Chapter 141 – Survival (3)
One Strong Boar’s hide was enough to cover the floor. I sniffed the surroundings, felt the monsters approaching, cut off the flesh and hide, and ran away. Beside me, ravenous morgues with sharp teeth ran across. Rather than fighting against me with a weapon in hand, they chose the comfortable path of biting off the corpse of a Strong Boar lying in front of them.
It was a very fortunate thing for me too, so I ran without any regrets about the remaining meat. It was because the flesh that came with the skin was enough for me and Seong Ha-yeon Hunter to eat one meal.
While running, I looked back several times to check my surroundings. Strong Boar’s corpse was breaking into pieces right in front of his eyes. The sight of various monsters attacking and preying on them was bizarre, as if even part of Hell had been removed.
I ran into the grass and rolled into the cave before they could even consider human meat for dessert.
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter was sitting in the cave. As soon as I arrived, she straightened her body and showed me her bright smile.
“You’re here. Thank god.”
She must have been worried that I might go out and have an accident. I held out the leather I just brought to Hunter Seong Ha-yeon and said.
“There was a Strong Boar nearby. I came from stripping her skin.”
“I’ve already reached the point where I can lightly catch a Strong Bore by myself.”
It was said that not long ago, senior Yoo-jeong and I were struggling to catch strong bores together. However, I had grown up before I knew it, and I had become a strong person who could lightly catch monsters with obvious weaknesses, such as Strong Bore. Seong Ha-yeon Hunter said.
“But don’t push yourself too hard. You don’t even know what’s around here, and you don’t know where and what monstrous monsters might appear. There are people waiting for you.”
At Hunter Seong Ha-yeon’s words, I remembered the faces of senior Yoo-jung and Ichie. What are the two of you doing now? Are you waiting for me Maybe I thought I was dead and then I was crying. Perhaps a long time has already passed.
I decided to put the bad thoughts aside. Because all I could do here was to believe. I closed my eyes tightly, calmed down my emotions, and then looked at Seong Ha-yeon Hunter again. She too was staring at me.
“But for now, we have to do as much as we can. What should I do with this leather? Shall we just cut off the pieces with the flesh on the ends and lay them on the floor?”
“I’ll do it. Because I’m good at this I’m taking a break. Great job.”
“No.”
We showed a caring tone for each other and then sat down again with a little distance. We had seen each other for quite some time, but we didn’t know much about each other. Since I mainly talked with senior Yoo Jung and Ichie in the middle like messengers, we weren’t very close. As if an invisible line had been drawn, I felt uncomfortable just sitting in the seat.
“Ah, I found a monster outside.”
So I came up with a topic to talk to her about. It was a story about the mysterious size that I discovered while grazing a while ago. Hunter Seong Ha-yeon showed her interest in her story of seeing her monster and put down her hand that was trimming her hide.
“Monster?”
“Yes. It was a very peculiar looking monster. It wasn’t in my encyclopedia.”
“Tell me more.”
The fact that it was not listed in my encyclopedia meant that it could be a high-risk monster that is not open to general D-class hunters or the general public. Looking at her serious expression, it seemed that her chest was tightening even to me.
I carefully explained the appearance of the monster again. A face attached to several places as if several monsters were put together, and flesh stretched to the point of crawling. And limbs all over the place. Hunter Seong Ha-yeon tilted her head and asked again.
“Aren’t you mistaken for Lava?”
“No. It looks different from Lava.”
“If you listen, it’s Lava except for the one with multiple faces, right? Oh, what is it Are you hearing it for the first time? Was there such a monster?”
When Seong Ha-yeon Hunter said he didn’t know, I was even more anxious. How dangerous is she? Is it a new species that has not been revealed until now because it died the moment it encountered it?
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter cleaned her own wounds, then lifted her hide again, she said.
“Well, listening to him talk, he’s big and his movements are slow, so there’s no way he’ll get caught. It’s best to just pretend you don’t know that and live your life.”
And she started to groom her skin again. The sun was shining through the crevices of the cave. The sun seemed to be setting in just a little while. When we stopped talking, a bleak chill enveloped the area. I looked around and said.
“Shall we light a fire soon?”
“Fire? Should smoke yes.”
The entrance to the cave was not that narrow, and there were holes all over the ceiling. A strong draft could hit them, so they had to build a fire to stay warm. I came out again and pulled out useful trees one by one. However, the trees all held a little bit of moisture, so I thought I would have to accept a bit of smoke.
I cut a thin tree neatly with the blade of my spear and brushed off the branches. Branches with thick leaves were first pushed into the cave by laying them on the floor. Seong Ha-yeon Hunter asked.
