When Cleo woke up, the sun was already at its peak. Immediately, he recalled Duk’s condition and checked on him. Duk’s body was still the same; the plant was also in a similar condition, but his breathing stabilized. Before he slept last night, he let Duk drink half of the bottle of water, making sure he had enough water in his system. At first, he planned to let Duk finish one bottle, but he was worried Duk would become too full, so he decided to give him half a bottle. In the future, he would give Duk half a bottle at every meal and maybe some fruits if he had any.

After checking Duk, he turned his attention to himself. His body ached all over, and he was still tired from yesterday's incident. Thankfully, his mind was fully rested and ready to go back and think of all kinds of solutions for his problem.

He intended to crawl out of his shelter, wanting to find something to eat. He was so tired last night that he didn’t even manage to feed himself. Maybe the reason he felt so groggily after waking up was that the only food he had yesterday was a single coconut he had eaten before they left. Before he went out, he awakened Duk, wanting to give him the remaining half of the water. Duk could now open his eyes but was still too weak to utter a word, but that was fine; as long as he was recovering steadily, that was enough for him.

Outside his shelter, he examined the surroundings, hoping to see the monkey. Unfortunately, he didn’t manage to discern a single sign of the monkey’s return.

Sighing, he walked closer to the pile of coconuts near the campfire. He wanted to eat, but then he realized that Duk wasn’t in a condition to help him open one. With another sigh, he sat beside the coconuts, having no clue what to do.

Yesterday, the three of them were happily dancing, full of hope and determination. And on the same day, all of that vanished like a puff of smoke. He had no idea where the monkey was; Duk was in bad shape, and he was starving; he couldn’t even crack one coconut for himself. His confidence was lost, together with the spear he left behind on the open field. He thought his situation was at rock bottom, but he never realized that there was still further down in the hole he fell into.

With all the negativity surrounding him, there was one thing that gave him positivity. Perhaps he was finally in the deepest; thus, there was only one direction he could go—up!

With newfound determination, he walked back to his shelter and took out the last sweet potato inside the bag. The plan was to plant it and have infinite supplies of sweet potatoes, but his situation was dire and needed a desperate solution. He couldn’t go back to the forest, not right now. He must regain his energy, gather his thoughts, and prepare himself thoroughly.

Yesterday taught him a lot of things that he had never considered before. His body was too weak, his stamina too low, and he was so naïve that he was not prepared to face anything. He must change the way his brain worked; his environment was different now, and the only person who could help him was himself. This wasn’t the city in which he lived almost his entire life. This was a place where the strong ate the weak—literally. Improving himself wasn’t an option anymore; it was a must!

He must strengthen his body, enhance his stamina, and return to his primal instincts! Become one with nature and embrace the change!

Motivation swelled inside him, and his weakened body slowly replenished with new energy. The mind was indeed an important tool for everything, as a change in his mindset brought a new energy that would help him achieve goals, at least for today!

After all the thought, he started a fire and ate the sweet potato.

Looking at himself, he needed to change clothes, maybe take a bath—it had been three days since he took one. Luckily, he didn’t need to go to the forest anymore, as he could use the same path he took last night to reach the river. Perhaps he could find something to eat on the way. He was so occupied last night that he had no chance to look for something useful while returning.

Carrying his bag, he readied himself and prepared the things he might need: new clothes, the pocket knife, and the empty water bottles. After that, he extinguished the fire and glanced at Duk before leaving—he was reluctant to leave him behind without protection, but he had no choice since he had no food and must replenish the water.

In his four days on the island, no other creatures besides them went into his camp. So, he had information to base that nothing would attack Duk while he was away.

With all that done, he set out.

He needed at least 20 minutes to get there, but he wasn’t going to walk. Not only did he have to hurry, but he also had to train himself; therefore, he decided to run there to improve his stamina. The distance between the river and his camp was perfect—not too far but not too close. Running every day back and forth would surely enhance his stamina.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Running was hard, but it was far more difficult on the beach, as he felt like the sand would hold his foot every time he took a step. Three minutes was all it took for him to run out of stamina. He knew his stamina was low, but he didn’t realize that it was this pathetic. It was indeed a good decision to train his body.

After two more minutes, he stopped and collapsed on the sand, panting. The thought of him running away when encountering the black panther was laughable. Ignorance was a scary thing; not only did he put himself in danger, but also Duk and the monkey. His naivete was the reason why he never succeeded; perhaps being stranded on the island wasn’t that bad, as he could see things in him that he had never seen before.

