The Hunt
Hunting.
Of course hunting existed in this apocalyptic world as well.
Where the quarterly subjugation campaigns were mainly about securing safety and procuring ingredients, hunting in this world was little more than a pastime for the upper class.
In a way, its purpose was not so different from hunting in the real world.
From a tower prepared for high-ranking officers, they would snipe distant monsters with rifles. That was what hunting meant here.
Safe indoors, racing against a time limit to see who could bag the most monsters—that was the usual form it took.
But the hunt I was about to undertake was nothing like that.
I was going to hunt for real.
Not for sport or wagers, but to obtain meat in the truest sense.
“I have no intention of sitting pretty inside the safe zone, serving dishes made from someone else’s kill and acting like I’ve done something.”
“Are you serious?”
Meursault, bundled in thick clothes, kept asking me as if he could not believe it.
“We’re going outside the zone to hunt? Just the two of us?”
When I first started dressing carefully and announced I was going hunting, Meursault must have written it off as a child’s romantic notion of the hunt, fussing over the outfit for the fantasy of it. Even when he reported to Commander Hayden that he would be accompanying the young master on a hunt, he never dreamed the hunt would look like this.
Only when he watched me head not for the tower but toward the outer edge of the zone—and then farther still—did unease set in. He finally asked, “Where exactly are we going?” and when I answered “Hunting,” reality hit him.
“This is insane… one rifle… with a kid like that…….”
We stepped beyond the zone and trudged through deep snow; Meursault’s pitiful muttering never stopped behind me.
I, of course, was well-practiced at this kind of hunt, knew the terrain, and was familiar with the monster habitats safe enough that even a ten-year-old could hunt them. But Meursault, who had no idea how much I knew, had every right to panic.
If he had realized in advance that I meant a real hunt, Commander Hayden would never have given permission.
“Meursault, we haven’t even gone that far from the zone yet.”
“I stay in the rear even during subjugation campaigns!”
Ah, right. He was the staff-officer type.
Still—he was a soldier. Was it really okay to look this scared in front of a child?
“If anything happens to Young Master Haydam, I’m dead for real……!”
Ah. So it wasn’t the monsters he feared—it was dying by the commander’s hand.
I had no choice but to invent a few comforting lies to soothe him.
“Back in the slums, whenever food ran short, the kids and I would go hunting. I know exactly how far is safe and which monsters a kid my size can take. Don’t worry.”
“Is that so……? Ah, so that’s why you’re so good at shooting… Wait. But you said it was your first time…….”
I flinched, but I didn’t let it show.
“You think the slums had guns? We only went after monsters you could take with a club or a steel pipe.”
Of course, today’s quarry wasn’t something a club or pipe could handle—that was why I’d brought a gun.
Only then did Meursault look convinced and quietly fall in behind me.
Truthfully I could have hunted without him just fine. But if I vanished suddenly there would be chaos, so I had brought him along as a formal guardian. I also needed a witness for my heroic tale.
In any case, I wanted to join the subjugation campaigns as soon as possible. To do that I had to prove I was a warrior worthy of the field.
“This looks good.”
We stopped only when we reached a place marked by the tiny tracks of a small monster. Meursault’s face brightened the moment he saw the prints.
“At that size, it shouldn’t be dangerous.”
I smiled at him, then piled snow beside the path the monster used until I had built a blind large enough for two people to hide. After that I deliberately walked a long distance away, then carefully retraced my steps without disturbing the tracks I had left—so the monster would not grow suspicious at a sudden break in the trail.
We covered ourselves with snow as well, carved firing ports in the packed snow blind, and fixed our weapons in place. Hunting preparations complete.
…Was it my imagination that Meursault, lying beside me under the snow, seemed oddly excited? Well, this was new for him too.
“I’ll do the hunting. You only step in if the monster doesn’t go down in one shot.”
“But I’m not that good a shot.”
“Just hit a leg instead of the gem, or fire a warning shot to keep it from closing. That’s enough.”
“That much I can manage.”
I had also left a biscuit as bait in front of the blind. Now all we had to do was wait for the prey to appear.
“…….”
How much time passed? What surprised me was that Meursault—despite this being his first time hunting this way—held his posture longer than I expected. But as the minutes dragged on, even a soldier’s pride had its limits. Just as his hands began to tremble around the rifle, the monster appeared.
Large for an ordinary rabbit. No—almost the size of a dog. A rabbit with deer antlers sprouting from its head was following the remaining tracks, hop-hopping closer until it stopped right in front of our blind.
“Oh… that size, I could catch it with my bare hands.”
What a hunting novice.
Quiet.
I mouthed the warning at him and held my breath, eyes locked on the creature ahead. The antlered rabbit glanced around cautiously, sniffed the biscuit, took a small nibble, then began to chew slowly.
