Precious Meat

Persuaded by the cuteness and teary eyes of Bai Shuixian, Zhu Jin unwillingly raised his claws and started carving the obsidian. Unlike what he thought, his claws were more than tough enough to cut through the obsidian without leaving marks. At that sight, he breathed a sigh of relief.

At the same time, he hoped that it would not leave a scratch on his claws as he progressed through the activity. He treasured his beautiful claws too much to let them have even a tiny scratch. Besides, he even made sure to wash his paws in water everyday so that his claws were clean.

By the time they finished making the knife out of obsidian, the sun had already gone to the west leaving only an orange hue and the moon appearing at the opposite end bringing with it the stars in the sky. The knife was definitely not the sharpest knife nor the most beautiful, but it was much more nimble and accurate than Zhu Jin's claws. This satisfied Bai Shuixian and she started to ignore the things Zhu Jin was saying to her as she busied herself with the boar.

"...as I was saying, please do not go anywhere without me," Zhu Jin finished off.

When he saw her concentrated look as though she had not heard a single thing he said, Zhu Jin got closer to her and patted her on the shoulder.

Bai Shuixian then glared at Zhu Jin for disturbing her. Her eyes pointed at him saying, 'What do you want?'

Sighing, Zhu Jin asked, "Little girl, did you hear what I told you at all?"

"Tell me what?" Bai Shuixian asked back in confusion.

Shaking his head, Zhu Jin summed up everything he told her, "Please do not leave my sight while you're in this layer. With all this meat, I don't think there's a need for us to find a cave to sleep in for the next passing days. So, once we get closer to the interior, please do not go anywhere by yourself."

Nodding her head, she said, "Okay. I understand."

Actually, she was not focused on what he was saying. She was too busy staring and cutting up the boar meat. As of right now, she had only managed to finish gutting the boar since it was so hard for her to get rid of the hair on the boar.

As though he knew that she did not listen to him again, he held his head in pain and shook it.

In the end, he said, "Seeing as you're busy, I'll repeat the things I said again while we're eating."

When he saw no response from her, he shut up and just stared at her for a while. After the sun had disappeared behind the horizon, Zhu Jin got bored so he laid down at the coolest part of the cave and took a nap. Why should he stay awake and watch her butcher the animal when he had no participation?

As she stared at his huge size, Bai Shuixian decided to have the bigger heart and give him a larger portion of meat. Anyways, it was not as though she could finish all the meat. Not only that, the meat would probably expire since there was no salt to make the meat into jerky.

Since she finished cutting up the meat, she pushed Zhu Jin's portion to him.

"Zhu Jin! Wake up!" Bai Shuixian calmly said as she shook his heavy weight.

As he groggily opened his eyes, Zhu Jin asked, "What? Did you finish?"

"Yeah, come eat your part. Finish all of them or else the meat will expire," Bai Shuixian answered.

Hearing the expiration part, Zhu Jin abruptly got up in shock and exclaimed, "Wait! The meat can't be preserved?!"

"Are you stupid?" Bai Shuixian facepalmed. "You need salt to preserve the meat. We have no salt."

His surprise calmed now, he muttered, "Oh… I didn't know."

Putting her hand on her chin, she asked, "Considering your age, shouldn't you know how jerky is made?"

"Hm? No?" Zhu Jin answered in a confused tone. "Isn't that a females' duty?"

"Are you telling me that only women stay in the kitchen?" Bai Shuixian questioned with a death stare.

Seeing her stare, he waved while constantly repeating nervously, "No."

"That better be it. Seriously, which ancestor of this world said women were below men?" Bai Shuixian raged.

Avoiding her question, Zhu Jin took the meat in front of him and started chewing. Once she saw him eating, she also started prepping her food. However, she first needed to prepare the sticks.

"Zhu Jin, is there clean water nearby?" Bai Shuixian asked.

