156 – Year 1(4)
Chester and Monia stared at the brilliant golden spider in front of them.
“… … spider.”
a spider How the hell am I supposed to eat this?
Yes, Chester has such a good stomach that he is willing to eat all sorts of bugs if need be, and he has no aversion to insects or the fact that he eats them.
If I had nothing to eat, I would eat centipedes like noodles, and even if that wasn’t the case, I could eat grasshoppers like snacks.
However, even Chester couldn’t figure out how to feed this gigantic spider, which seemed to be bigger than a human body.
When you lightly touch the spider, you can feel the hard shell underneath the soft fur.
“… It’s hard.”
Yes, spiders are also insects, so they must be hard on the outside, but how many times do people actually feel that they are hard while looking at them? Ordinary spiders, no matter how hard they are, will be crushed if a child presses on them.
Monia also trembled as if she was getting goosebumps when she touched the fluffy hair while trying to touch the spider.
“There’s no poison, right?”
“… … There is a picture drawn here.”
An explanation about the spider was drawn on the leaves beneath the spider.
“Well. A fruit-eating spider, not an insect? And live only at the top. Living in a place where nature is abundant and there are no competitors or predators, the body is dull and there is no weapon to defend oneself.”
“There are people at the top.”
“They don’t touch them until they get through the winter. 1 year… No, the floating island goes around the sea once every few years, so from the point of view of the kids, the people at the top touch them once every few years.”
“Oh, then you might not feel like a predator.”
“right. Anyway, since it’s not poisonous, you can eat it.”
But, how should I eat it?
Chester and Monia were in deep trouble.
“Shall I cut my hair first?”
“Well. OK. Cut and bake… No, no.”
Chester saw a kiln making smoke.
“Just like I said earlier, let’s use this palanquin.”
“yes?”
“Let’s put it in the kiln and steam it whole.”
Saying that, Chester pulled out a piece of firewood. Bring the burning firewood to the spider and move it as if the spider’s surface is slightly scorched with fire.
The spider’s hair curled and burned, but because the shell itself was golden, the spider did not lose its luster. However, the hair reflected the golden light here and there to make it look shiny, but as the hair disappeared, the color became a bit dull.
Chester opened the lid of the palanquin while Monia peeled off the tanned fur with a knife, making a space for the spider inside.
This spider is as huge as a human body, and the flesh rises well, so it is large, but it is still a spider. If you bend your legs and bend your body, the area becomes considerably smaller.
After bending it around and putting it into a round spider, close the lid.
While the spider was getting warm in the kiln and slowly ripening, Chester and Monia had a conversation while waiting for it to be completed.
“What about the warehouse? Build it?”
“Ugh. Winter weather won’t come for a while, so it’s okay to build it as it is, but I’m still anxious.”
Of course, most of the conversations that occur on a floating island where there is nothing special happen are work.
“Should I build it on the ground? Digging the ground… .”
“Oh, like I said before?”
“yes. Didn’t Ant ever tell you when he was digging the tunnel? I gave up because the workload was too much.”
“Because you can’t be held in one warehouse forever.”
“right. However, because of the hail and wind, I think we should be prepared for a situation where we can’t escape the island until next winter, even if it’s difficult.”
“Then shall we slowly build warehouses in the future? There won’t be a need to hoard so many preserved foods for a while.”
“Let’s get rid of all the warehouses built on trees, leaving only the underground warehouses.”
“yes. It’s a shame it broke.”
“I can’t help it. But we’ll do the demolition later, after we’ve completed the warehouse on the ground and moved the stuff.”
After sorting out the warehouse story to some extent, we move on to the next story.
In the past, when Chester thought alone and decided on a solution, Monia often listened to it and followed it, but as time went on, that decreased and more and more decisions were made while conversing with Monia.
“When the sun is out, are you going to practice riding a boat?”
“yes. It should be. It’s a pity that we couldn’t salvage an intact ship there.”
“Because everything is broken.”
“Because there was a boat hanging next to the ship… It must have been an easy target for them.”
