Omen (2)
Forcing hard labor onto a newly recovered man who had an amputated foot.
Anyone hearing only that much without context would curse me out, asking if I even had a conscience or if I was even human.
Yet I hadn't made this call on a whim. Even with an impaired leg, the man was leagues stronger than me.
He was simply someone whose leg only was inconvenient, and he was growing accustomed to that leg by the hour. Besides, wasn't it far more efficient to do what one could rather than sit idly doing nothing?
Charity work is a luxury for those with time and comfort to spare.
So long as we remained in a death trap where our very survival hung by a thread, everyone had to pull their weight, handicap or not.
Furthermore, once summer slipped away, winter was slated to come crashing down. Having firsthand, visceral experience of what horrors transpired during that season, I had to prepare with absolute thoroughness. Now that Ggobongi and a giraffe had joined our ranks, loafing around was out of the question.
Ggobongi is one thing, but building a shelter for that giraffe is a massive headache.
The giraffe: that sorrowful creature cursed with an excessively long neck.
Tragically, its overall bulk matched that description—it was astronomically large. Even its legs were endlessly long. Because of this, endless logistical nightmares bloomed when designing a house, or rather, an enclosure for it.
Right off the bat, its height alone easily matched the second story of an apartment building. I had no choice but to build it significantly larger than the cavern I currently inhabited.
I have to factor in cold insulation, too. And since it needs to share quarters with Ggobongi, the floor plan has to be massive.
In practice, it was equivalent to excavating an entire second cavern from scratch. There was a reason I had conscripted Ludwig into the labor force.
The ordeal started with logging timber to clear out a spacious plot, grading and leveling the uneven terrain, and laying down rows of baked bricks. Laying the brick foundation was hardly the end of it either. We had to stave off the biting frost, didn't we?
Laying mats over the floor will help keep out the ground chill, but... a fireplace is an absolute must.
Ventilation flues had to be installed, alongside a mountain of other considerations. On top of that, I needed an emergency escape hatch designed to withstand heavy snowdrifts burying the entrance. Not a single step of the project was easy, but every single one was non-negotiable.
I ought to carve out an emergency escape route for my own cave, too.
Had I tackled this alone, the sheer scope would have driven me to despair. But I had stellar workers at my disposal right now. Ggobongi went without saying, and Ludwig was an able-bodied human.
"Spread the mortar right there. No, wait. You already coated that spot."
"%^^#?"
"Yeah. Right there."
Though our communication misfired on occasion, once he grasped what I wanted, the work progressed at a brisk, painless pace. Thanks to that, we wrapped up the foundation work in no time. This would make the remaining construction considerably easier.
However, our supply of sand was running desperately thin, meaning I would need to trek downriver tomorrow to harvest more.
"Gguuuung."
Perhaps realizing this clearing was meant to become its new home, the giraffe crept toward us with gentle, hesitant strides. I gestured for the beast to wait, then brought up the Gallery interface. All I needed now was to procure a pair of reasonably plush, insulating floor mats.
"Here. Lie down and sleep on this. Ggobongi, I've got one for you, too."
"Gguuuuung."
"Ooh-ooh."
Ggobongi and the giraffe ambled over to their respective assigned mats. Both checked the cushioning with a curious hand or hoof before collapsing their heavy bodies onto the padded surfaces.
"……."
"Ooh-ooh-ooh..."
Both radiated profound satisfaction. Having slept on unyielding, rocky earth their entire lives, the yielding softness of modern sleeping pads must have felt like an entirely different dimension. Even if one gathered a mound of dry foliage to mimic a bed, the sheer quality of the cushion was leagues apart.
Come to think of it, what's that giraffe's name?
Since Ludwig was its rider, he would surely know. I strolled over to where he was finishing tidying up our tools and spoke up.
"Mister. What's its name?"
"?"
Ludwig blinked at me in confusion. To bridge the language barrier, I pointed toward my own chest first.
"Grylls."
Next, I pointed at him.
"Ludwig."
Finally, I gestured toward the resting giraffe. Catching on to what I was getting at, Ludwig nodded in comprehension.
"Largo."
"Largo?"
Largo, he called it. To be helpful, Ludwig even took a scrap of paper and scribbled the name down for me. While I could sound out the letters, I wondered if the name carried any specific meaning. Driven by curiosity, I uploaded a post to the Gallery.
The literal definition was a bit bizarre, but the pronunciation sounded cool enough, so I let it slide. The real crux of the matter was whether the creature itself would respond to it.
I called toward the beast lounging on its mat.
"Largo?"
"?"
The giraffe tilted its head toward me with an inquiring gaze, as if asking what was on my mind. Whether it had forged a deep rapport in that brief window or was simply remarkably intelligent, it clearly recognized its own name.
Time to whip up some dinner.
The sun had begun its gradual descent across the sky. Because it was high summer, twilight lingered, but by the clock, it was firmly dinnertime.
