Culinary God in Wilderness

Chapter 294: Chapter 197: A Race Against Time

First, he cut bamboo tubes to various lengths, leaving an extra finger’s length on each one.

He pressed the tip of his sharp military knife against the side of a bamboo tube, then used another piece of bamboo as a hammer to strike it down hard, piercing a hole. He then used the bamboo knife to widen the hole, creating a straight, horizontal slit.

He stood the bamboo tube upright and placed the blade vertically against its edge, giving it a light tap downwards.

CRACK.

Due to its natural grain, the bamboo tube split open instantly, cracking all the way from the top down to the slit.

He repeated the process on the other side, easily creating a small window-like opening.

Then he flipped the tube over and made another "window" in the same way. Now he could slot it onto the top of the bamboo wall.

This semi-H-shaped structure allowed one bamboo tube to be slotted securely onto another. If it didn’t fit, he’d just whack it a few times with the bamboo knife, forcing it into place.

The rain was so heavy anyway, and it didn’t look like it was going to stop anytime soon.

He stayed inside the bamboo hut, endlessly processing bamboo tubes of various shapes and fitting them one by one into their proper places.

After what felt like an eternity, when the last bamboo tube was slotted into its designated spot, Lin Chen let out a long sigh of relief and collapsed onto the ground.

The prolonged labor made his hands tremble uncontrollably. He could barely even muster the strength to make a fist.

He stopped to rest for a while. The blood rushing through his veins gradually cooled. His body was covered in a layer of moisture—he couldn’t tell if it was rainwater that hadn’t dried, sweat, or a mixture of both.

Although the bamboo hut could block the rain, it was, after all, just a structure made of bamboo stalks stacked together. It couldn’t completely block the wind.

Chilly gusts of wind seeped through the cracks between the bamboo tubes, making him shiver.

Lin Chen shuddered. He glanced at his shirt and pants on the ground nearby and hesitated for a long moment before giving up the urge to put them on.

He checked the time.

It was just past six-thirty.

It should have been sunrise, but the world hadn’t changed in the slightest. It was still dark and gloomy.

At this rate, the rain probably wasn’t going to stop anytime soon. His dry clothes were his last resort.

The walls were done, but the doorway was still an empty opening.

He brought a bamboo stalk in from the ground by the entrance and marked it at the appropriate height for the door.

"Making a door is much simpler than building the hut. I’ll just weave one out of bamboo strips."

Just like weaving a mat or a basket, he used a cross-hatching method. He prepared five short bamboo strips and laid them out side by side. Then, he took a long bamboo strip and wove it through them in a wave-like pattern, going over and under.

The second long strip would be the opposite of the first. If the first strip went over the first, third, and fifth short strips, then the second strip would go over the second and fourth.

The longer the bamboo strip, the better its flexibility. This meant the short strips were extremely rigid and served perfectly to hold the structure in place.

As he sat on the ground, leisurely splitting bamboo strips, he suddenly heard a faint voice calling from outside.

"Lin!"

"Lin, are you in there?"

"Hmm?"

’At first, he thought he was hearing things. In a downpour this heavy, no sane person would choose to go out.’

But just a few seconds later, he heard the same call again, and the voice was clearly getting louder.

He walked to the doorway and peered outside. The gray, torrential downpour was still raging, and he could barely see anything more than three meters away.

"Erica?"

He called out tentatively.

"I knew you’d be here!"

The moment she spoke, a slender figure broke through the curtain of rain, rushing straight toward him.

As she ran, she kicked up large splashes of mud, a dozen or so drops even splattering onto her fair face.

Erica was holding a bamboo basket over her head, with a wide banana leaf inside acting as a makeshift umbrella.

But the basket’s space was limited. At most, it could only protect her head. Her camouflage outfit was already soaked through, clinging tightly to her body.

She came barreling out of the torrential rain like that. If Lin Chen hadn’t reached out to stop her in time, the unlucky victim would have been his nearly completed bamboo hut.

"What are you doing here?"

Gazing at the soaked girl in front of him, Lin Chen frowned, his eyes filled with confusion.

"To grill you some fish!"

Erica turned to the side, and only then did he see that she was also carrying another bamboo basket on her back. Inside was a huge...

"A stingray?"

Seeing its unique shape and the few sharp barbs on its tail, Lin Chen, with his encyclopedic knowledge of marine fish, quickly identified the flat fish’s true identity.

He blinked, and it all clicked. No wonder he had faintly smelled the salty, fishy scent of the sea when he woke up this morning.

At the time, he thought it was a sign of the coming rain, and with the strong winds, he figured the smell had just blown in from the coast.

’So that’s what it was! It was the smell of this stingray all along!’

"You caught this last night? Nice!"

He gave her a thumbs-up, not holding back his praise.

"Of course!" Erica lifted her chin, her face beaming with pride. "I’ve always had great luck. Whenever I go out hunting, I almost never come back empty-handed!"

"Then here’s a question."

Lin Chen pointed at the curtain of rain outside, which looked as if the heavens had opened up. "Can you not see this downpour? Or feel this gale?"

"I know."

"Then what are you doing out in the rain? It takes at least half an hour to get here from the cave shelter. What if you catch a cold and get a fever?"

"We can just start a fire and warm up. Just think of it like getting out of the water after a swim. It was only half an hour. I’ll be fine."

Erica looked completely unbothered. Her eyes scanned him up and down, a mischievous smile playing on her lips.

"Well, look at you. You’re pretty built with your shirt off. The muscle definition is clear. Do you work out?"

’Is this really the time to be concerned about something like that?’

Lin Chen rolled his eyes, not bothering to answer her question. He pointed to the empty space inside the hut.

"Then let me ask you, how are we supposed to start a fire? Where are we going to find firewood?"

"Look at this."

Erica giggled mischievously and brought over the bamboo basket she had been holding on her head.

It was only then that Lin Chen noticed there was also a section of bamboo tube on the banana leaf. She must have been holding it up with her hand, and it had been hidden by the banana leaf and the basket, which was why he hadn’t seen it.

"This couldn’t be... embers, could it?"