The Cave Princess - Chapter 1

Johanna was a hunter. Her father was an extraordinarily dull man who seemed to find no joy in life, but his hunting skills were second to none.

From her father, Johanna inherited hunting abilities capable of sustaining her independently, along with long, sturdy legs, a slender waist easily defined by muscle, and a full, elastic breast.
However, she did not inherit her father’s remarkable flexibility, which allowed him to navigate even the narrowest paths with ease. Her joints lacked the smoothness of movement, resembling the stiffness of a doll’s limbs.

Occasionally, when she descended the mountain, she would watch children her age with soft, pliant limbs fluttering gracefully, stirring in her a vague sense of envy.

One day, she asked her father why her movements were so awkward. His response was succinct:
“Your joints may not be flexible, but you’re strong. And nothing is more important to a hunter than strength.”

He was right. Despite her slightly awkward movements, she had no difficulty catching prey. Nodding, she accepted his answer without further question.

Another thing that piqued her curiosity was her mother’s absence. In the village, children would return home holding their mothers’ hands—hands that, though worn, seemed soft. The children would chatter about their day to women whose faces resembled their own. Watching them, Johanna asked her father about her mother.

This time, his answer was even simpler.

“She’s dead.”

Once again, Johanna nodded without much thought.

Even as a child, she could see her father was quite different from the other men in the village. Unlike the men who spent their days drinking and lifting women’s skirts in drunken jest, her father seemed interested in nothing but his profession as a hunter. He drank no alcohol and certainly showed no interest in women.

Instead, he had a peculiar hobby that others might find odd—watching animals mate.

He would eagerly observe rabbits’ brief mating sessions or snakes coupling for over a week, treating it all with genuine fascination. If he stumbled upon mating animals in the wild, he would stop hunting and watch them intently.

Among these moments, the one Johanna found most striking was when her father observed the mating of insectoids.

Humans generally harbor an inherent animosity toward other species. Yet, the creatures humans avoided more than any others—even more than animals—were insectoids.

Insectoids. Creatures that belonged to the human genus but were not quite Homo sapiens. Like humans, they had heads, breasts, abdomens, hips, arms, and legs. However, their bodies were far from soft or fleshy.

Their exoskeletons were hard and smooth like that of arthropods with multiple legs. Some could even fly. Their teeth were sharp, their skin sometimes tinged with a greenish, insect-like sheen.

Having grown up in the mountains, Johanna was no stranger to their existence. She would see them from time to time, usually when they sought refuge in the village to escape the cold, only to be chased out, or when they landed briefly on tree branches to rest during their long flights.

They had eyes that seemed inorganic, like polished glass, along with tough-looking skin and arms that resembled muscular human limbs.

Fully grown insectoids were a head taller than the adult men she had seen in the village, and their ability to take flight with their wings struck her as almost mystical.

As a young girl, Johanna thought of angels whenever she saw them.

The people in the village had whispered about angels—heavenly messengers of God who descended from the sky and bore wings.

Johanna was curious. They both had wings, so why did people worship angels but despise insectoids?

Had Johanna ever seen an illustration of an angel in a storybook, she might have understood the difference immediately. But Johanna had never once laid eyes on a book in her entire life. Her father, the hunter, would never spend money on books when he could buy weapons for hunting instead.

That day, her father had set out on a hunt, eager to test a new set of arrows. Johanna, packing a lunch for him, decided to head to the area where he often hunted.

Before reaching her destination, Johanna rolled in a pile of fallen leaves on the forest floor. She had developed this habit after once earning a slap for startling prey with her scent. Her father had made it clear she was never to ruin his hunts again.

As always, she assumed the hunter would be absorbed in his pursuit. But when she found him, he was crouched motionless in a thicket of wild roses. The faint, spring-like scent of the blossoms filled the air.

Johanna loved wild roses for their subtle fragrance and tender shoots, which could be peeled and eaten. However, the sharp thorns demanded careful handling. Yet, her father wasn’t gathering the edible shoots, nor did he seem to be doing anything practical. Instead, he was crouched deep among the bushes, entirely focused on something.

Is his stomach hurting?

