On one hand, Theo could proceed carefully, biding his time to slowly approach the forest from the one direction the monsters were unlikely to attack him from - the underground.
On the other end of the spectrum, he could focus on speed as opposed to safety. This would allow him to gather the materials he knew he needed before the beasts - that were quite likely to lurk within the woods - could get a chance to get a jump on him.
In the end, however, Theo decided to follow neither of those paths.
'Why settle for one thing when I can get the most out of both?' he thought, as he crawled through the short grass of the open field for a bit.
Roughly five meters away from the hole he left behind him, Theo stopped before digging his hand into the ground.
[Dug out: 1 block of earth]
[Dug out: 1 block of earth]
With two cubes of earth now transferred from the real world into his inventory, Theo slid into the hole only to then repeat the process once again. And so, he shoveled at the ground with his hand, patiently waiting for the progress bar of his digging action to reach completion.
[Dug out: 1 block of earth]
'And now, let's do it all over again!'
The safe approach of just digging a hole and then taking his time to dig his way over to the forest came with quite the obvious cost - time. Time that Theo could afford if this was all but a game.
Regretfully, in real life, there was no hunger or thirst bar that he could more-or-less ignore. And with how unearthing a single block of earth required him to shovel at the ground fifteen times, he could only progress at a rate of a single block of ground every ten seconds or so.
With how each of those blocks would be only half a meter long, he needed to make the potential tunnel at least two blocks high to somewhat comfortably move through it, and then how there were roughly thirty meters between his current spot and the edge of the forest…
'That counts up to a total of a hundred and twenty blocks,' Theo thought as he climbed up from the hole he just made, took a look around to ensure there were no threats in his immediate proximity, and then fully climbed out…
Only to hug the ground again before crawling another five meters towards the forest and then repeating the whole process from scratch.
'Digging all that dirt would take me twenty minutes,' Theo concluded, using it as a justification for his revised strategy. 'And that's discounting all the risks of actually pushing my hands so far, when I still need them to gather other resources once I actually get to the forest!'
With each passing second and every move he made, Theo's reserve of energy would continue to drain. And with that in mind, digging up such a tunnel, even with these weird abilities of his, was simply not worth the effort.
That didn't mean he was willing to compromise on his safety, though.
'It's already a long stretch for me to assume I can just reincarnate again,' Theo thought as he stopped his crawl and started to dig another hole. 'And even if I actually could do so, who is there to say I would get abilities that have as much potential as what I have right now?'
This train of thought was what pushed Theo to devise his current strategy, of digging a hole he could safely seal every five meters. In this way, in case some monster jumped to attack him, he would never be further than just a few steps away from a perfect hiding place!
Bit by bit, Theo progressed along the plain, steadily approaching the front of the woods. Yet, before he could even reach the nearest of the trees…
'Wait, what if I can actually use those too?' he thought, staring at the one thing he didn't really pay much attention to when he first approached the tree.
It was nothing more than a slightly thicker bush made up of small, wooden sticks covered in a plethora of leaves and even some small, grape-sized berries.
'In that block game, it would be either a berry bush or just a part of the foliage,' Theo thought, lying flat on the ground, only to then squint his eyes. 'But I don't think one could pick up small stones directly from the ground in that game too. And that means…'
Theo squinted his eyes as he made a silent prayer before rising up to his knees and sneaking up on all fours towards the bush. Once near, he reached out and…
'Yes!'
[Gathering: 11%]
[Gathering: 22%]
…
…
…
[Gathering: 99%]
[Gathering: Completed]
[Gathered: 3 sticks, 1 berry, 1 foliage]
'Hell yeah!'
Screaming out in his mind with joy, Theo instantly turned around and sprinted back to his nearest hole, happily diving in only to quickly whip out his system and seal its opening with one of the twenty-one blocks of dirt he gathered on the approach.
'Now that I have some sticks, I should be able to get my hands on some tools, right?' he thought, taking the lesson from his recent experiences and just willing for the crafting window to appear.
This time, Theo had no doubts in his guess. After all, he could still see 'ultimate crafting system' written in bold at the top of the very first window that appeared before his eyes whenever he could be bothered to summon it!
Yet, what happened next exceeded even the modest expectations Theo had for it, given how massive of a blessing his system was already shaping to be.
Because not only a familiar window with a three-by-three grid appeared before his eyes, it also had a much more important element stuck to its side!
'A recipe book?! Are you kidding me?!'
To not scream out in jubilation took all of Theo's wits.
After all, he was merely hiding from the monsters, rather than leisurely enjoying himself in a properly secured bunker. Right now, staying on the low-key of things was his best bet at staying alive.
The existence of this recipe book meant a lot more than just having the ability to store recipes Theo already knew. A fact easily proven by how Theo didn't actually know any of those, yet the book still came with a list of the tools he so wanted to craft - a list that contained literally every item he thought about within the limits of what he expected to be able to craft!
'Now we are cooking,' barely able to contain his excitement, Theo quickly arranged two sticks, one above the other, before topping the whole recipe with the small stone he gathered when he first discovered how to use the system.
And just like that, the whole crafting window before his eyes flashed, with a new element now appearing to the side - a picture that Theo simply couldn't fail to recognize.
[To complete a craft, simply will for it to happen]
Before Theo could even try to figure out how to complete the whole crafting process, the system notification appeared before his eyes.
'Wait, isn't this kind of advice… kind of random? And why is it only now that it appears, instead of clueing me in on what stuff I can gather before?' he thought…
Only to end up dismissing the whole topic as he happily willed for the process to conclude, only for a simple, wooden shovel to materialize itself out of thin air and fall right into Theo's lap.
'I know this makes no sense, be it by the logic of my original life or even by the rules of the blocks game…' the young man thought, only to shrug his shoulders and silently laugh out.
'But whether it makes sense or not, I'm the last person willing to complain about it!'