Chapter 11

"The door... this is, I made, the door." Cloudy stuttered, trying to express something in the language she had just learned from Titus, pointing awkwardly at her small wooden door. "But, not... sturdy?"

"The door, very good!" Titus half crouched at the entrance of the cave, carefully examining Cloudy's wooden door, then reached out to take the door off the cave entrance, holding it in his hands to inspect.

Since Cloudy didn't know how to say in the native language, "Don't take it down, I worked hard to put it up, you just took down my home's door, what are you doing?" She could only wave her hands, taking the door back from Titus. After retrieving the door, Cloudy watched as Titus crouched down and crawled into her cave...

"What... what are you doing?"

"Small!"

Of course, the size of the cave entrance was very small, Titus couldn't even squeeze half of his shoulder in, so he had to regretfully back out. "Cloudy, live, small."

Small is not what I prefer... Cloudy awkwardly chuckled, reaching out to grab Titus's arm, trying to pull him up from the ground. With one tug, Cloudy almost felt like she was pulling several tons of stone, as Titus remained completely unmoved.

"You guys..." What's the deal with your race? If there's such a strong race, why is there no record of them in her era? At least there should be some skeletons unearthed, right? Cloudy wanted to ask this, but her vocabulary was limited, so after struggling for a while, she could only say, "You guys, big."

"Yeah, big!" Titus happily patted his chest, stood up and walked around in front of Cloudy's door. He seemed very interested in Cloudy's dwelling, in a way... Cloudy looked at Titus with his eyes shining with curiosity.

It felt like a city boy wandering into a village girl's small thatched hut, just looking around.

"Titus, food, thanks." She followed Titus, saying word by word, "I, things, do." She began to gesture with her hands as if hitting something, hoping Titus would understand that she had other things to do next.

"Things! Titus help Cloudy!" As soon as he heard this, Titus got excited. When he arrived, he saw basic materials scattered all over Cloudy's place - wooden sticks, vines - aside from the slightly weak door, she seemed to be planning to make something else. "Cloudy, what are you making?"

She was going to make a fence next, encircling the cave entrance in a fan shape, with a row of sharpened wooden sticks slanted outside the fence, similar to the most primitive defensive spikes.

First, she needed to sharpen the front ends of the wooden sticks with a bone knife. Cloudy estimated that she could sharpen about 6 sticks in an hour. The cave entrance needed to be enclosed in about 6 square meters, requiring 60-70 sticks. She planned to finish it in about three days.

If you let Titus assist her with this task, it would certainly speed up the process.
Cloudy looked at Titus's strong arms and thought they might be able to finish today.

"Shameful, Cloudy, you are truly shameful. This morning you said you didn't need Titus's help, and now you're already thinking of having him build the fence."

But what choice did she have? She was a cunning modern woman! Looking at it from a different perspective, it wasn't about relying on Titus or seeking his help, but rather utilizing Titus's productivity to make things easier for herself... Thinking this way made her feel like she was in control of everything.

"..." She looked at Titus, who now seemed eager and happy to help her. That innocent expression of his, who wouldn't feel guilty looking at it? Soon enough, Cloudy made up her mind, "Food, thank you, Titus... today, go back?"

She clasped her hands together and bowed slightly to Titus, feeling a bit awkward after doing so. She scratched her nose apologetically, "We are friends, but..." She didn't need his help with these things; she wanted to do them herself. She wouldn't say the second part, she just pointed to the sticks and vines on the ground and shook her head at Titus.

Titus wasn't a fool; he knew he was being rejected by Cloudy once again. He was a bit downcast, "Food, Cloudy likes; help, Cloudy doesn't like." Every time he brought food, she would devour it like she hadn't eaten in days, but when he offered to help her with something, she would always refuse.

Only when Cloudy had been poisoned by eating toxic fruit some time ago did she accept his help... What was she thinking? Titus looked at the fragile Cloudy in front of him. She had no tough skin, no strong muscles, and her running speed was like that of a newborn.

Even the weakest person in their village was stronger than Cloudy. And her habits and way of speaking indicated that she didn't belong here. Where did she come from? What kind of settlement was Cloudy hiding in... Could it be a threat?

As Titus pondered, Cloudy felt a bit embarrassed by his recent words, "Food, Cloudy likes; help, Cloudy doesn't like." It was indeed awkward. Every time Titus brought food, she would just eat and eat like a wild boar.

