Chapter 3

I understood.

It seems that for "what is drawn to materialize," a certain level of completion is necessary.

To materialize a red cherry tomato, the color red is needed. If that's the case, to materialize a green pencil, the color green is needed, right?

Mochi (rice cake) is white, so it was safe. As for barley tea... I think it was probably too dark, so it was treated as black and was safe.

...If it was barley tea of normal thickness in a white cup, I don't think it would materialize. I won't try it, though.

Well, this is a problem.

If only black and white drawings can materialize into black and white objects, it's quite troublesome.

I'm not that fond of mochi. I have some attachment to it, and I don't dislike it, but I like it as a memory, not as food.

The food I like... hmm, edamame?

Yeah. Edamame. I want to eat edamame. But I think edamame probably won't materialize unless it's colored green.

...But, if that's the case, it's simple.

I've decided on my immediate goal.

My immediate goal is... to obtain "color"!

Anyway, it's getting to be evening, so I decided to draw a blanket.

A blanket, or rather, a large blanket. Since the one I borrowed from the teacher's house was white, I thought I could manage, and I drew it, and it worked. Good.

So today, I can sleep quite comfortably. At least, I won't be cold even if I don't curl up.

...But my back hurts, so I want to make a futon tomorrow.

When I woke up, it was morning. Good morning. By the way, yesterday I only moved a few steps. Well, it's common when I'm drawing. There are days when I don't leave the room at all except to go to the bathroom.

Well.

From today, I think I'll go out to collect paints. Just thinking about it, I suddenly feel motivated. Well, it's bound to be more fun to look for paints than to look for food or water.

What should I do? The paints I used in my original world were mostly made of minerals. I don't remember much, but I think I used things like iron oxide and cinnabar to make red.

Also, flowers.

I remember using safflower for dyeing, and safflower could be used for both paints and cosmetics. I remember reading that in a Japanese history textbook. It's surprising that such a red color can be obtained from a plant.

I don't know if there are safflower-like flowers in this world, but I think it's worth looking for them.

If there are, I can eat as many cherry tomatoes as I want. And probably, apples and strawberries too.

...So, I decided to go exploring much more energetically than the day before.

Before going out to explore, I made a bag. Because I had more tools like the blanket and knife.

I didn't have the energy to draw something with a complicated shape... so, a paper bag. The kind that comes with paints when you buy them at an art supply store. I couldn't take it home, so I left it at the teacher's house.

A simple gray paper bag wasn't too difficult to draw. Honestly, I don't think the drawing itself was very good, but it materialized, so that's good.

I put the folded blanket, paper, pencil, and the newly made knife, and a few of the glowing flowers that were growing around, into it, and set out.

Walking with the paper bag hanging from my shoulder.

...I found a red flower blooming after walking for a relatively short time.

"Can it work?"

I might as well give it a try. I crushed the petals and used the juice to color.

What I drew was an apple. Not a Fuji or a King, but a Beni Shidare.

I could also express yellow using the pollen from the stamens of the flower. Since Beni Shidare isn't that yellow, this was enough.

I drew the details with a pencil. In other words, I painted over a pencil sketch. I've done watercolor over pencil sketches a few times, so I know the technique.

...And, three hours later.

One apple was made.

"...It was more difficult than I thought."

It's okay that it took three hours to make one apple. A pencil sketch can take about three hours, and for me, drawing is the purpose, not that I wanted to eat an apple. Well, it's fun that the drawing materializes.

...But, what was difficult was collecting the petals.

The amount of color you can get from one petal is very small. Collecting many, many petals and using them to force the color, is... inefficient.

Thinking about it, paints are a great tool. They spread well even in small amounts, and the colors are beautiful.

Yeah. If I had paints, I could draw more things...

...Ah.

Maybe if I draw paints, paints will come out...

I drew a tube of watercolor paint and colored one part of the label. This completed a very ordinary tube of paint.

And, at the same time as it was completed... just like with the mochi, the lines trembled and gathered, and then, pop, it came out.

A tube of paint came out.

...And when I squeezed the materialized tube a little, paint of the color I had painted on the label came out. The color of the petals. Red. It was a bit pink because it thinned out when I painted it on the paper.

But, this... is very convenient!

After that, I made many, many paints. I drew more paints than food. Humans, it seems, don't change that easily. It's the same as when I spent all my lunch money on art supplies.

There are many kinds of red, even if they're all red.

The red from petals and the red from berries are different. When I rubbed red soil and used it, I got a paint of that color.

...But, there is a limit.

"It's pale."

The color is pale.

...The color that comes from bright red petals is not bright red.

