20

Chapter 20

“Nice.”

As always, this latest project had been quite a success.

“People need to work up a sweat.”

“Kkung?”

“Those who do not work shall not eat.”

“Kkung, kkung, kkung…?”

Honey, the sweet-colored waterfowl, trembled all over. At the cry that seemed to ask, “Then what about me, since I don’t work?” Gio firmly shook his head.

“Why would you worry about that when you’re so cute?”

“Kkuk.”

“You’re already doing your share by being cute, so don’t worry about strange things.”

Even someone as carefree as Gio was not irresponsible enough to neglect a living creature he had brought forth with his paints. As the son of Gio, who was both a gourmet and a hearty eater, Honey would never have to go hungry.

“Understand?”

Convinced, Honey sprawled out comfortably.

“But please get out of there.”

“Kkuru.”

Of all places, he had chosen Gio’s basket.

“You’re making it hard to take out the seeds.”

“Kkurung.”

“Who did you inherit such stubbornness from?”

“Kkuk?”

“Me? What an unfilial child.”

Gio bent over and rummaged through the basket. Honey’s body had only the faintest viscosity and was otherwise transparent water itself, so that was not much of a problem. But the little fellow had played with the seeds and mixed them all into a mess.

“This…”

“……”

“…I think these were eggplant seeds.”

Fortunately, Seo Gio, who came from a mountain village in Gangwon Province, could identify a seed just by looking at it. Not everyone from Gangwon Province could do such a thing. Gio could only manage it because he was genuinely passionate about farming.

Having enjoyed farmwork since childhood, Gio rose with the eggplant seeds in hand and dropped them into the holes he had dug beforehand.

“Is it time to plant the potato now?”

“Kkureuk?”

“Hm?”

There was a brief failure in communication, but Gio soon realized what Honey was questioning.

“I didn’t mean I was going to plant your dad.”

“Kkung?”

“Potato is a pet name. Like a second name.”

His mother, who loved potatoes, had looked at his prenatal ultrasound and said that he resembled one, so she had given him the prenatal nickname Potato. Then, upon seeing the newborn Gio, his grandmother had nodded and said, “She ate nothing but potatoes, and now she’s given birth to one.”

“All the adults called me Potato, so until I was four, I thought I really was one.”

Perhaps that was why he had grown up so healthy and harmless.

“Well, I suppose that worked out fine.”

“Kkururu.”

“You just grow up healthy too.”

For generations, the Seo family had tended to respect the free will of new life.

Who knew how many days had passed, but Gio finally succeeded in planting every seed Yoo Seongwoon had given him. Now that he had even planted potatoes, sweet potatoes, and corn—crops famous for keeping people alive in lean times—it seemed unlikely that he would ever starve to death.

“Though I suppose it would be harder to starve to death in this body.”

“Kkururu.”

“No matter how hungry Dad gets, I won’t eat you, Honey.”

The crops had been planted in the kitchen garden behind the cabin.

“At this point, I’m not sure it’s still small enough to call a kitchen garden.”

It had grown a little, but it was still a kitchen garden. It was neither as large nor as expansive as the fields of people who farmed for a living, which gave Gio a reasonable excuse. In any case, it was a kitchen garden.

Gio was a fine adult who knew how to compromise with reality.

“Let’s head back, then.”

“Kkukkureuk.”

“Right, we should taste the cheong I made too.”

The fruit cheong he had prepared earlier should be just about ready by now.

“I used sweet-and-tart Mangdung Fruit with sour, bitter Drought Tangerine, so the combination itself is excellent.”

If there was anything to worry about, it was whether he had used the proper ratio of the two. But that did not concern him much. After so many years of living alone, Gio had somehow acquired a grandmotherly touch in the kitchen.

“I measured everything by hand and eye, but there is no chance I could be wrong when it comes to combining things I’m going to eat.”

As if to justify his confidence, a pleasant aroma was already wafting from the glass jar.

“Hmm.”

Upon entering the kitchen, Gio blinked as he looked toward the cupboard holding the fruit cheong.

“Since it’s been a while since I worked up a sweat, should I drink it as a cold tea?”

“Kkureuk?”

“I worked up a sweat in my heart.”

Honey had pointed out that Gio’s body did not actually expel waste products like sweat, but he had labored all the same. A person who had worked was supposed to drink a cool, refreshing tea. That was how one improved one’s efficiency.

“I’ll have to bring up some ice from the storeroom, then.”

A pig never hesitated in the face of food. Without even pausing to wipe away the sweat he had not shed, Gio headed straight down to the storeroom.

Naturally, the ice storeroom, which was packed with all manner of foodstuffs, contained ice. Pieces of it could be seen in every corner of the cavernous space, which seemed so vast that it was impossible to guess where the ice ended.

“Is it a little cold?”

When Gio opened the massive door and entered the storeroom, Honey froze rigid.

“Kku, kkugururuk.”

“If it’s too cold, you can wait out—oh.”

“……”

“…Did you freeze?”

Just as Gio, his face expressionless, became violently alarmed at the sight of Honey transformed into transparent ice itself—

Despite already being frozen, Honey fluttered his body once and began preening his feathers.

