I Became A Married Man in Another World
Chapter 25
025 Caught Some Emergency Rations
The dead rabbit was skinned right then and there.
The arrows, crafted from shaped bamboo, were thicker than expected.
Blood overflowed from the wound, which was as wide as Juhwan’s finger, soaking the rabbit’s fur while its body heat had yet to fade.
The torso, where the arrow hadn’t struck, was relatively clean. The fur had acted as a barrier against the flowing blood, preventing too much of a mess.
“….”
He had often watched rabbits being butchered, but this was the first time he had done it himself. He had made many mistakes when handling the wolf. He wouldn’t repeat them. Juhwan moved his hands, recalling what his grandfather used to do.
He had lived with his grandfather for about a year when he was in middle school. His grandfather passed away after only that much time together.
Afterward, he drifted between relatives’ houses for a week or two at a time before eventually getting a small place of his own.
He was lonely, but he didn’t resent anyone.
Among his relatives, rumors circulated that his parents and his grandfather had all died because of Juhwan.
He thought so, too. That everyone close to him, everyone he cherished, would die.
It was only natural for a child followed by death to live alone.
He accepted it that way, but perhaps he had been wounded in his own way; during high school, he would throw a punch at anyone he bumped into.
He didn’t want to lose anyone in this world. Riji and Dorothy…
No, Santa guaranteed it, so it would be fine. Surely.
While he skinned the rabbit and handled the entrails, thinking of these things in no particular order, Gus watched silently from the side.
Occasionally, Gus would lightly tap Juhwan’s arm to signal him to stop, then teach him a minor detail. Things like how to grip the knife or how to make incisions in the hide. Other than that, he didn’t interfere much.
After processing the rabbit, they hung it on a tree for a moment and removed the snare from that spot. Since it was a simple rope tied in a loop, the snare was as easy to remove as it was to set.
Gus used a hook-like piece of metal he’d brought to scrape the hard ground, then buried the entrails inside. After covering it with a bit of nearby snow, the spot looked clean.
Since it was far from the house, it didn’t seem like a big deal if beasts were drawn by the scent of blood, so why? Was there a reason to go through the trouble of burying it? The thought suddenly struck him as odd.
“This, blood, leaving it, okay?”
When he asked in awkward pronunciation if it wouldn’t be okay to just leave the blood, Gus shook his head.
“Bad, beast ### large ## no.”
They went back and forth a few more times as Juhwan struggled to understand.
During the conversation, Juhwan realized he had been confusing the words for ‘large’ and ‘wide.’
Once he corrected the misunderstood word, the meaning became clear. Because the territory of carnivorous animals was wide, it was better to bury the traces after killing an animal, even if it was far from home.
The words Gus and Riji spoke were surely the same language, but as he listened, there were times when the endings or the nuances felt slightly different.
It was likely a difference in the roughness of speech used by men versus women, or perhaps slight variations in tone depending on age.
Once he became fully accustomed to the language of this world, would he be able to understand such subtle differences? He was still far from reaching that level.
Seeing that Juhwan seemed to understand his words, Gus added more.
“Hunter ##### dangerous.”
Juhwan nodded, understanding. Ah, I see.
As long as they roamed the mountains, hunters could also encounter dangerous predators.
Thinking of that, it was best not to leave traces anywhere if possible.
There was a meaning behind even the smallest of a hunter’s actions. Juhwan recalled every single thing Gus had done while they were together.
Even if Gus hadn’t explicitly said so, there must have been actions among them that were absolute taboos.
There might have been cases with very significant meanings that Juhwan simply hadn’t known.
‘I should pay attention to those things from now on.’
The work of a hunter is learned more by watching and following than by verbal instruction. He must not neglect things just because he thinks he already knows them.
He thought so with his head, but it was still difficult in practice. There were still far too many things he missed without realizing.
He remembered the eyes of the rabbit that had looked at him, filled with pain and terror every time he loosed an arrow.
