Building a New Home
With the traps they set and the various plants they discovered, Chester and Monia's food situation had rapidly grown abundant.
A few days after their food supply became plentiful, Chester, who had once again woken up early on his own, pulled out some of the plants he had recently discovered to prepare for breakfast.
It was a plant shaped like a potato, but with tiny tubers that grew no larger than a thumbnail. Since he didn't know its name, he had dubbed it Kkae-gamja—meaning "sesame potato" due to its minuscule size. He swirled them in seawater to wash off the dirt and tossed them into a metal cup.
Having used the cup as a makeshift pot several times already, more than half of it, starting from the bottom, was charred pitch-black.
"Hmm..." While waiting for the water to boil, Chester examined a piece of bamboo resting in a corner of the Beach Villa.
Resting inside the long, halved bamboo stalk were pure white crystals. It was salt.
Seeing how Monia struggled to eat whatever he managed to forage or hunt, Chester had realized the necessity of seasoning and had begun making salt a few days ago.
He filled the halved bamboo with seawater, let it evaporate in the sun, refilled it, and repeated the process. After doing this several times, he was finally able to harvest salt.
Chester added a pinch of salt to the boiling water, then tossed in the leftover grilled fish and smoked pork from yesterday, along with a few wild herbs. After a brief wait, the flavors of the fish and meat seeped into the broth, releasing a savory aroma.
To think we have leftovers to eat the next day.
In truth, it was only because Monia, with her small appetite, had greedily tried to eat too much fish and ended up leaving some behind. Still, the mere act of saving leftovers for the next day was a stark reminder of how much their quality of life had improved. If nothing else, their food situation was vastly better.
Having finished cooking the makeshift stew, Chester pulled out a bamboo spoon. It was a crude, blocky utensil he had carved with a stone knife. Scooping up a mixture of wild herbs, Kkae-gamja, and chunks of meat, Chester ate his breakfast while quietly watching the waves crash against the shore.
It had rained once two days ago. As he stared out, he could faintly see heat haze shimmering in the distance.
The temperature really is rising.
The temperature on the Floating Island was climbing. The sun was rising earlier, and the air heated up much faster than it had just a few days ago, bringing with it a stifling, oppressive heat.
I should double-check the spot I picked out yesterday.
Deciding they needed to move into the forest quickly to escape the heat, Chester resolved to inspect the building site he had scouted the day before. As he ate and planned out the shelter, Monia woke up and stared blankly at him.
"Yaaawn." Now capable of waking up early without being shaken, Monia chased away her drowsiness with the stretches Chester had taught her. Once fully awake, she saw him eating and held out her hand.
"I want some too."
"Hold on." Chester finished the rest of the stew and handed her the cup. Monia took it and eagerly scraped up the remaining bits of food left inside.
Under normal circumstances, Monia, the noble eldest daughter of the Duke's family, would have treated anything Chester had eaten, used, or touched with his mouth as if it were crawling with germs. Now, she could eat his leftovers and share his cup without giving an indirect kiss a second thought.
"Phew." Having scraped the cup clean, Monia began preparing her own meal. She boiled her Kkae-gamja in water just like Chester did, but she didn't add a chaotic mix of ingredients.
While roasting some smoked meat over the fire, she tossed wild leaves into the fully cooked Kkae-gamja. She stirred them until the heat wilted the leaves, let the Kkae-gamja cool slightly, and then ate them together with the roasted meat. Monia had originally hated the idea of eating wild plants, but Chester had forced her to, insisting it was necessary.
"Ugh, so bitter."
"Eat up."
"Yeees..." Monia forced the unpleasant greens down her throat, using the Kkae-gamja and pork to mask the taste.
"What are we doing today?"
"We're building a house now."
"Ah, finally?"
"Yeah." At the mention of building a house, Monia's eating speed doubled. Seeing this, Chester handed her a water skin.
"You'll choke. Eat slowly."
"Got it."
Monia swung her stone axe with all her might at the bamboo before her. Having practiced every day, she had grown accustomed to the motion, chopping away steadily without tripping or tumbling like she used to.
Chester watched her with satisfaction as he swung his own axe. By the time Monia managed to fell a single stalk, Chester had already chopped down three. After stripping them clean, he brought over one of the stalks.
This particular stalk had been measured and cut beforehand to serve as a template for the shelter's flooring. Using it as a ruler, he began cutting the other bamboo stalks to match. Beside him, Monia worked diligently to cut her own pieces.
"Hah! ...Hah!" Sweat was already pouring from Monia's body, her tattered dress damp and clinging to her skin. Whenever she took a break from chopping, she sat on a nearby rock to drink water.
