kscans

Chapter 25 - A Story Without Mosquitoes, Mosquito Smudge

Fortunately, he had been able to find pyrethrum, or Pyrite as it's called here, but the amount was somewhat discouraging. He might find more if he expanded his search area, but he needed to think of an alternative plan in case he couldn't...

"Let's see, pyrethrum is originally from the Mediterranean region, and it was introduced to Japan around the Meiji era, right? Naturally, before that, they must have used other methods for insect repellent..."

He wracked his brain, dredging up memories from his past life, or rather, his life before reincarnation, and remembered mosquito nets and mosquito smudges, or kaibushi. He had only seen a mosquito net in a museum or somewhere as a child, but it was essentially a tent made of fine-meshed cloth. It wasn't structurally complex, but...

"The crucial cloth isn't made yet, and I don't know if I can make enough to spare for a mosquito net, so I'll have to pass on that..."

He didn't know about next year and beyond, but he couldn't adopt it as a countermeasure for this year.

"In that case, a mosquito smudge is my only realistic option, huh..."

He seemed to recall reading that in the old days, mugwort and cedar leaves were used for mosquito smudges or kaibushi. When he consulted his Rural Life Guide master, he was able to identify several plants that could be used. The main point was that they produced a lot of smoke.

"Oh, could the smoke from the Kamado stove have also served that purpose?"

Yuri had this thought, but his Kamado was already modified. He couldn't give up on channeling the smoke through the ondol for winter heating, but he pondered whether he should have directed the summer smoke indoors instead of through the chimney.

"No, if I do that, I'd have to keep a fire going in the Kamado even while I'm sleeping. That would be a waste of firewood, and there's also the possibility of a fire..."

The kitchen was practically made of Earth Magic. He didn't think there was anything that would catch fire just from a few sparks flying, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

"Besides, the times I'm more likely to get bitten by mosquitoes are when I'm working outdoors. Maybe I should think about something like an insect repellent spray. No, rather than that, it might be more practical to make something like a portable mosquito coil..."

Having thought this far, he realized that the 'insects' were not necessarily limited to mosquitoes.

"I mean, the vector insect isn't necessarily a mosquito. It could be fleas, lice, tsetse flies, assassin bugs..."

These were the vectors for plague, typhus, sleeping sickness, and Chagas disease, respectively.

"No, it's not just infectious diseases. There's also the possibility that something like army ants could attack and I'd be reduced to bones in one night..."

His imagination was running wild in a bad direction.

He was on the verge of panic, but he told himself to calm down.

"Whether such dangerous creatures exist or not, I need to take measures to either not increase the number of vectors or to keep them away."

Countermeasures against malaria and Japanese encephalitis must have started with the eradication of the vector insect, the mosquito. He should probably check for any puddles where larvae might breed.

In addition to that...

"And I should also think about treatment in case I do get infected. The specific drug for malaria is quinine, but is there a Cinchona tree here?"

He remembered hearing that on Earth, it grew wild in the tropics of South America. It was questionable whether it grew in this country, which seemed to have a climate similar to Europe's. No, if he was going to say that, the question was whether malaria even occurred in this country with a European-like climate.

"There's a theory that Taira no Kiyomori's cause of death was malaria, so it's natural to prepare for the worst-case scenario."

And so, Yuri's interest turned towards medicinal herbs.