there wasn't much to do in the overworld once you've completed a full set of iron armor aside from building and gathering more stuff. John didn't believe such words. The overworld he was in was dangerous; pack mentalitied chickens and Aggressive cows with steel for muscles. The monsters were also buffed up to the moon.
On one occasion John stumbled on a zombie resting under a tree's shade. Fully decked in iron, john provoked the zombie with a stone he threw. The zombie was slow but the moment it got within three meters John didn't expect it to suddenly rush at him. Throwing punches and kicks at John's unprotected parts even dislocating his shoulder when it had the chance. The only reason John survived the martial artist zombie's attack was because it accidentally stepped out of the shade and got burned by sunlight.
Skeletons were freaks as well. John and bohk were sleeping atop the trees near the edge of the forest when they heard a commotion outside. The curious John peeked through the ventilation hole and saw a skeleton swordsman duking it out with five zombies. It was an amazing display of skill, the five zombies failed to combo the skeleton as it kept dancing around and swinging it's blade taking limbs as it slashed through the air. Out of nowhere a cow went charging towards the skeleton. The skeleton only dodged when it was almost hit by the cow while the cow's head detached from it's bodt when it passed the skeleton.
John was sure that the skeleton wasn't just overly powerful but also made use of its superior skill. The cows head was easily severed because the skeleton target the joints in its neck passed its sword in the gaps.
John laid in fear that night. He was hearing loud screeches outside and assumed it was the phantoms telling him to go to sleep. He hugged Bohk and thought how safe and peaceful the island was. His eyes were closed but the surface of the platform he slept in changed tenperature.
John opened his eyes and saw a beautiful nightsky filled stars while his ears were caressed by the sounds of waves from a nearby beach. John was back, and Bohk came with him. Naturally John did something he considered to be smart. He slept till morning and went to the overworld.
John harvested everything he could transfer. trees couldn't be transfered since roots couldn't be transplanted but he managed to get Stones, dirt, sapplings, and flowers. He changed the structure of his tower turning it into a small castle. The walls around his castle were converted into walls of stone with a pillar every three meters. He re-carved the illustrations in the walls with the legends of his old world but with him as the main character. There was even one wall illustration with Bohk as the main character.
Each wall pillar was topped with a lantern and John noticed how the fire never went out unless actively put off.
His castle doors was something he handcrafted himself. It was made of wood that he tainted by burning the surface, giving it a dark woody grain. The double swining doors where held together by iron that John painstakingly hammered into shape. each side of the doors had half of a horned ogre bearing its metal fangs that met at the center.
Inside was a completely different scene. The original windows were gone. Light was replaced by lanterns shaped like skulls attached to the ceiling with differing length iron chains. With plenty of space inside the walls were no longer rounded as they used to but were now collectively shaped like an octagon. John didn't put any carvings in the floor or walls since he had plans of making them with a different material.
His throne however was finished. The stone stairs were left untouched but all around it were sculptures of horned humaboid beings climbing over each other to get to the top. Their claws outstreched and faces screaming in agony as they struggled in their positions. John's throne itself had no major changes aside from the materials used to make it. The conglomeration of swords in the backrest were now made of metal even the large pickaxe was treated the same. The giant pickaxe resembled an anchor more than a pick. Its blade or head had inscriptions of different patterns that were emphasized by the skull lantern's light.
Sitting on the throne made John feel powerful like a dark lord rulling over mortals. He even practiced his evil laugh, going through multiple laugh patterns before deciding one,
"HHAHAHAHA"
"HE.HE.HE.HE."
"HUEHUEHUEHUE"
"KAKAKAKAKA"
.....
While John was choosing his laughs he realised that he made a huge mistake! Everything he built didn't reflect his appearance at all. He was large yes, but his frame wasn't enough to give the vibe of supreme power. His armor was still the modified design he made with added shoulder protection and gauntlets. Not only was he lame he had barely any protection on.
His fight with the zombie made him realize the gaps in his armor were still weaknesses and the skeleton's way of fighting made him wary of sword techniques. John stopped his darklord antics and went towards his underground inventory in the castle.
Multiple chests adorned the wall labled in what items they contained. Beside the inventory room was a forging room. A place where John made new metallic products and registered them through the crafting table for new and improved products.
The crafting table was a mysterious and helpful item to John. When John forges a sword with engravings on the surface the crafting table gains a new recipe that would allow John to mass produce a better quality sword than the one he handmade. This was how John learned to forge, by learning from the improved items in from the crafting table he learned how to make better items that he could subject to the all powerful table. The cycle would repeat until the table could no longer make the item better.
The purpose of John coming here was to develop a new interlayer armor that he could wear under his external ones. He would also change the design of his armor into something cooler, afterall who wouldn't like to be badass while kicking ass.
The interlayer armor would be a chainmail sandwiched between leather. The leather was harder than its original form of skin and the chainmail would guard against slashing attacks that penetrates the first layer. the last layer of leather was just there as a last precaution.
The revamped armor design started from the helmet. Putting pads made with plant fiber(soon to be cotton if John manages to kill a sheep) and turning the eye holes into slits. There was no mouth openings since John could eat without actively putting food in his mouth. Overall the helmet looked like a cusader's great helm that had a pointed chin.
Next was John's shoulder pads, the ingame armor gave no protection towards the upper arm area and neck line so John would fix that. John made a Pauldron that reached until his elbows with three layers. The shoulder part was bigger and John purposely chose a sharper design as opposed to a rounder one to give him more edge and make his frame wider.
