Being forced into an unknown world was difficult for anybody especially if you don't have a purpose for being in that world. As for John, He found out that he could harvest tree logs by punching them down and that crafting tools would instantly become easier when he managed to build a crafting table.
From the table he created stone tools directly from the sticks he either crafted or collected from logs and rocks he found in the area. In his arsenal was a stone sword, a stone shovel, a stone pickaxe, and a stone axe. Another stone equipment he made was a furnace, It was square and unlike the game it stood almost half the height of john.
Speaking of heights John noticed that he was taller than his originally six feet and three inches height by at least 8 inches. Not only was he tall his physique was also extremely thinner than before, when he touched his sides he could feel his ribs through his skin. Another drastic body change were his eyes, which he noticed when he looked at his reflection on a nearby puddle. There were no whites on his eyeballs, it was completely black with a silvery blue pupil glowing in the center.
John realized that he was a freak, but since no explanations were given he threw the questions he had to back of his mind and focused on his survival. Using the stone shovel he took some soil and placed it in his inventory, he kept doing this until he had a sufficient amount enough to build a dirt shack. He would have made his first home out wood if it wasn't for the distance he would travel and the energy he would burn just to go harvest them. With his emancipated body and unknown habitants of the island it was a better desicion to keep his movements small. Time was running and he had to keep up.
Going back to the dirt shack he was building john realized that applying game physics to reality was a stupid move. At first he built it into a square shaped design but it kept collapsing into itself, he repeated the process twice and failed both times before he smacked himself in the forehead. The harvested soil was compacted into a cube shape of equal volume and size, cuboid shapes were great for vertical building but unless he had a skeletal support it wouldnt be able to hold its hanging horizontal structure.
John had to sacrifice room area and basically built a dome of dirt which was thicker on the base than it was on the top, it aint much but its honest work. Placing his furnace inside and placing a block of compacted dirt on the side for him to sit on, he ponders on his next move.
Food was an essential ingredient for survival and right now he was feeling hungry. The palm trees around him didnt bear any fruits and fishing was out since he both lacked experience and gear to be able succesfully catch a fish. He would definitely build a fishtrap in the future, his current choices were to forage and/or hunt deeper into the island. Since he didn't know if the island had other humans and he didn't want to meet them either so he had to keep his range to only a few tens of meters.
John had to keep silent and lay low to not attract attention to any possible prey or predator. There shrubs and foliages here and there which meant that the island was set in a tropical area. The chances of aquiring fruits and edible plants were usually higher in islands like the one John was in, expectations of a full stomach were there.
After a few minutes of scuttling here and there John didn't find any edible looking plants. What he did find was a pair of birds, one beautifully colored in shades red and orange and one plainly in red. The plainly colored bird was oddly similar to the one that was screeching loudly when he gained consciousness on this island, heck it might even the same bird! but john didn't care. Both birds were pinned to a tree quite possibly mating based on the position they took, the beautifully colored bird was being pinned to the tree by the other bird. While the the plainly colored bird was rapidly shaking its butt, John was crouching just five meters behind them holding an stone axe in his hand. Throwing an axe vertically forward rarely missed if the target was stationary as long as bo force is acting on its sides the axe would continue spinning forward.
*Swoosh*
John threw with as much force as he could surprising himself with the speed of which the axe travelled. Even if the axe head failed to hit the target the force of the throw was enough to hurt the bird giving enough time for him to run and finish it off with a smack of his shovel. Why the shovel? more surface area equals less chances of failure. Back to the axe, Luckily for John he didn't need to use his stone shovel to finish of the bird as it accurately hit it on its neck. The bird's sex partner turned around and rapidly detached itself from the dead mate, it was a shame to lose such a loud screeching mate but survival was priority.
John was a little dissapointed that he didn't catch two birds with one axe as the other bird flew away faster than he could react. Aproaching the soon to be dinner with a smile on his face, John pulled the axe from the bird's almost detached head and stored it in his inventory. While inspecting the bloody red bird with 3 pairs of legs on his way back to his dirt mound John was thinking of ways to to prepare it.
