The Primal Hunter

Jake had never been a huge fan of salads. He could do cucumbers, tomatoes, and a bit of lettuce in a burger here and there, but the mere thought of living off salads was horrifying to him. One should understand why he didn't find his current meal the most pleasant with that in mind.

He was currently sitting in the library, with a bowl in front of him filled with water and moss. He had tried to eat the moss, but it was honestly disgusting. Not the taste, it was fine, but the texture and the aftertaste of dirt.

Instead, he plucked it, rinsed it with water, and used the cleaned mixing bowl to eat from. It was a rather disgusting looking soup. He didn’t even have a spoon, so he had to use his hands to eat out of it.

However, the torturous meal was made acceptable by the feeling of knowledge and improvement from eating it. It was the same as with the Flyeater Mushrooms, though he made sure to control himself and not overeat.

After his wonderful meal, it was back to making potions. He had started alternating between health and mana potions to break the monotony. Not that it mattered much. He was also considering if he should give making stamina potions a shot, but according to the books, it was quite a lot harder than both health and mana. And not by a little either.

Stamina potions were essentially a mix of health and mana from a methodological standpoint. Quite honestly, the book’s explanations were quite terrible, and Jake had no desire to attempt it currently.

One good thing about his improved wisdom was that he no longer needed to take notes. By now, he could easily remember everything. It was kind of weird and a bit scary when he thought about it more in-depth. He had not felt anything immediately, even when gaining a lot of wisdom at once, but it changed him without a doubt.

He already knew that the system could directly implant knowledge, and it could obviously also improve memory. Jake had always had a relatively good memory, but now he could verbatim recall the page-numbers of where everything stood in his alchemy books.

And if the system could implant both knowledge and make his memory that much better, what was to say it couldn’t change something more fundamental. His intelligence stat had also been improved quite a lot, but he hadn’t felt anything directly from that. Something that he was still unsure if that was assuring or concerning.

What was to say that his improved mental stats had not made some fundamental changes to who he was already. Would even be aware if it happened?

For some reason, he found his bloodline far less scary, even though it clearly was the thing introduced by the system that had affected him the most. But he was aware of it doing so. He had let his bloodline affect him; he had allowed his improved instincts to take charge during times of danger. In essence, he felt like his bloodline wasn’t changing him, but merely bringing forth who he was in a more primal and instinctual form.

But ultimately, did such existential worries even matter in the grand scheme of things? If he had been changed, he would have no way of knowing. He remembered Descartes saying: “Cogito, ergo sum; I think, therefore I am,” and he was undoubtedly thinking far too much, so he most certainly existed in his own mind. Also, damn the extra wisdom making him remember random quotes.

Nevermind that tangent, back to potions. Jake had needed to refill the barrels of purified water a few times already, but after his meal, he had to do so yet again. It was kind of insane that he could carry an entire barrel filled with water. It was with some difficulty, but it still clearly showed that his strength had reached superhuman levels. Especially considering the difficulty mainly stemmed from how unwieldy the barrels were.

After filling the barrels and cleaning the bowl after his mossy meal, he jumped right back into it - an entire day of mixing ahead of him.

William walked through the forest, alone as always. Richard had gotten a bit annoying the last few days, but it was not time yet. The man still had time to grow. William also still needed him, or more accurately, what his camp could offer.

The teenager smiled as he saw a group of big molerats. He knew these things had some annoying sound attack that hurt like shit, but they were pretty weak defensively.

He took out his wand, an item he had found within the first couple of hours after he got here. He had been with a group of nine others, just like everyone else apparently had.

He had no idea who any of them were. But then again, he didn’t really know that many people before the tutorial either. His parents and his psychiatrist mainly. Oh, and the workers in the center, but they were all massive assholes.

Though let’s be fair, pretty much everyone was a waste of space. Everyone was either obnoxious, pretentious, or just plain old annoying. So, William had always preferred activities where no one bothered him.

molerats, he knew that he had to wait for an opportune time to strike. And strike hard he would. Admiring the wand that made this all possible once more, he only

Iron. The wand is made of a special kind of iron,

in any class or

butter since he got here, due to the skill attached. He discovered a box when he was bathing in a lake after seeing something glitter at the bottom. Diving down, he had found this wand. He

mana. This skill falls under elemental manipulation, a prevalent brand of magic throughout the multiverse. Adds a small

in his robe, this skill allowed him to dominate pretty much everything he met. His only weakness was his lack of healing outside of health potions, which was why he even bothered

to strike. The molerats had jumped

lifted the wand as seven daggers flew out of his robe, towards the closest rat. Their speed and power were far

could register that had happened, the daggers spread out, hitting the three others in their

spell towards the ground as a metal board appeared before him,

his whole body off the ground, it gave him excellent

dangerously low, the last molerat fell to the ground, never to move again. Checking his notifications, he was delighted to

have slain [Molerat Screecher – lvl 14] – Bonus experience

– Bonus experience earned for killing an enemy above your level. 2000 TP

have slain [Molerat Screecher – lvl 16] – Bonus experience earned for killing an enemy above your

Screecher – lvl 15] – Bonus experience earned for killing an enemy above your level. 1750

has reached level 17

level 14 to get from level 16 to 17. Richard kept refusing to go further into the forest, which made William really wish for some kind of healing skill at

(Common)], and at 15 [Metallic Sight (Uncommon)]. The Iron wall was the skill he had used in the battle before, and the metallic sight was the passive skill that made his entire style possible. It allowed William to ‘see’ through the metal he was manipulating, allowing his flying daggers to

fill any metal he wanted to control up with mana, linking it to him. This was done

he couldn’t make a warrior cut his own head off with his sword. Oh, or make an archer’s arrows do a 180 hitting themselves. However, the saddest was his inability to lift a medium or heavy warrior up

at once, and lifting even a set of armor was challenging. By now, he could do seven daggers comfortably but could push it to 8 in a pinch, though it would hurt his versatility in using his iron wall and his

felt it worked even better at stealthily killing. Having picked up Basic Stealth being a lucky

he arrived with was filled with the usual pieces of shit - pretentious idiots who kept talking about bullshit. None of them understood that things have changed. No, they were merely background-characters - unimportant fodder

enjoyed games and books his entire life. He understood the genre. One had to embrace the system, game it where possible,

for the entire tutorial. Didn’t they understand this was a golden opportunity?

fake. It was obviously real. Real, and yet still a game. Which was why

own stupidity. A light warrior had also died, so William gracefully offered to carry his daggers if anyone needed them later. The first fight after he reached level 5, one of the other casters suspiciously died, stabbed in the back of the neck by

archer leading their group, so it couldn’t possibly have been him. With the seed of discord planted, he managed to easily split the group. A little word here and there about how the third caster had asked for one of the daggers he had been carrying

one suspecting the small and scared teenager. Well, except the archer

a couple of

him like shit his entire life, no one

school. But he knew he couldn’t. At least not without getting caught. The rules of society had held him back for so long, limited him in so

and day out to try and

long hazy dream. But now William was awake, and he was aware. He understood his new reality far more so than