The beach is still a mess. Like the villa destroyed by cannonballs, the stones dug up covering the beach, and the bamboo salt farm that was equally smashed because of it.
I left the beach that way because of the winter, so I have to clean that up too. I’ve been clearing things up a bit over the past few days, but I’m still a long way off.
“Right, what did Baram say before he left?”
“I heard you expect your baby to be born?”
“yes? But why did you make that face?”
“Isn’t that a bit strange? When I said that of course I was waiting, the expression on my face was strange.”
“What is there?”
“Also, it must be their own culture. It’s a culture related to babies… … In my village, when a baby was born, all the women who gave birth raised it together.”
“Eh?”
“You said it was a poor village. If you don’t eat properly, even if you give birth to a baby, milk may not come out. It was a custom in preparation for such an occasion.”
Chester laughed.
“So I thought I had three mothers at first.”
“Whoop whoop. Well, you might have that kind of misunderstanding.”
“The first person I called mother was from another family, and that shocked my mother.”
Monia put on a strange expression when she remembered Chester’s mother watching over Chester, whom other people call her mother. It was obviously funny, but considering Chester’s mother’s feelings, it seemed like it was serious, so it was funny. It was a difficult situation.
After reading Monia’s expression, Chester smiled and said, “What do you care about?” and looked at the kiln, which slowly began to smell delicious.
“Oh, the smell is very strong? The strong smell of bear meat has completely disappeared.”
“Wow, this is, wow. What should I say about this?”
Monia, who smelled the smell of spiders coming out of the kiln, looked at the kiln with a startled expression.
“It’s the first smell I’ve ever smelled.”
“Monia, you too?”
“yes.”
“Then I have no idea what the hell this tastes like.”
“What is this? The smell is very strong, but not disgusting, and it is amazing. I guess I can taste the smell. Should I say flavor? Even so, it does not remain in the nose for a long time and disappears neatly, so no matter how much you smell it, it is not burdensome. But my appetite is ticking.”
“Even if you say so, I don’t know.”
“really. It’s going into your mouth, so be careful.”
This time, Monia bruises Chester.
At the end, when the smell had thickened to some extent, Chester opened the kiln and took out the spider from inside.
The golden spider had turned brown from the heat, and it gave off a smell incomparable to the one that leaked from being trapped in the kiln.
“… … How do you eat this?”
“Well, from what is written on the leaves, it looks like they are eating a leg. You broke your leg and chewed it like a cookie?”
“Can we do that with our mouths? The skin seems to have become harder after baking it.”
“It seems that the flesh inside is more delicious than the skin, so you can just eat that.”
Chester held out his knife and cut off three of the spider’s legs.
The moment the spider’s leg was cut off, something like water flowed out of the leg. Seeing the firm flesh filling the cut section, Chester cautiously used the knife to peel off a piece of skin from the leg.
The moment a piece of skin is peeled off, the flesh of the leg, which has lost its support, seems to fall down, and then bounces bouncy with the recoil.
“wow.”
“what.”
After peeling off the remaining two legs, give one to Monia and Ant.
The three watched the shiny spider’s leg meat, swallowed the drool that flowed out without even realizing it, and then all of them bit the leg meat together.
“Oh, that’s a little bit.”
“… … !”
– Kwang! kong!
Unlike Chester, who ended the evaluation with a little sweetness, Monia’s whole body trembled and struggled as soon as she took a bite.
and shouted
“Don’t end this with a little sweetness!”
The first thing that came out of Monia’s mouth was nagging at Chester’s reaction, which was even boring.
“Ah, what.”
“really! Let’s see! If you get out of here, I’ll feed you something delicious! Let’s see if he still talks like that!”
Monia devours the spider’s leg while screaming like that.
“delicious! Gummy is delicious!?”
When Chester saw that, he cut off a new leg and gave it to Monia, who took it and ate it.
“Then you only say that it’s delicious.”
It seems that Chester’s point was not heard by Monia now.
Chester ate the spider leisurely, laughing and crying while watching Moniana eat the leg of the spider and Ant rushing to eat the skin.