Chapter 48: The Function of Glasses

Chapter 48: The Purpose of the Glasses

While Su Keke was still watching cartoons, Xu Yi lit the other two bonfires.

Although they were at the edge of the jungle, there was hardly any wind. Otherwise, the smoke from three bonfires would have made it impossible for them to sleep.

After lighting the fires, Xu Yi made a perimeter check and saw no animals in their immediate vicinity.

When he used to watch survival shows, he remembered hearing Bear Grylls say that if you are roasting meat, a black bear can smell it from forty kilometers away. Whether black bears were truly that powerful was uncertain, but Xu Yi knew that most animals would not dare to approach an open flame. Animals that feared no fire were likely extremely rare. Creatures as fearless as honey badgers were few and far between. Besides, this was a jungle region, and there shouldn't be any honey badgers here.

Xu Yi had no immediate plans to touch the litter of mountain rats. Their pups grew quite fast; if the rats didn't relocate, Xu Yi figured it would be a good idea to catch them after a little while.

He chopped a thick vine and tied the end to his back basket, suspending it in the air. This way, the mountain rats wouldn't be able to reach the cassava inside the basket. Of course, because of the limited height, an animal like a black bear could still reach the contents of the basket. However, a black bear probably wouldn't cross the bonfires to come right into the middle.

If he had more time, he could have dug a wide circular trench. During the rainy season it would serve for drainage, and when it wasn't raining, he could fill it with glowing charcoal to form a protective ring. That would certainly be completely safe. Naturally, that required a sufficiently large area and plenty of charcoal; otherwise, it would easily lead to carbon monoxide poisoning.

The best method was still to build a sturdy fence to keep intruders out of the camp. Although it would consume a vast amount of time and energy in the early stages, once built, it would save trouble once and for all. Therefore, Xu Yi still favored using a fence. He planned to gather some thorny briars; a fence made of such material could block the invasion of the vast majority of wild beasts.

The advantage of humans lay in their ability to utilize various resources and tools.

"Daddy, the tablet ran out of battery and turned itself off."

Su Keke rubbed her eyes, knowing that there were no more cartoons for her to watch in this place.

Xu Yi checked the time and saw that it was already past ten o'clock.

"Then hurry up and go to sleep. Daddy will come to sleep in a minute."

Xu Yi intended to take apart the tablet before going to bed.

After handing the tablet to Xu Yi, Su Keke obediently crawled into the hammock and prepared for sleep.

Xu Yi held the tablet upright, close to the fire.

This tablet had no screws; it was sealed entirely with adhesive tape. As long as the edges of the tablet were heated to a certain degree, the screen could be pried open and detached.

[Now I finally know what the temple of Number One's glasses is for! It turns out it was meant for taking apart the tablet so he can use the metal back to make a pot.]

[I guessed it long ago. After all, the function of a spectacle temple is rather limited. I thought Number One might bend the outer curved part to make a fishhook for fishing.]

After heating it over the fire for half an hour, Xu Yi took off his jacket, picked up the tablet, placed it on the ground, and began to pry it open.

Because he had heated it for a sufficiently long time, and the glasses temple was thin enough, he easily pried the screen of the tablet loose.

After separating the screen and the back casing, Xu Yi tested turning it on.

"Good, it's not broken. It still turns on."

The remaining battery was only a sliver, and shortly after booting up, it shut itself down again.

"Tomorrow, I can forge this into a small pot. With a pot, boiling things will be a bit more convenient."

"However, its capacity is limited, so I still need to find a way to make pottery."

"As long as I find suitable clay, I'll start making pottery."

"Alright, it's getting late, I need to rest too."

With that, Xu Yi added more wood to all three bonfires before heading to bed.

Squeezing two people into one hammock was still quite crowded. Therefore, Xu Yi planned to pull down some vines the next day so Su Keke could weave a smaller hammock of her own. That way, they each would have their own hammock and could sleep much better.

Although they were close to the small river, the sound of the current was very faint. Listening to it was quite hypnotic because the sound of flowing water acted as white noise, making people feel very comfortable.

Before long, Xu Yi fell asleep as well.

During the night, some animal noises echoed nearby, but they didn't wake Xu Yi up.

Dawn broke quickly.

Su Keke woke up first and got out of bed.

After getting down, she added some dead wood to the bonfires. She retrieved two cassava tubers from the back basket, dug a small pit, and placed the tubers inside. She covered them with a very thin layer of soil and moved the fire directly over the cassava. This way, by the time Xu Yi woke up, they would probably be ready to eat.

Although Su Keke didn't have a watch, she figured it was still quite early, so she wanted to let Xu Yi sleep a little longer.

"Keke, did you go and roast the cassava?"

Xu Yi sat up and asked.

"Mhm, mhm! Daddy, why did you wake up? You could have slept a bit more."

Su Keke ran over to Xu Yi, picked up one of his shoes, and banged it hard against the ground.

Xu Yi had told her that upon waking up in the morning, she must always knock out the shoes so that any bugs or scorpions hiding inside would crawl out. In the jungle, caution was the most fundamental rule of survival.

Seeing the obedient Su Keke handing over a shoe, Xu Yi took it and put it on. Once both shoes were on, he patted Su Keke's little head.

"It's almost eight o'clock now, not early at all. We still have a lot of things to do today."

Since they had chosen this place to build a camp, they needed enough materials to construct a safe shelter.

"Daddy, are we going to build a little house today?" Su Keke asked curiously.

"Well, Daddy plans to collect all the vines nearby, and then we'll weave a house out of them."

Xu Yi shared his thought, believing that weaving a house from vines was a pretty good idea. The vines here were quite tough and could definitely accomplish this.

Since they didn't have enough time to build a fence first, a sturdy vine house could also serve as a great protective barrier. After all, the temperature difference between day and night here wasn't very large, and there was hardly any wind. Therefore, a well-ventilated camp was much more suitable.

However, whether it would actually work remained to be seen once they started doing it.