Why so slow?
Meursault mouthed the question; I mouthed the answer back.
Checking. For poison.
Small monsters like this were extremely intelligent. Large ones relied on raw physical power and rarely needed to think; the smaller the monster, the sharper its instincts had to be if it wanted to survive.
Once it decided the biscuit was safe, the antlered rabbit sped up and began to devour it in earnest. I simply watched. Meursault shot me a puzzled look.
Aren’t you going to hunt?
Not my quarry.
What?
Wait.
Meursault looked baffled but obediently held his breath. The prey I was after was not a small monster like this. What I truly wanted was the mid-sized monster that fed on such small ones. And what those mid-sized monsters loved most was the scent of blood.
While the antlered rabbit was absorbed in the biscuit, I slipped the knife from my sleeve and stabbed the back of my own hand.
“You lunatic!”
Meursault had been watching, wondering what I was about to do with the knife; the cry tore out of him in pure horror. Startled, the antlered rabbit sensed us and tried to flee—but it was already too late. The instant Meursault shouted, my hand had already shot out through the firing port and seized the creature by its antlers, my body still hidden.
“Kyaaak!”
The rabbit’s single scream as it thrashed in my grip, and the smell of blood welling from the back of my hand, began to spread across the snowfield.
How long did the thrashing last?
Thud-thud-thud-thud…….
From farther off came the heavy, pounding gait of something that had caught the scent of blood and was charging toward us.
This area was relatively safe precisely because a territorial monster lived here. The hippo-pig—body of a hippopotamus, hooves of a pig—devoured everything inside its territory. The antlered rabbit had fallen for a mere biscuit only because there was nothing left to eat nearby.
But hippo-pigs fled at the sight of humans, so you had to lure them out with a small monster as bait. That was also why I had used my own blood instead of Meursault’s. Monsters could gauge the size of a bleeding creature from the scent alone. Meursault’s blood would have made it approach with caution. Killing the antlered rabbit for its blood would have had the same problem. If we had fired a gun, the smell of powder would have kept it away. It needed to scream and draw attention so the hippo-pig could pinpoint the location and come running.
Judging that a small, wounded animal was wandering its territory, the hippo-pig charged straight at us, never realizing it was racing into a death trap.
The red gem embedded in the center of its forehead flashed in the sunlight as it charged.
Five seconds until it entered my rifle’s effective range… three… one.
Magic Marksman / Der Freischütz
I released the antlers, rose from behind the blind, and leveled my rifle at the charging hippo-pig.
The moment it spotted the humans and faltered, slowing its charge—
Bang—
One shot was all it took to shatter the gem in its forehead.
The massive body toppled sideways. Meursault stared at me with a face full of shock and awe. I grinned back at him.
“What are you waiting for? Go drag it over. Tonight’s first banquet is a samgyeopsal party.”
There was a reason I had chosen samgyeopsal for the first banquet.
Players dropped into this world were basically Korean—unless some foreign user who happened to be in Korea had wandered into that convenience store. Therefore, I reasoned, they would react to Korean food. Of course players could not enjoy meals. That was exactly why the expressions of NPCs and players would diverge so clearly. A player staring at a samgyeopsal party they could not taste would wear a face of pure anguish. For any Korean who had possessed a body in this world, it was a dish they could not help but react to.
I had considered fried chicken as well… but there was already a Chicken Area. Serving chicken in the Cola Area would look like we were losing face. Besides, I was no great cook. Compared to that, how simple was samgyeopsal? Just slice the meat and grill it.
Meursault had asked what “samgyeopsal” was; I ignored him.
And so the day of the samgyeopsal party—no, the banquet with children my own age—finally arrived. The commander had kept his promise and arranged a meal with kids my age. There weren’t many of them, so the barbecue was held inside the mansion. Instead of sitting at a table we stood and received grilled meat as it came off the fire. I had asked the servants to pretend not to know me for the duration of the meal. Ostensibly it was so the children could eat without feeling awkward about my status. The real reason was to make it easier for RoomCornerHoney and Taejeong—who already knew my face—to approach and speak to me freely.
“You’ve got some moves, huh? Thinking of stuff like this.”
The first to come up to me was RoomCornerHoney. After several weeks apart he had seemed a little more mature than the airheaded kid I first met. Thinking he had finally grown up, I fetched Taejeong—who was standing in front of the samgyeopsal wearing a look of pure tragedy—and introduced him without a shred of suspicion.
“What? Taejeong-Taese-Beyoncé?”
RoomCornerHoney immediately started having a fit.
“I wasn’t the only helper? You got into the mansion before me? Then I didn’t even need to enlist, you son of a b—!”
This bastard hadn’t matured one bit.