Chapter 20

“Nice.”

As always, this content was quite a success.

“A person must sweat.”

“Gung?”

“He who does not work, neither shall he eat.”

“Gung-gung-gung…?”

The body of Honey, the sweet-colored water bird, trembled.

At the cry that seemed to ask, ‘Then what about me who does not work?’, I shook my head firmly.

“What on earth are you worried about, being that cute?”

“Guk.”

“You are already doing your part with your cuteness, so don't worry about strange things.”

No matter how thoughtlessly I lived, I was not an irresponsible creator who wouldn't take responsibility for a single life form I had birthed from my paint.

As long as it was the son of myself, a gourmet and a big eater, Honey would never starve.

“Do you understand?”

Honey was convinced and sprawled out comfortably.

“But get out of there.”

“Kuru.”

Of all places, inside my basket.

“It’s hard to get the seeds out.”

“Grrrng.”

“Who do you take after to be this stubborn?”

“Guk?”

“Me? What a disloyal child.”

I bent down and rummaged through the basket.

Honey's body was just transparent water with only a very weak viscosity, so it wasn't a big problem, but the little guy had played with the seeds and mixed them all up in a mess.

“This is….”

“…….”

“…I think this was an eggplant seed.”

Fortunately, Seo Jio, a native of a rural village in Gangwon-do, could identify the type of seed just by looking at it.

Not everyone from Gangwon-do could do this; it was possible thanks to the fact that I was serious about this kind of farming.

Having enjoyed farm work since I was young, I picked up the eggplant seed, stood up and put it in a pre-dug hole.

“Is it time to plant the potatoes now?”

“Gurk?”

“Hmm?”

There was a brief communication error, but soon I realized what Honey was questioning.

“I didn't mean I was going to plant Dad.”

“Gung?”

“Potato is a term of endearment. It’s like a second name.”

There was an anecdote where my mother, who loved potatoes, saw a fetal ultrasound photo and said, ‘It looks like a potato,’ and named me ‘Potato’ as a fetal nickname, and my grandmother, upon seeing the newborn me, nodded and said, ‘She ate only potatoes and gave birth to a potato.’

“All the adults called me Potato, so until I was 4, I thought I was a potato.”

I also wondered if that was why I grew up so healthy and harmless.

“Well, that’s all that matters.”

“Kururu.”

“You just grow up healthy too.”

The Seo family, for generations, tended to respect the free will of new life.

A few days must have passed, and I finally succeeded in planting all the seeds Yu Seong-un had gifted me.

Having planted potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn, famous as staple crops, starving to death now seemed a distant prospect.

“Then again, it would be harder to starve to death in this body.”

“Kururu.”

“No matter how hungry Dad gets, I won’t eat you, Honey.”

The location where the crops were planted was the vegetable patch behind the cabin.

“Actually, at this point, is it a bit of an ambiguous scale to call it a vegetable patch?”

It had gotten a little bigger, but it was still a vegetable patch.

It wasn't as large and vast as the fields of those who made a living from farming, so I had a sort of excuse.

Anyway, it was a vegetable patch.

I was a wonderful adult who could compromise with reality.

“Then let's go back.”

“Kukkuruk.”

“Right, we have to try the cheong we made.”

It was about time for the fruit cheong I had made earlier to have ripened.

“The combination of the sweet and sour Mangdung Fruit and the sour and bitter Drought Pot is excellent, for starters.”

If there was one point of concern, it was whether the amounts of the two were in proper harmony, but that part didn't bother me much.

With my extensive experience of living alone, I had come to possess my halmi’s touch.

“It was only by feel and by eye, but there's no way I could be wrong about the combination of something I’m going to eat.”

Befitting such pride, a good scent was already wafting from the glass jar.

“Hmm.”

Entering the kitchen, I blinked while looking at the cupboard where the fruit cheong was.

“Since I’ve sweated for the first time in a while, shall I try it as a cold tea?”

“Gurk?”

“I sweated from the soul.”

Honey pointed out that my body did not actually discharge waste products like sweat, but anyway, didn't I do labor?

A human who has labored must drink a cool and refreshing tea for their work efficiency to go up.

“For that, I’ll need to get some ice from the storeroom.”

A pig does not hesitate in front of food.

Without a moment to wipe the sweat that hadn't come out, I went straight down to the storeroom.

In the ice cellar, which was full of all sorts of ingredients, there was, of course, ice.

In every corner of the storeroom, which looked so much like a cave that one couldn't even fathom where the end of the ice was, there were pieces of ice.

“Is it a little cold?”

As I opened the heavy door and entered the storeroom, Honey froze stiff.

“Ku, kugururuk.”

“If you’re too cold, you can stay out… uh.”

“…….”

“…Are you frozen?”

At the sight of Honey, who had become transparent ice itself, just as I, with my expressionless face, was violently agitated.

Even though it was already in a state of ice, Honey shook its body with a flit and pretended its feathers.