I would be eating the same forage as always, but Ludwig was a different matter entirely. I planned to keep him on a strict diet of boiled fish porridge at least until tomorrow morning. While the honey and Elixir had basically restored him to full health, I couldn't recklessly feed him raw local game. His body required delicate, measured adjustments in both quantity and ingredient profiles to acclimatize to the native fare.
Helping his digestive tract adapt was my highest priority. Otherwise, he might end up sprinting back and forth to the latrine all day long, just as I had back when I first arrived.
"By the way, do you know how to cook?"
"$%&^#"
When I made a pantomime of stirring a pot, Ludwig nodded. Yet his expression lacked confidence. That figured—he was a frontline combatant, after all. In the end, I took over kitchen duties. Until he adjusted, handling meals fell squarely on my shoulders.
"Dinner's served!"
"Kyuu!"
"Food. Food."
"……."
The addition of a single human and one more animal had turned mealtime remarkably boisterous. Thankfully, the giraffe subsisted on tree leaves, so it grazed separately. Part of me wanted to toss it an Inedia Pill, but I refrained, worried I might catch a death glare from Fast Sloth. Still, since it was family now, I would have to give it a taste eventually; I just needed to pick the right moment.
Speaking of Inedia Pills reminded me that Father Raccoon had been faithfully providing spiritual herbs in exchange for our meals.
Come to think of it, what was that yellow herb I received earlier?
Once dinner wrapped up, I inspected the yellow stalk. Normally, a plucked herb would have wilted and sagged by now, but this one held its stem proudly erect. I had no idea what variety the raccoon had scavenged, but it was unmistakably out of the ordinary.
Better send it straight to Cheonma.
She would identify it in a heartbeat. When it came to medicinal herbs, her encyclopedic knowledge rivaled that of Allfather or the Starlight Princess.
I packaged and transferred the stalk over to the Heavenly Demon, and sure enough, a reply arrived shortly thereafter.
As long as I maintained a steady influx of Inedia Pills, the rest didn't matter. In fact, those pills were my top priority. Tributing them had been the decisive factor in my survival so far.
A completely unexpected piece of intelligence dropped into our conversation. Right now, the Gallery was drowning in political scandals following Ludwig's revelations. Because all eyes were glued to the fallout in El Dorado, nobody had paid any attention to the Blood Cult.
If they actually came knocking with such nonsense, I would ignore them outright. The Blood Cult would throw a massive fit, but... why should I care? Unlike Ludwig, I had never wanted anything to do with those lunatics in the first place. Even if someone possessed devilish luck like me and managed to survive this forest, they were destined to become enemies.
Why did that real-life duel incident flash through my mind just now? Thanks to that spectacle, the spotlight meant for the Blood Cult had shifted entirely onto the Heavenly Demon instead. Whether the real-life Heavenly Demon and the registered forum user were truly the exact same person hardly mattered. The fact remained that she had been an immense help to me. Besides, whatever happened out in the real world stayed in the real world.
Once someone crossed the threshold into the Forest of the Four Seasons, however, the rules changed completely.
The turmoil in El Dorado could be dismissed; that was their domestic mess. But the Blood Cult was an entirely different beast. They might actually step foot inside this forest. Furthermore, armed with the testimony of Ludwig, a living survivor, they would prepare for every contingency.
Though penetrating the barrier is a gamble in itself, isn't it?
I had heard that passing through dropped intruders at entirely random coordinates. Ludwig had touched down in the savanna, but there was no telling where anyone else might spawn. An unlucky entrant might plummet straight into a volcanic wasteland, facing instant obliteration.
The ultimate hurdle, however, remains their total inability to channel mana.
I found myself mildly curious about how the Blood Cult planned to adapt. Still, my primary concerns were my own survival and maximizing Ludwig's utility.
"Mister. What do you actually want to do from now on?"
"……."
While I was utilizing him as raw labor, that alone felt like squandering his potential. On the flip side, combat was something we ought to avoid whenever possible. Nearly every native predator in this ecosystem was an apex monstrosity.
Should I start teaching him Korean?
Trading frantic hand gestures was getting suffocating. It was solely thanks to Ludwig's sharp wit that we managed; otherwise, my frustration would have boiled over long ago.
"#%%"
Having caught the drift of my question, Ludwig replied with a series of deliberate gestures. He mimed tilling the soil with a plow, followed by the scattering of seeds over freshly turned earth. The pantomime was vivid enough that I caught his meaning immediately.
"You mean this, right?"
"#%#"
To ensure I hadn't misconstrued farming, I sketched out a rough diagram in the dirt. Ludwig inspected the drawing and gave a firm nod.
It was a surprising choice, but surprisingly practical.
His foot is compromised, after all.
Unlike me, embarking on long treks was out of the question unless an extreme emergency arose. Riding the giraffe through the woods was equally unfeasible. Unlike the vast, unobstructed savanna, this place was a dense, choked forest. The routes an enormous giraffe could navigate were strictly limited.
This might actually be a great idea. Though it'll have to wait until winter passes.
