After making a fire again, he requested Duk—who was standing far away from the fire—to cut another coconut in half—a coconut without an outer shell. However, before the little bear took action, he made sure the water inside didn’t go to waste. He made Duk punch a small hole in the coconut, so they could extract the water first before cutting. Due to him not having more containers to put the coconut water in, they were forced to drink it all in one go.

The coconut water was more refreshing than normal water. If only he had ice to make it cold, he was sure it would be so much better!

With that done, they ate the coconut meat again, but of course, the lazy monkey didn’t let itself get left behind when it came to eating.

Finally, he began his experiment again, hoping for success this time around. Opening the plastic bottle with river water, he poured all the remaining water into the coconut. After that, he took a deep breath and placed the coconut on one of the stones.

Holding his breath, he prayed that it worked, as he didn’t want to go inside the forest as much as possible. The memory of the black panther stopped him from stepping inside the forest again. After all, if he encountered that beast while traveling, there was only one outcome for him—death! Was he supposed to fight it? Never, he wasn’t going to put himself in danger, as his goal was to go home, not to kill a beast.

Perhaps Duk could kill it, but he already declared he had no intention of harming other creatures. He just hoped when push came to shove, he would change his mind, as he was the only protection he had in the forest. How laughable to think he would put his safety in the hands of a cute mystical bear with no desire to harm others—he might as well fight for himself.

Amid his thoughts, Duk tagged his shirt, garnering his attention.

"Look, the water is boiling!" Duk exclaimed.

Removing himself from his mind, he glanced at the coconut—it was indeed boiling! But the thing that made him excited was that the coconut shell was still in good condition, unlike what happened to the first one, which was mostly burned black. Although the coconut shell wasn’t entirely unscathed, he could still use it—maybe three to four times more. For him, that was already good news!

After waiting for about two to three minutes, he removed the boiling water and let it rest. He was at ease, finding a solution to one of the biggest problems he had on the island. Now that he had food and drinkable water, the only thing he had to do was to upgrade his shelter.

Looking at it, it felt like he had made the shelter for a long time, but it had only been a few days since he built it. What a strange feeling he had, thinking about replacing the shelter made him think he was abandoning it. Even though, the shelter didn’t look that important—as he was sure others would see it as trash—for him, it was a valuable thing, as he learned how amazing to create something with his own hands!

However, he wouldn’t let his feelings stop him from having a better shelter; after all, his comfort and safety came first before anything else—maybe not anything.

"Why did you boil the water? Does it make the water tasty?" Duk asked it seemed confused with his action.

The question didn’t surprise him, perhaps there was no such thing as dirty water in Duk’s Realm or maybe germs couldn’t affect them.

"No, it won’t make the water taste better, but boiling it will make it cleaner. I need to avoid getting sick, after all," he explained.

"Why will you get sick by drinking water? Is the water in this world poisonous?" Duk asked with a worried face.

"No… Maybe, considering all the things we have done to our world, we might as well treat it like it had poison in it." He lamented.

"Then boiling the water can remove the poison?" Duk asked.

"It’s more complicated than that, but you can say it will." He muttered.

"Wow, I didn’t think fire has other uses, other than destroying." Duk looked at the fire with complicated eyes. "We don’t have fire in my Realm, but all of us hated it as it only brings destruction to us. I never knew there was something a fire could do other than kill things."

Duk’s words were confusing. How could they hate something that didn’t exist in their world in the first place?

"Wait, you said fire doesn’t exist in your Realm. How come you know about it then?"

"I’m a Spirit after all," Duk murmured.

"What do you mean? How is that related to my question?" He asked with a deep frown.

"I forgot to explain again," Duk sighed, he seemed stressed about it. "We Spirit are also known as the Elemental, as we are made with elements. For example, my kind is a Wood Elemental Spirit as we are a Plant Kin."

"So, you meant to tell me there’s more? Fire, water, earth, and wind?" He inquired.

"No, there’s still lightning, ice, metal," Duk nonchalantly remarked, but then his face changed from casual to fearful. "But there’s one Elemental Spirit that’s feared by many, if not all: The Dark Elemental Spirit, also known as the Corrupted." Duk’s whole body shivered at the mention of the name.

After seeing Duk’s reaction, his interest in this Corrupted thing skyrocketed.

"Why? Are they bad?" He asked.

"No, not just bad; they are the epitome of corruption." Duk’s body shivered more intensely while his eyes glanced side to side as if he were scared something might show up. "No, let’s stop talking about them. They might come here if their name is uttered repeatedly."