No matter what, the color will be pale. It also tends to be dull. So, when I make paint from red petals and draw a picture with it, I end up with... a slightly dull, pale red.

I thought maybe I could dry the petals after coloring them and then layer the color to make it darker, but that didn't work.

...The paint tube materialized as soon as the drawing of a "pale red paint tube" was completed.

It seems that if you hesitate at the stage of finishing the color, it materializes first. Then, I thought, if I color it first and then complete the drawing of the paint tube, it might work... but when I tried layering the color of the petals, it did get darker, but it still ended up being a dull color.

Well.

The color that came out the most vivid and intense so far was the color of the soil.

The reddish-brown made from red soil is the most beautiful color so far, but... it's still not enough.

Is there a vivid red somewhere? A red like the skin of an apple, a sunset, red ink, the belly of an American white grub, or blood. Is there such a red somewhere?

...Ah, "like blood"...

"I did it."

I did it. I made a very red paint. I can't help but be very satisfied.

By the way, as the price of the red paint, I had to cut my arm a little, but, well, it can't be helped. A little injury for the sake of paint is nothing. I wrapped it up, so I think I'm fine.

Well. Now that I have red, I want yellow next. And blue, too.

If I have red, yellow, and blue, I can make most colors. The three primary colors are not just for show.

...But, where can I get yellow, let alone blue? Blue is a very rare color in nature, so I think it will be difficult to make.

Well, it's fine. I'll start with what I can collect.

I got a surprisingly beautiful yellow right away. There was a huge lily that I could sleep in, and I took one of the stamens and used the pollen to make paint.

The pollen of flowers is a wonderful color. It turned bright yellow. The completed paint was also, but even more so, my hands.

...I wanted to wash my hands once, so I made water. I can draw a glass of water in black and white, so I did.

"By the way, I want water."

That's when I remembered.

I want water. I want water. Even without food, I need water. Water is not just for drinking; watercolor paint is watercolor, so I can't use it without water.

I can attach color directly, but... I want water, if possible.

If possible, I want an environment where I can get water without having to draw it every time. I don't need a faucet or tap water, but I want clean water.

But, I hadn't found a water source yet.

I think there is water in the ground. After all, plants are growing.

But, there was no place where it was springing up, and I hadn't found even a stream.

If there was such a place, it would be really convenient.

...But, there isn't.

So, I'll draw it. I'll draw water.

If I draw a huge container filled with a huge amount of water, I can save myself some trouble for a while, right?

So, I decided to draw a huge amount of water using the paints I have.

First, I had to find a suitable place.

...As a result, I found a place that was moderately open, with no rocks or fallen trees, and a depression that looked like "it used to be a spring but dried up," so I decided to use this place.

Well.

I sat on the nearby ground and immediately started sketching something that would be "a huge container filled with a huge amount of water."

What I drew was stones, soil, and withered grass. And, "a non-existent water surface."

I added non-existent water to the scenery I saw. In other words, I drew a huge amount of water in the "huge container" that was the dried-up spring.

The way the water surface reflects light. The way the water sparkles at the water's edge. The ripples created by the springing water. The light reflected by the ripples.

These are, in a way, about drawing light rather than water. And since drawing light means I can do it in black and white... and since I have red, yellow, and brown paints to make the color of withered grass and soil, I can draw something decent. I even thought about adding some fish, but it would get complicated, so I gave up. I just kept drawing the "huge container filled with a huge amount of water."

...And, as evening came, night came, I slept, and in the morning, I drew again... finally, it was completed.

It's a landscape. The first landscape I drew since coming to this world. A non-existent landscape.

In front of my eyes, in reality, is a dried-up spring. But, on the paper in my hand, there is a spring where water gushes out.

...Nothing happened.

I thought, "It didn't work, after all." After all, it's a landscape. If I had drawn something like a 100-liter water tank filled with water, it might have worked. But, I wanted to try a landscape, so I couldn't help it.

...Well, I drew what I wanted to draw, so that's fine.

I thought that and looked at the drawing I had just made again.

Then.

The screen trembled. And, just like when the mochi materialized, the drawing concentrated at one point and...

...gently spread and disappeared.

"...Huh?"

It didn't materialize, it disappeared. I thought, "Huh?" but it didn't materialize as water...

I looked up from the paper and was surprised.

There was a spring. Water had appeared where there was no water.

The non-existent landscape I drew had changed the real landscape.

And... the moment I confirmed that, I suddenly felt my consciousness fading, and I ended up taking a forced nap.

...In other words, I fainted. Probably.

When I woke up, it was after noon. My head was terribly painful.

But, there was a spring in front of me. A beautiful, very clear spring was there.

"...It wasn't a dream."