“What does this do?”
“I’ll put it on the floor. I thought it would be quite soft if we lit a fire in a corner and put it only where we would stay.”
When I cut down a handful of twigs from two trees and a handful of bushes that came out a little sideways and pushed them in, Hunter Seong Ha-yeon showed off her dexterity and made a plausible nest. I pushed the neatly trimmed tree into the cave, and Seong Ha-yeon Hunter cut the tree to the right length and put it in.
Like working in an automated factory, I neatly cut down the tree and went back into the cave.
“Welcome.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter smiled and said so. When I leaned my body against the wall as if I had become a store owner and saw the smiling faces, I had the illusion that we were not trapped beyond the gate, but that we were out for a picnic.
She was sitting on a well-made grass cushion, grooming her hide. The place was still small, so it was uncomfortable for two people to sit comfortably, but it seemed like it would make a pretty nice bed if we added bushes and branches periodically.
Leather cleaning went faster than expected. The chunk of meat had already fallen off and was on top of a bowl made of ice, but it was emitting hard cold air without even biting, as if Seong Ha-yeon Hunter was using her abilities periodically.
I said, knocking on the trees that were still wet.
“If you just burn this, it will smoke. Shall we just do it like this?”
“Wait a minute.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter put her hide back down and hid it behind herself, reaching out her hand toward the branches of her tree. Hunter Seong Ha-yeon’s fingers moved as if drawing a brush on the tree branches soaked with a little sap and moisture.
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter frowned and bit her lips.
Ice began to form at the tips of my spinning fingers. At the same time, I could feel the branches piled on the ground drying up and the air around me getting a little dry. Does it collect all the moisture around it and freeze it?
“Oh, I can’t do more than this.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter dropped her fingers and fell to the floor. As if it wasn’t because she was sick, as I approached her, she shook her hand again to indicate that she was okay. I said, touching the dry firewood.
“You are amazing. Hey, it’s very dry. You’re not feeling well, but you worked hard.”
“I can’t do more than this even in my original condition.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter shook her head, and she said so. Then she rolled up her roughly trimmed hide like a pillow and leaned against it. She stared at her ceiling. The black piles of stones were cracked like pebbles in a valley.
“Because I have to concentrate a lot when I use this. Something to show off just for fun at a dinner party? I went to her relative’s house before and tried freezing it in front of her there and her younger brother without touching the juice, and he really liked it. Ha, I really said I didn’t like it because it was hard for me to keep asking you to show it.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter stopped talking to her and shut her mouth. Her eyes were twitching. I silently gathered firewood and then found a concave bottom to make the shape of a campfire. And I found a twig to light a fire.
“Now light…”
“Write this.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter took her lighter out of her pocket and threw it. She looked at the cigarette left in her pocket and sighed.
“I will have to quit smoking for a while.”
And as she held out a whole cigarette to me, she said.
“Take this away when you leave tomorrow. If I have it anyway, I will think of it for nothing.”
“Are you okay?”
“It’s crazy to smoke around here. You know what will happen.”
“All right.”
I put a cigarette in my pocket and lit it. I could feel the gentle warmth spreading through the room. Hunter Seong Ha-yeon gave me her skin again and she said.
“You cover yourself. I don’t care about the temperature.”
“It is too big for me to cover alone. Do half and half and cover them together.”
“Then I’ll lie down.”
Seong Ha-yeon Hunter said that, then let me cover the other half, then jumped on top of the other half and then she slightly distanced herself. I said, staring at her bowl of ice that she had set aside.
“Do you want to eat our meal?”
Sung Ha-yeon Hunter also looked at the meat that was set aside and nodded her head.
*********
The door to the Black Dragon Room’s office burst open. Ichie jumped in with her face flushed red and shouted,
“Young sister! What is this article!”
“Why? What was the article about?”
Kim Yoo-jung was not present. Lee Jun-hyeok, who was reading a newspaper in the office, asked Ichie with an expression that he couldn’t understand why he was so angry. She shouted, pointing at the newspaper article.
“Article! This content! That’s strange!”
[Rookie King Ada Bomber Jeong Su-hyeon, disappeared through the gate while subduing ‘Young-mi XX owner’]
The headline of the article appeared as if it had been an accident due to a problem of indecisiveness. Lee Joon-hyeok barely managed to hold back the fact that he almost laughed involuntarily.
“…I see.”
“This thing! That… Why, why… ? Why, why…?”
“Distortion?”
Ichie nodded her head and shouted.
“It’s a distortion!”