“Pwoof.”

“?”

“Kkuk.”

“Did you evolve?”

“Kkuru.”

“I evolved from a human into a haunted portrait, so there’s no reason a waterfowl can’t become an icebird.”

He had been startled once because he thought Honey had died when he froze, then again when he saw that the bird could move flexibly despite being ice. But if nothing was wrong, what did it matter?

Honey was cute even when frozen, so it was fine.

“A moving icebird is certainly interesting.”

“Kkurururururururuk!”

“Seeing you enjoy yourself warms this father’s heart.”

Having taken after his creator and been born entirely devoid of any sense of danger, Honey was simply delighted by his transformation.

It seemed strange that even a bird made of water would freeze this quickly, but given that Gio himself had gone from being human to being a portrait, it did not surprise him too greatly.

“When have we ever obeyed the laws of physics?”

He had lived long enough to defy the laws of physics. What an interesting life it was.

“First, the ice…”

“Kkukkureuk.”

“It’s over there? Thank you.”

Now that Honey had frozen, his wings no longer merged back into his body as they had before.

Perhaps because he had acquired feathers—or body parts—that had not existed before, Honey showed Gio where the ice was, then busily preened himself. It seemed an inability to leave their feathers alone was simply a trait of birds.

‘He didn’t do it quite as much when he was water.’

Leaving Honey on his shoulder, Gio slowly walked through the ice storeroom.

“……”

It was cool.

“Haa…”

His breath misted before him.

The cloud was dense enough to see at a glance.

That should have meant it was extremely cold, yet for some reason Gio did not feel the chill, and the foodstuffs did not freeze.

He could not tell whether the ice storeroom was deceiving him or whether he and the food were simply tougher than the ice.

‘Probably the latter.’

Gio lowered his gaze to the floor.

“…Hmm…”

He murmured,

“It would be a catastrophe if this broke.”

The icy floor looked like a bottomless abyss.

‘It seems to be solid ice, but it’s so transparent that it looks as though there’s a lake beneath it.’

The floor was extraordinarily clear. Ice that formed very slowly became clean as glass rather than opaque, and such ice covered the entire floor. Gio could not even gauge its depth.

It was slightly slick and suffused with a faint blue hue. Now and again, clusters of light could be seen sparkling deep within it. Like fireflies, they illuminated themselves for a few seconds before disappearing, and Gio wondered what they were.

“Could they be inhabitants similar to Forest Butterflies?”

“Kkung?”

“Or perhaps they’re merely luminous moss or bacteria.”

They did not move. They simply shone for a moment and then vanished.

They resembled dim starlight.

“……”

It was a dreamlike sight.

“The colors are similar to a glacier, too.”

There was no strong scent of the sea, but the transparent blue ice floor, its depths impossible to fathom, reminded him of a glacier. Gio had never seen one on Earth, but the sight was enough to make him think this must be what a glacier looked like.

Read only on MUGEX

Gio lifted his head and surveyed the ice storeroom.

“Where did all this ice come from? There’s ice in every direction.”

He wondered every time he saw it.

“You have to descend quite a long way from the cabin’s first floor to reach this ice storeroom. Then perhaps there was groundwater beneath the cabin.”

But that created a contradiction.

“Right. Common sense can’t explain why groundwater beneath a forest with such a mild climate would be frozen solid like this.”

That only made it all the more mysterious.

“Nice.”

And amusing.

“It’s just like a fairy tale…”

He liked it.

Still wearing his usual blunt, expressionless face, Gio moved on.

Honey, apparently already accustomed to having a body that no longer spread out as before, flew around the enormous, cave-like ice storeroom while making cheerful cries. It was a scene straight out of a movie.

After walking through the hollow of ice for quite some time, Gio finally found what he had been looking for.

“Yes, that’s right. It was here.”

Ice had grown up from the floor like stalagmites in a cave.

“I like this too.”

“Kkuk?”

“It looks just like a cave.”

Absurd as it was, the ice storeroom also resembled a limestone cavern made entirely of ice.

Whether the water flowed from somewhere, came from something melting, or traveled through veins like sap through a tree, droplets fell here and there throughout the ice storeroom. Perhaps because of the low temperature, they often formed shoots like these or built up into pillars.

“Limestone caverns usually form in this manner. Water containing large quantities of lime drips down and slowly builds pillars on the cavern floor. The droplets splash in every direction and create protrusions like coral, or else…”

“……”

“Here. They remain in the shape of pearls, like this.”

Such formations were indeed known as cave pearls.

“Of course, these aren’t cave pearls. It would be more accurate to call them Ice Pearls…”

Did that not make this feel like a real cave? A magnificent mold fashioned by nature itself.

“……”

Ice Pearl

A naturally occurring, pearl-shaped formation of ice found in the ice storeroom beneath Gio’s cabin. A transparent pearl with a faint, mother-of-pearl sheen. It is edible. Like ordinary ice, it melts at high temperatures and has neither scent nor taste.

Elixir Refining Method: When melted and consumed, it is highly effective at stabilizing mental abnormalities such as depression and mania.

“Should I take these?”

