What I Hunt For
I was used to waiting for things.
Delivery food? I could tough out an hour no problem. Hunter Land updates with their endless downtime? Completely fine.
After all, I wasn't just sitting there staring at the clock. I'd do other stuff, and the time would vanish in a blink.
Still, some waits were harder to endure.
Like that moment when you suddenly need to pee in an elevator?
What makes those so miserable is probably that you can't do anything else. You can't even distract yourself. You just stand there, waiting for the doors to open.
Waiting for the Association to issue my hunter card felt a lot like that.
This wasn't something I could just shrug off and wait out.
Without a hunter card, I couldn't hunt! That was a massive problem for me. And if I hunted without a hunter's license, I'd face punishment from the Association—so I had to wait out the full day.
Though, yeah—that would basically make me a poacher. Poachers got punished in the real world too. Same rules applied here.
So what had I been doing all this time? Poaching, or fighting to survive…?
Honestly, there was a knot of unease in my chest.
I was living in a game world, in a body that wasn't even mine. If I'd been a man, maybe—but even my gender was different. It was the kind of secret you couldn't dump on anyone, and it sat heavy inside me, making me restless.
Those seven days in the flooded forest had been stifling and lonely. The terror of being stranded alone. The eerie roars echoing from every direction.
It was enough to drive anyone crazy. But even those dark thoughts would vanish the moment I moved my body.
So I'd swung my greatsword mindlessly inside the cave. Watching its clean arc, feeling my heart hammer, wiping away a bead of sweat—and an inexplicable thrill would wash over me.
Before long, I'd gotten used to this body and the greatsword. To stay alive, I'd hunted docile monsters for food. And the moment a hunt succeeded—there was a joy I couldn't put into words.
Sure, at the start they weren't big boss-class things like the Luga-lac or the Pienos. Just small monsters.
But even so, what I felt taking them down was a sense of accomplishment and ease. Yeah. Hunting was what soothed my heart.
When I fought the Luga-lac, when I fought the Pienos—I was utterly calm.
Facing a powerful enemy, I'd fold up all those painful thoughts and shove them into a corner, throwing everything I had into the fight. No room for anything else. Watching their movements, predicting the next move, figuring out how to respond—that was all I had time for.
I loved that kind of fight.
I had talent for this. Natural-born talent!
So hurry up and give me my hunter card already.
"Is it good?"
"Mm."
And the food here was seriously good. Can't eat without money. Gotta hunt to make money….
After the exam, I met Noah, who'd been waiting in the Association lobby.
When I told her the results, she was thrilled—she almost hugged me, then took one look at my blood-soaked outfit and marched me straight to the showers.
The Association had a shower room for hunters. Even though I was a girl now, seeing another girl's body was still awkward, so I washed up fast. I turned in all my blood-soaked gear and put on the loose clothes Noah had given me again.
The chest still stuck out, of course…. I needed to get proper clothes soon.
Then I ate a refreshing meal.
Yeah. Food was good. Cheiler suddenly came to mind.
That pig-slop soup I'd eaten in the cave. Weird-looking, but a meal that made my tongue happy.
Cheiler… always cooked for us.
"For a hunter, meals are the most important thing. They restore your energy and stamina completely. No matter what you're doing, you always eat first. If your body's got no strength, you can't do anything."
"Mmmmm…."
"Are you listening?"
"Yesh, I am."
"So you are listening."
Whether it was a sense of responsibility as a senior or what, Noah filled me in on all sorts of hunter knowledge over the meal.
Meals are important. It might sound like she's just telling me to eat until I'm full.
But in Hunter Land, eating was a mandatory step before heading out on a hunt. Not because of the taste—because of the effects the meal itself provided.
Increased stamina regeneration, making it easier to draw monster aggro, higher defense, boosted attack power… all kinds of effects.
Different ingredient combos gave different bonuses. Whether that applied in reality, I had no idea.
It was pretty funny that just eating a meal would give you those kinds of buffs. Probably didn't do much of anything in this world.
That stuff was pure game logic, if you asked me.
Still, meals mattered. If you went out hungry, you might collapse mid-fight from an empty stomach.
I set down the big bone I'd been crunching on. I really liked how oversized the food was here. One piece of meat and I already felt stuffed.
"Good, right?"
"Yeah, it's good."
"Hehe. This place does have good food. The owner used to be a hunter, so he's great at cooking monster meat."
A former hunter turned chef—sounds like a novel protagonist.
Cities with lots of civilians tended to be on the safer side, so ordinary people rarely ever saw a monster.
But places like Antico, out in the wilds, were mostly hunters. The Hunter Association itself set up shop in remote areas like this. Precisely because you could run into monsters so easily.
Uncharted wilderness was dangerous land—but it was also land of opportunity, where you might encounter new monsters.
Come to think of it, had Noah been a hunter based in Antico? I wondered how she'd ended up coming to the flooded forest to hunt a Luga-lac.
"Noah."
"Yeah?"
"Are you a hunter from around here?"
"Ah, I'm not an Antico-region hunter. I'm from another area—I just came here on a commission. Since I'm here anyway, I've been doing this and that. Well… I'll probably be active here for a while."
