Culinary God in Wilderness

Chapter 388: Chapter 243: Two People Targeting the American Crocodile (Part 2)

As someone who grew up in the city, he had never farmed a field, let alone built such a complex system. The closest he’d ever come was following his grandparents into the fields to harvest wheat during summer vacation as a kid.

He had been too small and weak back then, completely unable to cut through the thick wheat stalks. After a few failed attempts, he had lost interest.

If he had to name one irrigation device that left the deepest impression on him, it would probably be a water wheel.

’A water wheel... Ha, isn’t that a bit of an exaggeration? Is that really something I can just craft from scratch?’

’Water wheel aside, is there any way to ensure a constant supply of water without flooding and ruining the farmland?’

Pondering a series of questions, he found himself back at the entrance of his bamboo hut before he knew it. He subconsciously stared at the empty space around the hut and the irrigation channel, his mind racing.

’Irrigation channel... irrigation channel... Hey, I’ve got it!’

His eyes lit up as a brilliant idea suddenly struck him.

He rummaged through the hut and found several relatively thin bamboo stalks—the tips of the plant.

The hollow part of these sections was small, only about as thick as a finger. If he used these to act as aqueducts, he could largely control the total water flow.

Then, he could develop the farmland on the slanted slope, digging a grid of ditches to let the water flow through them on its own before rejoining the stream at the end.

This idea might actually work!

But the problem was that clearing the land for a field required a hoe, or at the very least, a shovel. How was he going to make one?

He laid out all the materials and tools he had on the ground. Crossing his arms and holding his chin, his eyes glinted in thought.

’I have a saw, so making a tool isn’t that difficult. The question is how to shape it into a shovel or a hoe.’

’If I use bamboo, half a stalk is too weak. It would probably split after just a few digs. If I bind the bamboo body with strips, it might hold up for a little longer.’

A shovel requires an upward motion, while a hoe requires a downward motion. Both need a relatively sharp edge to break the soil, which meant he would have to split a bamboo tube in half lengthwise.

’What if I don’t use bamboo? What about Light Wood?’

He only needed to dig a shallow trench, not a deep one, so the tool’s hardness wasn’t a major requirement.

There weren’t many days left. He didn’t have much time to sit around and think.

He quickly made up his mind: he would use bamboo!

He had a ready supply in his hut. Chopping down Light Wood would require a trip up the mountain, which would waste a lot of time.

If it broke while he was digging, he could just make another one. The broken pieces could even be used as firewood, achieving perfect resource utilization.

First, he selected a suitable slope and used a whole bamboo stalk to roughly sketch the boundaries of the field on the ground. Then, he drew a line from the highest point of the field to the vicinity of the water channel.

His original idea was to build another aqueduct in the air using thin bamboo, but after starting the actual work, he realized he was overthinking it. He could simply divert a new channel from the existing drainage ditch on the ground over to his new field.

If he wanted to control the water flow, he just had to dig a narrower channel. If he wanted to cut off the water, he could just stick a piece of bamboo at the entrance to act as a sluice gate. None of it was too difficult.

After drawing the rough sketch on the ground, he didn’t rush to start work.

He looked up at the bright sun in the sky, and an idea suddenly popped into his head.

Sun-dried potato sticks!

It wasn’t exactly a sudden idea. He had been thinking about what to do with the remaining potatoes ever since he started processing the sweet potatoes.

He definitely didn’t need any more starch, and he didn’t like eating them simply roasted.

He could only make a plain-flavored stew, or maybe mashed potatoes.

For the past few days, he had been trying to think of a way to prepare the potatoes in a form he hadn’t tried yet during this challenge.

Just now, as he was wondering if he could fry potato sticks in coconut oil, the warm sunlight on his skin gave him a flash of inspiration.

’That’s right! After sun-drying, the water in the potato sticks evaporates, leaving only the starch, fiber, and sugar. It’s the same principle as sun-dried sweet potato sticks.’

