Pillow

Rina hauled my ass outside, fuming while she was at it. And I understand because she knows I held out, and we've already established not to do that long ago.

"Now tell me." Her arms crossed on her chest, with the stance of an angry coach, waiting for her students to finish punishment exercises.

"You know I'd tell you, I just couldn't stomach repeating the statements in front of the guys."

I knew she wanted a blow-by-blow account of what the bastards said so I even go to the lengths of imitating their voices.

She's invested, her face scrunching up, if her eyebrows can go any higher, it'll be off of her forehead already.

"If you saw what I saw, even you won't care if Fara goes crazy. I'm the son of the chief, she's only my sister. I'll take that woman. Even if father doesn't agree, I can make her my slave." I repeat back to her, imitating his self-assured and arrogant nasal tone.

Now Rina has been stomping around, heavier the more idiotic lines she hears me repeat.

"Oh! Oh, and the idiot had the gall to say that when he's tired of me, he'd share me with his equally conceited friends."

Most people would probably hide things like these. Just keeping it in for fear of inconveniencing others, and I had the same outlook.

When I got harassed after suddenly being shunned by Lucian, I didn't ask for help, afraid of inconveniencing anyone.

But I learned from then.

Now I know that if I had talked about it with people who truly cared, then it would be far easier to deal with it.

"Now you see, I get that their moral standards are probably close to nil, but calling me delicate? Assuming that he can easily overpower me?" I'm flailing my hands around, trying to conjure words to describe how angering that was.

"His weak ass better be good enough to fight because being called delicate by a wimp, pheeeeew!" I blew out, angered by how the guy sounded confident in his ability to subdue me.

From looking very angry to laughing at me, is Rina sick in the head?

"What?!" I asked her, lips pulled to the side while giving her the stink eye.

"You weren't angry from being objectified and peeped on? But you got mad because he called you delicate?" She snorts while asking in between laughter.

"Bitch, before that, the incarnation of evil just told me that no one wants to see me naked. Then comes an idiot who's out to enslave me for my looks. I'm angry. But the opposing statements just canceled each other." I shrugged, I actually forgot about that.

"But now that I think about it, I should probably be raging about that too. He couldn't even get your hair color right, if so, how dare he use the same eyes to say I'm delicate?!" I kick the ground, indignant about this development.

"If you question his eyes then it'll shake the argument of him assessing you as hot too." Rina points out. Fuck.

"Don't take those to heart though, you're not blind, you know you look good." She tells me sincerely.

I snort, scowling at her. "I choose to believe that beauty standards may differ. If they prefer bulkier women, built like a tank for survival, then I'll really be ugly here." But I don't really mind, I didn't come here to be a model.

With a brow raised, Rina asks curiously, "But I'm surprised you let them go just like that."

I rolled my eyes at the reminder, "I was occupied. And they're in the middle of a hunt, if their Tribespeople look for them, they'd catch us off-guard."

I hate to admit it but Lucian was right about that. That dolt was the son of their Chief, someone would look for them if they didn't return. Tyr told us to help the humans of Eryndor survive, and here I was, planning on gutting the first humans I encountered.

"I had such a strong urge to kill him though." I look at my hands, earlier they shook with rage. At least I'm calmer now.

"I plan on getting a general idea about the human population, then maybe I can decide if it's okay to decrease the headcount by a bit." I smile at Rina, feeling happier about finding a compromise.

She looks like she's about to roll on the ground, trying to wipe tears from the corner of her eyes. "We can do that if that would make you happy. I'll help you hide the bodies."

We nudged at each other playfully, feeling a bit better about the situation.

Since the incident happened earlier, we assumed that it would be safe to go back to the waterfalls tonight.

We have so many things that need washing and I was dead set on sanitizing the feathers to make down pillows.

When we had to go for missions, I still had the delusion that when we returned, I'll be able to sleep better. But after being thrown here permanently, I'll end up sleeping like this forever if I don't fix this pillow problem.

I'm thankful that many of the steps needed to manufacture these things can be done simultaneously. It's a lot of waiting and checking, but it's allowed us to run around like busybodies.

I was happy to report that the lye was now strong enough after running it through the hopper twice.

Now we could boil it and the lard in preparation for making soap. I also wanted to experiment with herbs and flowers to make better soap.

I had to barter with Lucian for the stone molds by agreeing to make the hilts of the weapons he was making. I had expected him to make it harder to negotiate but I guess the urgency of things made him easier to deal with.

If it were up to me, I would've liked to stay here for longer. To fully cure the bacon it takes about a week, and if we randomly whip out a smoker, we might start a commotion.

I continue to pull out the smaller and softer feathers of the Troodons, deciding to save the long and durable ones for things like arrows or quills.

