episode_0040

I couldn’t fall asleep, so I got up.

I touched my cheek with my hand. I could feel the fever had gone down.

Perhaps because I had warmed myself by the fire all day and slept under a thick coat, my body felt much lighter.

My throat was dry, so I picked up my waterskin.

It was full again. I opened the lid and drank.

“-Haa.”

It was sweet and cool.

I didn’t know where this water came from.

But I knew who brought it.

It was that old man snoring behind the cabin.

It was irritating, but I couldn’t deny it.

While I was sick, he saved me the trouble of looking for drinking water.

Thanks to him, I could rest comfortably.

…And food too.

It must have been hard to find food right after the storm, but the old man had managed to get various provisions.

Ritsu had said that Fosao was very good at finding things in the mountains.

It seemed that was true.

When I woke the old man up earlier, he had a lot of scratches on his arms and legs.

They weren’t there originally. He didn’t have them yesterday.

He probably went through bushes or climbed trees to find food.

If I had been alone.

And in a state where I couldn’t move because I was sick.

Would I have been able to find a path around the mountain peak, find an empty cabin, and procure all the water and food myself?

…Honestly, I don’t know.

I had always hoped to become a great adventurer like my mom and dad.

But I just realized I was still hopelessly immature.

“…Tsk.”

I got up from my spot.

I draped the large coat over my shoulders and went outside.

As expected, the air was chilly after the rain.

I walked directly to the back of the cabin.

“Snore-snore-! *Gasp!*”

Fosao was snoring as if he was about to stop breathing.

I had just learned that words wouldn’t wake him, so I just kicked him awake from the start.

“Gah?!”

The old man, woken from his sleep, looked around again.

“Ti-Tia?”

“……Go inside and sleep.”

“Huh?”

“It’s cold outside. Come inside.”

The old man rubbed his backside and got up.

“But… you said you couldn’t sleep because I was too noisy, Ti-Tia…”

“It’s fine. I’ll sleep outside.”

“Ah, no! Tia, you’re sick right now! I won’t sleep, and I’ll… I’ll watch you sleep.”

“That’s even more unsettling?!”

“Whoa-! Sorry!”

Thinking about it, it was strange that this happened today.

Even though I was out of it last night, there’s no way I wouldn’t have heard that boisterous snoring.

Yet, the reason I could sleep soundly without any problems was….

It meant that Fosao hadn’t properly rested until now.

“Haa-. Did you sleep?”

“N-no, I couldn’t…”

“You said yourself that rest is important. Go in quickly and rest. If you get sick and collapse, I’ll just abandon you.”

“Whoa- Ah, alright…. B-but… Tia.”

“What is it?”

“Tia, you should go in and sleep too.”

“I told you, I can’t sleep because of the noise.”

The old man said, flustered.

“I-I have a good idea. I’ll cover my head with a cl-cloth when I sleep. Then… it’ll be okay, right?”

“You’ll suffocate and die that way.”

“L-let’s try it first. I… I can’t let Tia keep losing sleep because of me…”

“……”

Honestly, he’s so annoying.

“Alright.”

I went into the cabin with the old man.

We lit a new fire and slept warmly.

I was in the kitchen, and the old man was in the inner corner.

I don’t know how I slept.

Perhaps the old man’s idea of covering his head with a cloth worked well.

***

By the next morning, my clothes were completely dry.

Warming them by the fire for a long time had been effective.

Fosao’s foul smell returned quickly, but I was no different.

I hadn’t been able to wash for a long time, so I didn’t smell good.

But I didn’t have time to worry about such trivial things.

Because I still hadn’t gotten out of this mountain.

We shared the figs the old man had gathered and prepared to resume our trek.

We left the cabin as we had found it.

Even though it didn’t look like the owner would return, we did our best to tidy it up, as this house had allowed us to endure the storm.

Leaving a silent thank you in our hearts, we left the cabin behind.

This mountain range was truly deep and complex.

Though not as much as Dragonez, the steep and winding paths gave us trouble.

It often felt like going in a certain direction would work, but then we’d find a high cliff blocking our way.

The forest was tall and dense, making it difficult to discern the terrain from a distance.

I wasn’t sure when we would be able to escape this mountain range or if we would encounter any people.

The only good thing was that it wasn’t a high-altitude area, so there was no fog.

If it had been foggy here, we would have certainly lost our way completely and wandered in circles.

Fosao said.

“The fact that there was a cabin… doesn’t that mean there might be a village or something nearby?”

“……”

That was our only hope.

However, the cabin had been abandoned for a long time, and there were no signs of people having lived nearby, so it just seemed like an isolated annex built by some hunter in a remote forest.

Therefore, it was highly likely that it was far from any village.

I had heard that even our village, a long time ago, used to build cabins throughout the Dragonez mountain range for hunting.

The cabin where the Village Elder-nim resides was also one such annex built in that way.

But I’d heard from my mom that as time passed, the population grew, and the village expanded, people began to settle permanently in those locations.

So, if there was a settlement in this mountain range, wouldn’t they have settled down somewhere?

…With that thought, I walked endlessly towards the east.

Fosao followed slowly, a little distance behind, as usual.

It wasn’t that I particularly wanted to keep my distance.

It was just that the old man was gluttonous, so he would sometimes fall behind, busy gathering every bit of food he spotted.

I didn’t pay much attention even if he disappeared from sight for a moment.

Because he always found his way back to where I was.

And then he would grin, saying he had found daily provisions and we should share them.

After learning the lesson that rest was important, we took ample breaks.

During those times, we filled our stomachs intermittently with berries and fruits that Fosao brought.