"Got it."
So she had her own business in Antico. Hunters weren't exactly the type to settle down and work one place anyway, so I let it go.
"Alice, once you're a hunter, what kind of work are you going to do?"
"Hunting."
"W-well… yeah, that tracks? Honestly, giving Alice any other kind of commission would be a total waste of talent…."
Noah muttered under her breath.
"So, do you have a goal?"
A goal?
I chewed on my bread, mulling over Noah's question.
If I had a goal, it was probably getting back to where I used to live. I'd left a lot behind. But I had no idea how, and it wasn't a goal I could talk about.
"I'm going to raise my rank."
"Hmm, rank is important, yeah."
"And I'm going to hunt more monsters."
"…Really?"
For now, I'd see this world through to the end. Just like I had in the game.
Take commissions, hunt monsters one by one—something would turn up. Nothing gets solved by sitting still.
If I was a hunter, I'd find my answers the hunter's way.
Which meant I planned to mindlessly grind commissions. Climb the ranks somehow and go after high-difficulty monsters.
Easy monsters like the Pienos just didn't have that satisfying cut to them.
Those ones were just for punching-bag practice.
In Hunter Land, every outpost had lodging for hunters, and Antico was no exception.
Valuable personnel had come all the way out to the wilds—providing proper accommodations was a matter of principle for the Hunter Association.
Given the nature of the job—dying, getting injured, being away for long stretches on commissions—the turnover rate for lodging was high.
After the meal, Noah booked a room with Alice. They planned to stay in the forest city for a while.
Once she'd rented the room, Noah unpacked right away and washed up.
Humming, she scrubbed herself clean. Foam clung to her firm body.
She paused mid-wash and looked in the mirror. Her dark bob was plastered wet against her head like a drowned rat, but the face with its upturned corners of the mouth looked remarkably bright. It was a strangely fluttery moment.
The reason, of course, was Alice.
Hunters set their sights on what they admire. Some follow the legendary hunters of old. Some chase the Master Hunters of the present age. Some fall for the deeds of nameless hunters….
But what about Alice's goal? Just hunting monsters—a simple, modest aim. And that was what made it cool. It was the kind of thing a born hunter would say.
And Noah seemed to have fallen for that Alice.
It was fan-crush. Anyone who saw her fight wouldn't be able to help it. People always look their best when they're fully absorbed in what they do. In that sense, Alice was more of a hunter than anyone.
Suddenly, the cave where she'd lived came to mind.
Alice was someone who paid attention to nothing but her goal.
Looking at her, Noah felt a sense of precariousness. Those lifeless eyes reminded her of cherry blossoms. Like cherry blossoms that bloom in gorgeous abundance only to vanish in an instant—Alice seemed like she might disappear just the same.
Was hunting monsters the faint emotion left to a girl with no memories?
What had made Alice hate monsters so much?
What had happened to her memories?
She wiped off the dripping water and put on her underclothes. She hung the wet towel back on the wall, stepped out of the bathroom, and peeked her head out.
Alice was sprawled on the bed in a big X. She was waving her arms around while lying there, savoring the soft feeling. Her faintly flushed expression stood out especially.
Ah, so cute.
Was the berserker who slaughtered monsters Alice's true self, or was this innocent side the real Alice? Noah was fine with either.
"Alice."
"…You done?"
"Were you waiting for me? Let's sleep together!"
"W-wait. Put some clothes on…!"
Whatever form she took, Noah hoped she would be happy.
Tomorrow, once they got the hunter card, she'd hand over the Luga-lac's essence too.
Would Alice like it? Noah chuckled and wrapped Alice in a hug. Alice flailed her arms, telling her to let go—but Noah had no intention of letting go at all.
Alice didn't know it, but her appearance had stirred a great many people.
No—"stirred" wasn't enough.
It was a shock. A new storm blowing through the forest city of Antico.
Antico had an unusually high number of hunters thanks to all the monsters nearby. And in a place like that, countless rumors existed—most of them grist for the hunters' gossip mill.
Among those rumors, Alice's story rising to the surface was a common occurrence. A white-haired woman warrior who wielded a greatsword. She had that viral quality.
Hunters were restless by nature anyway. They didn't stay long in one city—they wandered to gain more experience. That trait meant rumors spread fast too.
Even if the person who first told the story never intended it that way. Gossip was an indispensable joy of life for hunters.
The buzz spread quickly—through taverns, restaurants, everywhere.
From Cheiler's mouth, from Ethan's, from Scudo, Sophie, Nab….
Plenty of people had her story to tell, and the rumors grew exaggerated with amusement and heat.
The unyielding berserker.
The rookie who took down a monster solo.
A monster in human skin that made other monsters flee in terror.
The blood-soaked devil of the flooded forest.
Rumors flowed from mouth to mouth, leaping and twisting free of their original shape.
If the rumors had one thing in common, it was this: the protagonist was a beautiful woman with a greatsword.
That detail only pulled people in harder.
It was obvious without looking that the interest would only grow.
How far the story would spread—no one could say.