DRAWN MOCHI VOLUME 1 CHAPTER 3.2: SEARCHING FOR PAINT*2
âŚâŚI kept at it, and in the evening, I went to bed at night, and in the morning, I continued again⌠Finally, I finished it.
It is a landscape painting. The first landscape I painted after coming to this world. It is a landscape painting that does not exist.
In front of me, in reality, there is a dried-up spring. But in the landscape drawn on the paper in my hand, there is a spring of water welling up.
âŚnothing happened.
I knew it was useless. Although it would be nice to materialize things like mochis, knives, and apples, this is just a landscape. I should have drawn a plastic tank of about 100 liters filled with water. But I wanted to try painting landscapes, so it canât be helped.
Well, I got to paint what I wanted to paint, so itâs fineâŚ
I thought so and looked down at the picture I had just painted.
And thenâŚ
The sheet trembled. And then, just like when the mochi materializes, the picture converges on one pointâŚ
âŚÂ softly, the picture spread out and disappeared.
ââŚWhat the-?â (Tougo)
It disappeared without materializing. I thought, âHuh,â but the water did not materializeâŚ
I looked up from the paper and was surprised.
A spring had formed. Water had formed where there should have been no water.
My drawing of a landscape that didnât exist changed the landscape within reality.
And as soon as I confirmed it⌠I suddenly felt my consciousness fading away, and I was forced to take another nap.
âŚThe thing is, I passed out. Probably.
When I woke up, it was past noon. My head hurt badly.
But there was a spring in front of me. There was a spring with beautiful, very clear water gushing out of it.
âIt wasnât a dream.â (Tougo)
I touched the water to test it, and it was indeed water. I scooped up some water in my hands and drank it.
It tasted delicious. Itâs water, so it doesnât have a taste, but apparently, my body was craving water. I think I didnât even drink enough barley tea yesterday, come to think of it. I wonder if thatâs what made me pass out.
Yes, thatâs it. Yes. I think I fainted.
I remember that the spring was completed. I also remember that it was morning.
But now itâs past noon. I think I lost consciousness at the moment the spring was completed. It was too sudden for me to have fallen asleep, and I probably fainted.
âŚI wonder why I fainted. Iâm a little worried.
I thought about it, but the feeling of wasted effort is overwhelming. I feel useless just thinking about it.
However⌠I think that the reason I fainted was that I materialized the spring.
The only things Iâve materialized so far are rice cakes, barley tea, knives, mini-tomatoes, and blankets at best, so they were things that I could hold in my arms. But suddenly, I drew something as big as a fountain and made it materialize, so, well, I guess it was different from what I had done before. Perhaps.
When I think back on it, the way it materialized was also different. Instead of materializing like a rice cake or a tomato, it was like âsqueakâ and âpopâ, instead, it was like âsqueakâ and âpoofâ, and then it spread out and I noticed that the landscape had changed.
âŚor is it because I painted something that doesnât exist? Or because I added something that didnât exist to the original landscape?
Hmmm⌠well, never mind. At any rate, Iâll keep in mind that in the future, âif I draw something big and materialize it, I might pass out.â
Well, after drinking some water, I remembered that I was hungry, so I decided to eat.
Todayâs meal is⌠meat.
Yeah, meat. Meat. I decided on meat. I think if I donât eat meat too, my nutrition will be unbalanced. On the other hand, I thought I can live relatively well if I eat only meat.
I could have drawn the meat as it was already cooked, but I wanted to try it out, so I drew the raw meat.
Steak meat like the one in the picture came out. No, itâs just a picture of meat.
After the meat came out, I painted the frying pan. This is easy because it is all black.
When the frying pan also comes out, I draw a lens.
I managed to draw the lens in black and white. It is fun to draw something transparent.
Now, letâs see. Once the lenses are done, we use the lenses to collect the sunâs light.
The point to collect the light is the piece of paper painted black. This is the one I drew to materialize the bicycle but gave up on it in the end. A piece of it.
When light gathered there, the paper gradually heated up and âŚâŚ eventually burned.
As soon as it caught fire, I threw some dead grass into it. When the fire grew big enough, I put branches on top of it to make a fire.
When the fire was big enough, we put a frying pan with meat on it and roasted it.
I realized halfway through the cooking that I hadnât put any oil on the pan, but it didnât matter. I decided to cook it in its own beef fat. In short, I grilled them as they were.
The meat stuck to the pan a little, but it turned out fine. I put the cooked meat on a plate made of a leafâŚ
âThank you for the meal.â (Tougo)
I ate it.
âŚit was meat. However, I didnât use any salt or anything, so it was really just a beefy taste.
I want salt.
