Chapter 34: Extinguishing Fire Teaching
After learning that the green fruit pit was natural scented soap, the green fruit’s value ranking in Su Ran’s heart immediately skyrocketed several levels.
She pocketed the already cut-open green fruit pit in her hand, then turned to hang the thermos and stainless steel mug she always carried daily on her body.
Then she took the jar of salt she had worked hard to make yesterday from her bag, along with the multi-tool axe always kept in her bag. She went to the fruit pile, pocketed a bit of several kinds of wild fruit, and finally signaled the werewolf to take two baskets of four-eared ox beef before hanging one hand around the werewolf’s neck and letting it carry her flying toward the river beach.
It was clear that the werewolf still preferred flying over walking.
And at the very beginning, when it carried Su Ran from the bird’s nest tree to the riverside, it was more like wanting to show her the way.
At this time, it was just past seven in the morning, and most of the beastmen who went out hunting had just left and hadn’t returned yet.
When Su Ran and the werewolf arrived at the spot where they made fire every day, no other beastmen’s figures could be seen on the river beach yet.
Originally, Su Ran hadn’t planned to light a fire this morning; she thought eating the already roasted ox leg brought back yesterday directly would be about enough.
But after seeing the werewolf’s learning and understanding ability with language, she suddenly felt she could try teaching the werewolf the logical relationship between making fire and extinguishing fire right now.
If the werewolf could learn it, and then it taught the other beastmen, popularizing fire among the beastmen and teaching them to use fire safely would be much faster.
The werewolf was now very proactive about making fire.
This was evident from how, after arriving at the river beach, it eagerly started searching for deadwood, piling up a campfire, and then kept calling “Ran Ran” “Ran Ran” nonstop to Su Ran.
After the werewolf urgently completed the preparations, the campfire by the river quickly started burning again.
This time, the piled campfire was slightly larger than the ones they had made before when it was just the two of them.
Next to the original branch rack, Su Ran set up another pair of branch racks beside it.
She first put yesterday’s already roasted ox leg on it, thinking to heat it up.
And on the rack on one side, she simply processed all the remaining beef and put it on the fire to roast.
After all, since lighting a fire once, might as well do more at once.
Because she had a lot of things she wanted to do today, she had a feeling that by evening, she might not have the energy to do anything else.
But before doing other things, she wanted to first teach the werewolf the logic and method from making fire to extinguishing fire.
She gathered a small handful of broken branches, stuffed some easily flammable weeds underneath, and placed the stainless steel mug filled with water on the side.
She called the werewolf over and looked up at it, saying: “Gray.”
As she spoke, her hand action pointed to the small pile of broken branches in front of her.
Once she saw the werewolf’s attention drawn to the small pile of broken branches, she undid the survival bracelet from her wrist and, in front of the werewolf, used the flint at the connection points on both ends of the bracelet to light the small pile.
The broken branches pile quickly caught fire. Su Ran looked up at the werewolf, pointed to the small campfire in front of her, and said to it: “Gray, fire~”
“Woo? Fire!”
The werewolf echoed Su Ran’s words. Its tone carried a bit of doubt, a bit of bewilderment not understanding exactly what Su Ran wanted to do, even though it had already learned the pronunciation of “fire” from Su Ran yesterday.
But the werewolf’s reaction was exactly what Su Ran wanted; because of curiosity, it would pay more attention.
She looked up and met the werewolf’s eyes, then pointed to the campfire and said again: “Fire…”
Then she picked up the stainless steel mug filled with water from the side and held it in front of the werewolf, letting it see the water in the mug before saying: “Water!”
Then she slowly poured the water from the mug onto the small campfire.
While pouring, she carefully watched the werewolf’s expression.
The room-temperature cool water slowly poured onto the vigorously burning campfire, making a sudden “sizzle” sound!
The werewolf was startled, its ears on top of its head twitching, but its face showed no big reaction.
After all, in the previous few times of making fire, it had already seen Su Ran carefully extinguish the campfire.
Sure enough, as soon as it saw Su Ran doing this, it immediately crouched down, pointed to the campfire, and said to Su Ran: “Ran Ran, fire…, Ran Ran, fire…”
As for what came after “fire,” it couldn’t say it, so it anxiously scratched its ears and cheeks.
The werewolf’s reaction was within Su Ran’s expectations.
Before, there was a language barrier between them with no way to communicate, but now that they discovered it could learn each other’s language, as long as there was a bit of curiosity, it would be particularly proactive.
She curved her lips and also pointed to the campfire, following the werewolf’s words: “Fire, extinguished.”
“Extin…guish…” She slowed her tone on the key words.
Then, after the werewolf stumbled through it a few times, it finally said smoothly to her: “Extinguish~ Fire, extinguish!”
“Mm!”
Su Ran nodded affirmatively and let out a loud “Mm” to the werewolf.
Immediately after, under the werewolf’s gaze, she piled up another small campfire with broken branches.
After lighting it, she looked into the werewolf’s eyes, pointed to the campfire in front of her, then to the mug still half full of water on the side, and said: “Gray, fire, extinguish.”
“Extinguish fire.”
“Woo~”
Su Ran smiled; the werewolf let out a soft woo, somewhat like a response.
It reached out to pick up the mug, glanced at Su Ran, and seeing no sign of stopping from Su Ran, slowly extended it over the small campfire and poured the water on.
Then, accompanied by a “sizzle sizzle” sound, a puff of white smoke rose from the small campfire, and the flames were instantly extinguished.
After the flames instantly went out, the werewolf looked at the now muddy water-soaked campfire pile with wide eyes, looking amazed.
It stared blankly at the blackened muddy campfire for a while, looked at Su Ran as if wanting to say something, then seemed to remember something and turned to look at the large campfire roasting meat on the side.
It raised its hand to point at the large campfire and looked at Su Ran: “Ran Ran, fire, extinguish?”
“No!”
Su Ran quickly shook her head, pointed to the roast meat, and said to the werewolf: “Roast meat, roast done eat meat, then extinguish.”
Such a sentence was still a bit difficult for the werewolf. But watching Su Ran’s gestures and words, it understood itself.
So it mimicked Su Ran’s action, pretending to hold something and gnaw on it, then looked at Su Ran: “Gray, eat meat, extinguish fire…”
“Right, eat meat done then extinguish fire.”
Su Ran smiled and nodded affirmatively.
So the werewolf showed a proud expression, as if saying: How about it, I’m very smart~ Understood so quickly!
But Su Ran, watching the werewolf happily sit down in front of the campfire, thought that even if the werewolf thought that way, it couldn’t be considered the werewolf bragging about itself.
After all, Gray was really very smart.
And if it were her learning the beastmen’s language, she probably wouldn’t learn it in her lifetime…
