Chapter 31
Yerin swallowed hard.
On the bamboo plate lay neatly arranged, translucent slices of sashimi.
The flesh glistened softly in the sunlight, looking utterly delicious.
And with the bamboo adding its own distinct ambience,
it almost made you forget this was the middle of a deserted island and feel as though you were in an upscale Japanese restaurant.
Of course, every slice was crooked and uneven,
but in a situation like this, it looked delicious no matter what.
“...Wow. We're really living in luxury on a deserted island. It's a little sad we don't have chojang, though.”
Kim Woong, standing beside her, nodded repeatedly in admiration.
“If we had a pot and some seasonings, we could've made maeuntang too. But, Benefactor, is it really okay for me to eat this?”
When Kim Woong cautiously glanced at Reels, she nodded absently. Then she looked down at the sashimi with a dissatisfied expression.
“...I cleaned four fish.”
“...?”
“And it didn't even make three servings....”
She still seemed bothered by all the flesh left clinging to the bones.
She looked incredibly regretful.
Yerin looked at the dejected Reels and said,
“Reels.”
“Yup.”
“It was your first time, and you still did amazingly well. It's not like you even had a sashimi knife, right? You'll do even better next time.”
“You think so?”
“Yeah. Reels, you're amazing!”
There was one thing Yerin had realized from spending time with Reels.
When someone praised her, she acted like she absolutely hated it,
but deep down, she secretly loved it.
There was a reason people said even a whale would dance if you praised it.
If Reels had a tail, it would probably be swishing back and forth right about now.
Yerin curled her lips into a grin.
“See? Our Reels is good at everything!”
“...I'm not.”
“You're good at catching fish, and you're good at slicing sashimi too!”
“....”
“You're good at making fire, and you're good at building shelters too!”
“Please stop.”
After being showered with praise, Reels, apparently embarrassed for no reason, stuffed a piece of sashimi into her mouth. Her expression loosened into a happy grin almost immediately.
“This is really good. Hurry up and eat.”
Yerin thought to herself,
She really is a kid.
@
Mystery Rich sensed that something was off.
As he ate with the staff in the studio aboard the cruise ship and watched the screens, he soon paused with his chopsticks in hand.
“...Hmm.”
Somehow, their menu was starting to look more and more like Reels's party's.
First ramen, then grilled fish,
and now even sashimi had appeared.
He should've realized something was up when the chef asked him to get Reels's autograph.
But with everyone happily devouring everything set in front of them, it was hard to complain.
And in fairness, the chef really was an excellent cook.
One staff member murmured in admiration through a mouthful of sashimi.
The camera director beside him nodded over and over as well.
“It really does taste different when you eat it right after catching it.”
“The texture is insane.”
“Man, this makes me want a drink....”
Mystery Rich let out a small chuckle and picked up a piece of sashimi.
And the moment he dipped it in chojang and put it into his mouth,
“...Oh. This is good.”
The chewy texture added to the savoriness, and a subtle sweetness spread through his mouth.
Maybe it was because he was watching Reels's party on-screen, but it somehow tasted even better.
Just as Mystery Rich reached for another piece of sashimi,
one of the staff members hurried over to him.
“Mr. Mystery Rich. Sorry to interrupt your meal, but there's something urgent I need to tell you....”
“It's fine. What is it?”
“I just checked the weather forecast....”
The staffer's expression stiffened slightly.
“There's a high chance of rain today.”
Mystery Rich slowly set down his chopsticks.
“Starting when?”
“As early as this afternoon.”
Rain.
Rain in a survival situation was practically a disaster for the participants.
Once their bodies got wet, their temperature would drop quickly,
and firewood full of moisture would become difficult even to light.
The biggest problem, though, was
shelter.
Anyone staying in a flimsy shelter would turn into a drowned rat in no time.
Rain alone was enough to send the difficulty skyrocketing.
Mystery Rich slowly turned his gaze back to the monitors.
On the screen,
Reels's party was happily eating sashimi off a bamboo plate as if they had nothing to worry about.
@
The moment I stepped outside, full of sashimi, to go give Kim Woong some pointers,
something about the air felt off.
Did the humidity suddenly shoot way up or something?
Sniff sniff.
I slowly drew in the air around me.
“...Hmm.”
Looks like it's going to rain.
For some reason, I've always been uncannily good at telling when it's about to rain.
I might even be more accurate than the weather bureau.
There's a distinct smell right before it rains, after all.
That damp, wet-earth smell, and that feeling like the air itself is getting heavier.
I tilted my head up and looked at the sky.
The sky, which had been blue only a little while ago, was already slowly filling with dark clouds.
“Looks like we'd better hurry.”
I'd originally planned to just give him a few pointers and then leave,
but given the circumstances, it felt like I needed to lend a hand.
The shelter's exterior wasn't as bad as I'd expected.
Thick bamboo poles had been planted on either side to make the basic frame, and long bamboo poles had been laid across the top, giving it a rough shape.
Of course, once I got closer, the problems were obvious.
The lashings were sloppy, so the whole thing wobbled if you put even a little force on it, and the roof's slope was awkwardly shallow.
If it rained, flooding was guaranteed.
Still, for a beginner, it was pretty well made—good enough that it only needed some touch-ups.
Okay. This passes.
“This is pretty decent.”
Getting praise from me for the first time, Kim Woong puffed out his chest.
