Transmigrating to the BeastWorld,I Picked Up an Adorable BeastHusband!-Chapter 59: How is she going to survive this?
The next morning, Ningning didn’t wake up to the sun or Weijie’s touch. Instead, a deep, rhythmic clanging echoed through the stone walls of the cave.
Gong.
Gong.
Gong.
She sat up with a start, her muscles still stiff but functional. Weijie was already awake, though he sat on the edge of the furs with a heavy, glassy-eyed look that made her heart sink. He moved as if he were underwater.
"The Elder..." Weijie murmured, his voice thick and slow. "Numa calls. We must go to the clearing. Let’s hear what he has to say."
Though Weijie had a feeling, the gathering was called, so he could announce that the cold was approaching.
They made their way down to the center of the tribe. The air was crisp enough that Ningning’s breath hitched in her chest, appearing as a faint mist.
Numa stood atop a large Stone, his weathered staff held high. The usual boisterous energy of the Snake Tribe was gone, replaced by a strange, quiet solemnity.
"The sun grows weak!" Numa bellowed, his voice carrying an eerie authority. "The sky prepares to release its cold rain. Close your caves. Seal the cracks with fat and mud. Store your firewood high. Soon the cold will be upon us. May the mountain keep your hearts beating until the thaw!"
As the crowd began to disperse with a mechanical, quiet efficiency, Ningning pulled back into the shadows of a large rock.
"Doudou, talk to me.." she called out in her mind. "Numa says ’prepare’ but they aren’t stockpiling food like I am. What exactly does this mean for them? And if they’re all asleep... who’s awake?"
[Brumation is the reptilian version of hibernation,] Doudou explained, his voice clinical. [For the Snake Tribe, it means their body temperature will drop to match the cave. Their heart rate will slow to maybe three or four beats per minute. They don’t ’eat’ because they aren’t burning energy. They just... exist in a state of stasis. But you? You’re a mammal, Dumpling. You’ll keep burning calories just to stay warm. If you don’t eat, you die. If they don’t stay warm enough, they don’t wake up.]
"And the rest of the world?" Ningning asked, her eyes darting around the clearing.
[The herbivores? Most die or migrate. But the endothermic predators, the ones with fur and warm blood..they stay awake. And they’re hungry. Wolves, sabertooths, and certain... other tribes. To them, a brumating Snake tribe or hibernating mammals is a full course meal]
-_-
The wind screamed through a jagged pass where the sun never touched the ground.
Here, the air was already lethal.
A group of figures moved through the swirling spindrift.
They were tall, draped in thick, dark furs that smelled of old blood, their eyes glowing with a sharp, malicious intelligence.
These were the Sabertooth tribe, and they didn’t sleep in the winter.
They thrived in it.
"The preparations are going as planned. Those black types really are sinister as their color. While they are asleep, we will carry out the operations and then we will have some enjoyment of our own." The man who said this, had a jagged scar across his face, his black hair which rolled into bangs, fell just after his forehead.
"The cages are getting built nicely. They should be ready before the first snow falls. Tribe chief Kunhla."
The man nodded, as he turned to the semi-desert like terrain.
"Let us have our fill, this coming winter my brother and our tribe be filled with the most beautiful of females."
The clearing was busy, but the usual noise of laughter and shouting had been replaced by a quiet, rhythmic focus.
Ningning walked toward a group of women near the drying racks, her eyes scanning their movements.
They were packing things away, sealing cloth bags with pitch, and moving with a deliberate slowness.
"I’m going to go see the others." Ningning told Weijie.
Who nodded, his eyes fixed on the clouds rolling over the peaks. "Don’t stay out too long. I’m going to check the wood supply."
He didn’t look sick, but he moved with a certain heaviness, like a man who hadn’t quite shaken off a nap.
Ningning found Xiaoli, Nala, Una, and Puka huddled together. They were working on a pile of animal hides, sewing them into thick, insulated layers.