Back in Solandis, the goal has always been to maximize productivity, it's been so long since I've had a chance to practice creativity. Now I'm here plucking feathers, thinking about soaps and leather clothes.

If someone told me that I'd be doing this in the future, I probably wouldn't have believed them. But now I've been trying to figure out how to make wearable leather clothes.

I was initially going for quantity, but if I had to fight in them, they'd have to be at least a skort. We're not about to give them a free show.

I'm confident about my sewing and mending abilities using fabric, but it's different for leather. Initially, it was because I loved making clothes for my dolls. That was when it was fun. Then came that challenging two years of trying to hide my damaged clothes.

It was during that period that I learned most of my skills, and from that point on, I always carried basic tools. I've long since graduated from being helpless, but I've still practiced the same vigilance.

The cave was filled with various sounds, the others were also focused on their respective tasks. Rina has been obsessing over making cordage since I taught her how to make them, while Rai has been stuck with smoke duty.

Lucian and Idris have been quiet, if not for the incessant pounding and scraping. They worked without communicating, making a few bone weapons from the tusks and teeth we've managed to get.

If one didn't know, you'd think that they were arming an army with the number and variety of daggers and short swords that they have made. We only have a few bones so most of those were actually made of stone and wood.

I'll have to make holsters for those too.

I'm eying my models, trying to visualize what we could wear with the hide we have now. Provided the climate here remains like this, we should be good for what I'm thinking.

We've stopped working to try out the meat of the Troodon. In my opinion, it was rather similar to a giant turkey, if we'd had more time to tenderize this, it'd be pretty good. For now, it's chicken skewers and chicken soup.

"Eli, you think we'd be able to make stuffed chicken? Like the ones Auntie makes for holidays?" Rina asks me as she gnaws on her skewer.

"Not exactly like that but we can try making something similar, we'll find more herbs so we can try. At least there's something similar to Turkey meat here."

"Vice-Captain!" Rai shouted in attention, then suddenly asked embarrassedly, "Can I also keep on eating your cooking? I lived on take-out and delivery, so I really can't cook to save my life." He rubbed a finger under his nose, almost pleading.

"If you keep on calling me Vice-Captain, you might as well starve," I tell him jokingly.

"I'm trying to cook with the least possible ingredients since we haven't found substitutes, but once we get to settle somewhere, we should be able to eat better things."

Come nighttime, we hauled several woven baskets and stone buckets to the waterfalls. With three Troodons to pluck, I couldn't finish it all in just several hours. So I picked ones that were suitable for use as a down pillow.

My level of investment in this was one Disinfectant tablet. One that I could've used on wounds but would instead go towards my neck and sanity.

Normally the five of us wouldn't go out all at the same time but we're about to have water supply issues so Lucian decided to block the cave entrance with his abilities instead.

Rina went ham on everything that could be washed. If our souls could be washed, she would've washed those too.

Her elemental ability made it so much easier for us. Not only would she effectively coat the item being washed, but she would also pull out the water once it was done.

On our trek back, I negotiate blow-drying services with Rai, telling him that if he can effectively blow-dry these feathers, we'll all have pillows tonight.

Upon our return, I call them all to vote on something important. There are so many things to deal with, but right now, this is of critical importance to me.

The four of them sat down on stone seats while I pulled out a pair of joggers. One large pair of joggers.

I see their perplexed faces so I explain. "I had this washed and sanitized earlier and wanted to ask all of you if I could cut this up and turn it into pillows." They're dumbfounded at my concern.

"I don't think any of you owns this. Each pantleg could probably fit Rai in, so I thought of cutting this up. We don't have a lot of clothes available so I know that each one is valuable." I looked at them seriously. It sounds childish but once I cut this up, there's no turning back you know.

Rina starts laughing while Idris visibly relaxes. Lucian looked annoyed but it wasn't as bad as I had thought.

"I'm good with medical stitches, but I can't really deal with making handicrafts, so if you think you need to cut it up, go ahead." Idris smiled.

I nod at him happily before looking at Lucian. He's still the boss so I still have to ask.

"I don't care." He said flippantly. And I grinned at him. Just the thought of having a pillow tonight has already drowned out today's bad encounter.

"Rai!" I look at him sternly, "You better blow on that as if your life depended on it. That's salvation right there!" Rai nodded several times, confirming that he understood the assignment.

Once we've set the soap into their molds and the hide onto the solution made of tannin, I started to hack into the joggers.

These definitely won't be near standard pillow size, but would definitely be travel-sized. That should be fine since our space domains can't even hold that much.

I decided to give Lucian the trousers part. Not because I didn't personally want to rest my head on someone's trousers, but as thanks for bringing back feathers.

Yes, that's it.

Hey! He'll have the biggest pillow. That should be fine, right? I couldn't help but snicker while sewing.