Although his curiosity wasn’t satisfied yet, he had no choice but to drop the matter. He was worried Duk might fall ill if he continued asking—was Spirit could even fall ill?

"Ok, I need to upgrade the shelter anyway." He said, changing the topic, knowing Duk’s shivering might get worse.

It seemed Duk had a lot of worry inside him, in stark contrast with his sunny personality. There appeared to be something deeper happening in his world; he should probably leave him alone again and let him calm himself down. After all, he had things to worry about.

Staring at his humble shelter, he outlined a new design in his brain, wanting to expand it and make it better. Designing was easy, but how about making it to reality? He must collect materials for his plan, and to do that, he must go inside the forest—the activity he sought to avoid. Should he delay the plan for now? Nevertheless, he still needed to do it sooner or later, so perhaps there was no point in delaying it—Well, not putting his life at risk was a good point.

Still, he had no desire to go inside the forest as of now, especially when Duk wasn’t in a mood. His food and water were already taken care of, so there were no immediate needs that he had to achieve, thus staying on the beach to meditate, maybe the best thing he could do.

After making his decision, he looked back at Duk, wanting to ask him how to meditate. However, seeing his dejected figure discouraged him from asking. Meditating was a pretty straightforward word; perhaps he could do it by himself.

Looking around, he wanted to find the best place to meditate. He didn’t want to meditate inside his shelter, as it was too cramped and the monkey was there to distract him. Continuing his search, his eyes landed on the Lunaria, standing peacefully while the wind made its body sway from north to south. Seeing how serene the image of the Lunaria was, he chose the place for his meditation.

He ignored other places and walked straight to the Lunaria. When he reached it, he admired its beauty again, and caressed its blue stem, then sat in a lotus form—like what he saw monks do—beside it. Closing his eyes, he emptied his mind, or at least tried to. However, it was harder than he expected it to be.

No matter how much he tried, memories, worries, and all kinds of things forced their way inside his mind. He couldn’t control it, or, to be exact, he didn’t know how to control it. What was he supposed to do? Nonetheless, he didn’t give up and kept trying. He must succeed no matter what, as this was the requirement for him to go home.

Intensifying his focus, his eyebrows furrowed while his eyes twitched. Frustration bubbled in his heart. Slowly his breath became rigid, while his posture began to curve. When the feeling of suffocation and panic almost reached him. He abruptly opened his eyes, as he panted with frustration.

Laying on the grass, he calmed himself and relaxed his whole body. The first meditation he did was a massive failure, he didn’t know he could fall into a panic while trying to meditate—perhaps he underestimated meditation too much.

After a while, he sat in the same position and intended to try again, but before he did, he sucked up a mouthful of air and released it, making his heartbeat slower. When his heart settled, he slowly closed his eyes and meditated once again.

Inside the darkness of his mind, his thoughts intertwined with each other. He tried to stop thinking and focus on emptying his mind, but the more he did that, the more thoughts came to him. It was rather confusing how things worked, as the more he forced himself not to think the more things he thought about.

Perhaps trying different things would work. If emptying his mind didn’t work, how about letting his brain ponder all the things it wanted to think, maybe it would get tired and stop reflecting on its own. As he let his brain do all the work, all kinds of memories went back to him.

He remembered the day Rebecca was born; it was a crazy yet very important day of his life. His wife almost removed his scalp when he was bringing her to the hospital; he could even recollect the pain he suffered that day. That was the first time he saw his wife crying. She didn’t cry because it was painful; she cried because she was worried about their baby.

That day he fell in love with his wife all over again, as that was the first time, he saw her boyish face crying. He never knew she could make such a cute face, considering her confident and fierce personality, he was lucky he witnessed something beautiful. That day he received two gifts at the same time, that day he was the luckiest man in the world.

When the memory finished, another replaced its place. It was a memory of his father teaching him how to swim. Even though it happened a very long time ago the image was still vivid to him. He recalled, that his mother and father had a huge fight that day because he almost drowned while on his father’s watch. He didn’t understand why his father let him drown that day, he even thought his father didn’t love him. However, he only learned the truth when he reached adulthood, as he didn’t ask his father about it afraid of the answer he would receive.

He remembered going home while crying, and he told his mother what his father did, and that was how they started the fight. He was so scared that day that he thought his mother and father would be separated because of him. But the next day, they were back to being a lovely couple again. They were his role models when it came to love, and his goal was to have the same kind of relationship as them with his wife. They would fight but would still love each other the next day.

However, his father wasn’t a good role model for being a father, at least in his opinion; after all, because of what he did that day, he never attempted to learn how to swim again. Even now, he still didn’t know how to swim—an embarrassing truth he buried deep inside him.