Providing food was undoubtedly a form of help... Cloudy was trapped by her own logic, but she still didn't want Titus's help in fixing the fence; this was her chance to challenge herself. With that thought, Cloudy stopped wasting time explaining to Titus and instead took out her bone knife, sat next to the pile of sticks, and began to work.

"Cloudy..." Titus called out a few times, noticing Cloudy was ignoring him. "Cloudy!"

"Working!" Cloudy didn't even lift her head. "I can do it myself!"

"..." Titus frowned; his expression was a bit scary, but...
Cloudy lowered her head, so she missed his intimidation.

Seeing that Cloudy was really ignoring him, Titus sat there sharpening wood. For a moment, Titus was a bit confused. After waiting for a few minutes, he slowly approached Cloudy, sat down beside her, and reached out to grab a stick to imitate Cloudy's actions.

"No, no, no," Cloudy pushed away Titus's hand. "I can do it myself!"

"(&...￥%&）（（）&…&（！！T￥&*T&&！！"

Cloudy looked surprised at the suddenly excited Titus, who was sitting on the ground waving his hands and saying a lot of things, looking angry.

Why, is he going to hit me? Titus had been very friendly before, which somewhat softened Cloudy's fear of his intimidating appearance. But now, faced with a man over two meters tall yelling, Cloudy was still scared.

Instinctively, she raised the bone knife, trembling, and pointed it at Titus. "What, what are you doing?"

"Help! Want to help!" The ridiculous bone knife in front of Titus was like a toothpick; he quickly grabbed it and also took the stick, starting to sharpen it.

"...". Cloudy felt that whenever Titus appeared, he would disrupt her plans. The contradiction was that after Titus appeared, he would greatly improve her quality of life in this ghostly place. Cloudy tried not to think about it, but if her parents found out about this situation, they would definitely say...

"You're useless. The young man across from you is willing to help you and treat you well. What are you not satisfied with? Marry him, and by the way, ask how much dowry he can give."

Ah, Cloudy covered her head; she didn't want to be so useless! Food was one thing, and getting things done was another!

With that in mind, Cloudy suddenly pounced, trying to snatch the knife and stick from Titus's hands. "Titus! Bad!!"

"Not bad!" Titus didn't let go, yelling at Cloudy, "Cloudy...only knows eating!"

How dare you insult me like that! Cloudy blushed again, not caring if Titus understood or not: "Who told you to bring food over? If there's food in front of me, of course, I'll eat it. I'm not a fool!"

Although a bit absurd, the two of them ended up rolling into a ball on the grass. It was more like Cloudy pouncing on Titus trying to snatch the stick. After a few back and forth attempts, the stick didn't get taken back, but it broke in Titus's hand.

The bone knife also flew to the grassy side because Cloudy was too rowdy, even starting to bite his nose. Titus had to use a bit of force to hold Cloudy's hand and pull her up.

"Let me go!" Cloudy struggled in vain. "Don't always lift me up like this; I'll look so useless!!"

Someone please come and save her, she was just...
Just wanted to make a fence for myself, why does this savage have to stop her? Does he have nothing else to do?

Thinking about this, Cloudy frowned, "Titus, you, the village... everything okay?"

Titus had been looking for her for several days in a row, and even yesterday, some of their own kind came to her door. Although she didn't know what they said, Cloudy's intuition was... there was some dissatisfaction with Titus. In such a primitive society, apart from uneven resource distribution, one of the biggest problems was the long absence of labor in the village.

Titus's expression next confirmed Cloudy's thoughts. On his intensely alien face, a somewhat "awkward" expression appeared.

"..." Titus slowly placed Cloudy back on the ground, then scratched his head, and started looking around constantly.

Indeed, did he really... leave behind the important tasks in the village to come find her? Why??

"Titus." Cloudy pointed to the sky in the distance, it was already approaching sunset, although there was still light, it was no longer the bright sunlight of noon. "Go back."

There was silence between the two for a while. Cloudy thought Titus would have a change of heart and stop goofing off, but he actually... sat back down.

"Cloudy, help." Even though he sat back down, Titus could still look Cloudy in the eye, his tone softened a lot. "Want, help, today, not going back, staying here."

"Huh??" Cloudy widened her eyes. Not going back, what does that mean?

"Want, communicate." He grabbed Cloudy's hand, shaking it slightly. "Cloudy, alone, will die."

No need to be so blunt, I've been surviving here on my own for a month. Cloudy felt a bit embarrassed.