Chapter 135: A tale by the foolish villagers

"I can't light up the fire, mom. Can you come over and see what's wrong?" A skinny-looking girl came to her mother with a fat looking splinter in her hand. Her delicate features were twisted in worry. 

Above the tip of the splinter there was a burnt ash of some sort of combustible substance that she was using earlier to light up the woods. However, the woods seemed too damp to catch the fire and even the splinter after getting rubbed against the hard cement surface multiple times barely produced any fire. 

"Why not?" The older woman who was busy kneading dough looked up at her daughter angrily. 

She rested her arms on her knees, hanging her dough-stuck hands downwards as she huffed, "How many times do I have to teach you this, huh?" 

"No mother, I can light the fire on this," She showed her the burnt tip of the splinter. "The woods aren't catching the fire. They are damp."