John already created forearm guards and gauntlets long ago and all he did was make the shape sharper
The chest plate was separated into two parts. The abdomen armor that protected his waist was filled with interwoven lines that made it look like the armor had abs. Layering on top of the abdominal armor was the chest plate which John emphasized the chest part for function and design. Function since he could put a second plate inside and design to make his side angles wider. The neckline of the the chestplate had an elevated collar that went past the helmet preventing any sideslashes towards his neck.
It was time to move towards the lower half of his body. It was difficult to put armor in the groin area since it would severely hinder movement. John solved this by placing linked plates attached to his waistline on the front,back, and sides of his body. The dangling square plates were shorter in the front and back while the ones on the sides were longer.
The leg armor consisted of the quad, hamstring, and knee protector. The shinguard was connected to John's special iron boot design that was made of multiple layers in the joints of the foot to allow movement. John added more angles and creases in the Leg armor to match the upper body style and finally finished the whole set.
The entire project took a whole year for John to finish. He had to go do multiple runs in the overworld to collect materials to improve the armor's quality. All while avoiding conflict with the creatures there. John also kept up his weight training and he could now endure a maximum of 1 ton in his body. The weight training was slowed down due to the difficulty of acquiring cow meat in the overworld and island fish barely contributed anything to his hunger bar.
Exiting the forge, John opens a stone wall by stepping on a pressure plate. The interior of the castle had changed. The original carvings were filled with gold. The story of John's life was written in gold. The skull lanterns had emeralds in their eyes reflecting greenish hue in the atmosphere. The iron throne was bigger and the clump of swords resembled a peacocks tail spreading out to the world.
The demon sculptures struggling to reach the throne were more detailed and life like. The walls were cracked in different patterns but the cracks were filled with gold. The floor was made with obsidian that was clear and smooth, reflecting everything that was placed above it as if another world was just below.
John slowly walked towards the throne, his metal wear clanking in a slow rythmic pattern, his steps echoing around. He arrives and turns his back on his metal symbol of sovereignty and laughs. It was a slow deep and dark toned laugh. For a moment it was as if the sculptures of monsters and demons around the laughing iron king came to life, But no would know for sure.
John sat down and reorganized his future plans. He still had much to do. The overworld wasn't explored yet and his armor was yet to be enchanted. Enchanting needed exp which was gained from killing monsters, something wasn't to excited for. He had the tools but lacked the experience. he would start with spiders and then transition to zombies before fighting the dreaded skeletons. John Had yet to encounter creepers or endermen and he was happy at that, if they were buffed like the rest of the monsters he would probably die in a second.
John was resting his chin on his fist and thinking about the future when a chicken walked through the castle doors.
"Bok'" the chicken said.
John broke off from his thoughts and called for the chicken. He placed a straw nest beside his throne as the chicken flew towards it and sat peacefully. John didn't mind Bhok, Bohk was family. While looking at obviously out of place animal, John thought about having more pets. Maybe a wolf and a horse would be good...
_________________________________________________
"Alright class! can anyone summarize what just taught you" A teacher shouted at the children infront of her.
Multiple hands went up in the air but the teacher chose the new student from a far away town.
"Vell, how about you tell the class" the teacher said in a soft tone.
"yes mam," the little girl answered as she stood up "humanity has faced multiple invasions from daemos in the past hundred years. The first invasion happened during the light ages when humans were making use of ethero in our daily lives and- and nearly seventy percent of the human race was eradicated. An invasion has four waves with each wave lasting for a year and intensif-sifying with each wave" the girl fumbled some of the words due to her lack of experience in speaking such words.
"haha vell stuttered" some of the kids said
"as if you could do better, idiot" someone retaliated
The teacher noticed the rising conflict quickly silenced the conflict and continued asking the little girl,
"yes, continue Vell" her tone returning to a soft one.
the now red faced Vell continued her speech, "an invasion is usually precedented by the reactivity of corrupted ethero thirty two years before the waves arrive. The last invasion happened aboit twenty four years ago which means we have twelve to thirteen years left in preparation" the little girl gulped her saliva before she continued "since we would be the adults during the time of the invasion we will be participating in the war". Vell's previous embarassment was now replaced with a slight fear.
Vell's mother had told her stories of the daemos. Monstrosities of different forms would rise from different places and attack human settlements. Her father that used to make her feel safe was now dead and her mother would only tell her the truth when she was older.
The teacher noticed the fear in her student's eyes and felt guilty. Every able bodied adult was required to fight of the invasions unless they were specialised in production. The children infront of her would mostlikely join the war and probably die.
The teacher shoke off the negative thoughts in her head and spoke,
"there's no need to be afraid, recent studies have created many weapons to guard against the daemos. The barriers are stronger than they were before and..." the teacher stopped for a moment before she continued,
"I may not look like it but im pretty good at offensive ethero application" she says with confidence while she makes a small flame dance in her hands.
"Maybe you guys will see me fighting in the battlefield one day"
The students were awed at their teacher's performance and started making bold proclamations,
"That's right! ill learn offensive ethero abblication as well and blast of those daemos!"
"You mispronounced application idiot.."
"Yes! teacher will protect us!"
The children regained their childlike vigour leaving their teacher who smiled wryly at their exclamations.