Chapter 50

The white lines on the lunar calendar were increasing, while the food in the wooden basket was decreasing.

Because Titus was still in the recovery phase, Cloudy didn't want him to go hungry. Every meal for Titus was a normal portion before the rainy season. Titus had refused before, of course. He wasn't foolish and knew how to eat during the rainy season. But every time he refused, Cloudy would hold the bowl, step on his knee, and forcefully stuff food into his mouth.

"Eat more! I don't want to risk going to the settlements in the rain again."

"But I've already recovered..." Titus puffed his cheeks, mumbling, "If we keep eating like this, we'll run out of food."

"There are fish in the pond to eat, or I can go out to find food. You can't go hungry now." After cramming a bowl full of stewed meat into Titus's stomach, Cloudy finally stopped. She sat back by the fire to eat her own portion - a root vegetable and a few pieces of meat, accompanied by last night's leftover hot soup.

Titus glanced at the lunar calendar on the stone wall. It was the sixteenth day of the rainy season. While Cloudy was eating, he went to check the reserve area. Yesterday or the day before, Cloudy had picked out some rotten jerky and roasted it vigorously over the fire to make fish bait.

Actually, he could eat the rotten jerky, but Cloudy wouldn't allow it. She believed it would hinder his recovery.

"In past rainy seasons, I would eat the spoiled food at home. It's fine."

After saying this, Titus only received two scoldings from Cloudy, which he didn't understand as it was in Cloudy's native language.

He scratched his head, looking at the now mostly depleted food basket. Discarding the rotten meat had reduced the meat reserves. At this rate, the meat would run out after four more sunsets, leaving only the unappetizing plants that Cloudy had stored in large quantities.

"What's wrong?" Cloudy approached Titus with a bowl of soup, following his worried gaze towards the food basket. "Don't worry about the food. If we really run out, I'll go out and find more."

"The rainy season hasn't ended. I don't want you to go out again."

"Do settlements go out hunting during the rainy season?" Cloudy asked, while Titus was rummaging through the basket, seemingly counting how much meat was left. "Do all settlements stay indoors during the rainy season?"

"Yes, I've already told you," Titus drooped his ears. "Starting tomorrow, I'll eat less. Is that okay? You've been eating so little every day and have already lost weight."

This was true. Since the rainy season began, Cloudy had been shrinking like dried seaweed. She was now so thin that her ribs were visible, and her cheeks had sunken in.

"I'm fine." She pinched her arm, indeed looking frighteningly thin...
She didn't feel anything wrong with her body, just a bit hungry every day! Speaking of being caught in the rain and beaten by the locals before, she surprisingly didn't catch a cold or fever.

Cloudy found it unbelievable how robust her body felt after crossing over. The only benefit might be that she had never truly fallen ill, except for that incident of food poisoning at the beginning.

"No, no, the food needs to be replanned," Titus said, looking towards the courtyard where the rain continued as usual, neither increasing nor decreasing, though the temperature had slightly warmed up a bit, not as cold as before. "I could sleep for days without eating."

But if you sleep for days, you'll have to make up for the missed meals later," Cloudy squinted, "You can't go without eating for days; I think it's not good for your body." However, she still planned to redistribute the food according to Titus's suggestion. By now, the difference in Titus's condition from before the rainy season wasn't significant, except that he still felt cold. Eating a little less should be fine...!

In these past few days, her ears twitched more frequently, and the terror in her six pupils returned, the bruising around her eyes disappeared completely. And she no longer coughed or had a runny nose. Titus' runny nose was truly terrifying; he had almost used up all the leaves in the house... When there were no leaves left, Cloudy could only hold a bowl of water to help him clean his face.

"But... Titus, how much can you eat at least?" Cloudy wasn't sure about Titus's appetite; she only knew that Titus, no matter how much he ate, could probably devour a whole dinosaur. "I eat three tubers, a piece of meat, and some leaf water every day."

When Cloudy cooked for Titus when he was ill, the standard was five pieces of dried meat stewed with tubers into a thick paste, then paired with two pieces of grilled meat; this was all he ate in a day.

Titus didn't think much, "I eat the same as Cloudy!"

"You'll starve."

"I won't!"

...

"..." Titus frowned, holding two peeled tubers in his hand. He wanted to say something, but Cloudy sitting across from him at that moment had a strange smile on her face, waiting for him to speak.

"Is it enough to eat?" Cloudy asked intentionally.

He felt that if he said the food wasn't enough at this moment, he would be teased by Cloudy. He could only put the tubers into his mouth and chew slowly. The juice with the peculiar plant's sour and astringent taste enveloped his teeth, making him want to drink a lot of water immediately... Not tasty. He didn't understand why Cloudy would collect such unappetizing plants in large quantities.

