The Primal Hunter

He now realized he had truly neglected his gear for far too long. Jake hadn’t made proper use of humanity and their ability to create items. Arnold had given him the Nanoblade, a far better weapon than his old Venomfang. Why not also get gear in his other slots? He had replaced everything from the first dungeon with the Badger Pants gone, but he had more subpar equipment to get rid of.

Actually, Jake still had the two pieces of equipment he earned from the challenge dungeon, which was technically his first-ever dungeon. He still had the Boots of the Wandering Alchemist and the Prodigious Alchemist’s Necklace of Holding. The necklace had his spatial storage within, so replacing that was impossible. The fact that only gave 25 wisdom was a bit offputting, though.

Jake knew there had to be ways of upgrading Soulbound equipment somehow. Perhaps he could find a talented jeweler… but to be perfectly honest, he didn’t really want to. He needed someone he truly trusted both as a person and their ability before he would ever risk them trying to improve the necklace.

The second piece of equipment he still wore from the challenge dungeon was, of course, his trusty boots. Now, did they only give 20 endurance and 15 agility? Yes. Had the enchantment to reduce stamina expenditure been useless for many levels? It had been. Did he still love the boots? Fuck yeah.

They were just too damn comfy and durable. They looked as worn and old as the day he got them, which was the point – they looked just like the day he got them. Without any self-repair, enchantment, that is. They had survived being blasted by mushroom-mega-beams, blown up in dozens of different types of explosions, and a slew of other things… but nothing had managed to leave a mark.

Their comfort was also on an entirely different level. The boots were snuggly and just felt good on Jake’s feet, and in the end, isn’t that what’s most important when it comes to choosing footwear?

Okay, he would try to upgrade them if he ever got the chance… but who could upgrade them was the issue once more.

But even if Jake didn’t want to mess with these two pieces of equipment, for now, that didn’t mean there weren’t other places to improve. His second ring, chestpiece, bracers, and gloves. These were the pieces of equipment he would seek to improve. The ring and chestpiece were okay for now… but he knew he could do better.

As for other “gear slots?” Villy had told him that humans could have ten pieces of wearable equipment bound at once. With Jake’s two rings, necklace, chest, legs, boots, bracers, mask, cloak, and gloves, he had those ten. This did mean Jake could toss away one of these things to potentially put on something else. Different humanoid races naturally had different pieces of equipment.

Jake himself could, for example, wear some earrings instead of rings or a hat or helmet instead of the mask. The gear was still bound to the parts of the body they went on, though. Also, based on their effects to some extent. Aka, Jake couldn’t just wear four chestplates or two pairs of boots. He could wear an undershirt of some kind and a big chestplate on top, though, but that would mean he couldn’t bind a cloak.

To be perfectly honest, it seemed like yet another place one could really min-max and optimize, even if young geniuses from other universes tended to be stat-capped anyway. Jake had absolutely no intentions of doing some major do-over of his getup – he just wanted to replace some of his old shit with new shiny treasures.

He liked most of his current things. Especially the mask. Not just because of its legendary-rarity and indestructible build, but because it was a mask. Jake had found that he actually really loved wearing a mask, and he found it sad he hadn’t discovered the comforts in wearing one before the system.

Then again, if he ever walked into a bank in a wooden mask with only eye-holes, he would likely have been arrested.

Also… it was probably about time he addressed what lay beneath. No, not in any philosophical way, but literally what lay beneath his lodge now. He went over and entered the cellar, and down there, he found a new door installed. It wasn’t a wooden door but one made of thick metal.

Beyond the wall was a hole. The entire hole looked a bit like an old mine-shaft. Wooden boards entirely covered the walls with metal plates in between to fortify and isolate the tunnel as a whole. It was nearly three meters wide and across, and one could easily fit a large elevator in there if they so desired.

And if it were before the system, one would be sorely needed.

a large and empty chamber that still looked to be under construction. There were beginnings of cutouts to other rooms. Jake also saw that a marking had been made in the direction of the cave with the dungeon. He had mentioned to Hank that he might have wanted to link them up, and this seemed to be the beginning

a few dozen meters below the lodge, but what he instead got was more what looked like an underground bunker 100 meters below. Heck, the underground complex would be

reminded him of the tutorial dungeon… a hidden livable chamber away from everywhere else. Now he just needed a spatial pocket with a garden in

He had a feeling they had

visit Hank and ask him about things. He didn’t really want to do alchemy down in the cellar in case

Jake went on a quest. To

from him stealthily checking it out when he went in and out of

instantly poured in a bit of mana, and the cloak began changing color until it was black. That projection had said it would take some practice learning

could. The valley was not that far from the relatively bustling city of Haven, yet it seemed nicely isolated due to its nature as a valley. There also weren’t any people walking in his direction

far as Jake knew. Wayward beasts, especially of the flying variety, were hazards to most other settlements, and the occasional alpha beast trying to lead its flock to take down a city also wasn’t abnormal. Heck, the Fort had to deal with

beasts. A pair of D-grades was far more than most beasts – even D-grades - could

fixed by Miranda reaching D-grade and also claiming the Fort as officially recognized as part of the area influenced by the Pylon. That would make it clear to all beasts

to invade the

increased all his other senses, it really wasn’t that effective most of the time. Hearing everything far louder was nice in

mana made smell kind of useless as the mana just kind of ate up all smells, making them not linger that long. Unless it was a magic smell. But those kinds of smells were most often placed because the source wanted you to smell them. He reckoned there were ways of using smell based on the many monsters he had encountered that used the sense. Jake just hadn’t learned how to

and even the sound of

was looking not towards the valley but the city. He even saw a sign on one of the trees saying the valley ahead was off-limits. The

passed underneath - Expert Stealth on full display and his new cloak making him appear almost invisible. Coupled with the guard not looking specifically for him or using any perception-related skills, it really wasn’t a surprise he missed the

began. He saw the trees above filled with treehouses, sometimes with accompanying buildings on the ground. More trees seemed to have staircases on them than not, and he

grilled meat. He hadn’t eaten for a good while with the dungeon and all. Not real food, at least.

of the trees. There was a single large man inside working it. He had a big rack of skewers in front of him with sizzling meat on it, and

the booth, waiting for the latest batch to be ready. Jake joined them as he deactivated Expert Stealth and also made sure his cloak didn’t passively hide him anymore. Naturally, he still had

in front of Jake nearly jumping in fright as a figure appeared behind him. The man turned around and

beneath the mask. He had felt the attempt at Identify. Could he feel it before? Jake wasn’t sure, but he could

the atmosphere and inspecting all of the city he could see within his sphere. It was actually great practice. Not looking at everything, but figuring out how not to look. He didn’t

looked at Jake but didn’t try to Identify him. A real

chief?” the cook asked Jake with

you could only get three, so… he took three. Also, there was a