Cautiously, she approached. His face, marked by harsh wrinkles, carried an intensity that came not from pain but from fierce concentration.

What is he watching so intently?

Johanna held her breath like her father, following his line of sight with curious eyes. When she finally saw what had captured his attention, her own eyes widened in shock.

“Sss, sss, sss…”
“Thwack, thwack, smack!”

In the otherwise silent forest, the rustling wind was interrupted by the rhythmic sounds of two tall figures entwined with one another, their hips moving rapidly. Every downward thrust of one figure’s waist resulted in a dull thudding noise as their bodies collided.

A glistening, dark-red organ appeared and disappeared repeatedly between their bodies, slick with moisture. Each time it vanished, a sharp noise erupted from the figure pinned below.

Their bluish, pale skin shimmered faintly, their cheeks unnaturally flushed with a reddish hue that contrasted eerily against their otherwise cold appearance. The juxtaposition was unnerving.

“Sss, sss…”

Expressionless faces gasped out soft, rasping breaths that sounded like someone drawing air through their teeth with their tongue pressed against their upper palate.

“Insectoids.”

Realizing what they were doing, Johanna’s heart raced in her breast. A wave of nausea rolled through her.

The hunter, however, seemed utterly engrossed, watching the insectoids mate as though it were the most fascinating spectacle in the world.

Then, Johanna noticed his hand moving discreetly between his legs.

It was more revolting than anything the insectoids were doing.

The feelings she harbored toward her kind and dependable father—who provided food and repaired their home when it broke—were certainly inappropriate. Yet she couldn’t help but recall the image of him, flushed and aroused, casually pleasuring himself while watching the mating of beastmen.

It was anything but respectable.

For the first time, she began to wonder if there was something fundamentally different about hunters compared to the other men in the village. How could someone with such abnormal inclinations have managed to meet a woman, build a life, and father her?

It was a mystery she couldn’t unravel.

Johanna didn’t know much about human mating, but she had seen animals mating countless times, so she understood the process of life’s conception. She almost let herself imagine a hunter burying his dark, swollen organ between the soft, warm thighs of a human, but the thought made her stomach churn, and she quickly pushed it away.

“Father is… a bit strange.”

The question that arose that day remained buried in Johanna’s heart. For some reason, it felt unsettling to bring it up to the hunter.

Now fifteen years old, Johanna still lived in the deep forest, in the old cabin.

Over the years, the cabin had faced its share of trials. The roof had collapsed three times from falling rocks, and the door had been torn off five times by angry wolves.

The hunter skillfully repaired the roof each time and used torches to drive the wolves away. In the process, he suffered bites to his arms and thighs. Though those injuries had left him weaker, he never stopped working.

Johanna, following in her father’s footsteps, grew into a skilled hunter herself. The hunter eventually allowed her to use the large bow he had favored in his youth.

As he handed it to her, he offhandedly remarked:

“You’re starting to smell like a virgin,” the hunter said.

Johanna had grown significantly taller, and her breast had swelled noticeably. To keep it from hindering her during hunts, she tightly wrapped her breast with thick fabric. In the summer, the sweat that accumulated made it unbearably uncomfortable, leaving Johanna frustrated with the changes in her body.

As she aged, her gaze increasingly wandered down toward the human village below the mountain.

The relationship between the hunter and the villagers was purely transactional—limited to exchanging necessary goods. The villagers avoided further interaction, wary of the hunter who lived deep within the ominous black mountains.

The only reason they tolerated his presence in the village was that he provided rare and valuable pelts, especially prized during harsh winters. Even so, whenever Johanna and the hunter entered the village, the townsfolk would watch them with guarded, almost hostile eyes, as if they were carriers of some terrible plague.

Each time Johanna left the village in a rush, feeling the sting of their disdain, she couldn’t help but feel disappointed. Returning home from the village left her heart heavy and her face clouded with gloom.

That day, once again troubled by the villagers’ scorn, she tried to shake off her frustration by chopping firewood. But even the rhythmic blows of the axe couldn’t lift her mood. Determined to rid herself of the lingering irritation, she decided to head out for a hunt.

