Chapter 8: Winter’s Warmth

Winter came. The forest disappeared and everything collapsed, but the season returned without fail. The survivors had to find a way to stay alive.

Luti, exhaling white breath, secured the buffalo hide more tightly. She climbed a ladder to pull the hide up to the ceiling, where only a skeleton remained. Once it covered the sky, the biting wind was blocked.

Luti moved busily, decorating the house with what she had salvaged. More precisely, she was filling the skeletal hut to make it look like a home, but the fact that any form remained at all was close to a miracle.

“If I can block the wind, I can survive.”

After drinking the red water at the river, Luti resolved to live. So she walked with a stick in hand, avoiding corpses. The ruined forest had blocked paths and new paths opening through them, and she couldn’t find the hut. The place she had played in for thirteen years had turned into an unknown world in an instant.

The river and lake that had always been landmarks were gone. Trees were split in half. The large rocks that marked the house’s entrance had shattered and flown away. There was nothing she could do.

She waited for night. She had read every book about the sky, so when night came she moved by the constellations. She found Scorpio. She found Virgo. She walked along the paths of night, and eventually found something familiar.

It was pieces of clothing Ru had been making, and Ru’s powder buried in the dirt, face down.

“Ru… These are Ru’s things.”

Luti wept sorrowfully as she picked them up and walked. She scraped together every small piece without missing one. Days passed, and she found the skeletal hut. Traces of life lay burned and scattered. Here was where the table had been. Here was where she had crushed flower petals with Ru. His workshop. The place where she had read fairy tales as a child.

When she found the remains of the hut, Luti began searching the surroundings like a madwoman. But she couldn’t find Ru’s corpse. Not a single bone fragment. No matter how much she searched, nothing appeared. She was devastated and could only cry. When she opened her eyes, she was crying. She often cried until she fainted and fell asleep.

While crying, searching, and wandering madly, winter came. And Luti made a decision.

‘Let’s make a house. Instead of spending time missing him, I’ll make a new house.’

She stopped crying and gathered the cloth to make a large sack. She sprinkled a little of Ru’s powder and sewed it carefully. The sack wouldn’t tear no matter how much she pulled. She put everything she could into the sack. She gathered the scattered things and made them into a house. She stripped the bones and flesh from a dead buffalo for food, and dried the hide in the sun for a tent.

In that sense, the harsher the winter, the better. Dead animal corpses didn’t rot in the cold. Young Luti couldn’t handle a knife skillfully, so stripping bones and flesh took time. Drying them well for winter food took a lot of effort.

Luti worked without rest. She woke early and dragged dead animals back. She made plenty of dried meat and used the oil from under the hides to light fires. Buffalo oil wasn’t as good as Landter’s, but it didn’t have a foul smell, so it was usable. The fire went out often and needed a lot of oil, but at least it provided warmth. She made small lumps and saved them carefully.

Only after she made the ceiling did she put a lump of buffalo oil into the hearth. She used stones to light a fire, and it caught quickly. Compared to before, it was a shabby hearth, but at least she could make soup with potatoes and herbs. Adding dried meat kept her full longer and generated heat until dawn, so she had to eat.

As long as she wasn’t sick, it was fine. If she had no pain, no injuries, and could move well, there would be no problem until her body grew. Of course, when fear swept over her, her body trembled and she couldn’t sleep, crying all night. But morning came, and when she looked at the tasks before her, she worked without rest again.

Luti placed the chipped bowl on the hearth. Then she brought the small bowl she had kept in the safest place in the house. Inside was the salt Ru had said was precious. When put on the tongue, it filled her mouth with saltiness. It was as precious as land. It healed wounds when applied, and settled stomach-aches when eaten. On cold days, sprinkling it in soup gave her strength.

Today she had used especially much strength working the buffalo hide. She had dragged the hides of four huge buffalo with her thin limbs. She would probably fall asleep as soon as she ate this soup.

“Cold.”

She dipped salt and put it in her mouth. Her brow furrowed as the salty taste filled her mouth. But the saltiness faded quickly, and saliva rose with sweetness under her tongue. Luti hugged the salt jar and thought of the little demon who loved candy. Sorotel, who used to hold the lollipop she made and act silly.