Only a few seconds had passed, and he already wanted to sit up. The sun was too hot for him to lie on the beach; if he wanted to rest, he should at least hide in the shade.

Thinking this, he sat up and examined the area, looking for a shade to take shelter in. After finding one below the tree, he hurried and sat beside it, leaning his body to rest. On top of resting, his mind thought of all kinds of things he should do to train his body and his plan for the future.

There were a lot of things he could do to train: lifting heavy rocks, push-ups, sit-ups, jogging, and more. He had many choices to choose from, so there was not much of a problem there. Of course, thinking of an exercise was easy, but sticking with it was a whole different thing. However, he was confident that he could do it. His life was on the line after all.

But his body wasn’t the only thing he needed to train; his mind was also weak, recalling how he cowered in front of the black panther. His training would be deemed useless if he couldn’t face the problem. Luckily, he already had training for that—meditating—the only problem was that he had no idea if it could make him brave.

As to his future plan, he hadn’t much of a choice due to the danger inside the forest. His plan to upgrade his shelter would need to be postponed. Maybe he could still go into the wild and look for materials if he was careful enough, but he didn’t want to risk it, as the lesson he learned yesterday was still vivid to him. However, looking for food on the periphery of the beach might be okay.

He would only re-enter the forest after training his body or with no other choice. But for now, he would like to stay on the beach as long as he could. The only thing he was worried about was Duk’s food, especially now that he was in that state.

He didn’t know how long he would last with only water, but the sooner he found food for Duk, the better.

After resting, he stood up and continued his run to the river. The cycle of him resting repeated itself two more times before he reached the river. He didn’t manage to examine the area last night due to his desire to go back. Therefore, he didn’t realize how rocky the place where the river and the ocean met. It was full of big and small stones; fish swam back and forth; and what captured his attention the most were the clams and a few small crabs hiding between rocks or small holes.

He had no confidence in catching a fish, but clams and crabs were a different story—especially the clams. Excitement rose within him; he had been wanting to eat meat, and though crab and clam wasn’t exactly the meat he thought of, it was far better than nothing.

After unclothing himself, he set aside his bag and clothes far from the water and then entered the shallow river. The water was refreshingly cold, washing away the sweat from his feet, legs, hips, and body. His aching muscles relax as the currents of the river flow over him. However, he didn’t want to move too much, afraid he would scare all the crabs away.

Although he could still flip the stone they hid in, finding them would become more difficult.

After satisfying his desire to dip in, he started his mission to catch the crabs and collect the clams. He wasn’t worried about where to put them, as he could always deposit them directly into the bag. As he crawled in the shallow river, his eyes focused on one of the nearest crabs. It was so small that he could probably fit four of them in his palm, and its black shells blended in with the surroundings.

With a careful approach, he made sure the crab wouldn’t escape before it was in his reach. Satisfied with the distance, he pounced at the crab, like what the black panther did to the monkey. The water was in chaos due to his sudden action; thus, he couldn’t see if he caught it or not. But he could feel something moving in his hands.

Lifting his right hand, he was holding the first crab he caught. It was easier than he thought it would be, but he wasn’t gonna complain; after all, he was the one who benefited.

With his first catch, he proceeded to the second, then the third, and the fourth… There were a lot more of them than he thought there would be—the river was like a crab paradise! In a matter of a few minutes, he had already gathered two handfuls of crabs and one handful of clams. He deposited them all into his bag, satisfied with his harvest.

Not wanting to catch too many, he stopped his activity for today and left some for tomorrow. After that, he wore the clothes he brought with him. It was a green shirt with the logo of a man wearing a green suit and a green ring wrapped around his finger. In the middle was a scribe of a lantern. He was pretty sure he had seen the cartoon character before, but he couldn’t remember where. The shirt was loose on him, but he didn’t mind, as he liked the refreshing wind flowing inside. His pants were in stark contrast with the shirt, as it was only plain black.

While staring at his pants, he noticed his shoes were already damaged, like a hungry crocodile opening its mouth when he raised it. Well, he wasn’t surprised; leather shoes didn’t belong on the island, and adding all the running he did, it was surprising it lasted this long.

Ignoring it, he took the plastic bottle and filled it with water. He was refreshed, found food, and had a safer path to replenish his water. His words were slowly becoming true; there was nowhere to go but up from there on.