First he had to remove the feathers and if it was hard to do so, he would craft a furnace and modify it into one that could hold water so could scald the bird. Hot water would destroy cellular firmness in the epidermis in the skin allowing him to remove the feathers with ease. A knowledge he gained from watching catch and cook videos from youtube.
Secondly, he would gut the bird with his sword and store the innards for fish bait and wash the bird in seawater. John was hoping that the seawater would clean and salt the bird at the same time. He would do all these steps and then oven cook the bird.
Arriving in the dirt mound he called home, John smiles as he looks at his home positioned beside a boulder. He was really lucky today and he didn't take it for granted he quickly prepared the bird using the steps he formulated earlier and finished cooking just as the sun had set.
Just like the game the furnace didn't produce any smoke during operation which relieved John as he didn't want any signals to give away his location. Thinking back, it was probably only john who was in the island. The birds were unguardedly having intercourse on the base of a tree producing a lot of noise, something paranoid creatures wouldn't do. It either meant that they were at the top of the foodchain or that there were no predators that would catch them of guard having sex. All of these were just theories but it still made John feel safer.
All these thinking made John's stomach grumble in hunger so he picked up a roasted mystery bird leg and pulled it to his mouth. Out of nowhere the leg vanished from his hands but john did not think a skilled ninja took it from him. He tasted the meat and felt the texture in his tongue before it travelled through his throat, dropping on his stomach and dispersing slightly energizing him. John's brain activated logical thinking and linked this event to the game, when your character eats it would only take three bites to chew through
a beef steak. Not only would it take a short amount of time to devour such a large portion of meat, it would also fill your hunger bar instantly and regenerate your health.
This eating ability was apparently translated into John's body, though it would make it less enjoyable to eat food regenerating health through eating was definitely useful. Wait, regenerating?
John had an epiphany, on his peripheral was a full hp bar if his hp bar was a measurement of his ability absorb damage before dying then fat
something else wasn't being counted here at all. If he was damaged from combat then eating would heal the wounds from that battle, what if he wasn't in battle? where would the food go?
The game was limited in showing details of stamina and fatigue, in fact it didn't show any at all except for the character bot being able to sprint when it is hungry. This means that food ingame still accounted for energy.
There was still one detail left, Muscular and skeletal damage. Repeated exertions from activities creates cellular damage on muscle fibers and impacts create hairline fractures on bones. Recovery of cellular damage on muscular fibers increases size and durability of these fibers allowing them to take stronger loads. The same theory applies to hairline fracturing on bones, Kickboxers train their sheens by repeatedly hitting it against a surface to induce calcification. Another proof of bone strenghtening are weightlifters having sigbificantly denser and stronger bones compared to non-lifters. Activity, Recovery, and Nutrition; the holy trinity of body enhancement.
If John was full health recieving no combat damage yet fatigued from labor, food would energize him and cure the fatigue. Despite being energized any muscular or skeletal damage would still be there, which means in theory excess eating would transfer nutrients from the food to the damaged areas and fixing them.
This was extremely important for John as he could completely hasten the process of recovery and nutrition. His ability of instant food absorption allowed him to not waste any time for digestive processes and overeating would heal his damaged muscles and bones. He would hasten the process of strength building by thousands if he had enough food.
To prove his theories John finished the half of it within seconds, he would eat the half tommorow as a fourth already filled his hunger bar. After storing the rest of the bird he checks his body for signs of repair. He flexed the glutes of his thin legs and felt no uncomfortablity then he started stretching his legs and felt no tension. He kept checking for signs of muscular damage and didn't feel any, making John extremely giddy.
Perhaps in this world he could become superman... maybe not but a man can dream, speaking of dreams it was time to sleep.
He plugged his "doorway" with blocks of dirt leaving a small crevice for air to come in. He goes to to one side of his mound and places dirt blocks wide and long enough for him to lay on and rests on it.
ahhh.. today was a good day.