I really wanted to dig right into what was happening, but as my stomach started to rumble, I put a pause on it right now. Without a way to send my consciousness down into my core and ‘visually’ poke around to see what had happened, there wasn’t much I could do right now. Too many times I had allowed myself to be distracted and we only had five or six days of shelter depending on how the rabbits wanted to calculate things.
Judging by the army that the goblins had been able to summon so easily, I had been incredibly lucky on my previous raids, and we couldn’t keep counting on sticking around and whittling them down to get stronger. Which meant we were going to have to depart for parts unknown, meaning that supplies had to come first. As much as I loved a good puzzle I had to stick to my here and now problems and only when I had gotten a handle on those, gamble on pie in the sky solutions. Magic might be real on this world, but I seemed to be missing the memo that everything else seemed to have gotten. Leading me to believe that forming my core before I had arrived here might have been a mistake.
But I was just going to have to deal with that later, I assumed that figuring out temporal manipulation so that I could go undo said mistake would be much harder than just finding a way to make things work. With my only known way to send my mind down into my core currently being to use the exp or the after death energy to drag it along, I was at a loss for what to do next. The only options I saw were to either kill a rabbit, and void the truce; or going on yet another goblin hunt, and I couldn’t waste half of another day on something that might not pan out. Maybe I could try meditating again before bed and at the same time, I might try to address my anger issues.
Snorting as I tried to hold back a laugh, I said. “Who am I kidding?”
At the bear’s grunting question, I replied back. “Just laughing at the thought of me being willing to deal instead of taking the time and fix the problem at the source. I only do that with physical projects, not my emotional ones. Thanks again for the help brother, sorry I constantly seem to be having issues.” As the bear padded back over to his dinner, I looked up to the sky. With just a few dying rays of light until twilight, I needed to find another stick to use as a fire bow quickly.
Hurrying up, I ran over the soft turf to the edge of the woods, grabbing the first long branch I could find, I booked it back to the supplies I had gathered together before my episode. Making sure I had a pile of kindling next to the bigger branch of a softer wood I had hacked a notch out of with my ax. I picked up the smaller stick of the harder wood that had been able to resist my pushing a nail into it. Quickly undoing the knots of the lace from the pulverized stick I had previously planned on using, I had to retie it by feel, as the light of the stars and our fellow moons wasn’t strong enough to break through the light cloud cover above us.
Hoping we weren’t in for another storm, I reached over to feel around for the smaller circle of flat wood I had cut another notch into to help hold the stick and save my hands. Before I looped the string around the stick, I rubbed the end I wasn’t planning on turning into a coal against my nose. Making sure to get a decent amount of oil on it so it wouldn’t start a fire in my hands, instead of on the board under my foot. Pulling the string farther down the end of my bow so it would tighten up somewhat, I used the board I had greased to press the fire stick down into the board with a notch and began to pull the bow back and forth. Aiming to go at a steady pace rather than give into the desire to let myself give into the frantic energy that told me to just go as fast as I could go.
Pushing down with steady pressure I did my best to fight off those feelings. The worst thing that could happen was I went hungry tonight and with the fruits lying on the ground nearby that really wasn’t that big of a concern either. Several false starts happened where I thought I had formed a coal and stopped my movements to blow on it. After several times thinking that it was ready for the additional oxygen, only for no red glow to appear, I was ready to throw in the towel.
But my stubborn side refused to let me give up, so I gave it another go. I continued to pull on the bow long after I knew that it was ready, refusing to let my anxiousness stop me short again. When I finally stopped and blew onto the waiting coal, I was relieved to see it light up in a yellow orange glow. Transferring the board over to the waiting kindling I had shaved off a branch when there was still light above me. I continued to send oxygen gently over the fire, slowly increasing the intensity as more and more of the shaved wood began to blaze up.
Moving back on the dirt patch I had cut out, I began to add larger branches over the pile, going with the tipi formation rather than trying to set up a log cabin style fire pit. When I had a large enough blaze to see the bear lying down a few feet away. I saw that he was watching intently, apparently still in awe that I was able to bring forth fire with such primitive tools. I took a second to walk over and rub his ears again; before heading over to get a drink of water, and give the fire a minute to settle down, before I tried roasting off my own dinner.
