Ch.4I Have Become the Top Priority Monster to Tame

After rescuing the helicopter, an inexplicable wave of fatigue washed over me.

So when I returned to human form.

“Little one? Are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?”

“Uh, well…”

“Where are your parents? Why are you here alone?”

“We found another lost child here! Requesting support!”

The rescue team members seemed strangely tall.

My original height was 184cm, which made no sense, so I turned my head toward the glass fragments from a collapsed high-rise building that happened to be visible nearby.

What I saw reflected in the glass was my appearance from elementary school days.

‘I got younger…?’

I was a small boy of adorable size.

What on earth had happened?

“Um, excuse me…”

“Yeah?”

“Could you tell me what date it is today?”

“…What?”

Maybe this wasn’t just a simple game possession.

With that thought, I swallowed nervously and asked the nearest intellectual-looking woman.

“It’s 2014 right now. Little one. Do you not remember anything at all?”

“You said 2014…?”

“…! Medic! Or at least a corpsman! This child’s condition seems a bit strange!”

Hunter’s Blood was released in 2024.

But if it’s 2014, then forget the game’s release – this is really when I was in elementary school.

“What the hell is…”

“Little one! Little one!”

“Corpsman! Hurry, hurry!”

The confusion was brief, perhaps because the tension had finally lifted.

I lost consciousness while trapped in a child’s body.

***

The next place I opened my eyes was none other than a hospital room.

An unfamiliar ceiling.

And even more unfamiliar was the half-ruined landscape of Jamsil that could be seen clearly through the window below.

“Are you okay? Does anything hurt?”

“Yes…”

“Um… do you still not remember anything? Like your parents or friends.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t remember anything.”

To the nurse’s question who came to visit me as always today, I gave the same ambiguous answer as usual.

“I-is that so?”

“Yes… I’m sorry…”

“Oh, no! What did you do wrong, Shinwoo! I’m sure you’ll recover with time! Until then, let’s just rest well, okay?”

“Yes.”

The nurse comforted me with all her might, as if soothing a child.

But even though my body had shrunk, my brain remained the same!

Since the contents were still those of a 20-year-old adult, I could roughly predict the future ahead.

‘Seeing how particularly sad she looks today, she’s probably going to send me to an orphanage soon.’

Having suddenly been transported to a different world that was merely similar to reality, I deliberately acted out ‘amnesia’ to hide my identity.

Even without resident registration or birth records, no one would bother asking someone with memory loss about such details.

The effect was doubled because I had become as young as an elementary school student.

From eavesdropping on the nurses’ conversations while pretending to sleep, the sympathetic public opinion toward me was proof of this.

“About Shinwoo, you know. The Hunter Association even took his DNA to try to find his family, but it turns out he’s a child who was never even registered at birth.”

“Oh my, oh my! Then what do we do!”

“Exactly… Sigh. Those terrible people. If you’re going to have a child, you should raise them properly!”

“Then before getting amnesia, Shinwoo was a young homeless child wandering around the Jamsil area.”

“Yes… well, that’s right.”

My first identity after possessing Hunter’s Blood.

It wasn’t as a Kaijufication Hunter or a powerful overpowered character, but as a young homeless child in Jamsil who wasn’t even registered at birth.

‘Hmm… I guess that’s good?’

Thanks to this, I’d be heading straight to an orphanage after being discharged from the hospital.

But at least it seemed better than being discovered as a humanoid monster and becoming internationally wanted.

‘Right. This is for the best.’

The setting of the original Hunter’s Blood was 2024, the same as the game’s release date.

There were still 10 eventful years left. Anyway, until then, it wouldn’t matter where I lived as long as I stayed in Korea.

I decided to leave my worries and concerns to ‘future me.’

Creak.

I was about to take a nap on the soft hospital bed, not knowing when I’d be able to use it again.

“Is there a child named Han Shinwoo here?”

Just as the nurse who had comforted me was about to turn around and leave the hospital room.

A woman entered the room at that moment.

Seeing her in a uniform-like suit with a commander’s cap pressed down over her flowing blonde hair, the nurse was so surprised she sat down right where she was.

“Nurse?”

“Oh, oh my… oh my oh my oh my oh my!”

“…?”

“You’re Ms. Rolling! I’m a huge fan!”

“Oh, is that so? I’m rather honored that you recognize me.”

“Could I possibly get an autograph later?”

“Yes. Of course. I’ll give you one when I leave the room in a bit.”

The woman courteously helped the nurse, whose legs had given out from surprise, back to her feet like a gentleman.

At first I wondered who she was, tilting my head.

“Oh, could it be…?”

The Commander Hunter who had commanded the Hunters and military forces when I encountered them in my monster form.

She had been hidden among the people so I couldn’t see her well, but seeing her up close, I could recognize that it was indeed her.

‘…Wait, but why is she here?’

A Commander Hunter appearing in person.

As the job title itself included ‘commander,’ Commander Hunters held quite high positions within the association or military.

In military terms, think of them not as division commanders but as corps commanders.

Moreover, thanks to their general-like image, they were the most respected Hunters among ordinary citizens. Just like the nurse’s reaction moments ago.

But such a big shot – equivalent to a top celebrity plus the highest military officer – had personally come to see me, a parentless orphan?

It was extremely suspicious.

I felt like something was about to happen, and I nervously swallowed.

‘She couldn’t have figured out my identity, could she?’

As I was getting nervous.

“Oh, Mom…”

“Yes. Sophia. This is the child you saw in the materials beforehand. What do you think?”

