I Became A Married Man in Another World
Chapter 37
037 The End of a Long Hunt Approaches
He held his breath and watched intently. Something was wrong. The state of their settlement was different from usual.
Goblins were violent, crude creatures. they were always bickering and fighting amongst themselves. It was common for one or two to die in a brawl over a female.
But today, they seemed even more agitated. The sounds of multiple goblins fighting echoed from the cave where the women were kept, and outside, several were being beaten by dozens of others.
A short distance away, dozens of goblins stood like an island isolated in the sea. But rather than being intimidated, they all seemed frantic. They were huffing and puffing as if ready to pounce at any moment.
Goblins further away also approached, curious about what was happening.
The number of goblins gathering in front of the cave steadily grew.
‘Perhaps.’
The situation he feared was unfolding. Gus rubbed his sweaty palms against his trousers.
There are no female Goblins. He had heard that female Goblins existed a long time ago, but now, not a single person claimed to have seen one. It might be that their numbers were so small they went unnoticed, or perhaps they had been outcompeted and gone extinct altogether. No one really knew the truth of it.
Regardless, that was why they lusted after human women who were capable of reproduction. Furthermore, the competition to claim a woman was more fierce than among any other Magical Beast or animal. Though he couldn’t say for sure, the lack of female specimens likely played a role. These creatures prioritized their sexual drive even over their appetite.
Judging by the atmosphere, something had shifted following their attack on the humans not long ago. Perhaps a mutiny was taking place. He had heard that such things happened occasionally when suppressed hunger and lust reached a point where they could no longer be contained.
When a mutiny occurs, those responsible are purged from the pack. Once exiled, there is only one place for them to go: the Village where the women are.
‘It’s too early.’
The adventurers had not arrived yet. They would likely arrive around this evening. If the Goblins moved before then, the plan would be ruined.
Gus’s face hardened. There was an item he had been carrying since he first considered this possibility. Today might be the day he finally had to use it. He had hoped to avoid using it if possible, but if the situation continued to spiral like this, he would have no choice.
Suddenly, the face of the Forester’s daughter came to mind. She was a small child who didn’t smile. She would hide in the house whenever people came by, and on the rare occasions he saw her, she wore a vacant expression.
He didn’t harbor any special affection for the child. Pitiful children were everywhere, and there were many children in this world fallen into deeper pits than that girl.
However, thinking about how she had recently become able to smile made his heart ache slightly. His heart wasn’t made of iron, after all. He wasn’t so wicked as to take pleasure in a child’s misery.
‘Besides, that child isn’t an object of my revenge.’
She was of outsider blood. She didn’t carry the bloodline of that Village. She wasn’t the prey he was hunting. But…
Gus slowly loosened his tightened grip. He had known it would come to this. Juhwan’s wife and daughter were destined to be sacrificed anyway. It was too late to be struck by pangs of conscience now.
Suddenly, he remembered the words his father spoke as he lay dying.
[I raised you as a Hunter from too young an age. You know too little of life as a human. Your personality is optimal for a Hunter, but lacking as a human. My son, your life is so unhappy… and it is a tragedy that you do not even realize it. You poor thing, my son.]
Well, perhaps that was true. From his twenties until his current age, as he looked toward death, he had lived solely to complete his final hunt.
A Hunter’s virtue is persistence. One painstakingly tracks the prey’s trail for a long time, moving steadily at a pace that is neither too fast nor too slow. And then, one waits for the moment the prey’s strength fails. Until the right time comes, one simply follows without losing the scent and waits. That is the hunt.
“….”
It was his father who had taught him that. His father had praised him, delighted that he was a natural-born Hunter, and loved him more than his other children, calling him the son who would carry on his legacy. It was irresponsible of him to say it was a mistake only at the very end.
In his childhood, his father had been his idol, but as he grew old and reached death’s door, he had become just an ordinary man. He had ceased to be a Hunter.
‘Father, you said I was unhappy, but you were wrong.’
What is happiness? If there is something you wish to achieve even at the cost of your life, and you feel a sense of euphoria in achieving it, is that not happiness itself?
Gus gazed blankly at his hands. They were trembling slightly. It was almost complete. If he just endured a little longer, if he just waited a little more, the moment he had long yearned for would arrive. His entire body was screaming and laughing in anticipation.
‘Is this not happiness, Father? You were wrong.’
Furthermore, he had a disciple to whom he could teach his ways at the final moment. Though he couldn’t teach him everything, he had at least laid the foundation for him to become a proper Hunter.
