With a tree stick, survival is half guaranteed!
That was, of course, a joke among the online friends.
But for Bi Fang, a straight tree stick was indeed an unexpected delight, as its help in probing the snow-covered ground was quite significant.
It protected his joints, maintained his balance, and even made walking up slopes more effortless, effectively increasing his average speed.
Studies have proven that a walking stick of the right length can reduce the impact on the knees by more than 40%, especially when going downhill.
Bi Fang’s joints were naturally strong enough to withstand the impact, but the stick’s help in maintaining balance and speeding up his progress was truly appreciated.
The tree branch itself had not dried out to the point of snapping easily; on the contrary, it retained a fair degree of toughness and could serve as a perfect probing stick.
And its length was just adequate to double as a makeshift weapon.
The reason it was just makeshift was that the Arctic was indeed too dry; although the tree stick still had toughness, using it as a spear was somewhat of a stretch.
As for brushing aside undergrowth, startling snakes in the grass, clearing thorny vines from the path, or webs along the way—these functions were utterly useless in the Arctic.
There were no trees nearby, so it was clear that the stick had broken off from some tree and been blown here by the wind, with many branches still attached.
Selecting a segment of the right length and straightness, Bi Fang whittled away all the excess parts with a knife. Larger branches were collected for making snowshoes; smaller ones, though less useful, served as fuel—nothing wasted.
"I’m not new to making snowshoes. Sometimes, in treacherous, snow-covered terrain, you find that your boots always sink into the snow. In such conditions, snowshoes are very necessary."
"Sinking into the snow is like sinking into mud while planting rice in the South, draining much more energy when walking. Energy is precious; we must save it. Homemade snowshoes distribute your weight over a larger area, making it easier to walk on snow."
"This branch is from a pine tree, the most common tree in the Polar Region. Even without leaves, its dense branches make excellent material."
Bi Fang cut 5 to 10 branches about half a meter long, tied the bottoms together, and gathered the branch shafts loosely around a central point. Next, he tied his foot to the front third of the makeshift snowshoe with a strap.
"If you have ample time, you could make a more complex trail snowshoe with saplings and thin ropes, but that’s not necessary for us on the vast expanse of Greenland."
Greenland is essentially composed of towering mountain ranges, massive blue-green icebergs, magnificent fjords, and barren, exposed rock.
From the air, however, it looks like a vast, open wilderness dotted with uneven black peaks occasionally piercing the blindingly white and endlessly extending ice fields.
Overall, Greenland is an island of great contrasts: in summer, meadows near the coast bloom with Purple Edelweiss and yellow poppies, along with shrubby arctic willows and birches.
However, central and northern Greenland are locked under massive ice caps, with no grasslands or flowers for hundreds of kilometers—a vast expanse reminiscent of a white desert.
"If you don’t plan to walk on flat terrain with your snowshoes but need to climb or descend mountains, or cross slopes, then your snowshoes need a certain level of adherence to the ground. Therefore, your snowshoes should have fittings like splints or hooks at the toes, heels, and sides to grip the terrain."
Read lat𝙚st chapters at fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓ Only.
After a brief overview of other conditions, Bi Fang continued to move forward.
With the aid of snowshoes, Bi Fang’s walking speed visibly reached a new level.
Looking at the sun overhead, the weather today was also quite nice, with intense sunlight melting and refreezing the surface of the snow, crunching beneath his feet.
Furthermore, during autumn and winter, temperate cyclones frequently invaded Greenland, causing dramatic temperature fluctuations, sometimes -50°C, other times -30°C.
Bi Fang suspected that today’s temperature might only be in the low twenties below zero, far less oppressive than the scorching cold of the previous days.
The howling winds, like frosty blades, seemed intent on dismembering a person, and the cuts made by them might be more appealing than the ice-fresh danxia produced by the Polar Celestial Wolf’s blade.
With unrealistic fantasies roaming his mind, Bi Fang felt he might be too hungry, as his thoughts began to drift away.
Normally, he was a person with a very strong sense of purpose, which allowed him to gradually establish stable living conditions in the wilderness without getting sidetracked with haphazard ideas.
Bi Fang felt that this was caused by a lack of energy in his brain, with his willpower being continually eroded in this harsh environment.
Many people would think that willpower is a psychological topic, without realizing that it should actually be categorized as a physiological one.
This thing is a consumable, each struggle against instinct causing internal consumption, and it’s also a main factor in supporting efficient work.
When willpower is insufficient, it’s easy to fantasize, to let one’s mind wander.
"Huff!"
Bi Fang pulled down the cover over his mouth and nose, exposed his face to the cold wind, and rubbed it, took a deep breath to maximize his blood oxygen content, and only then did he feel rejuvenated.
It was time to quicken the pace.
An unprecedented hunger pangs unleashed Bi Fang’s potential, and with the help of snowshoes, he even ran faster than when he first arrived in Greenland.
Bi Fang crouched down, knocked off a piece of light blue ice with rounded edges, and shoved it into his dry water bottle.
"The older the sea ice, the less salt it contains. Aged sea ice breaks off with rounded edges, and its surface is often pitted; the part submerged in water appears light blue. Fresh sea ice is milky white like cow’s milk, with sharp angles when broken."
[What’s the rationale behind that?]
"It’s due to different microstructures, ice varies from ice."
Bi Fang pointed to the ice beneath his feet, next to which was a thick layer of snow that had been shoveled and piled up.
After a blizzard, the ice surface exposed on the ground could hardly be seen, and snow had to be shoveled to fetch water.
"Freshly formed sea ice is made up of needle-like or flake-like tiny ice crystals; a mass of ice crystals coalesce and gather to form a sticky or spongy ice, which upon snowing at a temperature near freezing point on the sea surface, does not melt and directly forms a sticky ice."
"Ice skin is formed directly by the freezing of a calm sea surface, or by the continued freezing of newly formed ice. Its thickness is about 5 centimeters, quite brittle, and easily broken into rectangular thin ice pieces by the wind on the sea surface or the currents of the water."
"If the newly formed ice continues to grow, freezing into a flexible thin ice layer of about 10cm thick, it will bend easily and break into rectangular ice pieces under external forces. And the breaking of pancake ice into thin pieces, under external forces, will collide with and compress against each other, causing edges to rise and form."
"Eventually, it transforms into circular ice disks of about 30cm to 3m in diameter, with a thickness of around 10cm; this degree of ice is known as old ice. New ice doesn’t freeze like this, it seems the river section under our feet must have been frozen for a long time."
Shuiyou were still listening to Bi Fang’s scientific explanation, but when they heard the last sentence, they paused, and then suddenly realized what it meant.
A river?
Did they find a river!?