I Got a Camera
"Aaaagh!"
"Run! It's swarming!"
"What the hell is this? How did this happen?!"
The porters collecting items inside the dungeon scattered in every direction.
Behind them, the giant spider that ruled this dungeon began chasing them in a writhing mass.
The giant spider wasn't all that dangerous a monster.
If only five hunters of C-Class or higher gathered, a dungeon like this could be cleared without much trouble.
But that was the hunters' story.
Porters—ordinary people with no abilities at all—had a hard enough time taking on even a single giant spider.
So this was the result.
Out of the ten porters sent in, only two were still standing.
The rest had been knocked down by the attack. And they were either already dead or about to be.
"Those bastard said they’d cleared everything out. What the hell is that? They missed at least two nests, didn’t they?"
"That’s just how hunters are."
"Hurry the hell up, you bastards!"
As soon as we saw the giant spider, we had sent up an emergency signal asking for help.
But the hunters who were supposed to come were nowhere in sight, even though they must have known we were on the verge of dying.
"What do we do? Shit. I don’t want to die."
"Just swing at it first. Buy us some time, somehow."
"Ha... shit."
We were gripping swords from the items we’d collected and swinging them around half-heartedly.
At least having these kept us alive until now. If we hadn’t had them, we’d already have been torn apart like the others, writhing in agony before we died.
But even this was steadily chewing through our stamina.
Our bodies were already covered in wounds, blood running from one place after another.
We didn’t have much time left.
Then it happened.
"Jesus. What is it now? Where the hell did you crawl out from to make life annoying for people?"
A young woman’s voice rang out.
And then I saw her.
A woman so striking you couldn’t help staring at her once you saw her, walking toward us while hurling curses.
"F-finally."
They were here.
The hunters who had thrown us into this mess.
"Was there somewhere they missed? Ugh, this is such a pain."
"Huh? Two of them are still alive."
"What? Dammit..."
"They should’ve died with the rest. Why are they still alive? This is pissing me off!"
"No choice. Just clean this up fast and take them out."
To them, we were nothing more than inconvenient survivors.
If we’d died, they could have handled things to their advantage, but since we were still alive, that had become difficult too.
"Can’t we just finish those guys off too?"
"Don’t be stupid. They’ve probably already contacted the Association."
"Tch. Damn it."
And that was how we survived.
By getting help from the very people who were cursing that we hadn’t died.
The survivors ended up sharing a drink together.
Even though we’d only met today, we’d found ourselves sitting together over the shared feeling of having crawled back from death.
Lucky for us, we were both twenty-three, so we clicked even faster.
The place was this guy’s apartment. It was the only place we had where we could drink comfortably.
"Buurp. Those fucking bastards. You heard what they said earlier, right?"
"Haa..."
"Why didn’t we just die with the rest? Hah! Seriously, it’s disgusting..."
"When have those people ever treated us like human beings? Why are you acting surprised now?"
"The day I become a hunter, I’ll kill every one of those fuckers."
"Heh heh."
"What about you?"
"Like that’d ever happen? It’s my dream."
"Heh heh heh. Man..."
"Does it hurt?"
"Getting scratched by those spider bastards would’ve been better. Being kicked hurt way more. Those bastards."
The guy who had survived with me got kicked without mercy because he’d glared back at them just once on the way out.
In truth, Min Seolah had been the one glaring at him, but the idiot standing next to her had taken offense and kicked him instead.
He claimed it had only been a light shove, but my friend was hurt badly enough that the spot had gone black and blue.
"You going out tomorrow?"
"I have to. I need to eat. You?"
"Me... I can barely walk. How am I supposed to work?"
"Haa..."
Life was miserable.
The next day.
"He... died?"
"Yeah."
"Why would he..."
The friend I’d drunk with just yesterday had died.
After barely making it back alive from the dungeon, he’d taken his own life.
Did that even make sense?
"No, it doesn’t. But wouldn’t it make sense that way?"
"Ha... shit."
He’d been driven to suicide.
That was the right way to put it.
All because he’d glared in their direction...
It had already been twenty years since dungeons appeared in the peaceful world and hunters came into existence.
Those twenty years had changed everything.
The biggest change was that this world was no longer equal.
Just like the old feudal system from the Middle Ages, a new hierarchy had been born.
The master of a guild was practically a king. Which meant a guild might as well be a country.
And hunters? They’d be roughly equivalent to knights.
Then what about ordinary people who weren’t hunters?
Slaves.
Slaves you could toss a bit of food and work to death as much as you liked.
That was all hunters thought of ordinary people.
I was one of those slaves. A porter among them.
A porter who carried supplies for hunters when they entered dungeons, and handled the cleanup once the raid was over.