With his mouth full, he mumbled out, "Uh… Yeah… If you turn left from the cave entrance and follow the wall of the mountain, there's a lake."

"Okay," Bai Shuixian responded and ripped a part of the clothes she was wearing.

"Huh? Little girl, why did you rip your clothes?" Zhu Jin asked from the strange sight. "And a big piece at that."

"I don't have a bag to carry everything. This is perfect to carry everything," she said as she waved the large piece of cloth.

Zhu Jin then looked on as she packed up everything in the cloth. He then wondered about human inventions. Has it evolved so much that he did not know about how humans make bags out of clothes already?

In fact, it was not his fault. This method of making bags has been around for a long time, even when he was still a human but he had been too spoiled by his family that he did not know. As for now, it could only be blamed on the fact that he had been a tiger for too long without human interactions.

As he watched her continue to gather sticks and meat, he wondered, 'Isn't that bag heavy?'

With her continuous stuffing, the bag had started to look bigger than her head. It was known by the public that the human head was the heaviest part of their body, so he wondered how she would be able to carry the bag. Then, he thought about how among them, only he was able to carry the heavy bag.

Though he wanted to eat, he would not mind helping her again. Anyways, she was going to be his savior. He did not know how or why she would be saving him, but he was told by not only the lady back then but also the priest.

As she continued to stuff the bag, he continuously thought about when she was going to ask for his help. He did not come to think at all about what he had just told her earlier. It was really laughable that he forgot about how she was not supposed to be by herself.

When she finished packing the bag, she carried it with no effort and prepared to go out. She did not stare at Zhu Jin at all and this confused him. It had brought him so much surprise that all thoughts left his head.

The bag that had started from the size of her head, was now the size of her entire torso. Not only that, the meat was pretty heavy. Even meat the size of a hand was a few pounds (or a few kilograms).

Leaving the cave, she told him, "Zhu Jin, I'll be right back. I'm just going to wash the meat and sticks. Keep watch of the fire. I want it to still be lit when I come back."

By the time she left, he was still in bitter shock. He really wanted someone to tell him how such a tiny body was able to carry such a giant bag. Besides, the bag probably weighed a few pounds more than her or even equal to her own weight.

However, since there was no one else there in the cave but him, he would not be getting an answer. With the silence that overcame the cave, Zhu Jin was able to think about the strangeness of the girl. He was finally able to comprehend the personality of the girl that just left him in utter shock.

When she got outside, she saw the sky that had darkened so much that only the moon lit the forest. She was also able to see the beautiful stars. Taking a glance at them, she silently sighed in appreciation.

After looking at the stars for a while, she looked down the pathway that Zhu Jin told her and started to walk that way. She needed to hurry up. If it gets any darker, she would not be able to clean the meat and sticks.

Walking in hurried steps without the sun shining the path for her, she ended up tripping on a vine on the floor. As she fell down, the first thing she checked was not herself, but the bag. She was going to weep if the bag opened up due to her clumsiness.

Patting the bag all over, she felt no open space so she heaved a sigh of relief. Only now did she start to check her body. Instantly, a heating sensation hit her palms and she moved her hands in front of her.

Without sunlight, she had to squint her eyes to see the condition her palms were in. At the same time, she became more adjusted to the dark and saw the dark patches on her palms. In some places were mud and dirt and in other places were blood.

Asking herself the question if she should turn back and just cook the meat as is or go to the river and clean everything first, she answered with the latter. Food was more important and it was unknown if there were anything dangerous on the meat and sticks considering they were laying on the floor for a long time. Even if she did not care for her health, she did not want to be chewing on rocks while eating.

Toughening up, she stood up with the bag tied around her neck as she carried it and continued walking. She had already come up with a new plan to wash her hands first at the lower portion of the lake. There was no one in the world that wanted to ingest their own blood and she was also one of them.

Clinging onto the walls of the mountain as she walked to the lake in a hurried manner, she promised herself that she would not fear anything that came up in this solo trip.