Winter was barreling toward us, meaning actual cultivation could only begin afterward. I did my best to convey this reality to Ludwig. It was an uphill battle. Underneath a brilliant, scorching sun, who in their right mind would believe that winter was just around the corner? Having spent his recent days in an arid grassland, it was even harder for him to swallow.
"Well, if you don't believe me, feeling the frost bite your skin will be the best lesson."
"#%%#"
"I'll look into getting farming implements and seeds. In the meantime, let's figure out where to clear a plot."
If Ludwig established a viable farm, our food security would skyrocket. Historically, agriculture was the very foundation that freed humanity from chronic starvation. I had zero objections to farming; if anything, I welcomed it with open arms. We had simply lacked the manpower to attempt it until now. But with an exceptional worker like Ludwig on hand, it was entirely feasible.
"Do you actually know how to farm, though?"
"%^^"
Though I couldn't understand a single syllable of his language, the message rang through loud and clear: Nope.
He was just a guy who dreamed of farming. It was slightly dumbfounding, but considering his age, I understood where he was coming from. After all, retreating to the countryside to take up farming was a quintessential retirement fantasy for older men.
I should start sourcing the necessary supplies.
Before winter arrived, I needed to research the essentials and learn the fundamentals.
The succession ceremony of the Messiah Empire. The survival and whistleblowing of Ludwig. The brewing turmoil consuming El Dorado.
When one sovereign nation plunged into chaos, neighboring realms invariably felt the aftershocks. This was doubly true for factions that harbored unresolved vendettas—just as the Blood Cult had never been truly eradicated from the Central Plains.
Originally, the remnants of the cult had been meticulously orchestrating a clandestine infiltration into the Forest of the Four Seasons. Now, the operational landscape had fundamentally shifted. Ludwig's testimony had thrown their plans into disarray. Above all, the revelation that mana—internal energy—was completely neutralized inside the forest posed an insurmountable variable.
No matter how terrifying the cult's martial practitioners were individually, stripped of their internal energy, their martial arts were meaningless. The leadership was forced into a desperate council. Unlike before, brainless bluster was largely kept in check.
"The divine arts of our Blood Cult will prevail! Supported by our vast, unyielding reserves of internal arts, we shall surely withstand any external suppressive laws!"
Naturally, there remained a few zealots whose brains had hardened into absolute mush. Those fools quickly shrank back into their seats under a barrage of blistering glares from their peers.
As the debate dragged on, a surprisingly simple yet viable countermeasure emerged.
"What if we reforge all our internal cultivation into external arts?"
"External arts?"
Converting internal strength into external conditioning. On the surface, it sounded remarkably sound. What were external arts, after all? They honed the muscles, skin, bones, and raw physical resilience. This was not about internal body reinforcement; that, too, was fundamentally an application of qi. This was about unadulterated, biological physique—in layman's terms, raw weight class.
"Indeed. If internal energy is sealed, then we need only temper our external bodies, do we not?"
"Do you truly believe that feasible? If attaining an Impervious Vajra Physique were so trivial, every martial artist under heaven would be invulnerable!"
The elder's retort held undeniable truth. There was a definitive reason practitioners prioritized internal cultivation over external conditioning. Beyond the vastly superior ceiling of internal arts, external conditioning was excruciatingly grueling to forge. Furthermore, the surviving upper echelon of the Blood Cult consisted largely of aging veterans whose muscle mass was already in natural decline.
Yet the proponent of the idea countered with an unorthodox premise.
"I am not proposing we strive for a mythical Vajra Physique. I merely suggest we labor relentlessly until we attain overwhelming, unvarnished physical strength."
"And you expect such a crude, barbarian approach to succeed?"
"Then would you rather we march in hand-in-hand and slaughter ourselves? If you possess a superior alternative, speak it!"
"……."
Not a single hand rose. No one possessed a better answer. Unable to draw upon internal arts, forging their external vessels—maximizing raw bulk and power—stood as the only path forward. Was there any measure so brutishly simple, yet undeniably practical?
"What if we petition that man? The new survivor claimed to have received armaments from him."
"Do you genuinely believe he would grant them to us? And what if the Heavenly Demon catches wind of our contact? We must move in utter secrecy!"
In their hearts, they desperately wished to beg Grylls for a blade. Yet the fear that the Heavenly Demon might sniff out their movements froze their blood. Within the Blood Cult, terror of the Heavenly Demon remained absolute and pervasive. Absolute secrecy was non-negotiable. That was the consensus of the cult.
"Phew... Very well. We shall set our course on tempering the external form."
"A sound decision. Are there any objections?"
"None from me."
"Nor I."
The council aligned behind a single path. Whether this gambit would bear fruit or end in pointless folly could only be known once they breached the perimeter. Yet did these conspirators have any inkling that, even in this very moment, their secrets were leaking out like water from a shattered vase?
"...and that concludes their resolution, Sovereign."
"What amusing little games they play."
Every whispered scheme, without exception, was being delivered straight into the ears of the Heavenly Demon.