Duan Lili had seen online discussions about relieving oneself in primitive wilderness conditions.
It was said that leaves were not suitable—they didn’t work well. Instead, one should use small tree branches.
Someone had stepped forward to share their experience, saying their grandmother in the countryside had taught them when they were young. Choose tender, small branches, break off a suitable length, peel off the bark, and use the inner stick to scrape.
They guaranteed: It really scrapes clean.
Duan Lili now had no choice but to trust this person online.
She walked out of the dry toilet. Not far behind it, the forest gradually grew denser. If there could be a giant serpent in the water, who knew what might lurk in the forest. Duan Lili wasn’t ready to explore the forest just yet.
She didn’t venture into the woods but stayed at the edge, finding a shorter, smaller tree. She broke off several branches that looked relatively green and tender. After gathering a handful, she stored them in her warehouse.
The branches she broke varied in length and thickness, so the System probably couldn’t estimate them as individual units. In the warehouse, they were displayed as “a bundle of broken branches.”
In the warehouse, only completely identical items could stack, with a maximum capacity of 100 per slot. Items like tools, if their durability decreased, could no longer be placed in the same slot as new tools of the same type and would occupy a separate slot.
Since the cola bottle was also in the warehouse, storing the broken branches filled it up again.
Now, the issue was that the Personal Inventory wasn’t spacious enough, and the Crafting speed was too slow—a real headache.
But then again, Rome wasn’t built in a day. It had been less than 30 hours since she crossed over yesterday, and she already had a house and a toilet. That was actually quite impressive.
She was just too greedy, wanting everything to be perfect all at once.
Before going into hibernation, the System had instructed her to “survive.” If she had everything she wanted, it wouldn’t be called “survival”—it would be called living.
Duan Lili had been busy all morning. By the time she returned to the house, the System showed it was still before 10:30 a.m.
She felt she should pause and think things through, not just rush around like a headless fly, doing things haphazardly.
Duan Lili dragged the Old Wooden Chest closer and examined the items in her Personal Inventory and the chest. Many things she hadn’t actually seen in person, only as icons in the warehouse.
Transferring items between the warehouse and the Old Wooden Chest could be done by dragging them on the System’s Light Screen—no need to take them out physically.
Looking over the items, she noticed that the Small Wooden Axe was being consumed the fastest, as all the items she could currently craft were wooden. The tools Duan Lili now had were: [Small Wooden Knife 1], [Small Wooden Hammer 1], [torch 21].
Duan Lili placed these three items in the first three slots of the first row in her Personal Inventory.
For food, she had: [Steamed Buns 7], [Meat 5].
Duan Lili placed the steamed buns in the first row of slots. As for the meat, she hadn’t even seen it in person yet.
There was a Wood Block in front of the sofa, placed there last night when she slept and left out this morning to serve as a coffee table. It looked relatively clean, though she wasn’t sure if dust had settled on it. Duan Lili puckered her lips and blew on it twice, then took out a piece of meat.
The meat appeared on the coffee table. It was deep red in color and looked quite fresh. It was a sizable piece, estimated to weigh around three jin.
But she had only gathered 5 pieces of meat in total. Considering the size of that giant serpent from yesterday, this gathering ratio was a bit too low—so much meat wasted.
Duan Lili felt a slight regret, but her current attribute level was low, her equipment level was low, and both her gathering ratio and crafting efficiency were low. There was nothing she could do about it.
The meat was raw and couldn’t be eaten directly. Duan Lili first stored the 5 pieces of meat in the Old Wooden Chest.
At a glance, the [Crude Wooden Wall] she had crafted in the morning was still in the warehouse. Sure enough, when things got busy, everything became chaotic—she had actually forgotten to put it in the Old Wooden Chest. Her Personal Inventory was already cramped, and it was taking up one slot.
Duan Lili transferred this thing to the Old Wooden Chest first.
Now, her Personal Inventory contained 132 pieces of [Raw Wood], taking up two slots. Duan Lili kept 100 pieces of raw wood and transferred the remaining 32 pieces to the Old Wooden Chest.
The Old Wooden Chest now held a total of 52 pieces of raw wood. This was the most basic raw material—one could never have too much of it.
Her Personal Inventory also contained [Wood Block x9], [Wood Plank x6], and [Wooden Rod x36], all important basic materials. She placed them in the slots toward the front.
A bottle of medicine and a bottle of water (in a cola bottle) had to be carried with her at all times.
[Dry Grass x88]—this was something that could be gathered everywhere and wasn’t rare. Still, Duan Lili took out one piece of dry grass to examine it in person. One “piece” of dry grass was actually a bundle of dry grass. It was slender and flexible, and when many pieces were placed together, they had a certain fluffiness.
This item had potential for development—perhaps it could be woven into a grass mat or used as filling for a bed in the future. For now, she put it in the Old Wooden Chest.
The last item in the warehouse was “a bundle of broken twigs.” Thinking about its future use, Duan Lili’s lips twitched. For now, she had no intention of thinking about that… She’d just put it in the Old Wooden Chest for now.
After organizing the warehouse, five slots were freed up, giving her a sense of relief.
Looking at the items in the Old Wooden Chest, Duan Lili took out the snake gallbladder, snake egg, snake skin, and Snake Sinew to examine them in person.
The snake egg had patterns on its shell. Duan Lili was afraid it might hatch into a small snake, so after a glance, she put it back in the Old Wooden Chest. She pondered how to cook and eat this egg today.
She glanced at the snake gallbladder and stored it away.
