There comes a moment in every great construction project where you must ask yourself a single, terrifying question:
"Is this hole worth dying for?"
And as I stood knee-deep in sludge, squinting at a trench that now slightly curved like a drunken serpent, I decided—
Yes.
Yes, it was worth dying for.
I had drawn fresh gradient lines using my last intact spoon. The napkin blueprint had officially dissolved from overuse and rainfall, so I'd re-sketched the entire plan on the back of a broken soup pot lid.
We were down to our last:
-3 planks of haunted cedar
-1 cursed shovel (still whispering "dig deeper")
-17 kg of gravel
-And zero morale
Bento was wearing a towel like a cape and barking at shadows. I wasn't sure if he was guarding the site or hallucinating squirrel ghosts.
Timothy, bless his increasingly unhinged heart, was now holding full conversations with the shovel.
"She's called Matilda," he told me over tea.
"She?"
"She likes structure and she respects form. And if I dig at the wrong angle, she hums in judgment."
"…Oh."
I set up the new improvised leveling detection system: a soup bowl on a string tied to Bento's tail and a measuring stick I'd stolen from the village dentist.
"This isn't engineering," Timothy muttered.
"This is infrastructure magic."
Around midday, the trench was almost finished. We had reinforced both sidewalls with cedar planks.
The gradient held itself together, and the outflow tunnel was stable.
We dared to believe, and that was our mistake.
There was a tremor.
Then: SQUELCH!
Half the trench wall caved in. Gravel exploded. Timothy shrieked. Bento was flung six feet through the air and landed in a compost heap.
I lay flat in the mud, arms spread, staring at the sky like a man recently betrayed by God and soil in equal measure.
"…The earth mocks us," I whispered.
If that wasn't enough system rang once again. It worked as salt to our wound.
Ding!
[SYSTEM ALERT: TRENCH COLLAPSE]
Foundation Stability: 42%
Possibility of Structural Rebound: Minimal
Possibility of Villager Riots: Rising
Suggestion: Cry in increments. Hydrate between sobs.
Timothy, covered in gravel and dust, sat beside me.
"I vote we salt the ground and declare it sacred."
"No," I said, wiping clay from my eyes. "We rebuild one more time."
"Milord—"
"We will tame this trench."
I stood dramatically. My foot slipped. I fell face-first into the muck.
While I was brushing mud out of my teeth and questioning the fundamental concept of holes, Bento began barking at a nearby stump.
A tiny banner rose from it. A miniature red flag, painted with crude stick figures of villagers being pooped on by squirrels.
At the base, a scroll:
"You were warned. This land is ours.
~GREAT G"
"Gregory," I hissed.
Timothy held up a parchment labeled "Squirrel Treaty Terms," which he found nearby. It included:
-No human waste within 30 paces of squirrel nests
-Payment in acorns
-The right to poop in retaliation
"I think he's demanding jurisdictional rights over Section C of the trench zone," Timothy whispered.
"This is an act of war."
I gathered my remaining breadcrumbs of dignity and took a step forward.
"I am prepared to negotiate," I said.
A squirrel chucked a nut at my face.
"Diplomacy has failed."
***
We went mad.
Truly, gloriously mad.
Using a mixture of egg yolk glue, hair from Bento's tail, and powdered charcoal, we resealed the collapsed wall. Timothy made chanting noises. I made triangle calculations in the air using fingers and regret.
We rerouted water drainage through bent bamboo pipes.
We created an overflow trench using a broken bedframe and gravel stolen from the village shrine path.
We made soup. We poured some on the trench. For luck.
It worked.
Somehow, miraculously, the trench held.
I placed the ceremonial soapstone brick at the trench's corner.
It glowed faintly.
Maybe in approval.
Maybe just haunted.
Either way, it was done.
***
At twilight, we gathered.
Just Timothy, Bento, me, and a few curious villagers.
We stood before the now-glorious 3-meter-long, perfectly sloped, reinforced trench.
I raised the crazy ladle that brought forth the first revolution.
"I name this trench: Hopepipe."
Timothy clapped once, Bento farted solemnly and a wave of claps from villagers followed.
The System also chimed in.
[MINI-ARC COMPLETE: FOUNDATION FIASCO] Complete.
Trench: Fully Dug and Reinforced
Villager Riots: Averted (for now)
Tool Loyalty: Matilda has bonded with Timothy
Gregory the Squirrel: Watching. Always.
New Skill Unlocked: Soil Mechanics Lv. 2
Passive Buff: "Spite-Driven Digging +15%"
Quote of the Day:
"The first trench is the hardest. The second is for vengeance."
That night, I sat beside the trench.
It no longer smelled of shame and wet clay. Now, it smelled like the foundation of something real.
Something ridiculous, possibly illegal, but real.
Bento curled up beside me.
Timothy returned from the manor with a hot bowl of carrot-soup-tea-thing.
"We did it," he said, sipping. "Gods help us."
"I don't need gods," I muttered. "I have Matilda and 200 kilograms of gravel."
The trench was done.
The war had just begun.