Behemoth Just Lives an Ordinary Life

I wanted to find food.
And I succeeded in hunting.
So far, walking through the Great Forest, I had hunted a total of two monsters.
One was a giant with a single eye, and the other was a giant wild boar.
Since the giant with a single eye is a bit long, I’ll just call it by its proper name, Cyclops.
Originally, I had no intention of hunting the Cyclops.
First of all, it looked so disgustingly ugly that I didn’t even think about eating it.
Humans don’t look at cockroaches and think of them as food either.
It was exactly that kind of feeling.
So when I entered the mine where it lived, I was just going to pass by.
But it let out some kind of strange cry and suddenly tried to attack me.
So I was startled. I punched it in the face and.
SPLAT-!
Its head burst and it died.
The visual was like a drunk person vomiting food on the street, so I closed my eyes tightly and left that place.
It wasn’t completely without gain.
The Cyclops was a creature that ate food too.
I took out its extra-large cauldron, ladle, and something that looked like a kitchen knife.
The Cyclops was the same size as me or even larger.
The kitchen knife and ladle it used were perfect for my size.
They also looked sturdy, probably because they were made of iron.
I moved these to my cave and started moving again.
And then I met a giant wild boar.
Whether it was because of the DNA imprinted in the monster’s genes, or because I was human, I don’t know.
But it looked like a creature that I could definitely eat.
Anyway, having successfully hunted the wild boar, I’m currently in the cave.
And I’m pondering while looking at the giant wild boar.
“How should I cook this guy…”
My experience as a bachelor was 5 years.
I knew how to make most Korean dishes, but cleaning and cooking a wild boar was a first for me.
Could I make delicious food in this remote place without sesame oil, or even salt and pepper?
The wild boar’s smell was unbearably foul…
Even if I could somehow clean the meat with the kitchen knife, the key was to cook it ‘deliciously’.
There was no carbohydrate to accompany it, no seasoning, and I was in a situation where I had to use stone powder.
“If I had known this would happen, I would have asked the people I met for some seasoning… No, that would have been too much to ask.”
While hunting these two monsters, I met all sorts of creatures.
Among them were intelligent beings that could be considered ‘people’.
Dwarves, goblins, elves, orcs, etc. were typical examples.
Oh, and the ones that looked most like humans among them.
Were people with dragon tails and wings, and people with cat ears.
None of them understood my language, just like the elf girl I met first.
And they were afraid of me.
I understood.
I definitely understood, but.
Honestly, it was a bit disappointing and lonely.
Living as a monster in a distant land, there wasn’t a single person I could have a conversation with.
Even when I tried to communicate through body language, it didn’t work well.
“Pull yourself together.”
I patted my cheeks.
Yeah, so what if we can’t communicate?
I can talk to them later when I learn the language, and won’t there be opportunities later?
Humans are adaptable creatures.
Even humans who become monsters are adaptable creatures.
First, let’s fill our stomach.
This was all because I was hungry.
After a delicious meal, my gloomy mood would probably lift.
I walked to the riverside.
I placed the wild boar’s carcass on the stone table I had made before.
I gripped the kitchen knife.
I cut the skin in a straight line centering on the navel.
I tore off the opened skin.
I removed the internal organs and tied the meat, now free of skin and organs, with elastic branches.
When I hung the decently cleaned meat on a willow tree, blood dripped down.
It takes quite some time for the blood to drain.
Meanwhile, I went into the forest to find something to accompany the meat.
It was the place where I had pulled out the rotten tree to get firewood.
Probably, the elf I saw at that time was living close to this forest?
With these random thoughts, I sniffed the grassy scents on the ground.
It would be nice if there were herbs among them.
I also carefully checked the mushrooms under the trees.
Someone told me that colorful ones are poisonous mushrooms.
‘I’d better take the plainest one… Huh?’
I felt a warm touch on my tail.
I looked back.
Since becoming a monster, people who encountered me would be terrified and try to run away.
However, the woman was gently stroking my tail.
This was a first.
Should I call it the warmth of a person who is welcoming and missed?
Despite the woman’s somewhat rude action, I remained crouched in place.
“Hey, that’s a poisonous mushroom.”
“Huh? Oh, thank you.”
How could such a plain-looking mushroom be poisonous?
No, wait a minute.
How am I able to understand her words?
I had never been able to communicate with people until now.
“You use an interesting language. Did you come from a distant land?”
By the way, who is she to be calmly talking to a monster?
Is this kind of situation familiar to her?
As far as I know, I’ve never seen any monster other than myself speaking Korean.
It was the moment I had been longing for, but it came so suddenly that I was dumbfounded.