I also drew salt. âŚThis posed quite a problem. Because salt is just like any white powder. I thought that if I did that, it would be hard to distinguish it from flour, let alone sugar.
However, I decided to be open-minded and drew the salt crystals as they were, and it worked out well. A palm-sized transparent cube materialized, and when I licked it, I found that it tasted salty.
I licked it and found that it tasted salty.
âŚI will probably eat meat tomorrow and for the foreseeable future.
After eating meat, Iâm going to look for the next paint.
The paints I have now are flower petal red, nut red, red clay, and blood red. Then there is yellow pollen.
I also have ochre from yellowish soil, black from humus, gray from stone dust, light brown from sand, and some kind of flower extract that I donât knowâŚ
HoweverâŚ
âItâs mostly all red and yellow and brownâŚâ
Iâve learned that there are only a limited number of colors that can be easily obtained from nature.
What should I do? I was at a loss.
Iâve been making and making paints, but all of them are similar in color. Most of them are either slightly dull light reds, yellows, or browns. Something like that. I think white, black, red, and yellow are all the colors I can make.
âŚIf possible, I want blue. If red, blue, and yellow are available, most colors can be made. But I know blue is a difficult color to find.
What is it? I remember they used to make blue paint by crushing a gem called lapis lazuli. There are many other ways to make blue, such as from cowâs blood, but there is no blue color that can be easily obtained. Thatâs why humans went as far as crushing gemstones to make blue paint.
Other than that, if tulips and other plants are growing here, blue color can be made. But I havenât seen any blue flowers so far. I wonder if there are some somewhere if I look for them.
Also, I want green.
If I have green, I can draw plants. There may be some situations where I can use blue as a substitute.
I have a lot of green⌠but surprisingly, there is not much of it.
Even if I crush leaves, it seems that it is difficult to make the green color.
Even if I get a light greenish juice, it quickly turns brown in just a few minutes. I tried rubbing the grass directly on the paper and got a slightly darker color, but it was difficult to apply it evenly.
I want green in the form of paint somehow, even if it is âŚâŚ. Not just red and yellow, I want green. I want blue too. I want to use colors freely.
Iâve come to a strange world, but if I stay here, I can paint as much as I want. So this is not such a bad world. But if thatâs the case, I want to use paint freely. I want to use various painting materials freely. I want to use all kinds of painting materials freely. âŚI came to a world where I am allowed.
âItâs beautifulâ (Tougo)
The leaf I picked has a beautiful green color. There is no such thing as unevenness in the paint, and every inch of the leaf is green. Natural things are beautiful in their own right. It is just difficult to process them and use them as materials.
âI wish I could use this color for paint.â (Tougo)
If I crush this leaf and take its juice and paint it, it will turn into a pale, dull green. The color of this leaf is beautiful, but it cannot be made into paint.
Minerals are amazing in this aspect. Even if you grind them, they are still the same color. I have used sand as paint and red clay as paint, but it is nice to have the colors as they are.
I wish I could use this leaf as an art material like sand and soil.
The leaves reminded me of edamame [A/N: green soybeans] . No, it was because the color looked like that.
âŚI was thinking of materializing edamame if I could make green paint. But maybe Iâll wait for the green paint until I find some minerals.
I was a little sad, so I cut out the leaves with a knife for comfort. âŚin the shape of an edamame pod.
That alone doesnât look like edamame, so I cut out the brownish leaves finely to express the color of the part that is connected to the edamame branch, and to express the swelling of the pod where the edamame is inside, I cut another leaf. Try cutting and pasting.
âŚOh, what Iâm using as the glue is the nectar from a large lily flower. I was indebted to the pollen when I made yellow paint, but I am also indebted to the nectar as a substitute for glue.
Through trial and error, I was able to create a leafy edamame.
This kind of thing is called collage, right? I had never done it before, but it was fun to try, just like making crafts. It might be more fun if I made it on a larger scale.
And so, I was satisfied looking at my newly finished leafy edamame. It was fun to do something new, and it was fun to make things by trial and error. On paper, the leaves were bright green, which also contributed to my satisfaction.
I was looking at the leaf edamame on the paper, while I was admiring itâŚ
The leaves on the paper shook and trembled, and then they gathered at one point and⌠a squeak and pop.
An edamame came out.
âŚOh, so this works tooâŚ
Now that I know that itâs time to take on the challenge. I use the tip of the knife again to carefully cut the leaves.
Carefully, I make sure that the leaf is as even in color as possible. Match the shape of the colored part on the label of the paint.
Once the green pieces are done, I apply lily glue to the back and fit them into the labels of the penciled paint tubes.
âŚand.
âGreen!â (Tougo)
The long-awaited green paint was born in my hands.