He endured the night in a half-dream, half-awake state amidst the apocalyptic symphony of the storm.

When he opened his eyes again, the shelter was dimly lit.

He unlatched the door, only to find the snowdrift piled up halfway, allowing just a tiny gap to peer outside.

"Whoosh—!"

Outside, the wind howled like a knife scraping glass, no longer just white but a chaotic grayish white, with visibility less than a meter.

"The storm continues, even more ferociously than yesterday."

He glanced at the time on the camera.

November 20, 2021

"Good morning, as you can see, I'm trapped."

He spoke calmly to the camera, though his eyes were grave: "It seems like today, tomorrow, and perhaps the day after, I can't go anywhere. I don't know how the other contestants are doing either."

In this completely isolated and secluded environment, time seemed to stretch, with every minute feeling extraordinarily long.

The intense claustrophobia and anxiety over the unknown could easily crush an ordinary person's will.

But Lin Yu'an knew that the best weapon against all of this was to keep his mind and hands busy.

He started with a detailed review for himself, outlining every decision and action from landing to now in a waterproof notebook.

Then he opened the notebook and pen provided by the show, and his mind involuntarily began to replay the journey of the past twenty days.

Looking back, it truly was a time of racing against the clock.

The first few days were filled with frantic exploration and basic construction, setting up temporary shelters, discovering mussels, and finding life-saving food like bulrush.

Then followed ten days of frenzied construction.

His mind flashed with images of himself softening frozen ground with fire, moving huge stones, sawing and chiseling out saddle grooves bit by bit with a hand saw and an axe.

Afterwards, he shifted strategies.

He crafted snowshoes for exploring in the snow, boiled sea salt, and tracked Thunderbirds to design new traps.

Twenty days, from nothing to something, though challenging, every step proceeded on a reasonable strategy.

It was these accumulations that allowed him the qualification to peacefully sit by the stove amid the roaring storm.

Thinking of this, he stood up, the hunger pangs in his stomach pulling him back from his memories; he needed food.

This rational review reassured him of his situation and resources, dispersing the unease brought on by the storm.

"Alright, the review is over, now it's time to deal with breakfast."

Approaching the door, he once again felt the immense pressure on it, a wave of indescribable gratitude surging up inside.

He spoke to the camera, filled with emotion: "Now, I am immensely grateful for making the single correct decision, which was to steadfastly gather mussels each day and freeze them after roasting."

"Had I hesitated or been lazy, if my food reserves only lasted a day or two, in this dire situation, I wouldn't know what I might face next?"

"I might be praying for the blizzard to pass quickly, or picking up that satellite phone in hunger and despair."

"I didn't know about this storm beforehand, and didn't expect it to last and be so fierce."

"Yet I've always believed in one principle: never be picky about readily available food in the wilderness."

"Using current diligence to secure future certainty is perhaps the essence of survival."

"Looking back, my effort previously exchanged not just for food, but a calm readiness to await."

With that, he took a deep breath, once again unlatched the door, preparing for a brief yet necessary "resupply action."

Using a digging stick and his body, he arduously cleared a path through the snow at the doorway, then ducked out.

In an instant, he was engulfed once more by that roaring icy world!

Relying on memory, he frantically dug through the thick snow until his fingertips finally touched the storage basket woven from bulrush leaves.

He lifted the basket lid, grabbing a large handful of mussels that had long frozen solid like stones.

He took only enough for a day's need and quickly reburied the basket, then hastily retreated back into his shelter.

"Clang!"

The wooden door closed, and the world fell silent once more.

He removed his snow-covered coat, sat by the warm fireplace, and began heating the frozen mussels in an iron pot.

Hearing the "sizzle" from the pot against the muffled storm outside, the stark contrast fostered a powerful sense of belonging to the shelter he had built with his own hands!

After finishing the hot meal, Lin Yu'an was replenished with energy.

He looked at the grayish white chaos outside, knowing he had a whole day left to "kill."

He decided to use this God-given time to forge a crucial weapon for life after the snowstorm.

"Once the storm passes, the lake will freeze completely and be covered with thick snow. Ice fishing will become one of my most important food sources."

"Fish under the ice have a very light bite, requiring an extremely sensitive rod tip to detect. I must craft a professional ice fishing rod tailored for myself."

He walked to the corner, drew one of his spare eight carbon arrows from the bow-and-arrow set wrapped in a canvas bag.

Holding the arrow horizontally in his hand, he said to the camera: "Regular wooden rods, although tough, are inefficient at transmitting vibrations."

He gently tapped the black carbon fiber shaft: "This, on the other hand, is a miracle of modern material science, light, hard, and its vibration transmission efficiency is dozens of times that of wood."

"Any tiny touch beneath the ice can be transmitted to my hand without attenuation. Using this for an ice fishing rod's shaft, while extravagant, is absolutely fitting."

He planned to create a hybrid design integrating a wooden handle, wooden reel, and carbon fiber shaft.

First, he crafted a handle perfectly fitting his palm.

From a woodpile, he selected a dry piece of birch without cracks, wrist-thick, then spent over an hour meticulously carving it with a hand axe and hunting knife into a grip.

This grip's front end was slightly thicker, reserved for attaching the rod shaft, its middle aligned with the palm comfortably, the rear left with a platform for installing the reel.

Next came the soul of the entire creation—the wooden reel.

He picked another thicker piece of birch, intending to craft a reel resembling a miniature I-beam.

He first shaved the wood into a cylinder with a knife, then very patiently carved from both ends toward the center, hollowing the middle portion while leaving raised edges at both ends.

"The reel's rim must be smooth; otherwise, it will wear down precious fishing line." he said while repeatedly scraping the inner wall of the reel with his knife.

Now he encountered the first technical bottleneck.

He needed to drill smooth, straight, and precisely sized axle holes both at the reel's center and on the grip's rear platform.

He attempted to use the hunting knife's tip for drilling but found it not only inefficient but also hard to ensure the holes were vertical and smooth.

He stopped working, furrowing his brow, "No, continuing this way will ruin these painstakingly made components. I need a tool providing continuous and stable rotational force."

He surveyed his small shelter, his gaze falling on each available tool, seeking a solution.

His eyes finally settled on the recurved bow hanging on the wall.

"Bow..."

He murmured to himself, then a classic and efficient primitive tool appeared in his mind—a bow drill!

"I need to create a bow drill set. It requires four core components: a bow, drill shaft, handle, and drill bit."

"I already have the perfect substitute for the drill bit!" His gaze shifted to the corner's carbon arrow.

He took the carbon arrow, showing its head to the camera: "Standard hunting arrows use threaded connections for interchangeable arrowheads."

Lin Yu'an grasped the sharp G5 hunting arrowhead, twisting counterclockwise; with a slight friction sound, he unscrewed the deadly metal arrowhead from the shaft.

Exhibiting the connection between the arrowhead and shaft to the camera: "Look here, this metal arrowhead itself is a perfect, high-strength steel drill bit!"

"Using it for driving, precision and efficiency will greatly improve! I overlooked this when I was making the door!"

This discovery thrilled him immensely!