“Can you actually understand what I’m saying…?”
“Yes. Is there a problem?”
“How can you understand?”
The woman smiled slightly.
“I have better hearing than others.”
“That doesn’t make sense…”
“I was just born that way. Other than that, I’m an ordinary person with nothing special. Please, feel comfortable.”
She was an unusual person.
The most unusual among all the people I’ve seen so far.
“Aren’t you scared of me?”
“What? Me?”
“Everyone else tries to run away when they see me.”
No one was not afraid of me, larger than an elephant and covered in black scales.
Even other monsters get scared when they see me, so her reaction was quite peculiar.
She was, by human standards, a beautiful woman.
A chrysanthemum-like girl in a white blouse and green skirt, with a sweet scent.
She twirled her golden hair reflecting in the sunlight and smiled brightly.
“Are you perhaps scary-looking?”
“You can tell just by looking. Even I think I look incredibly large and scary…”
“I’m sorry. I can’t see what you look like.”
She pointed to her eyes with her slender fingers.
“I’m blind.”
The reason she had been keeping her eyes closed all along.
It was because she couldn’t see.
Hmm, I don’t know what to say.
Despite the atmosphere suddenly becoming somber, she maintained her smile.
“I actually think it’s a good thing. Thanks to me being blind, I can talk to you without being scared, right?”
“But still, things like the size of my voice, or the tail you just touched, didn’t they seem different from a human?”
Surely, she wouldn’t have thought I was an ordinary human.
“I may not be able to see with my eyes, but I can see something more precious.”
“What’s that?”
“The heart.”
She pointed to the path I had walked.
Chrysanthemums resembling her hair color were waving there.
“You’ve been carefully walking to avoid stepping on the flowers since just now, haven’t you?”
“That’s just because I could see them…”
Didn’t she say she couldn’t see?
How does she know that?
“Still. How many people see flowers and just step on them anyway?”
“Thanks for seeing me in a good light.”
Ahem, I cleared my throat.
“My name is Lucy. And yours?”
A name, I could give the name from when I was human, but I didn’t want to.
No matter how much I had a person’s heart, I thought a monster should have a monster-like name.
Also, the biggest reason was that the life to which that name was attached was already over.
Using the name of a past life now would be like being a living corpse.
‘Even though it’s a bit difficult, I’m still living diligently even with a monster’s body.’
“I don’t have a name yet. Call me whatever you like.”
“Then, can I just call you friend? I’d like to be close.”
“Sounds good, Lucy.”
“Sounds good, friend.”
Lucy extended her hand.
And I extended mine too.
My size was too big for a handshake, but we pressed our palms together and moved them up and down.
Lucy paused for a moment.
“What’s wrong?”
“Oh, nothing. What was friend doing?”
“I was looking for ingredients to go with meat.”
“…Can friend also eat poisonous mushrooms?”
“I don’t know, but I don’t particularly want to try.”
Lucy put the backpack she was carrying on her back into my hand.
Inside were fresh vegetables, fragrant herbs, and mushrooms.
“These go well with meat. If you marinate them with salt, they remove the gamy smell and make the meat tender. Oh, I have some rock salt at home, should I give you that too?”
“That would be great, but aren’t these things you worked hard to collect, Lucy? Can I really take them for free?”
“Of course. We’re friends, aren’t we? And I’ve already received payment from friend.”
Lucy was kind.
So much so that she was dazzling like the sun.
For her to be so kind to a monster she just met, my dried-up faith in humanity was welling up again.
“Phew, the world is still warm…”
“I’m glad you’re happy.”
After receiving fresh ingredients and rock salt from Lucy, I moved to the riverside where the meat was.
My footsteps must have been excited for the first time in a very long while.
‘A delicious bite.’
An empty stomach and a happy event.
Those were the perfect seasonings to enhance the taste of meat.

“The shackles have loosened…”
Lucy confirmed that the sensation of shackles that had been painfully constricting her heart had become faint.
It had been a very long time since she could breathe comfortably, so she stood still for a while at the spot where her friend had left.
Fresh air enters her lungs.
And she can feel it completely without pain.
Unlike ordinary people, this was a miraculous event for Lucy, who had been cursed by high-level wizards.
When she pressed her hand against her giant friend, the pain eased.
When the friend disappeared, the pain began to be felt again gradually.
But the brief moment when she could breathe the sweet air was a blessing like rain during a drought.
“My friend is an amazing person in many ways…”
Lucy spoke softly, opening and closing her right hand.
Would she be able to press her hand against his again next time?
“Of course, it would be rude, but still.”
Lucy returned home, following the path guided by the wind.