Chapter 25: Crooked Seams and Stone Counters
[Day 21: 07:30 PM - Dinner Time]
The sky above the Silent Death Forest turned dark purple, and then pitch black. The Singing Spikes down in the trench started their loud night-time humming. Vrrrrm. Vrrrrm. It was the sound of safety.
Kael sat on a log next to his fire pit. The flames cracked and spit orange sparks into the dark air. He had a thick slab of salted panther meat skewered on a green bamboo stick over the fire.
But tonight was different. He didn't just let the salt burn. He took the steel ladle he got from the System draws, dipped it into the massive glass jar of honey, and dripped the thick golden syrup over the roasting meat.
The smell hit the air instantly. The sugar caramelized on the hot meat, creating a dark, bubbling crust. It smelled like a high-end barbecue.
Noir was sitting on the other side of the fire. The massive SS-Rank Shadow Panther wasn't acting like a deadly predator right now. He was sitting on his haunches, his golden eyes locked on the meat, and a long string of drool was hanging from his jaws, dropping into the dirt.
"Hold on, buddy. Let it crust," Kael laughed, turning the stick.
He heard soft footsteps coming from the side of the cabin. He looked over.
Tess walked into the firelight. She was holding a large bundle of woven fabric against her chest. She looked down at the ground, her shoulders slumped. She didn't have her usual energetic step. She looked like she was dragging her feet.
"Hey Tess," Kael called out. "Perfect timing. Dinner is almost done. Smells good right?"
Tess didn't look at the meat. She walked over to Kael and stopped. She held out the bundle of fabric. It was the flax and spider-silk she had been harvesting and weaving for the last few days. Kael had given her some rough charcoal sketches of a simple t-shirt, some loose pants, and some curtains for the cabin windows.
Kael stuck the bottom of the bamboo skewer into the dirt so the meat kept cooking, and wiped his hands on his new cotton towel. He took the bundle from her.
He unrolled it.
Tess let out a small sniffle. She stepped back and raised her hands. Her fingers moved fast and shaky.
[I finished them, Kael,] she signed, her hands dropping nervously. [But... they are not good.]
She looked away, rubbing her eyes, and then her hands moved again, frantic and frustrated.
[The curtains are okay because they are just squares. But the shirt... the drawing you gave me was too hard. The sleeves didn't go right. And the pants... the legs are different sizes. I tried to pull the threads out and do it again, but it just made holes. I ruined the silk.]
Kael held up the shirt.
She was right. It was a mess. The neck hole wasn't a circle; it looked like a jagged triangle. One sleeve was pointing slightly forward, and the other was stitched on inside out. The seams were thick and bunched up in places.
It looked like a potato sack that got into a fight with a sewing needle.
"Tess, look at me," Kael said.
She slowly looked back, a tear sliding down her cheek. She felt like she failed him. He was out there digging giant trenches and creating magic seeds, and she couldn't even put two pieces of cloth together right.
Kael didn't say anything. He just pulled his dirty, stiff, blood-stained shirt off over his head and threw it into the fire. It went up in a ball of foul-smelling smoke.
Then, he grabbed the crooked shirt Tess made and pulled it on.
It was a struggle. His head barely fit through the jagged triangle neck hole. He had to force his wide shoulders through the weirdly sewn sleeves. When he finally got it on, it sat lopsided on his waist, tight in the chest and baggy in the back.
He looked ridiculous.
Kael looked down at the shirt, patted his stomach, and then looked at Tess with a massive grin.
"Are you kidding me? This is amazing," Kael said.
Tess blinked, wiping her face. She raised her hands slowly.
[It's crooked,] she signed, pointing a finger at his chest. [It pulls on your neck.]
"Tess, I have been wearing the same sweaty, disgusting clothes for three weeks. This feels like a cloud." Kael patted her on the shoulder. "Listen to me. Nobody gets it perfect the first time. Not me, not you, not anyone. When I built the first bridge, the wood cracked and it fell in the mud. I had to do it again. Building skills takes failure. You failed, which means you are learning."
Tess looked at the shirt. Her hands moved in short, quick gestures.
[You look funny.]
"I look like a guy wearing clean clothes," Kael laughed. "Don't stress about the ruined silk. We can always get more. You keep practicing. Keep making mistakes. That's how you level up your crafting. Next week, you make me another one. And I promise it will be better."
Tess let out a breath she was holding and finally smiled. She brought her hands up one last time.
[Okay. I will try again tomorrow.]
"Good. Now sit down. We are eating sweet meat tonight."
Kael pulled the skewer out of the dirt. He used his hunting knife to cut off a massive chunk for Noir, tossing it to the panther who caught it mid-air. Then he cut a piece for Tess and a piece for himself.
He took a bite.