"What are you guys doing?" Ningning asked, her new, melodic voice making a few of them look up in surprise.
"Getting ready." Xiaoli said, offering a small, tired smile. "The sun is losing its bite. We have to finish these before the wind turns."
Ningning sat down beside them, watching their hands. "I haven’t seen anyone drying meat. Don’t we need to store food for the winter?"
Xiaoli laughed, a soft, dry sound. "Food? What for? We don’t eat when the cold comes, Ningning. Our bodies just... stop. We find a quiet place, stay close to a fire or each other, and wait for the sun to return. Eating would just make us sick."
"We just need enough warmth to keep our hearts from stopping." Nala added, not looking up from her needlework. "But not too much. If the cave stays too hot, we wake up too early and starve. It’s a balance. Some of us don’t make it. They just stay asleep."
Ningning felt a chill that had nothing to do with the wind. "How do you keep the animals out? Or the snow?"
"The males.." Nala said. "Before they get too sleepy to move, they roll the big rocks in front of the cave mouths. They seal us in. It keeps the snow out and hides our scent from the wolves and other predators.." She paused, glancing toward Ningning.
"Most people share. It’s safer. Una shared a cave with Weijie during the last one because hers was damaged."
Una didn’t look up, her fingers moving faster over the leather. "It was just for the warmth." she muttered. "We were basically stones. We didn’t even speak. He’s with you now, so he’ll be in your cave."
Ningning chuckled at Una’s clumsy explanation.
Whatever happened between her and Weijie wasn’t her business.
She won’t get jealous was no reason.
Their methods worked for them hundred percent.
But she was human.
If she should get sealed in..
There’s no telling what might happen to her.
She couldn’t guarantee how fast the temperature in the cave would drop or just how many firewood she would have to burn.
[This is going to rough. Dumpling. I won’t say it wouldn’t.]
"I see." Ningning whispered.
She stood up, her heart thumping against her ribs.
She didn’t say anything else.
She couldn’t.
If she told them she was planning to stay awake, they’d think she was insane—or worse, a freak.
She walked back toward her cave, her thoughts spinning.
"Doudou." she thought as she climbed the path. "If I’m the only one moving while they’re all ’stones,’ I need to be ready. What happens if the fire goes out? What happens if I run out of wood?"
[Then you become a ’stone’ too, Dumpling,] Doudou replied, his tone unusually sober. [Except unlike them, your metabolism won’t restart in the spring. You’ll just be dead. We need to maximize Weijie’s strength while he’s still functional. He’s the only one who can move the heavy stuff.]
When she reached her cave, she found Weijie sitting by the entrance, staring at the horizon. He looked solid, like a part of the mountain itself.
"You’re back.." he stood up, walking up to meet her.
"Yeah.." she replied absent-mindedly, in her head she was running various of calculations.
How many wood would she need to burn a day to avoid getting Frost bite or Hypothermia.
"Let’s say I chop up a huge tree. How many firewood would that give me." she directed this question to Doudou in her head.
[Right, understood, Dumpling. One full-sized iron-oak tree, when chopped into manageable firewood for a decent sized cave, will yield approximately 30 to 40 large logs, depending on how aggressively you split them.]
Doudou explained, the data scrolling through her mind. [That’s about a week’s worth of 24/7 burning if you’re conservative. So, six trees is definitely the bare minimum to get you through the five months of isolation.]
Ningning felt her stomach drop. Six giant trees.
Hand-chopped, hand-hauled, and hand-stacked.
That was a lot of work.
Even for Weijie.
She looked at her hands, still stained with the white salt from yesterday’s work. They had the salt, but salt wouldn’t keep her heart beating when the temperature hit sub-zero.
"Weijie." she started, her hands finding their way to his hands.
"I know it’s alot of work. But we need firewood. You may not need it, but I’m only human, I’ll die if I’m not warm."
