Chapter 2 – 002 Flood Damage
Hwan-in was left alone in the world when his parents died in an accident when he got a job at the bottom of a large corporation.
Humans claiming to be relatives and cousins appeared aiming for their parents’ inheritance, but as a result of following the law, the authors of relatives disappeared without a sound, just like when they appeared with abusive language.
It didn’t hurt Hwanin who kept his parents’ legacy intact.
To Hwanin, who had no interest in human relationships, the humans outside his boundaries were like ants on the side of the road.
In any case, Hwanin’s life became more numb after his parents, who had taught him the purpose and direction of life, passed away in an accident.
He was a Hwanin who lived for 26 years and couldn’t find anything he wanted to do or achieve.
His only goal was to serve his parents who raised him without any cost or reciprocation.
However, such parents died in a car accident.
Purpose, direction, goal.
Hwan-in, who lost everything, wandered for a while, but wanted to live like a normal person according to the will his parents left in their lifetime.
It wasn’t difficult.
He is a hwanin who realized from an early age that if he pretends to be reticent, listens well, and smiles from time to time, most people show kindness.
Here, if you follow your parents’ behavior and act as your parents taught you, there will be no problem.
Occasionally, people would commit frightening acts, so people close to them would say, “Wow, isn’t this guy a psychopath?”, But the evaluation was good.
And on the third year since I started working.
Hwanin evaluated himself as a human shell.
A shell of a human being who has nothing to do and nothing to be interested in, who cannot die.
So he was not afraid of death. When death comes, it is at the level of simply accepting death as saying, “You are dying.”
You should say that death is grave.
But when he accidentally fell into a strange place and accidentally took the life of a monster he had never seen before, Hwanin felt a heightened sense of emotion for the first time.
The severance of life that has been handed down from the soles of your feet. The lightness of life flowing from the palm of your hand.
A seed sprouted in Hwanin’s heart.
“…… Well.”
Accepting that this is not the Earth, Hwanin made returning to Earth his top priority.
There was no particular reason.
It was because the word “Return” Came to Hwanin’s head after killing three green monsters and was in a state of emotional upheaval, and he came up with a goal in connection with it.
No family, no friends to call. There was no particular reason for him to return to Earth, but it was a goal he set because he seemed to know the nostalgia his father was talking about now.
A goal that is infinitely close to the bottom of the possibility of realization even if you look at it. However, Hwanin, who felt slightly encouraged by the fact that he had set a goal for the first time, fiddled with the gold coins in his pocket.
‘Transition or transmission?’
Hwanin read many genres of novels for knowledge, including world-famous fantasy novels.
Like Alice in Wonderland or the Wizard of Oz.
I picked up a gold coin and fell into a strange world. In other words, the gold coin is the medium of dimension movement, and he touched the medium and moved in dimension.
In addition, it is common for gold coins to exist as money.
To have money means to have civilization. Since civilization exists and dimensional movement exists, wouldn’t there be a wizard somewhere in this world?
If you find the wizard and ask him about the gold coins, you will be able to do what you need to do next.
Return to Earth as a major premise.
The wizard’s search as a minor premise.
The immediate goal is survival here, in the jungle.
Thinking that this was not a bad goal, Hwanin started moving to find a safe place to avoid the green monster.
I set a goal, but…… To be honest, the current situation was the worst.
‘It would be appropriate for a situation like this to have a lot of worries.’
Fallen leaves and humus piled up to the point where it was uncomfortable to walk.
A bush that grows to chest height and steals physical strength along with sight.
The weather is a bit hot, so no problem. At night, the temperature will drop, but you can avoid the cold by killing the green monster, collecting ragskins, and gathering leaves from small trees to make a bed.
It would be unwise to light a fire. If you are a wild beast who hates fire, you will avoid it, but if you are a curious person, you might come to see fire.
If it’s homeless, there’s no objection because I’ve been to biwak several times with my father before I was alive.
