Chapter 56

"Cloudy! Are you okay?"

It depends on whether you're asking if there's anything wrong physically or mentally.

Her left foot was still stuck in the tree roots, shaking like a sieve. The body that Titus... smashed the head of lay just a couple of fists away from her, suspicious things scattered all over the place. She tried hard not to look, but that smell... that deadly stench just wouldn't dissipate.

Cloudy didn't want to look at the other person's dead face either. It was hard for anything caught by Titus to survive, or to have an intact body.

"Don't be afraid of him, can't be afraid of him." Her body trembled almost instinctively, she couldn't speak, and her eyes remained closed, not daring to look at Titus. "I-I'm fine... I'm fine."

"Did they hurt you?" Titus's voice was urgent. "Why won't your eyes open? Are you hurt? Is it painful?"

Her eyes just didn't want to open, but to ease Titus's worry, she could only crack them open slightly. Through this narrow view, she saw Titus, his face covered in blood, and his eyes, probably still in the hunting excitement phase, with his pupils dilated. The normally round pupils were all vertical, completely different from his usual somewhat vacant gaze.

Throughout the rainy season, Titus exuded a sense of mid-life crisis, either lying in bed howling about his uselessness or sitting by the fire holding a root vegetable with a dull expression. This made it easy for Cloudy to forget that the tall man in front of her was actually a walking meat grinder...

"We agreed, wait for me in the cave. Why did you come out?" Titus was a bit angry. Not long ago, he hurried back to the cave with food, only to come out immediately after not finding anyone. It was simple to track Cloudy's footsteps before, but now that the rainy season had just ended, everything was waterlogged.

He could only guess which way Cloudy had gone, luckily he guessed right... coupled with hearing Cloudy's screams just now: "The two who caught you, and the ones who came to Green Hill looking for you before, they're from the same settlement, they're not friendly."

"If I hadn't come back today, they would have taken you away." He used his fingers to wipe away the blood on Cloudy's eyelids. "Cloudy, you're very capable, but these people can easily tear you apart. Just like how I tore them apart."

"I didn't expect anyone to come out so soon after the rainy season ended..." Cloudy's voice was trembling, she couldn't really think right now. After witnessing everything that just happened, she felt an intense longing for home, a feeling that hadn't surfaced in months.

She wanted to go back to civilized society, no matter how hard she tried to integrate into this place, it was ultimately not her world. In the jungle, regardless of her status or how hard she had tried to survive before, once she encountered a higher-level predator, she was just a pile of meat.

Ti
In the dark cave, Titus saw Cloudy trembling among the tree roots, remembering how confident she used to be during the rainy season. Despite being abandoned by the settlement for being weak and different, Cloudy's bold actions, like venturing out to find medicine during the dangerous rainy season, made Titus forget her past. As Titus calmly freed Cloudy's left foot from the entangled roots, her ankle was scraped and bruised from the struggle.

After an awkward silence, Titus took care of the bodies nearby while Cloudy checked her injured ankle. Titus mentioned he had brought food from the settlement, trying to engage Cloudy in conversation. However, Cloudy's response was subdued compared to her usual enthusiasm.

Cloudy realized Titus had done nothing wrong, and her unease stemmed from her own lingering moral compass from her previous world. She pondered the conflicts between settlements and the natural response of defending territory. Cloudy questioned if their actions might lead to trouble, to which Titus reassured her that the people they encountered were likely just desperate for food during the lean season.

As Cloudy tried to calm herself and wash away the bloodstains, she reflected on the new norms of this world and the necessity of adapting to survive.
Because of the psychological effect, even the places where blood touches my skin feel hot and very uncomfortable, as if it's penetrating my skin. "You should wash up too."

Titus nodded, reaching out to hold Cloudy and slid into the pool from the tree roots. Due to his height, he could stand in the water. Cloudy wanted to swim out and wash herself, but Titus didn't let go. He held her like a child, his hands under Cloudy's armpits, lifting her halfway up, "Don't breathe."