A girl with brilliant blonde hair just like her mother’s emerged from behind the ceremonial coat worn like a cape.

Her bright eyes looking at me were ocean blue, and the way she quickly hid behind her mother as a support was cute, like a frightened hamster.

“…Do you still find him unpleasant?”

The Commander Hunter and her daughter.

What kind of combination was this?

At least it didn’t seem like my identity had been discovered, so I was relieved, but I had no idea what these two mother and daughter were planning to do.

“Um, excuse me…”

“…!”

I was about to ask because I wanted them to finish their business quickly so I could rest.

My hand that I extended forward with my words.

Suddenly, the girl named Sophia came out from behind the coat and ran toward my hand with quick steps, placing both her hands over mine.

“…?”

What is she doing?

Does she want a handshake or something?

The child who had been shyly examining my palm as if it were some unfamiliar object, making her blue eyes sparkle brightly.

“I don’t… dislike him…!”

“Huh?”

“M-Mom! I don’t dislike this human… no, this boy…!”

“…Really? Are you telling the truth? My daughter?”

As the daughter turned around with flushed cheeks in excitement, the even more moved mother rushed over and hugged both me and Sophia at the same time.

“Thank goodness! Really… thank goodness!”

“Yeah yeah!”

“Uh, um… excuse me?”

“Ah!”

But we just met.

I was just confused, suddenly caught between the two mother and daughter.

The mother seemed to realize my state and released the warm embrace.

But the daughter…

“Mom! I want to have him!”

What am I, some kind of toy?

Even with a mother who has plenty of money and social authority, she wants to, to…

‘Wait, hold on. I’m an orphan. Am I purchasable?’

“Mom! Let’s take him to our house! Please? Please! Please?”

Was Korea in the Hunter’s Blood world setting one where human trafficking was possible?

“Mom! Please! I’ll feed him and clean up his poop and do everything. Buy him for me! I’ll really raise him well.”

I was getting chills from Sophia, who wanted to have me like she was picking out a pet dog.

Thwack!

“Sophia! You’re scaring Shinwoo by acting like that! Apologize.”

“Sniff. S-sorry…”

“Oh, okay.”

Fortunately, it seemed human trafficking was illegal in this world’s Korea too.

Then why did that kid say such things?

“You must be very confused.”

“Well, yes…?”

“I’m sorry. But please understand. Our daughter has never socialized with people in her entire life.”

“…What?”

Sophia was sniffling after receiving her mother’s loving tap on the head.

Looking at her daughter, the mother whispered softly in my ear.

“Our child was born with the talent of a Beast Hunter… um… how should I explain this? Anyway, to put it simply, she instinctively feels disgust toward people other than her blood-related parents.”

“Ah…!”

Only after hearing those words could I perfectly understand the behavior of that child named Sophia.

‘If she’s a Beast Hunter, then of course that could happen. Of course.’

Beast Hunter.

As the only existence among not just Hunters but all of humanity who could ‘command monsters.’

Instead of this highly valuable ability, they were born with one cursed handicap from birth.

That was congenital ‘misanthropy.’

A disadvantage that the game’s title screen always warned you to be careful about when trying to create a Beast Hunter.

‘Thanks to that, if you created a character as a Beast Hunter, you’d start with -100 affinity.’

Communication between people was naturally impossible, and this was the same even among Beast Hunters.

Even the monsters they commanded were connected through hierarchical relationships, never the kind of bond you’d share with a pet.

The more you developed them, the higher performance they showed among all Hunter classes, but the more they grew, the more various debuffs followed: depression, exhaustion, lack of affection, suicide attempts, etc.

If you let your guard down even a little, they’d immediately commit suicide – not killed by enemies, but by themselves.

That was the Beast Hunter I knew.

But she was born with Beast Hunter talent and likes me?

‘Ah, could it be the influence of my monster transformation?’

Come to think of it, I’m half-monster.

Unlike ordinary monsters, I can talk, interact, and can be comfortably taken around outside of combat.

“Huh?”

Suddenly thinking about it, wouldn’t I be exactly the kind of monster Beast Hunters would want to command?

‘I’m pretty awesome, aren’t I?’

I found an unexpected advantage.

Meanwhile.

“So we came here because we want to adopt you into our family.”

The mother revealed her true intentions.

Simply put, she wanted me to become the only friend for her daughter who couldn’t adapt to human relationships.

Staying by her side for life.

‘Actually, that sounds good?’

To enter as an adopted son into a Commander Hunter’s family that has all three: wealth, honor, and power.

In some ways, it would be a much more blessed life than before my possession… no, definitely better than my original life living alone in a 6-pyeong villa.

And for the main story that would unfold in 10 years, being an ‘adopted son of a Hunter family’ would be more advantageous than being a ‘parentless orphan.’

I was about to accept immediately.

But then a thought occurred to me.

“Um, but what happens if I refuse?”

A boy who would become the only conversation partner in the life of a daughter born with Beast Hunter talent.

If I refused adoption?

“Hmm… then you’d be sent to an orphanage until we find your real parents, I suppose?”

Surprisingly ordinary.

Well, a Hunter who saves people wouldn’t do anything just because a little kid refused a proposal.

“But recently there are no vacant spots in Korean orphanages…”

“??”

As she continued smiling.

“So if you’re not adopted into our family, Shinwoo would be sent directly to an orphanage in Venezuela or Suriname.”

Looking at the mother who was telling a completely unfunny story with a smiling face.

“I’ll be in your care from today!”

“Hoho. Yes. Please take care of us too.”

I immediately chose adoption.