The man might loathe him, hate him, and never forgive him, but regardless, he had inherited his hunting techniques.
Juhwan still had much to learn. He was still an inexperienced Hunter.
However, Gus had taught him all the unique skills he possessed. Juhwan might not realize it now, but he would understand later.
Even if Juhwan himself was not yet a complete Hunter, the things he had observed and learned would surely resurface in his mind later on.
Yes, what Gus had taught would surely become a magnificent seed that would bloom within that man. The image of the Hunter that Gus himself could not achieve, the one he had wanted to become, would be perfected through Juhwan. Gus knew this to be true.
‘Father, my life is perfect.’
No one could deny it. His life had reached completion when Juhwan came to this place.
Gus turned his gaze back to the Goblin settlement.
A creature that appeared to be the Goblin leader emerged from the cave. He seemed about a head taller than the other Goblins. In the leader’s hand was a club carved from wood.
The leader sauntered over slowly toward the fallen Goblins. He brought the club down hard on one of them. The Goblin’s scream echoed through the air.
The group that seemed to have attempted the mutiny appeared to be on the same side as the Goblin being beaten, but they did not resist. Some swayed their bodies in agitation or moved as if they might pounce at any moment. However, none of them dared to challenge the leader.
The leader Goblin beat the one individual relentlessly. He only stopped the lashing after the creature’s face was completely mangled and it had gone limp.
The leader discarded the club he was holding and picked up a sword, likely looted from a human.
As he growled and raged threateningly at the mutinous group, the fifty or so Goblins flinched and retreated.
The other Goblins of the settlement drew closer to the mutineers. The mutineers were pushed further and further back, until they finally left the settlement as if being exiled from the pack.
Gus began to move in the direction the mutinous group was heading. He couldn’t get too close. Keeping his distance and occasionally checking for tracks, Gus quietly followed them.
Goblins lived a primitive lifestyle, but they had their own language and devised their own strategies. Naturally, they also knew the location of the Village where the women were.
‘As I thought, this path is…’
Juhwan’s cabin sat along the path to the Village, but there was another route that led there as well. The Goblin pack was taking the path that bypassed the cabin.
Gus pulled out a small pouch he kept at his waist. Inside was a small box tightly sealed with beeswax. It contained dried powder taken from the body of a musk deer.
It was said that deer brought from a distant foreign land by a lord several generations ago lived in these mountains.
They were called musk deer, and the males produced a unique scent to attract females. Because that scent was said to be good for stamina, something called musk powder had apparently been in vogue among the nobility at one time.
However, the breeding program had failed, and he had heard that most of the imported deer had died. It was said they were gone now, but Gus had happened upon one of those deer by chance.
A Goblin in heat had been frantically chasing the musk deer.
Realizing that the musk attracted Goblins, Gus had spent a long time searching for that deer. Eventually, a few years ago, he had managed to catch the deer as he desired and obtained the powder. He had only managed to get a very small amount, a truly minuscule quantity, but it would be enough.
He opened the beeswax-sealed box to lure the mutinous Goblins.
The powder was divided into minute amounts inside several small cloth pouches. The amount was so small it could be said the powder was merely brushed onto them.
He took out one of them and shook it gently in the direction the wind was blowing.
One of the Goblins in the distance seemed to flinch, then began sniffing the air. It looked around in every direction.
A smile touched Gus’s face. As expected, it was working.
As soon as one reacted, the others seemed to catch the scent as well. The mutinous pack became restless.
Gus rubbed the cloth pouch against several trees before putting it back in the box.
He quickly left the area and ran toward the cabin.
As he ran, he smeared the scent of the powder on trees here and there. To ensure the Goblins didn’t catch up too quickly, he left the scent in small amounts at intervals.
The Goblins ran straight toward the cabin, just as Gus intended.
Juhwan sighed.
The Fire Magic he produced was still as small as a lighter flame. He couldn’t create a large fire even when trying to burn something.
If it was something the size of a rabbit, he could burn it instantly, but it was difficult with larger objects. A large fire like the one that had erupted when he first encountered the wolves had not happened again.
Furthermore, he didn’t seem able to kill living creatures easily with it. He had experimented once when he caught a rabbit, and it hadn’t died easily.
Parts of the body would catch fire, but he felt he needed more powerful force to make it spread to the whole. Or perhaps he needed to spend more time.