In addition to these, other minor problems could not be counted on two hands, but the very important problem at the present time was, of course, the supply and demand of food and water.
And the unknown monsters that live in the jungle and the beasts that must exist.
Gurgling-
A rumbling sound comes from the stomach.
It was 5 hours ago that I landed in this strange place.
All I had before that was a few glasses of alcohol, an ionized drink, and a small piece of chocolate, which effectively meant that I hadn’t eaten for 10 hours after lunch.
If this was Earth, securing food and water would not have been urgent at least right away.
You can moisten your lips with the morning dew, or you can find fruit and eat it. There is a word called chogeunmokpi.
However…….
Kiyorrrr-
“…….”
A purple horned bird flies overhead, making a strange noise.
This is not Earth.
Of course, there are a few horned birds on Earth. Whether it’s a hornbill or a hornbill. But there is no purple bird the size of a crane with spiraling horns like a drill.
At least, it wasn’t in Hwanin’s memory.
In other words, it means that the premise must be established that the common sense and knowledge of the earth will not work here.
There is no way to deal with a disease that comes from a completely different environment, so even if you come up with countermeasures against being attacked by beasts or monsters while sleeping and sleeping.
I don’t know what to eat.
“If you bake it…….”
Turning his head, Hwanin muttered and shook his head as he touched the 500 won-sized orange fruit growing on a thick bush with a stone axe.
Roasting over an open fire is not safe either. Isn’t there a guarantee that a deadly poison will not be produced by an unknown chemical reaction?
So is water
Finding a source of drinking water is not reassuring. You don’t know what kind of microorganisms live in water and how they affect your body.
There are times when you go on an overseas trip and drink local water and get a stomachache. What if the world itself is different?
The laws of physics seem to be similar to Earth’s, so it might be okay to make a simple filter or heat a fire to boil water.
Since he was a Hwanin who often did bushcraft with his father during his lifetime, he could make a simple filter or earthenware that could filter muddy water.
But bushcraft in a forest inhabited by monsters.
It would be safe to say that it was suicide.
Hwanin felt as if an invisible blade had reached under his chin.
It was the first time in 26 years of living.
The night in the forest comes early.
Hwanin’s head was saturated with many things to think about, but in the forest where darkness gradually began to fall, he began to look around with the idea of solving the problem in front of him.
The current time on the wristwatch is 1:17 AM.
When I first landed here, the clock was pointing at 5pm. The time when the sun sets in the spring is around 7:00, so it is about 8 hours based on the time difference with Korea.
If the location has an 8-hour time difference from Korea, it is 0° longitude, which is the prime meridian. Vertically connects England and Africa.
‘If I substitute the temperature here…….’
The jungles of Central Africa, or the primeval forests of England, France, and Spain.
…… It makes no sense.
Let’s assume the one-in-a-kind, one-in-a-million thing that the green monster is an unknown native aborigine.
The distance that Hwanin traveled in a few hours would exceed 20km even if it was shortened.
According to Hwanin’s common sense, there is no jungle in Europe at least where a giant tree reaching a height of several tens of meters can cover an area of 20 km in diameter.
I’ve never been to Africa and I’m not interested, so maybe there is, but I heard that the daytime temperature in April and May in Africa is well over 30 degrees. Depending on the location, it can reach 40 degrees.
It’s not that hot here. Humidity seems to be high.
‘After all, this only reinforces the hypothesis that this isn’t Earth.’
Hwanin, who was looking for a suitable place to spend the night thinking about something else for a while, sighed lightly.
There was no good place to camp at the current location.
In the next hour or so, the forest will be enveloped in pitch-black darkness. There is a possibility that nocturnal beasts may appear, so finding a safe place is your top priority.
Moving forward with uncertainty in mind is a foolish thing to look down on the forest.
‘I have to go back.’