I touched the water to test it, and it was indeed water. I scooped up water with both hands and drank it.

It was delicious. It's not that water has a taste, but apparently, my body really needed water. ...Now that I think about it, I didn't drink much barley tea yesterday. Maybe I fainted because of that.

Yeah. That's it. I fainted, I think.

I remember the spring being completed. I also remember it being around dawn.

But now it's after noon. I think I lost consciousness the moment the spring was completed. It was too sudden to be a nap, so probably, I fainted.

...Why did I faint? It's a bit scary.

I thought about it, but it was a huge waste of effort. I also felt like thinking about it was a waste of time.

But... I think I fainted because I "materialized the spring."

Until now, what I had materialized were things like mochi, barley tea, knives, cherry tomatoes, and at most, a blanket—things I could carry. Suddenly, I drew and materialized something as big as a spring, so I think it was different from before. Probably.

When I think back, the way it materialized was different, too. It didn't materialize with a "kyu" and a "pop" like the mochi or tomatoes, but with a "kyu" and a "fwoosh," and then the scenery changed.

...Or, maybe it's because I drew something that didn't exist? I added something that didn't exist in the original scenery?

Hmm... well, it's fine. For now, I'll remember that "drawing and materializing something big might make me faint."

Well, after drinking water, I remembered that I was hungry, so I decided to have a meal.

Today's meal is... meat.

Yeah. Meat. I decided on meat. I think I need to eat meat to avoid a nutritional imbalance. On the other hand, I think I can survive on just meat.

I could have drawn a cooked piece of meat as it is, but I wanted to try, so I drew raw meat.

A steak-like piece of meat came out. Well, it's meat I drew.

When the meat came out, I drew a frying pan. This was easy because it was all black.

When the frying pan came out... I drew a lens.

I could draw the lens in black and white. Drawing transparent things is fun, after all.

Well. When the lens was ready, I focused the sunlight with it.

The target was a piece of paper that was blackened. ...A bicycle I tried to draw to materialize but gave up halfway. A part of it.

When the light focused on it, the paper gradually heated up... and eventually, it caught fire.

As soon as it caught fire, I threw withered grass and other things into it. When the fire grew, I added branches to make a campfire.

When the campfire was ready, I held the frying pan with the meat over it and cooked it.

...I realized halfway through that I hadn't put any oil on the frying pan, but, well, it can't be helped. I decided to cook it with beef fat. In other words, I cooked it as is.

It stuck to the frying pan a bit, but the meat was cooked safely. I put the cooked meat on a leaf plate...

"Itadakimasu."

I ate it.

...It was meat. But, since I didn't use any salt or anything, it was just plain beef.

I want salt.

I drew salt. ...This was quite a problem. After all, salt is just white powder. I thought, if it becomes just white powder, it won't be distinguishable from sugar, flour, and other things.

But, I decided to draw the salt crystals as they are, and it worked. A transparent cube the size of my palm materialized, and when I tasted it, it was indeed salty.

This way, I was able to eat meat with salt.

...I think I'll be eating meat for a while from tomorrow.

After eating the meat, I went to look for more paints.

The paints I have now are red from petals, berries, and red soil, and red from blood. Also, yellow from pollen.

I also have yellowish soil, black from humus, gray from stone powder, light brown from sand, and some unknown flower juice... various paints.

...But.

"Almost all of them are red, yellow, and brown..."

I realized that the colors I can easily get from nature are limited.

What should I do? I'm in trouble.

I've made a lot of paints, but they all look similar. Mostly, they are slightly dull, pale red or yellow. And brown. It feels like I can make all the colors that can be made with white, black, red, and yellow.

...I want blue, if possible. If I have red, blue, and yellow, I can make most colors. But, I know that blue is a difficult color.

What was it? I think they used to make blue paint by crushing lapis lazuli, a gemstone. There were also ways to make blue from cow's blood, but... there is no easily obtainable blue color. That's why humans used to make blue paint by crushing gemstones.

There is... if there are plants like Japanese indigo, I might be able to make blue. But, I haven't seen any blue flowers so far. If I search, there might be some somewhere.

Also, I want green.

If I have green, I can draw plants. It might also be useful as a substitute for blue.

...But, green is surprisingly rare.

When I crushed leaves, it seemed that it was difficult to make a green color.

Even if a light greenish juice came out, it turned brown in just a few minutes. When I rubbed the grass directly on the paper, I got a slightly darker color, but it was difficult to apply it evenly.

...But, I want green in the form of paint. I want green, not just red and yellow. I want blue. I want to use colors freely.

I ended up in a strange world, but as long as I'm here, I can draw as much as I want. So, this isn't such a bad world. But, if that's