Night had fallen deep.
Augusta was jealous of my surging popularity, and even more jealous of the way Nathan's attitude toward me had shifted.
While everyone slept, she crept over to my camp.
She stomped every herb I'd spent the day collecting and sorting into pulp.
Then she poured out every last drop of the clean water I'd stored.
The next morning, I looked at the wreckage spread across the ground.
I didn't fly into the rage she'd been counting on.
I crouched down, studying the ruined herbs, my eyes cold as ice.
Nathan came over, saw the scene, and his brow furrowed tight.
He was about to open his mouth to comfort me.
I stood up and brushed the dirt off my hands.
"Back when I was a kid up in the mountains, the wild boars that stole our grain? I broke their legs."
My tone was calm, but there was a hard edge running through it.
Nathan froze.
He realized the "countryside" I was talking about was nothing like what he'd imagined.
The image he'd had of me as a delicate, fake little heiress shattered completely.
I didn't go confront Augusta.
Instead I turned and went into the woods, and gathered some plants all over again.
When I came back, I set up the stone pot and simmered a big pot of broth, deep green in color.
I made a point of doing it right in front of the camera, ladling out a big bowl and handing it to Nathan.
I called out at the top of my voice, "Nathan! Drink up!"
"This is the good stuff. Detoxes you, does wonders for your skin. It's a secret recipe you couldn't buy for any amount of money out there."
Augusta was sitting not far off.
She'd been under a lot of stress lately, and a few pimples had broken out on her face.
The moment she heard the words "does wonders for your skin," her ears pricked right up.
I used her vanity to build a trap tailored just for her.
I carried that pot of broth over to a "weak signal zone" the drones couldn't capture.
It was a blind corner, half-hidden behind leaves.
But I'd adjusted a big, glossy banana leaf ahead of time.
Using the sunlight's reflection, I cleverly bounced the blurry image from that corner to the edge of the main live feed.
Once all that was done, I pulled Nathan along and headed out.
"Come on, keep me company. I want to scout a water source further out."
I'd handed Augusta the perfect opportunity to commit her crime.
In the surveillance blind spot.
Sure enough, Augusta couldn't hold herself back and sneaked over.
Guilty as a thief, she glanced around, and once she was sure no one was there, she picked up the stone pot.
She drank the remaining half-pot of broth down to the very last drop.
Under the gaze of several million viewers she never noticed, she drank down her comeuppance.
Half an hour later.
The production team gathered everyone together for the routine interviews.
When it was Augusta's turn to speak, her stomach suddenly let out a thunderous rumble.
It was loud enough that even the sound mic picked it up crystal clear.
Her face flushed red in an instant, then turned green.
In front of all the cameras and every guest, she clamped both hands over her belly.
Squeezing her legs together, she bolted for the temporary toilet at a dead sprint.
Image gone, utterly humiliated.
The ingredient in that pot of "beauty broth" was a plant on the island that was harmless but powerfully stimulated the bowels.
To put it plainly, it was a super laxative.
The result was that, for the entire rest of the day, Augusta became the person who ran to the toilet more than anyone else on the island.
I watched her drained figure retreat.
Then I turned to Nathan, blinked, and put on an innocent face.
"Looks like Miss Augusta's got quite a lot of toxins in her. She really does need to work on that skin of hers."
Nathan looked at me, swallowed, and quietly took half a step back.
