--A house in the village of Koliat

　My husband and child put on their thick leather shoes and stood up.

'I'll be off then.'

Mom, I'm going!

'Yes, go ahead. I'll be at Raina's house to collaborate with you after I finish this knitting, and you'll have some stew warmed up for lunch.

　I smile and wave as I send the child out of the room to see how well she's doing.

'Yes!'

Okay, thank you.


　The child responds cheerfully to my words and runs off into the snow, and my husband follows suit.

　Then the door closes.

　The only sound in the room is the sound of burning wood, to warm the room.

　I stop by the fireplace and adjust the wood to burn more and sit down beside it and start knitting.

'Huh, it's cold,'

　Since farming is not allowed at this time of year, clothes and baskets made of wood are paid as a tax. There are several of these to choose from.

　In our house, we pay for clothes and wooden baskets.

　Some people in other families do things like teacups, cups, and wooden carvings. No one in my family is that handy, so we do very common tasks.

　Lately, we've been doing this every day as a family, but today, with the snow piling up, we decided to send the kids out to play.

　I wanted to go with all of us, but I'm holding back today.

　Because today is that day.

　To tell the truth, I'm finishing my quota for today for this day.

　The rest of the day, I'll just knit until I hear from you.

　It's been a twinge of cold since this morning, probably because of the snow we've had today, and my hands are cold.

　I managed to keep my hands from getting numb, and lightly warmed my fingers over the fire as I manipulated the knitting sticks to make up the clothes.

　The room feels even quieter because earlier the kids were making a lot of noise, screaming about snow and snow.

　As I work silently by myself, with no one to talk to, I hear a rhythmic pounding on the front door.

'It's okay,'

As I reply, I rattle open the door and my best friend, Rita, walks in.

'Hannah, it's snowing today, so we're going to have our congregation outside.'

What the hell are we doing today?

Today, you know, na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na!　We're going to make an ice statue!

　I can hear Rita's excited voice. Could this be the case?　My inner delusion spreads.

'Could the subject be........'

"Sil X Al!

'One minute!　I'll be there in a minute!

You need to hurry up.

　I quickly put out the fire, get dressed and run with Rita into the snow world.

'Come on, let's get you involved!

What shall I do?

"'Goofy, rotten.



　× X X X



　--In the village of Koliat.

　There are a lot of children running around in the village, probably because of the snow.

　I'm sure many of them have gotten tired of staying inside and doing the inside work. Many of them are bored with their domestic chores, though.

　Roland, who makes snowmen in the village, is one of them.

'Look!　Westa!　My snowman!　Your abs must be as banged up as mine, right?

'Hmm, it's Roland. What's the fun in showing off something with only two heads like that?　Look at mine!　You're properly humanoid.

'What?　Hold on a minute!　Any minute now, I'm going to make you an ice statue that looks just like my body.

Hmm. Try not to be a bear or a snowman at all.



　Then we turned our backs on each other for a while.

"I got it, Wester!

　Roland showed off his confidence.

　It made up an inverted triangle of his body, which was beautifully expressed down to the smallest of muscles. The abdominal muscles and biceps in particular showed extraordinary attention to detail.

　Just looking at this place alone, I thought I could say a word of admiration for Wester.

What's on your bottom half?

'Oh?　Of course it's the lower body that supports my magnificent upper body.

You can't understand that, can you?　Seeing Roland's face as he said this, Westa made a blue streak appear on his face.

'You didn't expect me to jump out of the range of bears and snowmen and create a demon, did you?　What's with that misshapen body of yours?　You look like an orc?

'Huh!　What about yours like that?

　Wester sniffs and shows off his ice statue as Roland packs in with a look of pride.

'Parentheses!　This is the ice sculpture of my physical beauty!

　The ice statue of Wester, with his arms behind his head, emphasizes his pecs and abdominal muscles in an unflattering manner. Its perfection was certainly high, but the muscles were obviously more discounted than Wester's when he was undressed.

　That was the first thing Roland noticed.

'Hoho?　This is you?

　Roland narrows his eyes and gives a quizzical look. However, Wester is proud to say that he has nothing to be ashamed of.

'There's no way your muscles are this big!

"Hey hey hey what are you doing.....　My abs and pecs!

　Westa screams and throws snow at him, telling him to stop.

　Roland gets hit in the face with it.

'You, what the hell are you doing all of a sudden?

Well, you should get what you deserve for messing with my ice sculptures. That's nice, Roland. You're looking twice as good as you usually do.　Hahahahaha..........................Ka-pe!

　A snowball is thrown into Wester's mouth, who was laughing with his big mouth open.

'Ki, sah, well. Are you going to do it?

"Come on, you little shit!

"I'm gonna crush you, brainiac!

　A fierce snowball fight began on the side of the village road.

　The other villagers who were watching it gathered around, curious as to what it was all about.

''Hey, Ehrman, give us a hand!　We're going to beat the crap out of that bastard!

What?　Is it me?

"Lardo, give me your hand!　I'm going to show those muscle guys what they're made of!

'What?　Me?

　Hearing Roland and Wester's call for support, the villagers said, "We're in the mix! That's a real snowball fight! And one by one, they come.

　Then the team split into two, and the village of Koliat became a battleground.