Chapter 15
Chapter 15
Unknown Footprints, A Dangerous Situation
Winston suddenly raised a hand to stop me.
“What now? Another snake? Don’t tell me this one brought a partner.”
“…No. Look at the ground.”
The thing embedded in the dirt where Winston pointed was something I could barely believe.
“…What the hell is this?”
The shape was bizarre. Overall, it was slightly larger than an adult man’s footprint.
The toes were unnaturally long, and sharp claw marks dug deep into the mud at the tips.
But the creepiest part was the stride.
These weren’t tracks from something crawling on four legs.
They were unmistakably the footprints of something walking upright on two legs.
“Hey, Winston. Is this a bear? Or can monkeys get this big?”
Winston crouched and touched the mud before shaking his head.
“I don’t know. Judging by the size, it’s probably a little bigger than us, but the toe arrangement isn’t natural. And if it’s an animal, the way it places its feet is too consistent.”
“So what, some lunatic’s walking around this jungle wearing monster cosplay shoes?”
I scanned the surrounding forest.
The birds that had been screaming noisily a moment ago had suddenly gone silent.
Oddly enough, the fact that the creature wasn’t some gigantic monster but something roughly our size made it even more unsettling.
It felt like an unseen enemy was watching us from somewhere nearby.
The footprints abruptly ended as if they’d vanished into thin air.
“…The tracks stop here?”
Winston wasn’t joking.
The trail crossing through the muddy ground had literally disappeared.
How the hell was that possible?
“What the fuck? Did it fly away or something?”
“Hm…”
Winston looked around carefully.
I instinctively raised my head too and scanned the treetops.
Sunlight pierced through the dense leaves overhead.
For some reason, it felt like I’d become the protagonist of a movie.
“You know how this always goes in movies? It’s either above us or hiding somewhere off to the side. Then it suddenly jumps out and attacks when the characters let their guard down. Happens every damn time.”
Winston turned toward me with a bitter expression.
“Honestly, our situation really does feel exactly like that cliché.”
But I had absolutely no intention of dying like some idiot movie protagonist.
“Then we break the cliché. How about we run away instead?”
Winston blinked.
“Run away?”
“Yeah. Whether that thing’s drooling above us or not, there’s no reason we have to play along with its script, right?”
Winston thought for a moment before pointing toward the forest opposite the direction of the footprints.
“What if we head the other way? If it was moving in this direction, taking a wide detour toward higher ground might be safer.”
That sounded more reasonable than simply running blindly, so I nodded.
“Let’s do that. Even if we stop scouting and head back, there’s no guarantee that thing won’t come after us anyway. Better to avoid crossing paths completely. Let’s move.”
As if we’d planned it beforehand, both of us immediately started walking toward the opposite side of the forest without looking back.
The back of my neck prickled.
I flipped the middle finger at the unseen enemy behind us and quickened my pace.
Every step forward became more irritating than the last.
Vines wrapped around my ankles while huge leaves slapped against my face.
“Goddamn it. Why are these plants so aggressive?”
I swung my knife and hacked through the vines blocking the way.
Winston walked ahead silently, pushing branches aside without saying a word.
After struggling through the jungle for a long while, the dense vegetation slowly began to thin out.
Then I heard it.
Clack. Clack-clack.
The sound of trees knocking together in the wind.
“Cheon! Look at this!”
Winston’s eyes lit up.
I thought he’d found food, but when I approached, I froze.
In front of us stood an entire grove of green bamboo.
“Bamboo. And high-quality bamboo at that.”
Winston ran a hand along one of the stalks.
“Cheon, this is a huge opportunity. With bamboo, we can make water containers, fishing tools, reinforce the shelter, even craft spears to defend ourselves against whatever made those footprints.”
“…Great. I came to a deserted island and now I’m becoming an architect and blacksmith too.”
I grumbled, but honestly, I already knew there was no way to survive here without working my body to the bone.
Even those survival videos always used bamboo for everything.
Curious about what Winston would come up with next, I asked,
“So what should we make first?”
