Brian and Theo

Stepping out of the house, our group headed over to the nearby forest. We wanted to replenish our supplies.

[There are a couple of kids following behind us.]

Sazzy commented as she walked over to several very intense eyes. Being a little mischievous, and obviously wanting to blow off some steam, she grabbed the branches and parted them to reveal the two kids.

Stunned at having their cover blown, they didn't even stop to think how a bunch of leaves suddenly bent to reveal them. With a face as if they saw a ghost, the two of them ran away.

[Hah! Scaredy cats!]

Laughing out loud to their back, Sazzy then turned around and we continued deeper into the forest.

"Oliver, make sure you don't touch anything. Especially without your gloves on. There are many dangerous and poisonous plants around."

While talking to Oliver, I spotted the red trees that had edible red branches. I walked over to them and broke off a branch. Then I stuffed the branch into a plastic bag and kept it in my bag.

Walking further into the forest, I stopped now and then to collect some ingredients which I recognized while relaying what I learnt about them to Oliver. On the side, Sazzy and Ava were wandering around but near us, looking at the flowers on some of the plants or the more interesting insects.

I planned to circle back around to the village, since we didn't want to get lost. So, while keeping track of the direction we were going, I led us through the forest.

"This tree here is a tree you should never touch. Its bark is filled with thin and invisible needles that would enter your skin and make the remaining hours of your life very painful. By traveling through your bloodstream, it will pierce you from the inside and cause incurable internal bleeding."

The more I spoke, the further Oliver got from the tree.

"But the gloves we are wearing are thick enough so that it won't enter our bodies. But try not to lean on them, because our clothes are not so thick."

Moving on from that dangerous tree, I pointed to another dangerous tree that had a yellow colored bark.

"You shouldn't get close to that tree either. The bark looks deadly, but it is actually safe. The lethal part of the tree is the fruits overhead. When they fall, they can break apart and spill a fruit juice so acidic it can melt bones."

Right. Just like the melted skeleton we had observed from who the previous owner thought was 'Amanda'.

We kept clear of the acidic fruit trees and headed slightly left. After grabbing some more ingredients, we finally exited the forest a slight distance away from the village.

Instead of heading directly for the village, we walked all the way to the shore side and picked up several clams for ourselves.

"Are you planning on cooking some Red wood clams?"

Oliver exclaimed with a sparkle in his eyes. Maybe he had investigated my previous livestreams and saw how delicious they looked.

"Yep! But since we don't have a grill right now, I was thinking of improvising. "

Opening the door to our temporary residence, we dumped our gathered ingredients on the table and got to cooking.

"In the original recipe, I would soak the clams in Red wood water for 30 minutes and then grill them. However, since we don't have a grill, I was thinking of substituting grilling for boiling."

Hauling up a pot onto the stove, I filled it halfway with water and dumped the Red wood in. I then set the heat onto medium.

"While we are waiting on that, we can go ahead with another dish! Stuffed mushrooms!"

Taking one of the purple mushrooms we had harvested in the forest, I broke off the stem of it and took a spoon to scoop out the insides of the mushroom. I then chopped up the mushroom stems and put them aside.

"Stuffed mushrooms are exactly what they sound like. By emptying the mushroom cap, we can fill it to the brim with other ingredients and steam it to create a delicious dish. But don't touch the mushroom with your bare hands, they are poisonous raw."

Gesturing for Oliver to stand a little farther away, I scooped out all the insides of the mushrooms and cut up their stems.

"Oliver, can you pass me the green berries, red nut and the white flowers? Make sure you don't let them touch your skin!"

Cautiously, Oliver passed me all the ingredients I asked for. For the green berries, I cut them all into small pieces and padded the bottom of the cap with them. The middle ingredient was the cut up stem and insides. Then I used my knife to flatten the red nuts before cutting them. These then filled the other half of the mushroom cap up until the top. Finally, I stuck the white flower in the middle of the cap, its petals facing inside, with its stem removed.

Making several of these, I then carried them over to a pot I had asked Oliver to fill with water. Then placing the bowl onto the water, we closed the lid to allow it to steam for about one hour.

Removing our gloves, I cleaned up the table while Oliver was in charge of checking the progress of the Boiled Red wood water.

"Sister! They're done!"

Rushing over to me, I dunked the poisonous table cloth into the sink before I headed over and opened the lid.