In the end, Juhwan had ended the life of the half-burnt rabbit himself with a knife. He felt sorry for causing it pain, but he convinced himself it was a necessary act.
The hesitation and shock he’d felt when shooting the rabbit’s limbs felt like a lie now. He still didn’t quite understand the meaning behind the actions Gus had forced him to take. There was likely some other intention beyond what Juhwan himself had considered. Perhaps a day would come much later in his life when he would understand Gus’s meaning.
At the very least, however, his hesitation in killing and utilizing animals for his own purposes had diminished. As the experience of that day blended into the process of catching and killing rabbits daily, his senses seemed to be growing duller.
“….”
Juhwan shook his head. The afterimage of the rabbit that had surfaced in his mind still remained. it hadn’t disappeared. But the sense of revulsion had faded.
‘I really have changed.’
It felt as though a layer of asphalt had been laid over his heart. Just as a river cannot stay in one place, he was also changing. He wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
Juhwan moved on again. While checking his snares daily, he also surveyed the mountains around the house. Today, too, there was nothing unusual in the vicinity. It was fine. There were no wolves, no dangerous animals.
This was a mountain where Magical Beasts like Horned Rabbits lived. He never knew what might appear. He always had to remain vigilant.
Because the mountains were so vast, even though he circled the area, it wasn’t perfect. There were spots here and there that he missed or couldn’t check. Many of them, in fact. Perhaps it was simply impossible to perfectly circle the house in such a large mountain range.
‘Should I try a different path today?’
There was still time. Thanks to becoming somewhat accustomed to the routine, he still had time until lunch even after checking all the paths he usually took.
Juhwan picked up a small twig from the ground. He snapped it to about the size of his palm and channeled mana into it as he walked.
He wasn’t trying to burn it. His goal was to make the fire stay within the twig. If he could keep a fire lit on part of the wood, its utility would increase greatly. The only thing he could think of right now was fire arrows, but perhaps other things would be possible as well.
But it wasn’t easy. The moment he channeled mana and ignited it, it burned up completely. His power seemed too strong to be contained in a small piece of wood.
‘Sigh.’
He knew. In life, nothing was ever easy. If there was any consolation, it was that he was becoming slightly more proficient in using Fire Magic itself.
Even if nothing seemed different on the surface, the feeling was different. Within his own perception, he could tell that he was becoming able to channel slightly smaller amounts of mana. Even so, it was still strong enough to burn it all at once.
After a sigh, he channeled power into a new twig.
It burned up again. He took another long breath.
‘Maybe it would be possible if I fasted for a few meals.’
Fire infused with mana was not hot while it was in his hand. However, once it left his hand, it became as hot as any other fire, and he couldn’t touch it himself. Was it because the mana was connected while it was in contact with his body? He wasn’t sure why.
Juhwan waited until the twig, which had become a red ball of fire, cooled completely before throwing it on the ground and picking up another new twig.
Even if this seemed like nothing right now, it was something he absolutely had to train for.
Just like throwing punches, maintaining a proper pace in anything was important. If he did it wrong, he might use too much strength at the beginning and mess everything up at the final moment.
He hadn’t faced such a danger yet, but there was no knowing what the future held. Just as a healthy person could die in an accident tomorrow, danger could strike one’s life like a bolt of lightning at any time.
‘Because I’ve experienced that sort of thing several times.’
Someday he might encounter countless enemies, or face something stronger than himself. If he were alone, he might manage to escape somehow, but now he had Riji and Dorothy. No matter what happened, he could never afford to lose.
But why was it so difficult? Suppressing the feeling of being pathetic, Juhwan channeled mana into the twig again. Another failure. Still, he tried again.
Maybe he really should try it after skipping a few meals. Suddenly, he seemed to hear Dorothy’s voice saying, “Poor Papa.”
“….”
It was when he had turned onto a path he didn’t usually take and gone a bit further.
Something suddenly leaped out from the bushes.
“!”
It was a deer. It seemed slightly larger than a Korean water deer. He hadn’t even seen one when he was with Gus, but they wandered down this far.
He was startled.
The creature seemed startled as well, its eyes wide as it bounded away into the forest.
“Ah.”
Too late, the thought occurred to him that he should have caught it. Something that size would have provided more food than a wolf. He reached for an arrow a moment too late; the deer had already disappeared into the depths of the forest.
Juhwan clicked his tongue and moved on again.
It was at that exact moment that he discovered the unfamiliar footprints.