Spend all day following them around and working like that, and they’d toss you enough money to live on for maybe two days, as if they were doing you a favor.
But no one could complain.
They’d be dead the moment they did.
I’d heard there used to be good hunters once...
But those hunters were long gone from this world.
What was left now were only the bastards who had beaten them to death and taken everything from them.
That was the kind of world this was.
I went to see the friend I’d only met for a single day, to pay my respects at his funeral.
We had survived together, after all. I felt like I at least owed him that much.
"...Poor bastard."
What else could I say to a guy who’d died because he’d offended them just by looking at them the wrong way?
"I’ll be going now."
I said goodbye to his sister, the only family he had left.
She was at least ten years older than us, a big sister who had kindly put out side dishes for me, calling me her little brother’s friend even though her family probably wasn’t doing so well.
She was so shocked she could barely hold herself together, and when she heard me, she forced herself up.
"Please, stay seated."
"No. No, it’s fine. I have something for you. Something I need to give you."
"Huh?"
What was she trying to give me?
We hadn’t exchanged anything before.
The sister disappeared toward the back for a moment, then came back holding a small box.
"This... was in the place where my brother was at the very end."
"Ah... I see."
"But I think you should take it."
"What is it?"
"Don’t ask. Okay? I don’t need it anyway, so just take it."
"Well... okay."
I’d intended to refuse.
But the look on her face made it impossible.
So I took the thing, not even knowing what it was, and went home.
"What could she have possibly given me?"
After I got home, took a quick shower, and laid the box on my bed, I picked it up again.
I peeled off the roughly taped seal and opened it. Inside was... a case that looked expensive.
"A camera?"
I didn’t even need to open it to know it was a camera.
And when I opened the case, it turned out to be a Polaroid camera, the kind you hardly ever saw these days.
"What the hell..."
Why would she give this to me?
Completely unable to make sense of the situation, I reached into the box to take the camera out.
But the moment my hand touched it, a slight headache hit me, and something pushed into my mind.
"Th-this is..."
I’d heard of this before.
There were items that chose their own users. Rumors about such things had been floating around for a long time.
But since no one had ever admitted to owning one, it had always remained nothing more than a rumor...
Until now.
This camera was speaking to me.
There is currently no user.
Would you like to register as the user?
It was asking me whether I wanted to register, just like that.
I was startled, but there was no reason to hesitate.
"Register."
Registration complete. Owner: Han Jungwoo
It was mine now.
I still had no idea what it was, but an item I had never had any connection to up until now had become my property.
Ignoring how my heart felt like it might burst from my chest, the item kept talking.
This item possesses the power of subjugation.
Subjugation?
What was that supposed to mean?
Any living being captured in the camera is subjugated to the user for seven days and will act as required, obeying under any circumstances.
However, the subjugated being cannot be made to harm itself.
If the target's mental strength surpasses the camera's power, subjugation may fail.
The camera's power can grow.
"...Holy shit."
After seven days, the subjugated being will return to its original place and forget everything that happened during this period.
"This is insane."
If, during that period, the being is completely broken by the user, permanent ownership becomes possible.
"Huh..."
The camera provides three films by default. Any used or failed film disappears.
Each time you successfully subjugate a living being, five new films will be granted.
Warning: Never discard the box.
"What the hell kind of thing is this?"
I was too stunned to speak.
I touched the camera again, wondering if I had really seen what I thought I had, but nothing else came to mind.
"Why the hell did she give this to me?"
She’d gone out of her way to hand this to me. As if I were the only one who could take it.
Which meant she must have known what it was, right?
At the very least, she must have known it wasn’t an ordinary camera.
It had been found beside her dead brother. There was no way she hadn’t checked it.
And yet she still gave it to me.
Why?
"Then why was it there in the first place?"
Did my friend get it from somewhere?
That didn’t make sense.
He could barely walk.
Then someone must have left it there?
That made more sense.
Who?
"Ugh... my head hurts. What the hell happened here?"
I had no idea.
My stiff, clumsy brain couldn’t make sense of it at all.
"So what am I supposed to do with this?"
It was clearly an incredible item.
But I had no idea how I was supposed to use it.
"Did it say they’d obey me for seven days?"
And it also said they’d forget everything that happened.
"Those bastards..."
One thing every ordinary person wanted, deep down, was to kill hunters.
And every ordinary person had at least one hunter they hated like an enemy.
I was no different.
"Min Seolah..."
Wouldn’t that friend have felt the same way about Min Seolah?
I’d only been humiliated, but that friend had actually been hit because of her.
And then he died.
Maybe she wasn’t the culprit, but she was definitely connected to it.
The camera’s first target had been decided.