The Red wood water, unlike its name, was brown when it was boiled together with the rain powder. The high temperatures together with the reaction with rain powder mysteriously neutralized the poison in the Red wood water.

"Ok we can now add in the clams."

Oliver heard my words and rushed over to where we placed the clams, soaking in water, as he poured out the water and brought the clams over to me.

Allowing him the honors, I watched as he one by one dropped the clams into the boiled Red wood water with a look of glee and anticipation. And once he was done, we closed the lid again and waited for another half an hour.

Maybe while we were waiting we could have some private sibling talk? Or play some games together?

As I was wondering what to do to kill around half an hour's worth of time, Sazzy's voice suddenly came from the living room.

[The little kids are back!]

Exiting the living room, we immediately noticed two sets of eyes peeking in very obviously through the living room window.

"Hello there, do you two want to come in?"

Opening the window, the two pairs of eyes looked up at my face before they moved slightly back from the window.

"If, if you don't mind..."

The child on the left stuttered as his eyes tried to stare past us and into the kitchen. Maybe they smelled the food we were cooking.

The child on the right who had a small scratch on his cheek puffed up his chest and answered.

"We smelled something needing an investigation in this house!"

Chuckling at his show of bravado, I told them to head to the door and allowed them into the house. Immediately, without any words, they hurried over to the kitchen to look at what was cooking. Oliver, who was beside me, followed after them, worried that they would mess things up.

I guess I knew how the half an hour would be spent now.

Closing the door, I walked slowly over to the kitchen where Oliver was explaining the food we were cooking as well as how they shouldn't touch it.

"Of course we know not to carelessly touch food! My mom has been nagging at me about that for longer than I have remembered."

The kid with a scratch on his cheek huffed as he folded his arms to stare down at Oliver.

"Brian, you shouldn't do that! That's rude!"

The other kid put his hand onto Brian's arms and Brian immediately put his hands down and muttered a reluctant 'sorry' to Oliver.

"Sorry for coming over so suddenly. My name is Theodore, although you can call me Theo. This is my big brother Brian."

[Hehe, I see Brian has a soft spot for Theodore.]

Watching the show with pleasure, Sazzy chuckled from her front row seat at the kitchen entrance.

The three children talked among themselves, and soon they all sat down on the table with their personal terminals open.

"We live near here. We heard there were outsides who came into town and we wanted to check you out. See if you were some bad guys or maybe good guys on the run!"

Tilting his head up in a proud manner, Brian announced the reason for his and Theodore's snoopiness.

"What Brian means is that there aren't many times the village has visitors. The last time was around 20 years ago, from what mom had said. So we wanted to see why people from outside the village came."

Theodore tried his best to soften Brian's words, while Brian's attention was obviously distracted by the pots, or rather the food inside the pots.

"But wasn't there a family of three that recently came to the village?"

Oliver retorted back.

"You mean Margret and Jenny? They're not considered outsiders! They come by now and then to give us sweets and tasty food!"

Brian immediately flared up and stood from his chair.

"Well we are friends of Jenny. And if you are going to be so rude then you won't be able to eat anything that me and my sister cooked!"

Immediately Brian sat down with a loud thump.

Theodore put his hand on Brian's arm to calm him down.

"You say you are friends with Jenny, but how come we haven't heard of you? We've only heard of a fellow foodie friend of hers! Not a small child!"

Reluctant to lose, Brian tried his best to act tough towards Oliver, which only resulted in a sigh from both Oliver and Theodore.

Leaving the three to sort their grievances out, I opened the lid of both the pots and scooped their contents into the bowl. First was the Boiled Red wood clams, which unlike their grilled counterparts, were more brown in color and smelled more spicy. Then there were the stuffed mushrooms, which looked absolutely delicious with their purple bodies and the melted flower on top.

Serving the dishes to the children, I immediately distracted them from their quarrel and everyone reached out a hand to pick up their food.

Oliver chose the clams first, holding the shell between his thumb and pointer finger before slurping up the meat. In no time, his face turned red and he opened his mouth to give a little pant as the spiciness got to him.

The other two picked the stuffed mushrooms first. With less hesitation that they should have, they stuffed the whole thing into their mouth and gave a strong chew. You could see the delighted smile on their faces as they enjoyed the mixture of flavors in their mouths.

Taking my own dish, I picked up the clam first and gave it a try.