The Primal Hunter

”I fucking hate curses,” Jake muttered out loud as he got up. It had taken nearly an hour to fully eliminate the energies in his body, and he had only been up in those dark clouds for a minute or two. Shit, he had even lost over a thousand health during the process. When he imagined what was further up, he shuddered.

Seeing that traveling up the side of the mountain wasn’t an option, he went for just traveling inside it. Before that, however, he took all the plant boxes on the balcony into the inventory. None of them gave off any special aura, but they were made out of some kind of metal, so he reckoned they could prove useful. Also… the storage given seemed borderline infinite, so why not just swipe anything you could?

Walking up the entrance of the mountain, he inspected the large black gate. He frowned a bit as he put his hand on it. He noticed how it almost seemed to reject him, and when he tried to pour in a bit of mana to inspect what it was made of, it was just repelled.

It wasn’t that the door was enchanted either. Perhaps it was once upon a time, but not anymore. Instead, it appeared to be made out of some kind of metal that completely rejected all mana. Jake also saw further inside with his sphere that another gate was only five meters inside the hallway leading into the mountain.

Considering that his danger sense was silent and he didn’t detect any magic, he decided to head inside. Two handles were attached to the door, and he grasped one of them and pulled. The door was heavy as fuck, but he managed to get it open after a bit of struggling. He noticed some mechanism made it close by itself again, making it harder to open as it constantly wanted to stay shut.

Jake was pretty damn sure the door was opened by some kind of enchantment when this place was actually used. That, or they actually kept it well-oiled. Anyway, he went inside and had the door close behind him nearly instantly as it slammed shut.

Once inside, he noticed something, or rather, the absence of something. There was no mist inside, and what had entered with him was quickly dispersing. On a closer inspection… two gates… locking out stuff… yeah, this was totally an air-lock. Well, a mist-lock would be more accurate, as clearly it sought to keep out the mist.

Did those who used to live here fear the mist? Jake asked himself as he went through the second door, now truly entering the mountain. On the other side of the second door was just a long boring hallway with several etchings along the walls and floor. No doubt old inactive enchantments or something. He did test something, though.

*BOOM!*

The Pillar of Encumbrance was summoned, and he slammed it into the wall, feeling his arm hurt from the feedback. In retrospect, not the smartest decision. As for the wall? Well, he had taken a small nick out, so that was something. Needless to say, this confirmed the walls of this mountain were strong as fuck. It was like back in the Challenge Dungeon and the indestructible walls back then. Man, he couldn’t wait till Hank learned to make invincible houses.

He put the Pillar back in his inventory as he began running forward, taking in the environment. After running nearly half a kilometer, he finally reached another door. All the enchantments or other tools to keep people out were long gone, it seemed, and now anyone who could open the door was free to enter.

Enter, and steal all their shit.

Well, at least he hoped they had a lot of stuff because the entire place seemed quite bare so far. Getting through the third gate, he now truly entered the mountain and what was hiding within, and inside he found… more hallways. But! These hallways also had rooms attached to them - a massive improvement for sure.

Sadly for him, what was inside the rooms was the opposite of interesting. All of them reminded him of those small shitty cabins you got on a cheap cruise ship, with only a single small mat in each and none of them larger than the smallest of apartments.

The only objects inside were a few pieces of old furniture, most of them made of stone. He did see some signs of what had likely once been wooden furniture, but all of those had long rotten away. Additionally, he did notice something else. Ash. Nearly all the rooms had ash, often on the mats that Jake assumed had once been used for meditation or maybe sleeping on.

An enlightened race for sure, Jake confirmed to himself.

Now, Jake did say there were no real objects of value… but that didn’t mean he didn’t take anything. For example, if a stone looked slightly shiny, he swiped it. Something made of metal? In the inventory you go! Glass? Inventory!

didn’t rush through but carefully tried to get an understanding of the area. He counted thousands of residences. If the construction within the mountain had as many floors

and what looked like a lift. A lift that had long ago become unable

bit further, he finally spotted something out of the ordinary. There was a large hall ahead of him. A communal area? It was towards the center of the

all, but it looked like it had at least been partly hollowed out to make a huge skylight.

To explore it all properly would take a while even with his sphere, as picking up all the information from it at once was more than a little challenging. So instead, he closed his eyes and focused on Sense of the Malefic Viper and the ground beneath his feet at

felt nothing. The entire mountain felt… hollow. Not a single ounce of life or trace of mana anywhere. No… there was some mana. The natural mana in the atmosphere was always there. Always seeping into the natural materials of the world. Yet, he noticed some areas had far less mana than others, which meant that something else had to consume it

into the open space in the atrium. His wings spread out as he began flying upwards. The lower floors appeared to be where the common people had lived, while the higher floors were where this civilization’s rich

or it was just where they kept the

he took a turn and landed on one of the over a thousand balconies extending all the way up the structure.

reason: another black metal door. This one wasn’t

a good push and stepped inside. He found himself in a large room a few stories high with many tall bookshelves lining

no books. All that remained was dust where the books had once been. Everywhere… except for one place. Directly ahead of him was

giant magic barrier sealing it in – no doubt the reason why

the surrounding mana. Jake walked closer to the barrier… and then finally, something actually

what was a good Treasure Hunt without a

with an orange color. Jake didn’t know what he had expected. Maybe

Fire.

A lot of fire.

Limit Break at 10%, and a bubble of arcane energy began forming around him. At the

entire room began glowing orange, and soon the bookshelves caught fire. Next, the balconies and everything else not either within a barrier or made of stone

to hold it back. His scales protected him, but they were far from

If the heat got high enough and the

stopped. The atmosphere ceased burning, and all that remained in the room was a single barrier covering the bookshelf.

egg that cracked a moment later as two crispy wings fell to the ground,

just making pained coughing sounds as his internals had

was something, he just thought instead as he shook his body like a wet dog, sending ash flying everywhere, revealing his mostly undamaged armor beneath. The only thing that had really taken a beating was the cloak, and even that

his danger sense… and throughout it all, it hadn’t really activated. In other words, the trap simply wasn’t good enough to be a serious threat to

as they would have plenty of

trap was gone, and now he just needed to find a way to open the barrier

of wind, had picked up. He looked down and saw the ash-covered ground glow again, this time with an odd