Winston pointed at the bamboo joints and immediately began explaining.
“If we preserve the segments properly, they become excellent water containers. Lighter and easier to carry than our rain collectors. Sharpen the ends and they make great throwing spears or arrowheads. Split them into thin strips and weave them together, and you can create stronger fish or crab traps too.”
A water container, a spear, traps…
All from a single bamboo stalk.
At this point bamboo felt like a real-life cheat code.
“Oh… So we can make much bigger traps than those tiny plastic bottle ones?”
“Of course. Not just fishing rods either. If we shave bamboo slivers thin enough and bend them into shape before hardening them, we can even make decent fish hooks. Which means tonight’s meal could end up far richer than yesterday’s.”
The word fishing instantly caught my attention.
Hunger had a way of making people hardworking.
I grabbed my knife and began cutting down several bamboo stalks of suitable thickness from the base while Winston pointed them out.
And just like that, beneath the shade of the bamboo grove, we began seriously gathering materials for survival.
We crafted fishing rods, carved water containers, and processed bamboo for reinforcing the shelter, all while trying our best to forget those mysterious footprints.
After bundling several bamboo stalks over my shoulder, the heavy weight somehow felt reassuring.
I tapped the bamboo joints happily, unable to stop grinning.
“This is good. Really good.”
Winston, who’d been trimming branches nearby, wiped away his sweat and looked over at me.
I started rambling almost like I was rapping to myself.
“We’re rich as hell right now, aren’t we? Think about it. We’ve got flint, a lighter that still has gas left, and even a ton of wet wipes. And now we’ve got all this bamboo too. At this point we’re basically billionaires on this island.”
Winston let out a dumbfounded laugh, but I kept going.
In modern society, these were things people would throw into the trash without thinking twice.
But here?
They were lifelines.
Power itself.
Having supplies made people incredibly generous.
And a little insane too.
“Yeah. This is happiness!”
I burst out laughing loud enough for the entire bamboo forest to hear.
“Happiness was never far away, huh? Seriously. If I’ve got a spear in my hand, materials to build a shelter, and tools to start a fire, that’s happiness right there. Back when I was desperately grinding through life, I never realized it. But after ending up on this shitty deserted island, I finally get it now. Happiness wasn’t something far away.”
Instead of raising my middle finger this time, I lifted the bamboo container toward the sky.
We returned proudly carrying the bamboo cheat code we’d obtained from the forest.
The uneasiness from those mysterious footprints still lingered, but what could we really do about it?
We decided to build the new base camp near the hunting grounds.
This place was officially our new headquarters.
We split the bamboo, built a sturdy framework, and tied everything together tightly with vines.
Before long, it actually looked like a proper survival shelter.
As soon as the basic structure was complete, we sharpened bamboo segments inward to create traditional bamboo fish traps and tossed several into deeper waters.
Then we went to check the plastic bottle traps we’d left in the shallows earlier that morning.
Honestly, I hadn’t expected much from a bunch of plastic bottles.
But—
“Holy shit. Is this for real?”
The moment I lifted the trap, a heavy weight pulled against my wrist.
Inside the transparent bottle, several crabs thrashed violently with their claws.
Automatic hunting was overpowered as hell.
I pulled out the lighter and easily started a fire.
Now all we had to do was place a bamboo container over the flames, toss the seafood inside, and boil it.
Drip.
…Drip?
Something wet landed on my cheek.
“…Huh?”
The moment I looked up at the sky, my face stiffened.
The clear sunlight from moments ago had completely vanished.
Massive dark clouds now covered the sky.
SHAAAAA—
Rain poured down in an instant.
“Wait—!”
I tried shielding the fire with my body, but it was useless.
The smoke we’d carefully built up was crushed immediately by the downpour.
The firewood hissed angrily, releasing nothing but bitter smoke as it died.
“No, you’ve gotta be kidding me! We were JUST about to eat!”
If all the wood got soaked, even the lighter would become useless.
Wet firewood only produced smoke.
How did those survival videos deal with this again…?
Then Winston spoke.