“What should I hunt today?”

The villagers had been increasingly uneasy about frequent incursions by chung-in—half-beast, half-monster creatures of the mountain. Johanna thought about hunting one to ease the villagers’ fears, but she had never killed one before, and sightings had been rare recently, so she dismissed the idea.

“A gray wolf would be perfect. This time, I’ll end it once and for all.”

She resolved to eliminate the cunning gray wolves that often intruded upon their cabin.

Gray wolves were among the predators of the mountain, and these particular wolves harbored a deep grudge. Years ago, the hunter had killed one of their packmates, and since then, the wolves had sought revenge. They would flee when chased but return to the cabin, stealing game or attacking when least expected. They were a persistent nuisance, and Johanna decided it was time to put an end to them.

“The traps I set last time worked well. This time, I can handle it on my own.”

She planned to ambush their den, a location she had discovered a few days earlier, and rid herself of this lingering threat.

Johanna armed herself with her sturdy bow and a sharp hunting knife, securing the latter at her waist. She was ready for the hunt.

The hunt took an entire day.

Through the night, she toiled, setting traps and digging pits. It was grueling work, but by morning, she had successfully wiped out the pack in their den. It was an undeniable triumph.

As she embraced the largest of the wolves—a thick-furred specimen that promised warmth in the harsh winter—Johanna, though battered and bruised, smiled with satisfaction.

“The villagers will be happy about this,” she thought, the possibility of gratitude flickering in her mind. Perhaps, for once, they might even thank her. The pelts would keep them warm through the winter, after all.

But as she looked at the heap of wolf carcasses, she hesitated. Skinning so many pelts on her own would be no small task. It would require the skilled hands of a seasoned hunter.

She raced back to the cabin as if flying, the adrenaline of her victory still surging through her veins. It wasn’t until she arrived that she noticed her arms and legs were smeared with blood. The wounds were from the wolves’ claws, but she had been so preoccupied with the thought of processing the pelts that she had completely forgotten about them.

“Ugh, what a hassle.”

Brushing off the injuries as a minor inconvenience, she hurried toward the cabin.

“Father!” she called out.

Though the sun was high in the sky, the cabin nestled deep in the forest remained cloaked in shadow. In summer, it stayed cool, but in winter, the shade made it bone-chillingly cold.

“…”

The silence of the forest was both familiar and unsettling. There were no lively human voices here, but usually, cheerful birdsong would echo through the trees. Now, even the birds seemed subdued, their absence turning the quiet into something oppressive, like the rustle of dead leaves falling to the ground.

Johanna, with her limited understanding of emotions, didn’t know to call this feeling loneliness.

“Father?” she called again, louder this time.

No response.

There were no sounds—not even the faintest rustle of life.

Her gaze shifted to the cabin, standing there, eerily still. Her heart began to pound, a heavy, sickening rhythm. Johanna’s instincts, honed through countless brushes with life and death, screamed a warning.

Something was wrong.

The unsettling quiet weighed on her like a suffocating shroud. The shadowed cabin seemed trapped in death, the silence thick and cold, like an inanimate thing.

Her cheerful expression vanished, replaced by the stony face of a predator stalking unseen prey. She moved silently, cautiously, like a beast avoiding the gaze of its hunter.

Creaaaak.

The old door groaned as she pushed it open, and a wave of metallic tang hit her nose—blood. The air reeked of it.

Johanna froze, staring in shock at the cabin’s battered floorboards, now painted in dark, dried blood. The wood had absorbed so much of it that the floor was stained a sinister, deep red.

A sense of dread clawed at her chest.

And then she found him.

By the firepit at the center of the cabin, her father lay. His body was torn apart, shredded beyond recognition.

Even as Johanna stared at the gruesome sight before her, the thought of death did not immediately cross her mind. The torso left on its own and the scattered limbs lying around seemed more like the result of a cruel, tasteless prank than anything real.

But the inescapable stench of blood snapped her back to reality.

Her father was dead.

Frozen like a statue, Johanna eventually forced herself to act. She began to gather the scattered remains. She reattached the arms and legs to the torso as best she could, though the severed joints were bent and splintered. The task felt oddly like solving a grisly puzzle.