He must not forget today’s work either. Even though he could have ended its life in an instant, he had intentionally caused it pain. That wasn’t hunting, nor was it a righteous act. It was a cowardly deed that went against the natural order.
However, seeing that Gus had insisted on it, there must be a reason.
‘I think those eyes will stay in my heart forever.’
Juhwan let out a soft breath.
Suddenly, a scene flashed through his mind—a bear or a wolf breaking into his home and harming Riji and Dorothy. Biting their hands so they couldn’t move, tearing at their feet… The terror-stricken eyes of his family overlapped with the rabbit’s eyes.
Stop.
Juhwan shook his head.
He had tools now. Using the tools the villagers had brought, he would be able to build a fence around the house. He would start today, right away.
Hunting isn’t a romance. It’s a matter of survival for both humans and animals.
And never forget. Humans aren’t the only ones who hunt. Animals do the same, and often much more skillfully.
Gus rummaged through his bag.
Gus’s bag was only slightly larger than Juhwan’s, but it seemed to hold more items than expected.
From a corner of the bag, Gus pulled out a small, rolled-up bundle of cloth. When unfurled, it became a pouch made of old cloth.
Gus held the cloth pouch out to Juhwan.
“Here # rabbit #### put # take.”
It seemed he was giving all the rabbits they’d just caught to Juhwan. Without refusing, Juhwan bowed his head slightly.
“Thank you.”
“….”
Gus gave a silent, toothy grin.
Juhwan put the skinned rabbit carcass and the fur into the cloth pouch.
He wrapped the long string attached near the opening around it to tie it shut, then fastened it to his waist.
His waist felt heavy with the weight of the rabbit, and his heart felt a little heavy, too.
There were a few more places where snares had been set. Nothing had been caught the previous night, but today, there was a rabbit in the second snare as well.
Gus handled it this time.
After telling Juhwan to watch from the side, Gus killed and skinned the rabbit in an instant.
His method was slightly different from Juhwan’s. It was faster and rougher. Where the naked rabbit and its fur remained, there were also fewer traces of blood.
It would be better to follow this man’s way from now on. Juhwan mentally rehearsed what Gus had done several times.
That rabbit became Gus’s. Gus also put it in a pouch and hung it from his waist, just as Juhwan had.
But when they went to the fourth snare, there was another rabbit caught.
That was the last snare. Gus smiled as if they were lucky today.
“You ## rabbit ### take.”
The last rabbit seemed to be Juhwan’s share. Fairly speaking, they should have split it in half, but Juhwan didn’t try to save face or offer it back. He decided to accept it gratefully.
Approaching the snare to take the rabbit, Juhwan suddenly stopped. The thought occurred to him: what if he raised this rabbit?
Raising rabbits isn’t that difficult. As long as you feed them and keep the hutch clean, they don’t require much work. If he remembered correctly, the smell wasn’t that bad either.
Though their appearance was slightly different, the ecology in this world and Earth was probably similar. Or perhaps, since it was a rabbit, it was exactly the same.
Rabbits have many offspring. He remembered his grandfather often muttering that it was hard work cutting enough grass to feed them because they had so many babies so often.
During times when he couldn’t hunt or during seasons of hunger, rabbits would serve as good emergency rations. The slender frames of Riji and Dorothy floated before his eyes. He could keep those two from going hungry. If he raised rabbits, he could have a stable supply of meat.
“….”
His grandfather had occasionally bought feed to give them, but basically, he had fed them straw from barley or rice and grass cut from the surroundings.
The mountain was covered in trees and grass. There would be plenty of food.
“Okay?”
Seeing Juhwan suddenly stop, Gus asked as if it were strange.
Juhwan looked at Gus and spoke.
“Gus, rabbit take, kill, no.”
When he used gestures to explain that he wanted to take it alive and raise it, Gus finally understood and covered his mouth with his hand. For some reason, he couldn’t seem to stop laughing.
Gus didn’t particularly object, nodding his head while saying, “Good, good.”