’After drying, I’ll steam them to gelatinize the starch, which will create a sweeter taste. Then I’ll dry them again. After three cycles of steaming and sun-drying, the dried potato sticks should have a very rich flavor and be plenty sweet.’

’If they’re not sweet enough, I can brush on some mango juice as a substitute for syrup during the process. Finally, I’ll roast the finished product until it’s crispy. Won’t that be delicious roasted potato fries?’

This was a fantastic idea. He immediately washed his hands and started preparing the potatoes.

He didn’t need to peel them. After washing them clean, he cut them in half or into thirds depending on their size, then cut each piece into three or four sticks. The width of each stick was kept to about two fingers thick.

He laid a layer of bamboo on the ground and spread the cut potato sticks on top, placing them in a wide-open area with plenty of sunlight so they could be fully exposed.

Since this was a trial run, he didn’t make too many. He started with three potatoes to test the waters.

’For the first drying, I won’t do anything. I’ll see how they look and taste after they’re dried. If they’re not sweet enough, I’ll add mango juice then.’

The mango tree was a bit far from him now, over by Erica’s shelter. Given that girl’s laziness, she probably spent most of her day near her shelter.

He was also a little afraid of interacting with that crazy girl. Every time they talked, he had to focus all his attention, terrified she would just take off her clothes without a second thought.

However, in the four full weeks since the competition began, he hadn’t noticed any significant tan lines on Erica.

It wasn’t that there were none at all, but every time she pretended to take off her camo jacket, the snow-white skin tightly wrapped beneath would blind him.

Only at those moments could he see the obvious two-toned color difference between her neck and her collarbone, as well as the strap marks from her tight tank top.

Of course, it wasn’t that she hadn’t gotten tan at all. It was just that, in contrast to her darker parts, the areas usually covered by clothing appeared even fairer.

What did this fact prove? It proved that she usually kept herself completely covered up. She probably hadn’t even been in the ocean, sticking to activities on the beach to minimize her time in the direct sun.

This behavior was clearly different from the men. She wasn’t here to survive in the wild; she was truly on vacation, even finding the time to worry about her skin.

That was precisely why he didn’t want to head over there too often.

A pampered rich girl who usually wouldn’t even take off her jacket was threatening to strip in front of him time and time again. What was that if not messing with him?

He really wasn’t good at dealing with women. Unless it was absolutely necessary, it was better to stick to the area around his own shelter.

After setting the potato sticks out to dry, he finally started making the hoe.

He called it a hoe, but really, he just split the bottom of a bamboo stalk halfway up and then tightly bound the split with bamboo strips to prevent it from cracking while he worked.

The next step was to use this simple hoe to dig along the lines he had previously drawn. It didn’t need to be deep—the depth of one finger was sufficient.

After digging for just a few minutes, he discovered a little trick for using a bamboo hoe.

Unlike a normal hoe, which you first drive into the ground and then dig with, bamboo wasn’t as hard as metal and was prone to splitting. Even with the bamboo strips for reinforcement, the half-tube blade could still easily break.

So, he utilized the natural semi-circular shape of the bamboo piece. First, he’d insert the bottom edge into the soil. Then, bending over, he’d use his left hand to steady the thin bamboo, rotate it slightly—ten to twenty degrees to the left or right—and pull it toward himself.

Under this force, the soft soil would naturally follow the curve of the bamboo and be pushed to the sides of the trench. He barely even had to perform the action of digging.

However, while this method saved effort, it had one drawback: bending over for a long time easily led to an aching back.

He quickly solved this problem too—by working while sitting or kneeling.

Besides, he had soapnut on hand. As long as it wasn’t ink or some other pigmented substance, most stains could be washed out.

After about two hours, a branch channel connecting the farmland and the stream was successfully completed.

He dusted off his hands, shoved the hoe into the last remaining earthen wall at the channel’s entrance, and gave it a hard push. The weak wall collapsed instantly.