The crunch of the caramelized honey mixed with the salty, gamey meat. It was so good Kael actually closed his eyes and groaned. The palate fatigue broke. It wasn't Indian food, but it was a massive step up from boiled survival food.
They sat around the fire, eating in silence, listening to the forest outside the safe zone. Kael wore his crooked shirt with pride.
[Day 22: 06:00 AM]
Kael woke up in his cabin. The wool blanket he got from the System was incredibly warm. For the first time, he didn't wake up shivering from the early morning mist.
He sat up and stretched. The shirt Tess made pulled uncomfortably under his armpits, but he ignored it.
"Alfred. Daily draws for Day 22. Let's see what we get."
[Processing Daily Random Draws, Sir.]
The blue grid appeared on the wooden floor. Three items materialized with loud clanks.
Kael got out of bed and inspected them.
* An Iron Hand Saw: It had a thick wooden handle and sharp, jagged teeth. It looked heavy and durable.
* A Wooden Box: He opened it. It was full of thick, square-cut steel nails. There had to be at least five hundred of them in there.
* A Heavy Iron Chisel and Hammer Set: The chisel was thick, meant for shaping stone, not wood.
Kael picked up the chisel and the hammer. He felt the weight in his hands. He smiled.
"The System knows what I'm doing today," Kael said. "Alfred, we are building the kitchen."
[A logical progression, Sir. Proper food preparation requires a sanitary, elevated surface and a controlled heat environment.]
Kael walked out of the cabin. The sun was just starting to peek over the trees. He walked to the river first, using his soap and towel to wash his face and wake himself up.
When he got back to the yard, he looked at the space next to the cabin. He didn't want the kitchen inside. Wood cabins burn down if you make a mistake with a massive indoor fire. He wanted an attached outdoor kitchen area. A solid stone structure with a roof over it later.
"I need counters," Kael said, pacing out the area. "I need a place to chop vegetables. I need a place to wash the roots. And I need a big stone oven. Not a small fire pit. An oven that can trap heat so I can bake."
He had a pile of river stones, but they were small and round. Round stones slip. He needed flat slabs.
"I'm going to the river, Noir. Watch the farm."
Kael grabbed his new iron bucket and walked into the forest, heading upstream to where the river cut through a rocky gorge.
[08:30 AM]
The river gorge was full of dark grey slate. The water had washed over these rocks for thousands of years, making them flat and smooth.
Kael found a slab that looked like it belonged on a high-end kitchen island. It was about four feet long, two feet wide, and three inches thick. It probably weighed close to three hundred pounds.
He didn't use a cart. He bent his knees, dug his fingers under the edge of the slate, and heaved.
His high Strength flared. The veins in his neck popped. He lifted the massive slab of stone and rested it on his right shoulder.
It was brutally heavy. The sharp edge of the stone instantly dug deep into his collarbone.
Kael gritted his teeth, his legs trembling slightly under the sudden weight.
They made this look way easier in indian movie Baahubali, Kael thought, trying to balance the massive slab.
The cooks back at the Golden Sitar in Indianapolis used to play it on a laptop in the kitchen. In the movie, the hero lifted a giant stone Shiva Lingam onto his shoulder and carried it under a waterfall while epic music played in the background. It looked majestic.
For Kael, there was no epic music. There was no slow-motion. There was just the sound of his own heavy breathing, the sharp pain in his shoulder, and a mosquito buzzing near his ear. Reality sucked.
He started walking. He carried it all the way back to the cabin. His boots left deep footprints in the dirt.
He dropped it in the yard with a massive THUD that shook the ground.
He carried it all the way back to the cabin. His boots left deep footprints in the dirt.
He dropped it in the yard with a massive THUD that shook the ground.
He went back. He found another one. Carried it back.
He did this five times. By the time he had five massive slate slabs in the yard, it was almost noon. He was covered in sweat, and his shoulder was bruised purple. Infinite stamina meant his muscles didn't fail, but his flesh still took the impact of holding 300 pounds of sharp rock.
"Now the mortar," Kael panted, leaning on his knees.
He couldn't just stack the stones. They would wobble and collapse the second he pushed hard on them. He needed to glue them together.
He grabbed the iron bucket and his granite spade. He went down to the edge of the farm moat. He dug up the thick, heavy grey clay. He filled the bucket and carried it to the yard.
Then he went to the river and got a bucket of fine sand.
Then a bucket of water.
He dumped the clay and the sand onto the ground. He poured some water over it. He rolled up his baggy pants, took off his boots, and stepped into the pile bare-footed.
He stomped. He used his body weight to smash the clay and the sand together, mixing it into a thick, sticky mud. It was disgusting work. The mud squelched up between his toes.
