Chapter 11

The Painter Who Draws Dungeons — Episode 11

Gio was standing in the studio.

“...”

What he was looking at was the countless drawers that wrapped around the entire walls on all four sides.

What he was thinking of was the paint materials that would be quietly sleeping inside those drawers.

“...”

Before long, Gio moved.

“...Let’s use what I used last time.”

He took out the materials he had used in the past, when he created the waterfowl.

It wasn’t only that.

Not only jewels that resembled aquamarine and emerald, but also pebbles as white and transparent as marble by the streamside.

Fragments of obsidian branches that had been hiding among the trees, pretending to be burnt wood.

Light green tree bark that looked as if juice would come out if you pressed it, brimming with vitality...

Once he felt it was enough, Gio stopped taking materials out of the drawers.

“If there’s leftovers it’s a pain to put them back, so if I’m short I’ll just take out more later...”

Clink, clatter.

He set the materials on the worktable.

“...Today’s content.”

Making my own paints.

“Nice.”

Basically, the materials needed to make oil paint were pigments to produce color and oil to knead them with, and a glass plate and muller to gather and mix them into a fine paint.

If you want to mix them well, you also need a fillet knife of an appropriate size.

Among them, what Gio was trying to make right now was the pigment that would give the color.

“Should I break them up first.”

In the state the materials had just been taken out of the drawers, he couldn’t manufacture proper paint.

They all had to be turned into colored powder, and to do that, it seemed he had to break them up first.

Gio prepared a sharp nail and a hammer.

Staring quietly at a transparent jewel, he soon set the nail at a certain point and tapped the top—

Tok!

“...”

Even though it wasn’t a strong force, the jewel, struck precisely at the crack point, split into two.

Gio thought.

‘As expected, I’m a potato—magnificent potato.’

This mountain-village idol knows the point where minerals will split just by looking at them.

‘I should’ve been a miner.’

Gio continued the work.

Clatter.

“...”

Tok, thud.

Creeeak...!

“...”

“...Yeah.”

Perhaps because he only confirmed the weakest grain and applied impact, the jewel was soon divided into pieces even smaller than Gio’s pinky nail.

“This should be enough.”

Gio smashed the finely broken jewel with the hammer, then swept the even smaller fragments into a ceramic mortar and ground them with force.

At some point, the sound that had grated against his ears shifted smoothly, like glass beads rolling, and the jewel all became powder.

“...What’s the principle behind this...”

A pigment was completed, with blue and light green subtly mixed.

“This is troublesome—because everything that makes up me is this special, I mustn’t end up getting caught and dragged to a lab.”

All the studio’s materials were unique.

Originally, even if you grind a jewel, all that comes out is stone powder.

Most jewels are transparent and beautifully colored thanks to their molecular structure, but if you grind that up, you can no longer find the jewel’s transparency.

But the jewels here were different.

‘Even when you grind them, that color and transparency remain intact.’

Even through the process of an amateur like Gio, their original color remained whole—he was, truly, benefiting from the virtue of excellent materials.

When the finely ground jewel was clumped together, it would shine with its own refreshing transparency.

Silently turning all the materials into pigments, Gio slowly mixed them with the oil he had prepared.

“...”

No matter that he had made powder, even after mixing in raw stone powder, the oil and pigment did not separate and float.

Normally, he would have to prepare an oil suited to the pigment’s properties, but the wax in his studio showed excellent viscosity and blending power.

“...Mix in some fragrance too...”

Going beyond simply producing color, Gio added even a matching fragrance.

Oil infused with the scent of flowers or fruit, strangely, harmonized excellently with the pigments.

“Grind, and add it...”

He put in the pigments and the scented oil and ground them finely on the glass plate.

“...”

So that it would feel as if silk brushed against the hand.

Very finely.

* * *

The waterfowl Gio had made were more playful than he expected.

“Kids.”

Clatter.

“Dad’s neck is chilly.”

They were wriggling into the inside of Gio’s collar and nesting there.

Inside the shirt collar at the neck, inside sleeves where there was just the slightest gap, inside pants and outerwear—anywhere there was space, the waterfowl were wedged in there.

‘Aren’t they uncomfortable.’

Trying to compare them to small water balloons, the sight of them squeezing inside his clothes, even crumpling their shape, was hard to call either a balloon or a bird.

