The sun was just beginning to sink behind the jagged hills when Lingling returned to the village, a bamboo staff balanced across her shoulders, buckets hanging from either end. Tied around her waist like a wild skirt were short bamboo tubes, cut neatly at both ends—some still glistening with dew.
Her arms were full of dry branches, her back damp with sweat, but her pace didn't slow. She chews on a bitter root, humming a tune only she seems to know.
As she reached the edge of the village, she paused, squinting.
A line of villagers—dirty, loud, and oddly excited—was snaking down the path, all heading in the same direction: toward Jinhai Ren's hut.
She tilted her head.
"Eh? she muttered aloud, brow furrowing. "Did Big Brother attract more food while I was gone?"
Quickly, she dropped the wood beside Grandpa Lao Chen's hut, then offloaded the buckets near the clay stove.
"I'll boil it!" the old man called from inside, as if reading her mind.
"I'll be back!" she shouted, already sprinting barefoot toward the gathering crowd, her bamboo skirt rattling like tiny drums.
As Lingling reached the crowd, she slowed. A group of villagers—mostly toothless uncles and sweaty aunties—were singing. Loudly Badly.
"Two planks for your noble butt,
No splash, no stain, no muddy rut!
Squat like kings, no need to beg,
It won't touch your pants, your hands or leg!"
They clapped and laughed, some holding wooden sticks like microphones. ( The clean one of course )
Lingling blinked. "What …in the demon's armpit…?"
She considered joining the line, but then remembered who built that wooden thing.
Instead of heading toward the Toilet Throne, she veered left and knocked twice on the door of Jinhai Ren's hut before sliding it open without waiting for a response.
Inside, Jinhai sat cross-legged, deep in thought, staring at a diagram drawn on a plank of wood, Arrows, strange symbols, and what looked like a tiny butt surrounded by measurement notes.
Across from him, a man Lingling hadn't properly met sat stirring a pot with a small stick. He looked up, startled.
"Oh," Jinhai said, glancing up. "Perfect timing."
He stood and gestured between them.
"Lingling, this is Ma Cheng. He's the one who panics a lot but gets things done, I love him as my brother. Ma Cheng, this is Lingling. She is good at hunting food."
Ma Cheng stood quickly, almost knocking over the pot. "Ah, nice to meet you."
Jinhai's gestured to the wall where he had nailed a rough wooden sign.
On it, drawn in thick charcoal, was a poorly proportioned human squatting above a rectangular plank with an arrow pointing between their feet.
"That," he said proudly, "is how to use it."
Lingling tilted her head. Look confused.
She handed the bamboo stick back. " I will try to use it tomorrow, but I need to get back—got things to sort before sleep. Water, firewood, and that lizard I catch on the way back."
Lingling walk back, then she heard a group of villagers still singing new verses about clean butts with wooden stick.
Back at Grandpa Lao Chen's hut, the old man was poking at the fire under the clay stove steam from the boiling pot rose lazily, thick with the scent of old roots.
Lingling dropped off the remaining bamboo cup beside the door.
"You're back early," Lao Chen said without looking.
She wiped her forehead with her sleeve. "Jinhai talked a lot. About toilets."
"He sure does."
She turned to head inside, but Lao Chen added:
"Bring a small bucket to him and that Ma Chen boy."
She stopped.
"They didn't fetch any water today," he said. "If you don't share, they'll go thirsty tonight."
Lingling rolled her eyes but grabbed the ladle.
"Just one bucket. I'm not their water fetcher."
As she walked of into the dimming twilight, bamboo cup clinking softly at her hip, she muttered:
"Big Brother can make a toilet…but he forget about water."
Jinhai sat outside his hut that night, legs stretched, sipping warm water from a bamboo cup Ma Cheng handed him.
"This tastes… like burned tea," Jinhai mumbled.
"Still better than nothing," Ma Cheng replied, licking his dry lips.
They drank slowly, neither speaking. In the distance, a frog croaked once and regretted it.
Inside her hut, Lingling lay on her side, hands behind her head, listening to the sound of bamboo wind chimes. She didn't say it out loud, but she smiled to herself.
Let's see what else Big Brother will bring next.
The sun had not yet fully risen when Ma Cheng burst into Jinhai Ren's hut, panic etched all over his face.
"Little Master! We have no water left! Not a drop to drink or cook!"
Jinhai sat up slowly, eyes half-closed. "Did we not just drink tea last night?"
"That was the last of it! We're dry! Even the emergency gourd I hid behind the firewood is bone dry!"
Jinhai pinched the bridge of his nose. "Fine. Go fetch some. Take Lingling with you—she knows the route."
They both came back with a few buckets of water, which is enough to use for one day.
The Next Morning
Ma Chen stormed in again, waving an empty gourd.
"No water again! Nothing left to drink or cook!"
Jinhai groaned, then muttered, "This is no way to live."
Without even brushing his hair, he stumbled over to Grandpa Lao, who was sipping something that smelled like old bark.
"Grandpa," Jinhai said, "what did people do to get water if there is no well and the water source is far away?"
Grandpa Lao gave him a long look. "We chased clouds. Or, more practically—dew, cut bamboo into cups, hang them overnight on trees, and wait for morning. Learned it when I hunted ginseng."
Jinhai's mind clicked into motion.
Calculations:
1 person needs ~2L/day
4 people = 8L
Average dew yield per cup = 150ml
Need ~54 cups —> round to 60 for safety
"Operation Dewfall," Jinhai muttered. "Let's do it."
Bamboo forest
The trio set off after breakfast, what little breakfast there was. Lingling led them toward a dense grove of tall, green bamboo.
Jinhai carried a bundle of rope, a machete, and a poorly sketched plan. Ma Chen had baskets, snacks, and a worried expression. Lingling had only her fists, a knife, and what was look like a frog's jaw tied into her hair.
They spent the entire day cutting bamboo segments, hollowing them into cup shapes, and tying them with bark—fiber rope onto branches and thin poles angled to catch the maximum dew.
Jinhai calculated sun angles and nighttime wind direction like a scholar planning.
Ma Cheng to bit by a beetle, tripped twice and accidentally drank sap.
Lingling name her bamboo cups after poultry.
"This one's Duckfoot. That's Screaming Rooster. This short fat one—Limp Goose."
By sunset, the grove looked like a strange shrine of hanging bamboo fangs.
They stumbled back to the village, legs sore, backs stiff, and stomachs growling.
"I feel like my arms have turned into noodles," Ma Cheng whined
"Mine turns into snake tails," lingling added cheerfully.
Dawn of Dew
The next morning, before the rooster even crowed, Jinhai dragged Ma Chen and Lingling out of bed.
They returned to the bamboo grove, breath misting in the cold morning air.
Jinhai gently tipped the first bamboo cup—clear water trickled into a bucket.
One by on, they harvested the dew.
Most cups were half-full. Some dry. A few overflowed. They collected nearly 10 liters total.
Ma Cheng stared at the bucket like it held liquid goal. "It's beautiful.."
Jinhai grinned. "Enough to drink and cook. Barely."
Lingling wiped her hands. "Still better than licking tree bark."
They returned to the village with their small victory.
And for the first time in days, the fire pit smoked with cooking broth.
The thirst was held at bay—for now.