"Ah. The water isn't cold at all."
"I know."
The once-refreshing river water had already grown lukewarm under the forest's heat. The sweat coating their bodies felt sticky and suffocating in the humid air, making them thoroughly uncomfortable.
"How much water do we have left?"
"Uh, ten skins."
"We still have plenty, then." Chester poured an entire skin of water over his head. Taking advantage of the brief, refreshing relief, he threw himself back into his work with even greater vigor.
"Once we're done with this, let's head to the waterfall."
"Okay. Wait, a waterfall?"
"Yeah, a waterfall. You don't know what that is?"
"I don't."
"Sigh... Right, of course you don't. A waterfall is..." Chester explained the concept of a waterfall as he chopped the bamboo. Once they had gathered a sufficient amount, they carried the materials toward the building site.
The site Chester had chosen was a spot where the trees grew exceptionally thick and dense. To protect them from sudden weather changes, he had selected a naturally sheltered area—the very place that had sustained the least damage during the previous storm.
Of course, building a proper house in such dense woods was difficult, but fortunately, venturing a bit deeper into this lush area revealed a suitable clearing. It was a small open space dominated by a single, massive tree that had monopolized all the nutrients of the surrounding soil. This giant tree would serve as the foundation for their home.
"Hello, Tree! Have you been well?" Monia dropped her bundle of bamboo and threw her arms around the trunk. Watching her, Chester lightly rapped his fist against the bark.
Still as hard as ever. Judging by the feel, it was so solid he might as well have been knocking on an iron plate.
I've wondered since I first saw it, but what on earth is this tree? If he tried to swing an axe at it, the blade would likely shatter before leaving so much as a scratch on the bark. It was absurd. What kind of country, what kind of environment could produce such a tree, and how had it drifted all the way to the Floating Island?
Chester handed one end of a sturdy vine to Monia and climbed up the tree. Scaling up to the largest, thickest branch, he began swinging his axe at the surrounding smaller branches.
No matter how hard the trunk's bark was, the smaller branches were thin and fragile. With a few powerful swings, they snapped easily. By clearing away the brush, Chester managed to carve out a decently sized space high up in the canopy.
"Hmm." Having cleared the first area, Chester set down his basket, leaped lightly, and climbed onto the next branch. He cleared the smaller branches there as well. Once he had created a sufficiently wide space, he grabbed the vine and pulled.
As he hauled the vine up, the bundle of bamboo Monia had tied to the other end came rising through the air. Now, Chester's task was to construct the flooring of their shelter using these stalks.
First, he laid a single bamboo stalk across two branches, then lined up the rest side by side. He lashed the stalks together one by one to create a large, solid platform, then secured the entire structure firmly to the branches.
The material he used was the rope he had instructed Monia to braid. He had originally intended to use it for a fishing net, but that could always be remade later; for now, the shelter took priority.
He had laid the floor, but it was still far from complete.
Just one more trip should do it.
"I'll make this the doorway." Chester marked the spot with a thin sliver of bamboo, set his basket down on the platform, and pulled out the materials he had stored inside.
They were materials for a ladder: rope and wooden rungs. He had lightly charred the wooden rungs over the fire to make them sturdier. Singeing wood slightly evaporates its internal moisture, hardening it.
After securing the ropes to a thick branch, Chester pulled them taut and began tying the rungs. He used a marlinespike hitch.
It was a simple knot: you wrap the rope around your palm, hold the short end firmly, and pass the long end through the loop on your palm. Once the loop is formed, you slide the wooden rung through and pull it tight.
He performed this on both sides of the rung simultaneously. Then, he grabbed another rung and repeated the process just below the first one. Over and over he went. Having finished the ladder in no time, Chester dropped it down through the opening he had left in the platform.
After confirming that the ladder reached all the way to the ground, Chester checked to ensure the knots were secure. Once satisfied, he climbed down.
At the bottom, Monia, who had been waiting with a face full of anticipation, immediately rushed over to him.
"How is it? How is it?!"
"Hmm? We've only just started, so it's hard to say."
"But how is it?!"
"...Want to go up and see?"
"...! Yes!"
Monia beamed, grabbing the ladder with both hands and stepping onto the first rung. And then—
"Ah."
The moment Monia eagerly climbed onto the ladder, the unanchored, free-hanging ropes twisted violently. Startled by the sudden lurch, she lost her grip and fell, face-planting directly into the dirt.
"Kyaah!"
"...Let's start by learning how to climb a ladder first."