What happened to Sorotel, who loved sweets despite being a demon? She thought he was probably dead, but he might be alive somewhere. He was a demon, so he would have run faster than any human. With his strong body, he might have survived and left the forest.

But was Sorotel really a demon, when he sacrificed his horn to save Luti? At first he was a demon, but not now. In the moment the metal flew, the demon who drove his horn into her chest was not a demon but an angel.

An angel shining with only the good energy of sunlight.

Luti carefully touched Sorotel’s horn, still embedded between her chest and collarbone. She didn’t know how to remove it, so she kept it, but she didn’t know how long she could. She would grow soon, and she couldn’t live as a human with a demon’s horn. But when she thought of it as Sorotel’s horn, it was different. It felt like a fast-footed man was protecting her. Even now, the reason she could endure this terrifying situation was thanks to Sorotel’s horn.

“Sorotel…”

Yes, this was a precious gift from the little demon. This itself was Sorotel, and thanks to his gift, she was alive. If not for that, she wouldn’t be in this world. Luti placed her hand on her thin chest. She felt her heart beating.

She prayed again in her heart that the little demon was alive.

Winter was harsh. It brought two winter storms and made it snow heavily for a week. Naturally, the buffalo hide flew away, and the skeletal pillars collapsed.

She couldn’t endure it. If she didn’t leave the hut quickly, the strong winter wind would tear her skin. She put Ru’s belongings in the sack and walked toward a place where the wind couldn’t reach. She put the remaining dried meat and flour in the sack, lay between split trees, and napped under a pile of large rocks. Her hair froze and broke. Her feet and hands swelled with frostbite, red and swollen.

It was so cold that tears wouldn’t come. Several times she thought she would die. In the morning the sun seemed to come out, then the harsh wind blew again. Digging the frozen ground with her weak arms and legs had its limits. She walked and walked, and barely hid in a crack between split rocks. Then she noticed a rustling movement. She thought a piece of wood had flown in the strong wind, but it wasn’t.

It was a living being. A unique aura and signal from something alive.

She rubbed her eyes because she couldn’t see well. She moved her body wrapped in the remaining buffalo hide, and heard another rustling from deep inside the rocks. A person? An animal? A strange creature? A demon?

Her heart pounded. It didn’t matter what it was. Monster or whatever, as long as she wasn’t alone. The important thing was that someone existed in this forest.

She moved her frozen legs and headed inside. The cold wind still blew overhead, and the blackened forest gave off its peculiar smell. Crunch. The moment she stepped on the frozen ground, a tear fell from Luti’s eye. The warmth she felt now was fire. The bright light illuminating the surroundings was definite warmth.

Yes, warmth. The warmth of fire. The warmth emitted by a living being.

She had thought she was alone in this dead forest with no people, but she wasn’t. In this forest, there was a being that could breathe warmth. Tears suddenly welled up. Along with the hope that another life like her might exist, someone came to mind.

Loneliness worse than the cutting cold. Longing deeper than the fear of death. That was…

“Ru… I miss you. Sorotel… Please be alive.”

I hope it’s Sorotel. I hope it’s Ru. Even knowing both were dead, she hoped and hoped. She knew it was foolish, knew it was all useless, but she kept hoping. So the warmth now was both welcome and sad.

“…Boing boing.”

Luti’s crying stopped abruptly. What poked its head out was an animal. A cute creature with brown limbs and a white face.

“Boing boing.”

“…A raccoon?”

At Luti’s words, the cute creature came to her feet. It looked around, circled once, and sniffed. It seemed to be talking, so she stared down at it. Strangely, she heard its language.

‘You look like our master.’
‘Hmm, the smell is similar too.’
‘But you’re not master. Our master has big feet and gives off a strong smell. This one is small and the smell is weak.’

The cute creature snapped its head up. Looking closely, it was closer to a raccoon than a raccoon dog, smaller than a calf, staring up at Luti.

‘It’s a small girl. Hmm, she looks like she’s been through a lot too?’

Luti blinked in surprise. The cute creature was talking. No, it wasn’t speaking human language, but she clearly heard a voice in her ear.

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