Standing at the corner of the first-floor stairs, Sento rested one hand on the railing, tilting his head to watch Ai beside the iron stove as she cooked breakfast.
Because the room wasn’t particularly cold, Ai wore only a thick shirt, and on her legs were the thick cargo pants they had found yesterday; even in this slightly rugged, wilderness-style outfit, she couldn’t hide her youthful aura.
Sento let out a slow breath.
How to put it?
Watching Ai cook felt like a newlywed wife preparing a meal for him.
Alright, fantasy over.
Teasing himself internally, Sento continued walking down.
When he stepped onto the last stair, Ai seemed to hear the movement, turned back to look at Sento, and waved.
“Ah, Sento-kun, are you already up?”
Ai, who had noticed Sento’s movements while he was secretly observing her moments ago, pretended she had just noticed him.
Sento nodded in response and walked toward the multi-layered wooden shelf behind the counter.
The tools and a significant portion of the materials they had collected at the Camp Office were placed on the shelf.
Ai had likely tidied them up after waking up this morning, and everything was organized very neatly.
Sento took a small bottle of lamp oil from the middle shelf and then took out a few rags from the wooden crate beside it.
Ai, who had been keeping an eye on this side, asked, “Sento-kun, are you making something?”
“Yeah, I plan to make two torches.”
Sento picked up a few wooden sticks he had gathered yesterday from the floor by the door and replied, “Although I anticipate that we should try to return while it’s still relatively bright, what if we encounter some unexpected situation?
So, we still need to prepare some lighting gear.
It’s a pity we couldn’t find a storm lantern or a flare, so I’ll just have to make some torches myself.”
With the rags, wooden sticks, and lamp oil placed together, the moment Sento placed his hand on them, the panel sent a notification.
[Blueprint detected…
It is the game blueprint [Torch].
Do you want to record it?]
Sento nodded with satisfaction.
A torch is one of the craftable items in the long dark game.
He guessed that his survival skills should be able to detect the corresponding blueprint, and sure enough, there was no problem.
The crafting of a simple torch is actually very simple: just wrap a rag strip soaked in lamp oil around the tip of a wooden stick.
Not to mention Sento, even if someone who had never touched this area were given a verbal explanation of the method, they would be able to make one by following it.
However, Sento always felt that a torch made using the game blueprint might be more reliable than the rough one he would make by hand.
Under Ai’s surprised gaze, Sento activated his auto-crafting, skillfully soaking the fabric strips in lamp oil and then wrapping them around two joined wooden sticks.
It was not only aesthetically pleasing but also looked very sturdy.
The time consumed to make the torches was very short, and Sento quickly finished two of them.
He picked one of them up and swung it a few times, creating a whistling sound.
Sure enough, the item made from the blueprint was indeed more reliable than one he would make himself.
This torch looked sturdy enough to be used as a melee weapon.
With the tip lit on fire, poking a wolf on the nose with an enchanted little torch would make any wolf howl and flee—it’s simply a perfect tool for repelling wolves.
Sento’s skilled crafting process made Ai envious again.
The two had a simple breakfast of oatmeal, chocolate bars, and a can of sardines found on the second floor yesterday.
By the way, while eating, Sento noticed that although the food Ai prepared was indeed quite delicious, it didn’t seem to have any substantial difference compared to yesterday.
Could it be that the Wilderness Gourmet skill was learned for nothing?
However, he quickly realized that the skill description stated it was about fully bringing out the deliciousness of [natural] ingredients.
Looking at what they were eating: factory-packaged oatmeal, plastic-wrapped chocolate bars, and canned sardines—none of these could be called natural ingredients.
No wonder the skill effect wasn’t activating.
However, being able to drink hot oatmeal in this frozen wilderness was already good enough.
It’s just that the canned sardines tasted a bit mediocre, far inferior to the dace with salted black beans in Sento’s memory.
“Hmm…
Sento-kun, are there any other cooking utensils here?” As they were finishing breakfast, Ai said somewhat helplessly, “A frying pan is fine for stir-frying, but it’s really inconvenient for making stews or even cooking porridge.”
“Yes.
In this game, besides the frying pan, there is another type of cast-iron pot with a larger capacity, which is perfect for cooking porridge, stews, and even boiling water.”
After eating and drinking his fill, Sento took the brand-new, unopened wool socks that Ai handed him, which they had found yesterday.
While putting them on his feet, he continued, “Theoretically, the probability of finding a cast-iron pot is even higher than a frying pan, so it shouldn’t be hard to find.
When we go to search those houses across the lake in a while, maybe we’ll find one.”
The two roughly divided the clothing they found yesterday, with each putting on an extra layer of thicker inner lining.
As for the outer clothing, Sento wore the Parka and work boots, while the rubber boots and the medium-length windbreaker went to Ai.
It sounds like Sento’s outfit is thicker, and in reality, it is, but at the same time, Sento’s outfit is also heavier.
The windbreaker that Ai wore was actually very strong at resisting cold wind and retaining heat; as long as she wore enough thick layers underneath, her perceived temperature wouldn’t be much worse than Sento’s.
Wearing such a lightweight outfit, Ai would find it more convenient to move around.
Of course, there was a more important reason: the size of the rubber boots fit Ai’s feet better.
The two checked the items they were carrying: a hunting knife, an axe, a small amount of emergency food and water, fishhooks and fishing line, some wolf meat and wolf liver they had dug out to use as bait, and the torches tucked into the sides of their backpacks—everything was packed and ready.
Ai, standing at the doorway, patted her cheeks.
“Alright, let’s go!”
The warm and sturdy house, along with a fairly sufficient supply of fuel and food for the short term, made both of them feel quite relaxed.
The atmosphere when they left was significantly better than yesterday morning when they were rushing from the Trappers Home to the Camp Office.
After stepping out the door, Ai first looked up at the place Sento had pointed out yesterday where there might be a grouse gathering, but it was still very quiet there, with no sign of a grouse.
“Sigh, what a pity.
I thought I’d be able to eat some grouse meat…” Sighing with a hint of regret, Ai quickly adjusted her mood, kicked her legs, and trotted happily toward the wide lake surface.
Having changed into new shoes, Ai felt that moving around was significantly more convenient than yesterday.
Not only was the insulation better, but the grip of the rubber boots was much stronger than her little leather shoes, so even while hopping around on the ice, she didn’t feel off-balance at all.
It looked like she was playing happily, but in reality, she was adapting to her new shoes to ensure she could perform better during combat.
It might not seem tempting right nobut who knows what the future holds?
“And If you’re enjoying it, drop a Power Stone for me!”