Before Cloudy could react, he lifted her up and down in the water several times, like scrubbing a stomach with hot water: "Wait... cough! Wait!!" After the fourth time back and forth, Cloudy finally came to her senses and started screaming.

"What's wrong?" Titus froze, his hand stopped cleaning Cloudy. "Don't want to wash anymore?"

This isn't how you wash! She spat out the water in her mouth, which happened to land on Titus's face. Maybe he inhaled it as he began coughing too.

"Let me go, I'll wash myself."

"No, I'll take care of Cloudy. You were just scared." He coughed and tried to push Cloudy into the water again, but this time Cloudy wasn't going to let him. She curled her legs up to her chest and pushed hard against Titus's chest, trying to push him away.

Unfortunately, Cloudy underestimated Titus's strength. Her legs kicking against him were like hitting a cement wall; Titus didn't budge. Her heels hurt a bit... she was pushed into the water and pulled back up.

"Clean now." Titus smiled, looking at Cloudy, who had turned back to her bright self, even though she was glaring at him. "Quick, right?"

Was this a retaliation for not following the agreement to stay in the cave, or do these wild people really wash each other like this? Given Titus's peculiar nature, Cloudy couldn't tell. She felt a bit like a rag now.

Titus lifted Cloudy onto his shoulder, then quickly washed his face with water. "Let's go back to the cave."

They should go back, but Cloudy was still concerned about something.

"Just now, they found something in the trees... seemed like food. I saw them picking it." Cloudy pointed in the direction behind her. "What is it?"

"Oh, oh, oh!!" Titus exclaimed happily. "This is good stuff!"

Light brown, somewhat milky coffee-colored. Fist-sized round fruits lay in Titus's large hands. This was what the two locals were picking.

"What is this?" Cloudy was still sitting on Titus's shoulder. She had suggested going down earlier, but Titus didn't seem to mind.
They were unwilling to let her down, so they had no choice but to give up.

Because the two of them had just been chasing after Cloudy, the "fruits" they picked scattered in the pool, floating and sinking on the shimmering water surface. Titus scooped up another one and handed it to Cloudy, saying, "Open it like this."

He pinched a fruit, applying a slight force with two fingers, and the thin milky coffee-colored peel easily cracked open. Inside, there was a crystal-clear milky white liquid seeping out slightly, looking very appetizing in the sunlight. Cloudy even caught a whiff of a sweet fragrance, somewhat like green tea but with a hint of a woody aroma.

Titus looked satisfied at Cloudy's bright eyes upon seeing the food; this was the Cloudy he knew well. "Eat, it's delicious." He stuffed the opened fruit into Cloudy's mouth.

The taste was sweet and indeed somewhat like green tea, but with a softer, creamier texture that melted on the tongue almost without the need to chew. After the sweet taste of the fruit dissipated, a rich woody aroma lingered. This was the sweetest fruit she had ever tasted in the rainforest.

"So delicious!" Cloudy exclaimed excitedly, swinging her arms and legs on Titus's shoulder like a hungry monkey. "Give me another one!"

Following her command, Titus began peeling the fruits non-stop, one after another, until they had finished all the fruits in the water in no time.

Wiping her mouth contentedly, all the frustrating events that had just happened were completely washed away by the sweetness of the fruits. She was only thinking about how many of these delicious fruits to take back to the cave. "Are these fruits from the trees? Can we find more nearby?"

"These are tree insect eggs, and there might be insect nests on the trees nearby."

Silence followed.

A whirlwind of emotions - confusion, surprise, reluctance, fear, and doubt - swept through Cloudy like a storm, finally settling on "acceptance and understanding."

Regardless of what it was, the deliciousness had surpassed its essence.

"Let's go, let's find the insect nests!" Cloudy raised her hand on Titus's shoulder, pointing to a tree below. "Let's start from that one!"