The problem was… no matter how much we ate, we still felt hungry.

A handful of these small berries and a few fruits were not enough to sustain us through the arduous mountain trek.

It was the same for Fosao.

He had a body that needed more food than he could eat alone, yet he shared the hard-earned provisions with me, and I could see him growing tired quickly.

We had to solve the food problem somehow.

“……”

Gripping the Rose Saber as if it were a spear.

I threw it with all my might towards a rabbit on the hillside below.

Whoosh-!

The thrown blade fell weakly to the ground, and the rabbit scurried away to a distant ridge and disappeared.

Of course. It wouldn’t work.

I hadn’t expected much to begin with, but I still felt a drain of energy.

As I picked up the Rose Saber and returned, Fosao shouted in an excited voice.

“Th-the attempt was st-still good! Tia!”

“Haa…”

I wanted to eat meat.

I wasn’t particularly fond of eating meat.

But with prolonged hunger, I desperately craved meat.

I knew it. To hunt, I needed a bow and arrows.

Or I could make a sling and throw stones, but that was something only truly skilled hunters did as a trick…

As for making traps, we were in a situation where we had to keep moving, so waiting indefinitely was out of the question.

As I walked, clutching my hungry stomach, the old man suddenly made a suggestion.

“How about we tr-try making a bow?”

“…How?”

“I-I know how to make one. But I don’t have the t-talent for it…”

Long ago—before I was even born—the old man apparently lived alone and taught himself archery.

At that time, he even tried making a bow himself, but the problem was his dull motor skills; he couldn’t even properly draw the bowstring, let alone hit game.

In the end, after realizing he couldn’t make a living by hunting, he quietly learned another trade.

Truly… a life story befitting Fosao.

“So, I-I’ll make the bow, and will Tia try using it?”

“Do as you please.”

And so, the bow-making began.

Surprisingly, it wasn’t a grand endeavor.

As I walked as usual, Fosao simply followed behind, diligently making something.

The old man gathered an armful of nettles, picked out only the sturdy ones, and peeled them into thin strands.

He carried the peeled strands around for a long time to dry them thoroughly, then twisted them into a cord by rubbing them between his hands.

Next, he picked up fallen branches from the ground. Ideally, they needed to be thick, sturdy, and undamaged.

I had to help with this.

If we had an axe, we could have just cut down a suitable tree, but trying to find one was the hardest part.

Fortunately, we barely managed to find a tree that could serve as the frame before nightfall.

Darkness fell.

After finding a suitable spot and building a campfire, I began the bow-making process with Fosao.

First, we peeled the bark off the wood with the Rose Saber. Then, we gradually shaved it, shaping it as if carving.

Since we would only be hunting small animals anyway, and it was being made specifically for me, its small size didn’t matter.

After carving for a long time, when a slightly rounded bow shape emerged.

Just then, the old man also finished making the string.

He strung the bow tightly, tying it securely to connect it firmly.

“It’s d-done! It’s Tia’s bow!”

The old man handed me the bow with a joyful voice.

It was crudely made in a hurry, but it fit my hand perfectly, so it wasn’t bad.

Next, we made arrows.

Similarly, we carved the wood thinly and straight, made a nock for the bowstring, and sharpened the tip.

Gathering bird feathers found on the path and tying them with string… an arrow was quickly made.

Holding the newly completed bow and arrow, I tried a test shot.

“Dr-draw the bow slowly.”

I had seen the elders use bows before.

Recalling old memories, I took a similar stance.

Creak-.

I extended my left arm holding the bow straight forward and drew the bowstring with my right hand.

The string was taut, requiring a lot of force.

Also, I had to pull it back much further than I expected.

Hooking the arrow onto my thumb, the moment I released my drawn hand.

Whoosh-! *Thwack!*

The shot arrow embedded itself in the dirt ground.

Quite deep.

The old man praised me.

“Am-amazing! Tia!”

I shot the bow over and over again for practice.

At first, it required a lot of strength and my arms trembled, but after correcting my posture as the old man taught me, I could draw it much more easily.

However, there was one problem with this posture.

“Ouch!”

“Hm? What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing.”

How could I explain it? That every time I released the bowstring, it would snap back and hit my left chest.

Perhaps because bow hunting itself was traditionally done by men, this aspect was uncomfortable for women with breasts.

But with survival at stake, this was a minor inconvenience.

And I couldn’t tell that old man that my chest kept getting hit.

I simply decided to practice consistently and adapt.

First, I practiced hitting stones from nearby, then from a little further away, and eventually from a great distance.

Indeed, the more I practiced, the more the sensation became familiar in my hands.

I made a small stone about twenty paces away my target.

The old man asked in a worried voice.

“Are you su-sure you can hit it? It’s so far…”

“I can do it.”

I held my breath and shot the arrow.

Swish-! *Thwack!*

The arrow flew a long distance, knocking the stone far away.

The old man shouted.

“Tia! You did it!”

“Whoa-!!”

“Amazing! Th-that’s truly amazing!”

It was thrilling.

Every time I accurately hit the target, there was a satisfying sensation in my hands.

I roughly adjusted the angle according to the distance and read the wind by instinct.

It wasn’t as difficult as I thought.

After sleeping near the campfire, when dawn broke again.

As soon as I woke up, I spotted a rabbit sitting a short distance away.

Without hesitation, I raised the bow and shot.

Whoosh-! *Thwack!*

“I got it!”

“Wh-what…?”

I proudly showed the captured rabbit to the old man, who had woken up late.

For the first time in my life. It was the day I succeeded in hunting.