After a refreshing drink of the cool water, I picked out a few of the tubers that the rabbits had provided for us, giving them a quick rinse in the bear’s drinking log, I figured that was the cleaner option than my wash tub and I didn’t want to muddy up my own drinking water. Setting them down on a flat board I sawed off of a log earlier in my preparations. Grabbing my ax, I used the light of the blaze to pick out a couple of likely branches that looked to be good to use for skewers. A few quick swings got me the tools that I would need. I thought about trying to build a spit, but in the end, my stomach rumbling convinced me that roasting smaller pieces was the better way to go.
Using my knife to peel away the bark and trim off any smaller twigs, I started slicing the loin into pieces about to inch thick. When I had five slices, I stacked them on top of each other to make quartering them easier. Pushing one onto the end of each of the branches, I dipped them into the salt to give it a slight crust and held the two branches over the fire, slowly rotating them like I was roasting a marshmallow. After a few minutes, I began to see the grease start dripping out of the meat and begin to fall down onto the coals, causing them to hiss out steam and send a pleasant smell out into the air.
If I were back on earth, with pigs fed a steady diet of antibiotics, this would probably be the time I would pull them away from the heat and put them on the board to rest. But as I wasn’t anxious to invite any parasites to begin taking up a residence inside of me, I was going to have to cook them way past the point that would be enjoyable to eat. As the juices finally stopped coming out of the meat, I took that as a signal to pull it away from the flames and used my knife to scrape the pieces off onto a second board I had waiting. With the meat too hot to eat I wanted to give it a couple of minutes to rest and cool off, so refilled the skewers and then stabbed the root vegetables with my knife a couple of times so the steam had a way to escape. I then added the tubers to the coals and returned to holding the meat back over the flames.
After a couple of more cycles of roasting off the pork, I was chewing on the meat that was tougher than I would have liked from my cooking it for so long. The salt definitely helped add to the flavor, along with the acorn diet that most commercial pigs back home never got to receive. Hopefully, that was all they were eating and this guy hadn’t dined on any sentients in his time. Forcing my brain away from topics I really didn’t know about, I found myself ducking as an explosion of sparks shot up in front of me. As I rolled back to my feet, I started to rub my cheek. It would seem I hadn’t been quick enough to avoid the piece of flying vegetable that came shooting through the air to hit me.
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As luck would have it, it didn’t seem like there was enough starch in them for it to stick to my face and burn me any further. Although, from the little bit of swelling, I was lucky it hadn’t hit my eye instead. Grabbing my tongs, I quickly pulled the rest of them out of the fire before the moisture in them caused any more of them to explode.
Going over to my drinking water I dipped my face in to help cool off the burn before going back to cut open the finished vegetables and add some salt. Tossing another bit of meat into my mouth while I waited for them to cool off enough to consume. Staring into the flames, part of me couldn’t help but wonder if Gaian would have been able to regrow an eye for me if I had been just a little slower. Thinking about what happened to the roots, I couldn’t help but wonder about the similarities to what had happened to me. I could still feel the occasional gusting through my channels and it was a disturbing feeling.
Holding my hand out to the sky I focused on trying to send a burst out, but it still refused to listen to my call. I had to wonder if it had been my intense anger that had caused the explosion earlier or if it had been the vortexes I had formed to steal more of the soothing energy from the sky funnels.
Sadly I doubted I was going to be able to figure out the answers tonight as I was exhausted and doubted I would be able to summon up the rage I had felt for both myself for enjoying my time in this world and the unfairness I couldn’t help but feel at the universe for putting me in a situation. Now I could already tell I was moving to a low point, I knew the solution was to throw myself into a project, but I couldn’t bring myself to care. Sometimes all you want to do is wallow and not even the prospect of figuring out my own magical powers seemed to be enough to drag me out of the waiting funk. Tossing another of the cooked chunks of meat to the bear, he snatched it out of the air with gusto as he showed signs of a quick conversion to the wonders of the extra flavor that came from rendering fat and adding salt to your meal.
Happy that one of us was having a good time, I had no desire to rain on his parade and tell him how much better the meal could be with a few more tools or an actual variety of spices. Adding the last two pieces of raw meat to the skewer, I sprinkled an additional bit of salt on one of the vegetables before trying a bit of one myself. It had an earthy taste to it, missing a lot of the sweetness that had been bred into the terran varieties after countless generations of selective breeding, but overall it was certainly edible and the lack of sweetness made it possible for other more subtle flavors to play around that might have been overcome by commercial harvests.