Kneeling, she examined the jagged edge of a severed arm closely. The body was cold and stiff, like a wooden log left in the winter for too long. But Johanna was no stranger to handling animal carcasses; this didn’t faze her.

When a person dies, they’re no different from a beast.

She felt no tears welling up. Despite their distant relationship, the man lying in pieces before her had been the one to help her survive all these years. Shouldn’t she feel something more? And yet, no tears came.

Was it because, as the villagers had always whispered, the hunter was a wicked, lowly creature?

Her grief was muted, almost vague, but her anger burned sharp and clear.

Johanna was a hunter. Revenge for her father’s death became her only focus. But first, she needed to figure out who—or what—had done this to him.

Her sharp, almond-shaped eyes narrowed dangerously.

The severed arm wasn’t cut cleanly. Instead, the edges were ragged, as if it had been torn. It reminded her of the rough edge of a large leaf, slowly ripped apart by hand.

Her father hadn’t been killed by a blade. He had been torn apart.

She turned her attention to the head, detached from the body. The eye sockets were hollow, the eyes ripped out, and the nose had been gnawed off.

“Again, the edges are jagged.”

Not sliced—ripped, like prey caught in the jaws of a predator.

Her gaze swept over the body again. She found more signs of tearing, more marks that could only have been made by teeth.

She recognized the shape of those marks. Her sharp eyes narrowed further as a single thought crystallized in her mind.

“Ants.”

She carefully reattached her father’s arm and scanned the cabin. The scene unfolded in her mind like a ghostly reenactment of the attack.

The ambush had been sudden. Her father must have grabbed the wood-splitting axe in a desperate attempt to defend himself, but the ants had quickly overwhelmed him, disarming him.

Johanna’s gaze landed on the axe, lying discarded in the corner of the room.

Then, the ants had grabbed him as he tried to flee. They had torn his limbs from his body, one by one, while he was still alive.

The stench of the cabin was nauseating. Not just the metallic tang of blood, but something more insidious—a foul, malicious odor that clung to the air.

Whoever had done this had hated her father deeply.

Johanna’s expression hardened. Beneath the searing heat of her rage and the damp chill of her grief, questions churned in her mind.

Why?

It made no sense. She knew little about the ants, a type of chung-in, but one thing was certain:

They lived in colonies, hidden away in their own territory. They had a queen, who served as the center of their existence, and all others devoted themselves to her survival.

“That’s it. That’s all there is to them. Aren’t they supposed to be one of the less aggressive species? A type that doesn’t bother humans unless provoked?”

So why had they killed her father so brutally?

Could it be…?

She grimaced. Had he spied on their mating rituals again and paid the price?

As Johanna stood in the bloodstained cabin, lost in thought, her gaze instinctively dropped to the floor.

As the sun dimmed behind a thick layer of clouds, shadows fell across Johanna’s delicate features, casting a dark veil over her pretty face. The sharp contrast of light and shadow made her expression unreadable as she slowly turned her gaze toward her father’s mangled remains. A mixture of emotions briefly flickered across her youthful face—anger, grief, confusion—before she forced them away.

Moments later, Johanna stood in the backyard.

Her mind felt tangled, a chaotic storm she couldn’t quiet, so she shook her head violently, as if trying to force the thoughts out.

She kept her lips pressed tightly together, focusing instead on digging a grave. She made it as deep as she could, ensuring that no animal would disturb it. Into the pit, she carefully laid the dismembered pieces of her father’s body, then carved a crude marker from wood to serve as a gravestone.

It was a clumsy, makeshift grave, but it was the best she could manage.

Afterward, she returned to the blood-soaked cabin and began cleaning the mess.

Through it all, Johanna fought to keep herself from falling into the pit of questions swirling in her mind. The stiffness in her joints, sharper and more uncomfortable than usual, grated on her nerves.

Perhaps, deep down, she already knew why.

Perhaps that was why she was so adamant about not thinking too deeply.

Some truths are better left buried. Sometimes, covering up a problem is far better than uncovering what lies beneath.

* * *