With their minimally round shape, all scrunched up, Gio stared at the ceiling for a moment.

“...”

It’s funny, so I’ll let it slide.

“...Maybe it’s because it’s something they do to me, their parent, but they like being wedged somewhere.

Or do they like hiding.”

The waterfowl had a habit of sticking together in flocks.

If not that, they preferred pooling somewhere.

Sometimes, when he went outside the cabin, he was often startled by puddles he saw even though it hadn’t rained.

‘It’s definitely different from an ordinary puddle, so I can notice it quickly.’

The puddles they gathered into had a faint bluish tint, were strangely transparent, and inside them, various bits and bobs rolled around.

Considering that when they’re normally gathered in their round bird form, you don’t feel a shred of viscosity, it was ironic.

“On the outside, it’s just water, though.”

Pashuk.

“If you keep being noisy, I might stick in a straw and slurp you down.”

Rustle, rustle.

“That was a joke, I won’t drink you.

Even I think that was a scary thing to say.”

Living water—how could one drink such a thing.

“Eating something alive, drinking paint, consuming children I birthed as paint—physiologically, that’s hard.”

Clatter?

“Before I’m moved by your filial devotion—saying that if Father is thirsty, you can offer your one body—I feel fear.

It would be best to restrain yourselves.”

Gio, having meaningless conversations with nearly a hundred children, was sitting in the studio now.

“I need to make you a home.”

At first he hadn’t thought much of it, but with living, moving water wandering around near the house, it was no small concern.

If they just stayed quietly clumped together, it would be fine, but sometimes they came into the house and caused accidents, or stole things.

Up to that point, Gio would let it slide as cute, but since they sometimes hid in the streamwater too...

“I’ve been saying it, but I’m really not going to drink you.

I misspoke, kids.”

Pishuk.

“No, I don’t like that.

Don’t slander this dad with a weird preference.

I just wanted to drink water.”

He had almost drunk the waterfowl.

“Do you know how surprised I was when you popped out inside my mouth.

Yeah, you—this one with nothing inside your belly right now.”

The only way to tell the waterfowl apart was their faint light and the junk inside them, but when they had no belongings and fully blended into the streamwater, you couldn’t distinguish them.

When he felt wriggling water in his mouth, Gio’s heart dropped.

The parties themselves didn’t care at all—amazingly, they seemed to like it—but Gio did not have such a ruthless preference.

“You need a home too.”

Clatter, click?

“You need your own habitat.”

Do we lack money, do we lack time, do we lack land.

In this abundant, vast world, what do you mean freeloading.

“And...”

There was also personal interest.

“I’m going to decorate this place little by little.”

Tap-tap, click!

“Right now it’s too monotonous.”

A single cabin, a vast forest, and a beautiful spring.

That alone was insufficient.

“I need to make a fishing spot.”

It’s not for nothing that the popularity of open-world RPGs varies so widely.

In every kind of content, it’s not good for a map to merely be wide; it must be rich with things to enjoy.

“This isn’t really a game, but it’s true that I need to grow it another step.

In the end, it’s the same context.”

Right now, Gio’s outdoor activities were at best gathering and farming.

He had to increase the content he could do one by one so he wouldn’t get bored without even going outside the painting.

“The outside right now, strangely, doesn’t feel dear to me.”

Brbbk.

“Is it because it isn’t the world I remembered back then...”

“I don’t want to live there.”

Gio liked being inside the painting now.

“Being unemployed is nice too.”

To be honest, this was the best part.

“...Now come out.”

Click!

Clack!

“Watching me paint is fine, but if you keep staying inside my clothes, it bothers me.

Even now my shirt is about to burst, the poor thing.”

Clatter...

“Do you think this dad is doing this just because I like it, kids.

Remember that this is all so I can make you a home.”

Fortunately, the waterfowl obediently came out of Gio’s clothes.

“...”

Thanks to children who could listen when spoken to, Gio could finally hold his brush.

He opened his mouth.

“If I’m going to fish...”

A big lake would be good.

“Let’s do a lake.”

Let it be a lake where the trees and water fully touch.

Under it, fish would live.

There would be tiny minnows that flowed in from the stream, and there would be flat fish that hid their bodies, trapped in the sand at the bottom.

“Nice.”

Let’s also build a bridge where you can fish.

There will be a wooden bridge that connects across the middle of the big lake.