"Do you want an extra piece of dried meat?" Seeing Titus not answering, Cloudy took half of the dried meat from her hand and held it out to him, "Do you want it?"

"No," Titus said without looking at the dried meat in Cloudy's hand, chewing on the unappetizing food in his hand.
The plant said, "You're here, making fun of me."

Cloudy chuckled dryly and handed over the jerky, "Eat more if you need, you don't have to eat as much as me. You're taller and bigger than me."

Titus shook his head, chewing on something in his mouth, still worried about his and Cloudy's food supply. This worry was something he had never experienced during any previous rainy season because he had never been sick. Most of the time, he just needed to lie down and sleep, sometimes for days, and then eat a few bites of food in the house after waking up.

"Don't worry." Cloudy extended a finger, pressing it in the middle of Titus' furrowed brow, trying to smooth out the creases. "You're already better from being sick, so what's the worry about not having enough food?"

"I'm here to make sure you get through the rainy season safely." Titus' brow remained furrowed. "I'm... not happy because I got sick."

“Why are you still thinking about this?” Cloudy impatiently put down her hand. “If you keep talking about it, I'll get angry.”

“Don't be angry! I'm just... worried that after the rainy season, you'll go back to the settlement, and something unpleasant might happen to you.”

“Oh, I've been so busy these days that I forgot we have to go back to the settlement after the rainy season.” Cloudy's brow furrowed now, too. “Hmm…”

“How long did the last rainy season last before it ended?” She remembered asking Titus this question before. “Was it 18 sunsets?”

Titus nodded, but to prevent Cloudy from being too optimistic that the rainy season would end after two sunsets, he added, “The rainy season before that lasted for 34 sunsets.”

“...” Thanks for crushing my hope in an instant. It seems the duration of the rainy season is very irregular. All we can do is pray that this time won't be too long.

“And after the rainy season ends, it will take some time for the land to recover. During that time, there won't be much prey.” Titus pointed to the water below the hill. “Even after this water disappears, it will take several sunsets.”

“I really wish it would end soon…” Cloudy complained loudly, holding her bowl. She was already starting to miss the sunshine and the lush green forests before the rainy season. This was something she never thought she would miss. “I want to go out and walk around. Staying in the cave is so stuffy.”

“After the rainy season ends and the water disappears, the settlement will celebrate.” Titus finally started eating the last bit of tuber in his hand. Normally, he would have finished jerky or something similar by now. “It might be the most interesting time. Since you're going back to the settlement after the rainy season, you should find it interesting.”

It was the first time she heard Titus praise something in the settlement as interesting. Most of the time, he either avoided the topic or looked like he wanted to eat someone. “Celebrate what?”

“&%^$*…” Knowing this was something he had never told Cloudy before, Titus deliberately spoke more slowly, gesturing as he spoke.
Cloudy, do settlements not celebrate? After a rainy season, once it's over, everyone will grow."

Cloudy watched as Titus gestured abstractly, pondering for a while before coming to a conclusion - the celebration in the settlement after the rainy season is similar to celebrating the New Year; no matter how long the rainy season lasts, as long as it ends, it marks the end of the year for the locals.

This reminded Cloudy of something, a question she had never thought about since meeting Titus - how old is Titus?

Due to the significant age gap between them, Cloudy could only vaguely guess that Titus should be in his prime years, roughly around her age: "Titus, how many rainy seasons have you experienced?" she asked eagerly.

Perhaps caught off guard by her sudden inquiry, Titus hesitated for a moment, "How many rainy seasons? Why do you ask?"

"Just curious!"

The wild man in front of her squinted as he began to reminisce, "Hmm... It should be fifteen rainy seasons."

Cloudy froze, her mind spinning at high speed upon hearing "fifteen." No, it couldn't be fifteen years old. The concept of "years" in this era isn't precisely defined in days, and the duration of the rainy season isn't accurate either... Moreover, the fifteen Titus mentioned must be the ones he remembered, not from birth until now.

To accurately calculate Titus's age, Cloudy optimized her questioning, "How many rainy seasons does a newborn need to go through to be considered grown up?"

"Four. A newborn needs to go through four rainy seasons to be able to communicate smoothly."

"..."

Cloudy looked at the huge figure in front of her, even sitting by the fire, towering over her by a head, she felt like her jaw couldn't close.

"Are you only 19 years old?!" she exclaimed in disbelief in her native language, startling Titus sitting across from her, nearly dropping the bowl into the fire.