"Too dry," Kael grunted. He stepped out, poured more water from the bucket, and stepped back in.
Squish. Stomp. Squish.
He bent down and picked up a handful. It was a thick paste now.
"Let's build."
[01:00 PM]
Building a wall looks easy when you watch someone else do it. Doing it yourself is a nightmare.
Kael wanted a U-shaped base to hold the heavy slate counter tops. He started laying the smaller round river stones on the ground, slapping handfuls of his clay mortar on top of them.
He built the first leg of the counter base about three feet high. It looked terrible. It was lumpy and bulging in the middle.
"Whatever, as long as it holds," Kael muttered.
He grabbed the first 300-pound slate slab. He lifted it and carefully placed it on top of the stone and mud base.
SLUUURP.
The weight of the slate was too much. The mortar he made was too wet. The round stones at the bottom couldn't grip. Under the massive pressure of the slab, the wet mud squirted out the sides, and the whole stone base collapsed outward like a crushed can.
The slate slab fell, slamming into the dirt, barely missing Kael's toes.
"Dammit!" Kael yelled, throwing a handful of mud at the cabin wall.
He stood there, staring at the ruined pile of rocks and mud. His chest was heaving. Mental frustration hit him like a brick. He had just wasted an hour building that leg.
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Calculate risks. Think in contingencies. "The mortar is too wet," Kael said out loud, forcing himself to analyze the failure. "And round stones don't stack. They create lateral pressure. They want to roll outward."
He looked at his new tools. The heavy iron chisel and the hammer.
He couldn't be lazy. He had to shape the stones.
Kael sat down in the dirt. He pulled a round river stone into his lap. He placed the sharp edge of the chisel against the side of the rock. He brought the iron hammer down.
CRACK.
A chunk of the rock chipped off, leaving a flat edge.
He did it again. CRACK.
It sent a shockwave up his arm every time he hit it. It hurt. But he kept going. He spent the next two hours sitting in the hot sun, breaking the round stones into crude, flat-sided bricks. His hands were covered in white rock dust and tiny cuts from the flying shrapnel.
Then, he went back to the mud pile. He added more dry sand and some wood ash from the fire pit to thicken the mortar. He stomped it until it was thick and sticky like peanut butter.
[04:00 PM]
He started the base again.
This time, he used the flat-edged stones he had chiseled. He put a thin layer of the thicker mortar between them.
He built it up slowly. He constantly checked the level with his eyes. If a stone was sitting crooked, he didn't just leave it. He took it off, scraped the mud away, and tried a different stone.
It was a slow, agonizing puzzle. Small corrections. Retry cycles.
By 05:30 PM, he had two solid, straight pillars of stone and mud standing three feet tall. They didn't bulge. They didn't wobble.
Kael walked over to the slate slab. He took a deep breath, braced his core, and lifted it.
He walked it over to the pillars. He gently lowered it down onto the mortar bed on top of the pillars.
He stepped back. He waited for the collapse.
Nothing happened. The base held perfectly.
Kael walked over and pushed down on the slate counter with his hands. It didn't even shift a millimeter. It was rock solid.
"Yes," Kael breathed out. He ran his dirty hand over the smooth slate top. It was cold and clean. It was a real kitchen counter.
He didn't stop there. He used his remaining flat stones and mortar to build a second section, connecting them to make an L-shape. He left a gap in the middle where he planned to build the stone oven later.
By the time the sun went down, Kael had a functional, waist-high prep counter standing outside his cabin. It was ugly on the bottom, with mud smeared over the chipped rocks, but the top was a beautiful, smooth slab of grey slate.
He was completely exhausted. His Essence was full because he didn't use magic, but his mind was drained from the focus, and his hands felt like they were vibrating from holding the hammer and chisel all afternoon.
He washed his hands in the bucket. He looked at the crooked shirt he was wearing. It was covered in mud and stone dust now, but it held together. The bad seams didn't rip.
"Hard work," Kael whispered to himself, leaning against his new stone counter. "That's the only way out of this."
He looked out toward the 1.5-acre field fifty meters away. The dirt was dark a
nd quiet. The seeds were in there. The flavor was coming. And now, he finally had a place to cook it.
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Author's Note:
Hey everyone, I have a quick question for you.
I was reading another novel recently, and the author uploaded character reference images whenever a new side character was introduced, or when the MC got a major look change. It helped give a clear picture of the cast.
I am thinking about doing this for Kael, Noir, Tess, and the new characters we will meet in the future arcs.
I want to know what you guys prefer:
Do you want character art posted at the end of the chapters so you know exactly what they look like?
Or do you prefer to rely entirely on the text and your own imagination?
Let me know in the comments. If you guys want it, I will start getting the character designs put together. If not, we keep it strictly text. Your call.