However, looking at his expression, there was no doubt he thought Juhwan’s idea was foolish. Since he allowed it, it didn’t seem to be a forbidden or dangerous thing, but why? He didn’t know. At any rate, it was fine as long as raising rabbits on the mountain wasn’t prohibited.
As Juhwan approached the rabbit, Gus gave him one more pouch.
When he put the rabbit inside, it struggled a bit at first, but soon grew quiet. It remained still, huddled up.
He worried for a moment if the rabbit would attract dangerous animals like wolves, but looking at Gus’s reaction, that wouldn’t be the case.
There seemed to be something Juhwan didn’t know, but as long as it wasn’t dangerous, it was fine. Given the laughter, it couldn’t be anything serious.
Afterward, Gus took Juhwan to his house.
Juhwan stood waiting in front of the house, but this time, Gus led him to a shed located behind it.
The simple, wooden shed wasn’t much different from the one at Juhwan’s house. It was ordinary. Since there was a separate place for firewood, he figured the items inside would be similar.
Not knowing why he had been called here, Juhwan stood hesitantly in front of the shed.
Gus opened the door and called to him.
“Come inside.”
“….”
As he followed the summons into the shed, the scent of wood wafted out. Even though it was daytime, the interior was a bit dark.
Juhwan’s eyes widened in slight surprise.
On a shelf along one wall, bamboo arrows were laid out. There were a great many of them.
Some had heads, and some didn’t. Some were tipped with blunt iron heads, while others had barbed iron heads.
There were also arrows made entirely of wood, with the tips simply carved into sharp points.
On the floor next to the shelf, several large wooden buckets were placed.
They were filled with bamboo stalks about the thickness of an arrow.
And in the opposite corner, there was a container filled with bird feathers.
It was full of long, slender feathers.
A small container nearby held only the iron heads.
Juhwan shifted his gaze to the side.
On the wall directly facing the door, flat wooden planks about the height of Juhwan were stuck in a bin. There was a considerable amount of these as well.
Unlike the arrows, which were all bamboo, the planks here seemed to be made of different types of wood.
However, they were all of a similar shape.
Some just looked like planks because they hadn’t been carved yet, but the ones that were carved were the same shape as the one Juhwan was carrying. The middle section curved inward in a smooth circle.
“Bow?”
When Juhwan asked, Gus nodded.
Gus pointed to a corner. There was a wooden workbench on the right wall, and an unfinished bow lay upon it.
Juhwan had thought bows and arrows were something bought from somewhere. But except for things hard to find on the mountain like iron heads, it seemed Gus made them all himself.
“Gus make? Bow? Arrow?”
“Yeah. # I make. ## You ## teach ####.”
“I, learn? Gus teach?”
“Yeah.”
It seemed Gus was going to teach him how to make bows and arrows from now on.
Suddenly, he thought he knew why the bow’s shape was almost a straight line.
Even to Juhwan, who knew nothing about bows, a curved bow would be difficult to make.
For wood to take such a shape, it would probably have to be bent for a considerable period of time. Perhaps some kind of apparatus was needed. He might not be able to do it alone. He didn’t know for sure, but it was certainly a difficult task.
But if it were such a simple shape, it was possible to do it alone.
“I, look? Okay?”
When Juhwan pointed at the bows and arrows and asked if he could take a closer look, Gus nodded.
Juhwan looked around the shed thoroughly, occasionally stroking things with his hand.
He touched the arrows on the shelf and picked up a feather from the bin to check it.
The feathers had slightly different curves. Some curved to the right, and some to the left.
He had thought feathers grew straight, but it was different from what he’d imagined.
Surely the feathers in this world weren’t different from Earth’s, yet it felt a bit strange. Didn’t all birds have the same kind of feathers?
Juhwan walked around, touching the long bows and the uncarved wooden planks.
It seemed a process of drying the wood was necessary to make bows and arrows. Perhaps that period was quite long. The moisture in the wood felt slightly different to the touch.
Since coming to this world, he had come to realize how little he knew. Most of what he had learned while living on Earth was useless here.
A bitter smile played on Juhwan’s face.
