Miracle Of Life (Part 1)

Notice: As you may have noticed by the title, this chapter (and the next) will be talking about the process of giving birth, so if you are not interested, feel free to skip the next 2 chapters and continue reading on from there.

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June 21rst, 0001:

Today I did not keep track of what was happening regarding trade or arrow repairing since the two people I taught yesterday seemed to have everything under control. So instead, today, I actually focused on making a tiny, strong rope and the closest thing I could to a small bronze scalpel.

The reason was that it had already been around three months since that pregnant woman in her third trimester joined the settlement, and it was about time that she gave birth, meaning that it was best to have everything ready just in case.

I hadn't had everything ready beforehand because although looking back on it, I already did have all of the material necessary to cut an umbilical cord, I had honestly been too caught up with daily life to keep track.

Surprisingly, although there were almost as many women in the new settlement as there were men, none of them seemed to be pregnant. More specifically, none of them seemed to be anywhere near the third trimester, with some already having very young children.

Regardless starting today, I would be keeping a close eye on her. It would be disastrous if she ended up having the child on her own, as although it would certainly be possible for both of them to survive, the chances would be very slim, at the very least with the help of the scalpel and the string/small rope I could somewhat guarantee the survival of the child.

Since I did still want to make small technological advancements though, with the help of the hammer and chisel that I had made, I got to work on making wheelbarrows; that way, people would be able to transport goods more easily and easier for trade to occur.

The day actually passed quite fast, and I was able to make a single one-wheeled wheelbarrow that I passed to the two people I had taught how to make arrows so they would have an easier time carrying all of the arrows they fixed once they were done.

The design was pretty simple, only a huge and deep tray with a when on the front and a hollow wooden rectangle on the back with two handles one could use to raise the tray and move the wheel barrel using just the wheel.

Before the day came to an end, I also decided to spend 70 of the RP I had left to obtain the knowledge regarding safely cutting an umbilical cord from the system store. It was the only real knowledge I could afford when it came to delivering a baby.

Afterward, I just decided to call it a day and go to sleep while also getting mentally prepared to probably teach somebody how to make wheels and wheelbarrow in the settlement, so I could move on to something else, in the middle of the night though, a scream woke me up.

Immediately assuming that a predator had managed to make its way into the settlement, I grabbed a dagger plus a bow and arrow before running where the sound came. And once I got there, I was on high alert for any sounds around me as there was no real light other than that from the moon.

Eventually though, once everyone else had woken up and somebody started a fire for light as was procedure if there was to be an attack at night, I saw that there were no animals nearby, and I was able to calm down for a second; it didn't last for long though as almost imminently after there was another scream.

So, I opened the door that the screams were coming from to find the pregnant woman to be the one screaming. Immedienltly I made the signal of a false alarm to everyone else. Before they left though, I began to shout for 'get water,' as they already knew what that meant.

I had absolutely no idea about anything regarding the process of labor or delivering a baby apart from the fact that 'water broke' before labor and that it usually took about 8 hours for a child to be born after labor started.

As soon as I approached, the first thing I did was to remove the plant shorts she was wearing to let the water constantly be coming out from her thanks to her 'water breaking' to actually leave and not be stopped by the piece of clothing (and you know, so she could give birth).

This was seen very differently by the people outside the house however, as they looked at me with an expression of both disgust and confusion with what I could only assume was her partner coming up to me and staring at me with a glare that said that he would kill me if I made any move.

I couldn't care less about the threat though; a misunderstanding could be resolved later, but stabilizing her condition was the only thing that really mattered right now. So once the people I had sent out to get water came back, I ordered someone to get a cup of water.

As soon as the cup was in my hands and I checked my pocket watch, I saw that it had been four minutes since the last scream, so I grabbed the guy who was looking at me like he was about to attack and pulled him next to the woman while avoiding his punch.

From there, the woman grabbed onto the man's arm right next to her and squeezed it, probably because she had a contraction, before releasing another scream which caused the man to look at her with worry immediately; after all, one usually screamed when they were in pain.

As soon as she calmed down slightly, I passed a cup of water o the man, who almost instinctively gave it to the woman for her to drink. I did this because I remembered hearing from my mother when she gave birth; they recommended that she drink a lot of water during labor; water couldn't hurt the pregnant woman anyway.