The snake skin was different from what Duan Lili had imagined. She had thought it would have scales or patterns, but when she took it out, it was a soft, green leather with a very comfortable texture—it felt like a processed product.
The Snake Sinew was a black, elastic cord-like thing about the thickness of a finger. She’d think about what to use it for later and stored it away for now.
Aside from these items, the Old Wooden Chest also contained Duan Lili’s dead phone and half a bucket of potato chips.
In addition, Duan Lili currently owned two and a half pieces of real estate.
One was the house she was currently in, which could shelter her from wind and rain. At night, when she slept, she could seal the entrance with wood blocks, making it safe inside. With walls a meter thick made of solid wood, even a bear could be kept out, right?
The other was the dry toilet she had just built, solving a major life problem.
As for the “half” piece—it was the temporary toilet she had hastily built yesterday, located right next to the house.
Originally, Duan Lili had planned to dismantle this temporary toilet after building the dry one. But just now, walking back from the dry toilet to the house felt a bit far—over a hundred meters away. During the day, it was fine, but at night, if she needed to use the toilet, it felt less secure.
Duan Lili changed her mind at the last minute and decided to keep the temporary toilet next to the house for relieving herself, while the dry toilet would be used for bowel movements.
While organizing her thoughts and tidying up her warehouse, Duan Lili didn’t forget to keep holding the Small Wooden Hammer and continue Crafting without wasting time.
After resting in the house for about 40 minutes, she had sorted out the warehouse and the Old Wooden Chest, and in the process, she Crafted one Small Wooden Pickaxe, one Small Wooden Hoe, and two Small Wooden Axes.
Looking at her Personal Inventory and then at the empty house, she felt that her current supplies were far too scarce. What she had were all basic raw materials. Apart from the basic equipment provided by the System, she had almost none of the necessities for daily life—no, not even daily life, but for survival.
Even for drinking water, she only had one cola bottle.
This was really inconvenient.
Duan Lili sighed and began to miss the modern society where food delivery arrived at her doorstep in half an hour.
But then she looked up and reconsidered. It had only been a day and a half since she crossed over, and she had already built a house. It wasn’t that difficult after all.
With this thought, her spirits lifted again.
Checking the time, it was almost noon, so Duan Lili decided to prepare lunch for herself.
Having eaten three steamed buns in a row, she felt like having meat for this meal.
With renewed energy, Duan Lili took out the half-full bucket of potato chips from the Old Wooden Chest and ate one as a reward for owning real estate—a mansion—on her second day in the Another World Continent.
Licking her lips and savoring the taste of the potato chips, Duan Lili reluctantly sealed the bucket and stored it back in the Old Wooden Chest.
This item might not exist in this world, and with only half a bucket left, she had to save it.
She took out a piece of snake meat and, after a moment’s thought, also took out a snake egg and placed it in her Personal Inventory.
Refueled, Duan Lili walked out of the house. The sunlight was stronger now, and the temperature had risen.
Duan Lili went to the river to fill the cola bottle with water and spent some time searching for and selecting some pebbles.
Since she would need to use fire later, Duan Lili, with a strong sense of safety, chose a spot not far from the water. She laid out several pebbles on the ground and found a large, flat, smooth round stone from the riverbank. After washing it in the water, she placed it in the center on top of the pebbles.
While building the house this morning, Duan Lili had experimented and found that she didn’t need to touch items with her hands to retrieve or store them from the warehouse. As long as she focused her thoughts, she could retrieve or store items within a certain range.
After arranging the stones, she directly placed the meat on the flat round stone in the center. Then, she took out the torches, placing the burning ends on the pebbles and the other ends on the ground. In this way, she surrounded the flat round stone and the meat on it with five torches.
The flames burned, roasting the meat on the flat round stone.
Seeing that everything was fine, Duan Lili left it for now. She then headed toward the mountain forest.
Both banks of the river were open flatlands with no trees. Only after about a hundred meters did sparse trees begin to appear, and further back, they gradually thickened into a forest.
As noon approached, the sun rose higher. Duan Lili felt a coolness as soon as she neared the mountain forest.
She jogged over and ducked into the shade of the trees.
Entering the edge of the forest, she immediately spotted an animal that looked like a squirrel and two clearly identifiable rabbits. These small creatures darted and leaped through her field of vision before quickly disappearing. Sensing that this place was teeming with life, Duan Lili thought she probably wouldn’t lack meat in the future.
Duan Lili had come here because she currently had no daily necessities—not even a bowl or chopsticks to eat with.
She came to see if she could figure something out.
Not daring to venture deep into the woods, she searched around the outer edge and found a tree with exceptionally large leaves, big enough to cover her entire face.
To get the leaves, she couldn’t use the System’s tools to chop down the tree. Using the Small Wooden Axe to fell it would only allow her to Gather bare tree trunks as raw wood, stripped of branches and roots. The branches of the trees she gathered seemed to vanish into thin air.
It was just like how the giant serpent had only dropped five pieces of meat—where did all that massive amount of meat go?
The tree’s canopy was high. Duan Lili released several Wood Blocks, stacking them into a makeshift “stairs” to climb up high. Grabbing a large branch with both hands, she used her body weight and gravity to pull downward, and with a loud “crack,” she snapped it off.
It was quite heavy, so she stored it in her Personal Inventory. Duan Lili jumped back to the ground and collected all the Wood Blocks.
Just as she was about to head back to the riverside, she suddenly noticed a large cluster of plump, round mushrooms under a tree.
Mushrooms! Do they count as food? Are they edible?
Duan Lili, who had failed to catch fish and failed to hunt the Deer herd, felt her eyes light up.