Hwanin returned to the place he had seen on the way, the place he had been 20 minutes ago, and looked at the jungle overflowing with life.
There was a lot of life in the forest.
The elements that make up the forest, such as plants, small animals, and insects, were no different from those of the earth.
If you dig a little bit on the ground, earthworms (with golden scales), animals resembling moles, and colorful caterpillars pop out. Shiny mayflies took flight.
Fortunately, after encountering the green monster, he did not encounter any other monsters or beasts, but the fact that there were no other beasts was regarded as a bad sign by Hwanin.
It can also be interpreted that the green monsters, bipedal and able to handle tools, took over the area by chasing or hunting animals.
‘All three of those monsters were male.’
It’s ugly, but the male’s genitals were hanging from his groin. Considering their behavior and tools, females must be focusing on breeding in a safe place.
The more I infer the situation, the more bad thoughts occupy my head.
As a consolation, I wonder if I rolled on humus soil for a while and smeared the soil and leaves on my clothes to get rid of the body odor peculiar to city dwellers.
“Whoa.”
Arriving at the destination, Hwanin let out a small sigh and reached for a tree root thicker than his body.
After working non-stop for nearly 9 hours, I was subtly fatigued.
If it were sneakers, not shoes. If it was a sportswear, not a suit.
I don’t know how many times I’ve had that thought.
In any case, Hwanin, who periodically left a small mark that only he could recognize, was able to easily find the giant tree that he marked in advance and immediately started looking for a place to sleep.
It is a huge tree that requires 20 adults to cover it.
The roots exposed on the ground were as thick and lush as people, so there were places between which an adult man could squeeze his body.
Hwanin laid a bunch of leafy branches in one of the gaps in the trees, and spread the skins he had killed and captured the green monster on top.
The leather was also rubbed with soil and grass, but perhaps it was too much to get rid of the smell, and the rags and leather spread on the floor exuded a strong and unpleasant smell, which irritated the throat and nose.
Here, even the green grass and trees.
“The house my parents left behind was heaven.”
The smell that irritated his nose and throat seemed to make him cough, but Hwanin forced himself to take off his suit coat and put his body in the gap.
He naturally became a squatter, but in the face of his survival, comfort was a luxury.
Holding the stone ax in his arms and covering the front of the body with a dark gray coat, I felt quite cozy.
…….
Have you ever been nervous? Being like this reminded me of what I had experienced throughout the day, and I had the illusion that everyone was coming in from exhaustion.
As a result, hunger and thirst began to become evident.
After tearing off the cuff of the sleeve and wiping it clean on the lining of the shirt, I held it in my mouth and rolled it with my tongue, and saliva came out little by little.
‘This is just an emergency…….’
There was nothing to eat or drink, so two days would be the limit even if I tried to endure as much as I could. Wouldn’t it be better to take the risk when I have enough strength to move?’
It reminds me of a fruit the size of a 500 won coin that was spread out quite extensively in the forest.
It looks like a lot of juice, so if you eat it, you will be able to satisfy your hunger and thirst at the same time.
However…….
“…….”
Do you suffer from hunger and thirst and die of starvation, or do you risk death to eat an unknown fruit?
If you have to choose between the two, you have no choice but to choose the latter. The former is only death, but the latter still has a chance to survive.
At least, you can choose what you eat, but if harmful substances exist in the atmosphere, you are helpless.
In the Middle Ages and modern times, it is said that what killed the most natives of the New World was not the invaders, but the germs that were buried in the bodies of the invaders.
Monster…… Monsters also live there, so you can get killed by monsters.
“Kuk-kuk.”
Hwanin let out a laugh.
When was the last time you laughed? Was it when her mother hugged her when she was in elementary school?
It felt like standing naked in a bomb field, but it wasn’t too bad.
Anyway, it’s an environment with many problems in survival, but I have to try my best until I die.
Hwanin buried his face in the hem of his coat to block the laughter that was about to spill out and went to sleep.
