zhu swinging his pickaxe nonstop below. Puzzled, she smoothed her skirt, crouched down, and cupped her chin in her hands as she called down to him.
"Mr. Fu Zhu, what are you doing?"
Hearing the voice, Fu Zhu looked up and saw Ruan Mei crouching at the edge of the cliff. He then lowered his head again and casually replied.
"Collecting materials to build a mob grinder."
"Mob grinder?"