Whatever their effects, they supposedly tasted the same as ordinary ice, did they not?

“And cutting off a piece of that huge ice bamboo shoot would be tiring.”

“Kkureuk, kkureuk.”

Honey, now an icebird, fluttered over and swallowed one of the round Ice Pearls clustered together. Gio could not help but marvel at his speed.

“Are you eating it? Are you a pig?”

“Kkurururururu!!”

“No, you misunderstand. If it sounded as though I was criticizing you, that is a very serious misunderstanding. Dad likes pigs.”

Having been raised by his grandmother for most of his life, Gio had inherited some of her preferences. One of those was an inability to stand by and watch someone remain painfully thin.

In that sense, Gio would be pleased if Honey, whom he considered his child, grew plump.

“Children are supposed to eat plenty and grow big.”

Become a pig—hya!

“Let’s go back upstairs now.”

“Kkung, kkung, kkung…”

“I’m telling you, I’d prefer it that way, piggy.”

“Kkururururu!!!”

“Children are supposed to be plump so they can grow well later.”

Gio soothed Honey as they left the ice storeroom, then headed straight to the kitchen.

A pleasant fragrance was rising from the fruit cheong he had taken out of the cupboard earlier, and he was already looking forward to discovering how good it tasted.

He took out a clean glass and transferred two spoonfuls of fruit cheong into it.

“It really does smell wonderful.”

The more Mangdung Fruit was dried, the stronger its aroma became. It seemed that even without drying, some form of aging process also intensified its fragrance.

Soaked through with sugar and lending it their scent, the Mangdung Fruit gave off its characteristic sweet, refreshing aroma.

“Perhaps because Drought Tangerines are part of the citrus family, they seem to have a citrus scent as well…”

One might describe it as the distinct bitter, tart scent of lemon peel.

“I’m looking forward to this.”

The fruit cheong in the glass possessed artistic value all on its own.

Having greedily absorbed the sugar and freely surrendered its juices in return, the fruit cheong gleamed with a glossy sheen.

The flesh of the Mangdung Fruit had transformed into a soft jelly, while the Drought Tangerine, whose thin membranes Gio had painstakingly peeled away, had hardened slightly, spreading through the mixture in clearly visible vesicles.

“Now to add the Ice Pearls…”

“Kkokkureuk.”

“That’s the pearl you ate earlier. Put it back.”

“Kkuk?”

“No, thank you.”

Honey, who had already returned to water, attempted the bizarre feat of regurgitating the Ice Pearl he had just swallowed, but Gio stopped him by paternal authority. It was not as if it were penguin milk. Gio had no desire to go that far.

“Now, if I stir it gently…”

Clink, clack.

The glass and Ice Pearls struck one another with a clear sound.

“The fruit tea is finished.”

“Kkwak.”

“Are you a chicken?”

“Kkurung.”

“I have no idea what you are.”

The completed fruit tea was beautiful enough to make him want to paint it. The deep vermilion tea visible through the glass was remarkably transparent despite its rich color.

Perhaps because of the Ice Pearls, the sparkling blue lights he had seen in the storeroom repeatedly shone and vanished like shooting stars. Between them floated pieces of fruit shaped like full moons and half-moons.

When he took a sip…

“……”

An exquisite flavor filled his mouth.

“…Delicious.”

It had a depth and savor unlike anything he had ever tasted.

The vermilion tea was smooth and cool. Just when its sweetness seemed on the verge of becoming overpowering, an unhurried bitterness arrived and courteously calmed it down.

The Drought Tangerine’s once-intense sourness had met the Mangdung Fruit and sugar and become as endearingly petulant as a child’s sulk.

‘I like the fruit pieces too.’

The Mangdung Fruit, robbed of all its juice by the sugar, was like jelly. More precisely, it resembled konjac jelly, though it was much softer.

Its texture was soft yet strangely springy, like a grape with all its skin peeled away.

The Drought Tangerine vesicles burst in the mouth like those of a grapefruit or orange. They, too, seemed to have had their juice stolen by the sugar, but they were slightly firmer.

It was not an unpleasant firmness, however. The vesicles gently scattered across his mouth and lent the drink a pleasing texture.

‘The flavors and aromas have all blended together, so it’s difficult to distinguish them individually…’

There was the tea itself, with flavors as layered as a soup rather than one-dimensional; the pieces of fruit, which added delight to a texture that could otherwise have been monotonous; and the strange sensation of something softly melting over his tongue.

That subtle sensation likely came from the clusters of light that had been trapped inside the Ice Pearls.

“…Popping candy?”

It did not exactly fizz or burst like fireworks, but the blue specks of light scattered throughout the tea added a peculiar savor. His tongue experienced a pleasure that could not be expressed merely as sweet or salty.

It was the sort of fruit tea that made him smack his lips for more.

“……”

“Kkureuk?”

“It would make the perfect gift.”

He had plenty, so perhaps he could package some.

“I’ll give it to Yoo Seongwoon.”

Wanting to share one’s cooking was a grandmother’s instinct.

Having grown up hearing his grandmother and life mentor tell him to live generously, Gio wanted to fatten Yoo Seongwoon up.

(To be continued)