Should the color be a little light.

A light, soft color like freshly baked white bread would be good.

If the lake water could be glimpsed between the wooden planks, then in the day it would glitter in the sunlight.

What about the evening scene.

“...”

Each time it swayed with the wind, the surface of the water would glow like faint lantern light.

When night falls and it gets dark, it would be nice if you could see its interior well.

It would be nice if you could see all of the deep inside of the lake.

Like the luminous bracelets I treasured and admired so that only I could see them, hiding under a thick blanket in a dark room as a child—it would be bright yet faint.

“...It’d also be fine if the color changed depending on your mood.”

Rustle.

“On days you feel good, gold; on days you don’t, red; on days you’re sad or depressed, blue... on an ordinary peaceful day, green.”

Pashuk, pashuk.

“You don’t have vocal cords, so you can’t cry.”

If I can’t hear, then make it so I can see.

“So I can talk with you too.”

Gio was the creator of the waterfowl, but he couldn’t control them however he wanted.

So he didn’t know what the waterfowl were thinking, and their form was hazy, and because they had no vocal cords and were quiet, if you didn’t listen closely you couldn’t even tell where they were.

‘It’s not for nothing that I almost ate them.

There mustn’t be another catastrophe like that.’

If they weren’t so playful and chatty, Gio surely wouldn’t have been able to find them.

“...”

That would be a little sad.

“I’ll come play at night.

Then we can talk.”

Pishuk.

“If you shine like that in the dark evening, I’ll be able to see you even if I’m in the cabin.

Yeah, that’ll do.

I’ll be watching you from the terrace, so you can tell me what you want to say then.”

Pishuk, pishuk.

“Yeah.”

Gio moved his brush again.

“Let’s do that.”

The lake he drew held night within it.

“...I like it.”

The lake’s color wasn’t just one.

The waterfowl liked to clump together, but the treasures they put in their bodies were each different.

Their personalities were different.

The way they spoke and thought and acted all had to be different.

‘So every night, their whispered complaints and boasts will all be different too.’

So he placed their halos one by one with his brush.

“It’s like pointillism.”

Up close, he would be able to tell which of you are having a hard time or are sick, and which are enjoying yourselves and are happy.

From far away, he would be able to tell what all of you want to say to me, and when I should go find you, soothe you, and talk to you.

“Nice.”

It also looked like a flower bed blooming atop the water’s surface.

Maybe because he drew it with paint he made himself, it was clearly water, yet an indescribable freshness could be felt.

“Good.”

Or like fireflies, or the forest butterflies here that resemble sunlight and moonlight.

Or perhaps it resembled the sparkle of transparent lighting reflected in a windowpane.

“...”

When Gio had drawn out all of their emotions, the lake was dyed in golden light.

“...I think it’s good.”

That pleasure of pulling something imagined into reality was beyond words.

This lake would be set a little far from the cabin, clearly apart from the springwater as well.

The trees pressed tight against the lake’s boundary would still keep their greenness.

“In the day it’ll be blue.”

If you scoop it up, it will be clear as if holding the sky, and inside it will be a chilly blue like the sea, and the glints shimmering when sunlight hits it will look almost white.

And with all these waterfowl hiding and moving there, wouldn’t they sometimes poke their heads out and play tricks when they’re bored.

“At night, you’ll sparkle however you want...”

Sparkle like water made of fog.

“You’ll scatter.”

Like a newborn baby laughing giddily at even a small breeze, you’ll shine with all your light.

Imagining that made him feel very good.

“...”

When he tapped the canvas, the painting soon disappeared.

Maybe it was his imagination, but from far away, the smell of water drifted in.

It was a faint scent, enough that just smelling it made him want to immediately lie down on moss and fall asleep.

‘To think scent comes from water with nothing in it—does it feel similar to the white-tree springwater.’

The bird on his shoulder quivered at the scent, and the bird sitting on the canvas fluttered.

Paddeudeuk—!

Poruruk, poruk!

Paseuseuseuseuk—.

Clack, clack!

Splash...!

Countless birds that had been hanging from the lamp flew out between the open windows.

Their lively wingbeats, like migratory birds returning to their hometown, were as refreshing as if a wind from the seashore had passed through...

“...”

He liked it, as expected.

The waterfowl will too.

Fantasy, modern,