“Poof.”

“?”

“Guk.”

“Did you evolve?”

“Kuru.”

“In a situation where I myself evolved from a human to a haunted portrait, there's no rule that says a water bird can't become an ice bird.”

I was surprised once, thinking that Honey, who had instantly turned to ice, had died, and once again at the sight of it moving flexibly despite being ice, but if there was no problem, then what did it matter.

Honey was cute even when frozen, so it was fine.

“A moving ice bird seems interesting enough.”

“Kurururururururuk!”

“This father’s heart is pleased that you are also joyful.”

Honey, who, like its creator, had no sense of crisis from birth, was simply delighted by its change.

Even for a bird whose body was water, I wondered if it was right for it to freeze this quickly, but having become a portrait from a human myself, I was not greatly surprised.

“Since when did we ever follow the laws of physics?”

To think I’d even ignore the laws of physics in my life, it was quite an interesting life.

“First, the ice….”

“Kuk-kuruk.”

“It's over there, thank you.”

Honey's icy wings did not clump together into its body as before.

Perhaps because it had gained feathers, or body parts, that it didn't originally have, after showing me the location of the ice, it frantically preened its body.

Being unable to leave their feathers alone must be a species-specific trait of birds.

‘It was less so when it was water.’

Leaving Honey on my shoulder as it was, I slowly walked through the ice cellar.

“…….”

It was cool.

“Haaah….”

My breath was visible.

A thick breath, visible at a glance.

It must be that cold, but for some reason, I did not feel the cold and the ingredients were not frozen either.

I couldn't tell if the ice cellar was deceiving me, or if I and the ingredients were tougher than the ice.

‘Probably the latter.’

I looked down at the floor.

“…Hmm….”

I muttered.

“It would be a catastrophe if this broke.”

An icy floor like a bottomless pit was visible.

‘It seems to be a solid block of ice, but it’s transparent, as if there’s a lake beneath the ice.’

It was a very transparent floor.

Ice that has frozen very slowly is not opaque but clear as glass, and such ice was spread all over the floor.

I couldn't even guess its depth.

It was a little slick, had a faint blue hue, and occasionally, a shimmering halo of light could be seen from the inside.

They would light up their bodies for a few seconds like fireflies and then disappear and I was curious about their identity.

“Are they a type of resident similar to the forest butterflies?”

“Gung?”

“Or they might just be some kind of glowing moss or bacteria.”

They did not move.

They just briefly lit up their bodies and then disappeared.

They resembled the faint starlight.

“…….”

It was a dreamlike scene.

“The color is similar to a glacier, too.”

It didn't have the deep scent of the sea, but the transparent and blue ice floor, whose depth was unknown, was reminiscent of a glacier.

I had never actually seen a glacier on Earth, but I felt that it would probably be a scene like this.

I lifted my head and looked at the full view of the ice cellar.

“Where on earth did all this ice come from? It’s all ice on all sides.”

I wondered every time I saw it.

“This ice cellar can only be reached by coming down a long way from the first floor of the cabin. Then maybe there was groundwater beneath the cabin.”

Then a contradiction arises.

“Right, it doesn’t make sense, logically, for the groundwater under a forest with such a mild climate to be frozen solid like this.”

That was why it was all the more mysterious.

“Nice.”

And funny.

“It’s just like a fairy tale….”

I liked it.

I moved my feet with my face still expressionless and stoic.

Honey, perhaps having already adapted to its body that no longer spread out as before, flew around the large, cave-like ice cellar, making its usual pleasant chirping sounds. It was a scene like a movie.

After walking for a long time through the icy passage, I found what I was looking for.

“Yes, right. It was here.”

It was ice that had grown like a stalagmite in a cave.

“I like this too.”

“Guk?”

“It’s just like a cave.”

It was absurd, but the ice cellar also looked like a limestone cave made of ice.

I didn't know where it was flowing from, or if it had melted, or if it had a water vein like a tree.

Water was dripping here and there in the ice cellar and perhaps due to the low temperature, they would form shoots or create pillars like this.

“Usually, limestone caves are like this. As water containing a large amount of limestone drips, it slowly builds up a pillar on the cave floor, and the water droplets splash here and there, jutting out like coral, or….”

“…….”

“Here. They remain in the shape of a pearl, like this.”

They are actually called cave pearls.

“Of course, these should be called ice pearls, not cave pearls….”

At this rate, doesn't it feel just like a real cave? The great mold created by nature.

“…….”

Ice Pearl

A pearl in the form of ice that occurs naturally in the ice cellar below Jio’s cabin.

A transparent, edible pearl with a faint mother-of-pearl-like luster. It melts in hot temperatures just like real ice and is odorless and tasteless.

Elixir Recipe: When melted and consumed, it shows a great effect in stabilizing mental-type abnormalities such as depression and mania.

“Should I take this?”

Regardless of the effect, didn't it say the taste was the same as real ice?