As I felt my stomach reach a state of fullness, I started tossing some of the rest of the meat to the bear who happily snatched them out of the air showing a dexterity that was surprising in an animal with his bulk. Setting both my plate and cutting board in the flames. I had thought about keeping them, but they had just taken a few slight minutes to form, and rather than try to sanitize them I thought it would just be easier to make new ones tomorrow. Taking my equipment over to the wash log, I quickly cleaned them of all the residue they had gained before drying them off on the turf to prevent the chance of rust, Feeling along the edge of my knife blade, I realized I was going to have to figure out an option for sharpening in it soon, as all of the projects I had been using it on was starting to dull the blade.
With two more projects to take care of before I was ready for bed, I took my blade over to where I had left the organs and cut the stomachs away from the intestines. Dumping out the contents in the woods at the farthest point from where I would be sleeping, I brought them back over to the wash log to rinse out all of the acid from them. Pulling them out, I used my blade to slice into the lining, before pulling it off away from the organ itself. When I had removed the outer covering, I started pushing it through the top branch the esophagus had connected to, as it was slightly larger than the bottom opening, not having been able to remove all of the contents this wasn’t the most pleasant of tasks.
Unable to remember the proper steps to turn them into containers, I decided to leave them soaking overnight, hoping that would keep them supple until morning when I might have some better ideas. I was pretty sure I needed to either tan them or boil them out, but without the proper equipment that was going to be a task for the next day. Leaving them for now I decided to check on my clothes next.
Walking over to the branches that held my clothes I could feel that they were still damp which meant I was in for an uncomfortable night if I couldn’t figure out a way to dry them off. Taking the two branches I hadn’t used to cook the meat, I put my socks over them first before holding them high above the coals, I had no desire to accidentally melt the polyester that had been added to them when they were made. With no more sewing kit and backup pairs, I was sure that these would be the first of my clothes to wear out, and I didn’t yet have a good plan as to how I would replace them. I guess I could try to make some moccasins with the hide of a furry creature. But as of yet, the only natives I had found that met the requirements I would need were my hosts, and I doubted trying to acquire the necessary materials from them would go well for me.
Moving on to the rest of my clothes, I slowly started to dry them while making sure to keep them far enough from the flames I didn’t put any holes in them. As I finished and dressed for the night, I started to feel the breeze pick up and the air around me started growing colder. Hearing a rumbling of thunder coming from the distance, I realized that my string of bad luck was continuing and I was in for another wet night.
It seemed like the universe was just looking to undo all of my hard work, had I known this was coming I wouldn’t have bothered washing or drying my clothes. Picking my wallet up from the ground, I thought about what I could do to keep it safe. Part of me wished I was in the pine forest where the goblins made their homes, as they were so much better at keeping the water away from their base. They made amazing living shelters and it would have been easy just to hide under the branches.
But with their woods being both several miles away and their inhabitants having a clearly unwarranted animosity towards me. I didn’t think they would be willing to form any sort of agreement that would let me stay there. So I went with option two, going over to the pile of grass, I started weaving some quickly together in the low light of the dying coals. Quickly adding more blades of grass, I had to be careful not to pull them too tightly so they wouldn’t break apart.
After about ten minutes, just when I started to feel the first of the drops start raining down, I had a square about two feet by one. While it had plenty of loose ends it would just have to do. Grabbing my ax I chopped a small hole into the side of one of the trees, angling it up into it so any water that made it in would just as quickly be pulled out by gravity. Putting my wallet into the hole, I notched a line in above it and using a stick started shoving in the ends of the woven grass.
I was sure that if I wasn’t so panicked I could think of a better solution, but in my anxiousness to save my last memories of my children. I was frantic and this was the only thing that had come to mind. Notching another line below the small hole I had made I used the same twig to push the loose ends in and hopefully with it being on the leeward side it should stay safe.
With my memories protected, I burrowed into the pile of grass myself, I was sure I would be wet and was unlikely to get any sleep, but hopefully, the heavy blades would keep some of the heat in. I thought about trying to pull one of the corpses over me but as this wasn’t a snowstorm on an ice planet, I figured the grass would be enough and it wasn’t worth the bloody clothes. As I had the thought, I felt the bulk of my friend burrowing into the pile next to me, rolling over to huddle next to his back, I was happy to steal some of the heat radiating off of him.