“Haha. I took your feedback to heart and fixed things up here and there.”
“The frame is fine for now. But here.”
I tapped the spot where the bamboo crossed with my finger.
Creak.
“You can't tie it this loosely. You need to fasten it much tighter.”
I grabbed the loose lashing and put my strength into it, wrapping it several times in an X-shape until it was secured firmly.
You couldn't just loop it around once and call it done. You had to cross-wrap it so it could withstand pressure from multiple directions.
After that, I fixed the flimsy roof too.
“It needs more slope.”
“Doesn't it already have enough of an incline?”
“No. Rainwater will pool on it.”
Tropical rain was no joke.
A squall like this could dump down water as if the sky itself had split open.
If he built it like this, the shelter might not hold under the weight of the water and collapse with the roof.
I angled the bamboo supporting the roof more sharply to make the pitch steeper. The shelter instantly looked much more convincing.
Then I layered big palm fronds and broad leaves over the top,
overlapping them downward like roof tiles.
That way, rainwater wouldn't seep inside.
Kim Woong could only stare blankly as he watched me work.
“Oh... Benefactor, it really looks like a proper shelter now.”
“It's too high for me to reach, so help me with this instead.”
“Yes, ma'am!”
@
Shaaah.
Thick sheets of rain began pouring down, as if swallowing the deserted island whole.
It was a mindless, torrential downpour, like a hole had opened in the sky.
The leaves shook violently,
rat-a-tat-tat-tat.
and heavy raindrops hammered the surroundings like mad.
We sat near the hearth, guarding the embers.
Fortunately, we had plenty of firewood.
That was because Kim Woong, all brute strength and no finesse, had hauled back a mountain of it to repay us.
Yerin, staring out at the rain pouring beyond the cave, shook her head and said,
“Wow, it's really coming down hard. This feels even worse than monsoon season.”
Kim Woong, sitting beside her, gave an awkward smile and nodded.
“Seriously. If I hadn't met you two, I would've been in real trouble too.”
The shelter Kim Woong was going to use was already finished,
but
with the rain coming down that hard, we couldn't just leave him out there to sleep alone.
The cave had plenty of room anyway,
so we could just spread some leaves on the floor and let him sleep there.
Crackle, crackle.
Only the logs in the hearth burned quietly,
and after sitting there absentmindedly listening to the rain for a while, Yerin asked Kim Woong,
“By the way, how did you end up becoming a fitness YouTuber?”
Kim Woong scratched the back of his head.
“Me? Hmm... believe it or not, I used to be a total twig.”
“...What?”
“I was 193 centimeters tall, but I only weighed 67 kilos.”
Yerin and I both froze at the same time.
He looked like a Spartan soldier, and he used to be a twig?
No way.
As if he were used to getting that reaction, Kim Woong smiled sheepishly and continued.
“Then I happened to go to a gym one day, and I met the person who changed my life.”
Kim Woong dropped his voice low and imitated someone.
“That's not how you do the bench press.”
“....”
“That's how it started. That's when I met my benefactor and properly began working out.”
I nodded quietly.
Only now were a few of the puzzle pieces starting to fit together.
No wonder he never seemed the slightest bit bothered no matter how hard I came down on him with my pointers.
Unbelievably, gym rats came with built-in immunity to unsolicited pointers!
Suddenly curious, I turned to look at Yerin beside me.
“What about you, Yerin-nim?”
“Hm?”
“How did you end up streaming?”
Yerin casually swept back her bright yellow hair.
“Me?”
Then she gave a small snort.
“Someone as pretty as me obviously has to be on camera.”
“...?”
“Celebrities have way too brutal a schedule.”
Yerin waved her hand dismissively.
“You have to go to the salon before dawn, show up at events, do shoots... I can't do any of that.”
“So that's why you became a streamer?”
“Yep. I can just stream comfortably from home.”
That was an incredibly practical reason.
Apparently, she cared a lot about work-life balance.
Kim Woong, who had been quietly listening to our conversation, spoke with a puzzled look.
“But, Yerin-nim.”
“Yes?”
“It's true that you're pretty, but....”
Kim Woong continued, looking utterly unbothered.
“Wouldn't being a celebrity still be a bit much because of your age? Idols these days are, like, middle schoolers and high schoolers and all that. Hahaha.”
The air inside the cave turned icy in an instant.
Absurdly enough, there didn't seem to be any malice at all in what Kim Woong had said.
He was just... an honest idiot with no tact?
“...?”
The corner of Yerin's mouth twitched ever so slightly,
and I knew at once.
Ah. This is bad.
Of all things, he'd gone and smacked right into her biggest sore spot.
Yerin pointed at her own face as if she couldn't believe it.
She was smiling on the outside, but her expression didn't look remotely amused.
“Kim Woong. You were talking to me just now, right?”
“....”
“You're saying I don't look like a celebrity...?”
“No, I mean, of course you're pretty, but... since you're a little older....”
“Hey.”
“Yes?”
Yerin's fist immediately slammed into Kim Woong's upper arm.
“Ow! Why'd you hit me?”
“Because you said something worth getting hit over.”
“That's not fair!”
“What's not fair about it?”
I quietly turned back toward the hearth.
Crackle, crackle.
The sound of the firewood burning was strangely soothing.
...Those two really do play well together.
It felt like putting a cat and a big dog in the same room.
Watching them was entertaining enough that I had a feeling I wouldn't be bored from here on out.