“It’s tiring to cut off that big ice shoot.”

“Kuruk-kuruk.”

The ice bird Honey, who had flown off with a flit, swallowed one of the roundly gathered ice pearls.

At that nimble sight, I couldn't help but be impressed.

“You’re eating it? Are you a pig?”

“Kurururururu!!”

“No, it’s a misunderstanding. If it sounded like I was scolding you, that’s a very big misunderstanding. Dad likes pigs.”

Having been raised for most of my life by my grandmother, I resembled some of her tastes, one of which was that I couldn't stand to see a skinny person.

In that sense, it would be a joyous thing if Honey, who could be called my child, became plump.

“Kids should eat a lot and grow up big.”

Become a pig, zap.

“Then let’s go up now.”

“Gung-gung-gung….”

“I’m telling you, I actually like it, you pig.”

“Kurururururu!!!”

“Kids have to be chubby to grow up well later.”

Soothing Honey, I came up from the ice cellar and headed straight for the kitchen.

A good fragrance was coming from the fruit cheong I had taken out from the cupboard in advance, and I was already looking forward to how delicious it would be.

I took out a clean glass and transferred two spoonfuls of the fruit cheong into it.

“The fragrance is really nice.”

The Mangdung Fruit, whose fragrance had intensified as it dried, seemed to have its fragrance further amplified when it went through a kind of aging process, even if it wasn't drying.

The Mangdung Fruit, which had soaked up the sugar and imparted its fragrance, gave off its unique refreshing, sweet scent.

“Maybe because the Drought Pot is also a citrus fruit, it seems to have a citrus scent too….”

Should I say it has the bitter and sour scent unique to a lemon peel?

“I’m looking forward to it.”

The fruit cheong in the glass was in itself of artistic value.

The fruit cheong, which had absorbed the sugar completely and generously given up its juice, showed a glossy sheen.

The pulp of the Mangdung Fruit had changed into the form of a soft jelly, and the Drought Pot, whose thin membrane had been painstakingly peeled off, had hardened a little and its pulp had spread out enough to be visible to the eye.

“Let’s add the ice pearl here too….”

“Kok-guruk.”

“That's the pearl you just ate. Put it back.”

“Guk?”

“I decline.”

Honey, who had somehow become water again, was about to perform the bizarre act of vomiting up the ice pearl it had just swallowed, but I stopped it with my authority as a father.

I wasn't asking for penguin milk, not that much.

“Now, if I stir it gently….”

Clatter, clink.

The glass and the ice pearl collide, making a clear sound.

“Fruit tea complete.”

“Quack.”

“Are you a chicken?”

“Grrrng.”

“I can’t figure out your identity.”

The completed fruit tea was so beautiful I wanted to draw it.

The vermilion tea, seen through the glass, was very transparent despite its deep color.

Perhaps due to the influence of the ice pearl, the sparkling blue light I had seen in the storeroom repeatedly shone and disappeared like a shooting star and between them, pulps in the shape of a full moon and a half moon could be seen.

When I took a sip of it as it was….

“…….”

I felt an enchanting flavor.

“…It’s delicious.”

It was a flavor and a savory taste I had never tasted before.

The vermilion tea water was soft and cool and just when the sweetness felt too strong, a leisurely bitterness would approach and politely subdue it.

The intense sourness of the Drought Pot, having met the Mangdung Fruit and sugar, felt like a child's cute whining.

‘I like the pulp too.’

The Mangdung Fruit, which had lost all its juice to the sugar, was like a jelly.

To be precise, it was similar to konjac jelly, but it was much mushier.

It was a texture that felt soft yet had a strange elasticity, like the pulp of a grape with all its skin peeled off.

The Drought Pot had a taste that popped, just like the pulp of a grapefruit or an orange. It seemed to have lost its juice to the sugar like the Mangdung Fruit, but it felt a little harder.

But it was not an unpleasant hardship.

The pulp, which spread gently in my mouth, delivered a pleasant texture.

‘The taste and fragrance are all mixed together, so it's hard to distinguish….’

The tea water, which was by no means one-dimensional and showed a flavor like a soup, and the pulps that added enjoyment to what could have been a monotonous texture and the strange change of it melting softly on the tongue.

That small change was probably from the halo of light trapped inside the ice pearl.

“…Popping candy?”

It didn't exactly spread with a tingle or explode like a firecracker, but the blue halos of light dotted throughout the tea water added a strange savory taste.

I felt a pleasure on the tongue that could not be expressed with sweet or salty.

It was a fruit tea that made one smack their lips for no reason.

“…….”

“Kururuk?”

“It would be perfect for a gift.”

Since I had a lot, the thought of packing some up came to mind.

“I should give it to Mr. Yu Seong-un.”

Wanting to share one's cooking is a halmi’s instinct.

Having grown up hearing ‘live by giving’ from my grandmother, who was my life mentor, I wanted to fatten up Yu Seong-un.

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