The Primal Hunter

The entire rest of the epic item auction went pretty uneventfully. Jake sat on his ass and kept watching the bracers the whole time, even though barely anyone bid on them. Well, he did also spend a majority of his time playing with Sylphie – his arcane conjurations clearly better boxers than Sylphie’s.

The cursed bracers ended up only costing him a bit below two hundred thousand Credits, which honestly wasn’t that bad. A difference between the rare auction and the epic auction was that everything was available until the very end. Jake did feel like it was a bit unfair, as some items were only up for around an hour, while others were up for several hours, but, hey, what can you do about it?

The moment the auction ended, he just had the bracers directly deposited into his inventory without any fanfare, and at the same time, he also saw his total Credits jump more than two hundred million as every single item he had put up was sold off.

Credits Available: 498,870,214

With around forty items for sale total, he quickly calculated they had sold for about five million each on average. He wasn’t sure if that was good or bad, but it sure as hell was a lot better than the rare items by a huge margin. Jake also truly began to realize he had wasted his money-making potential before this event. While he had earned a lot of money by selling, he had also bought a lot, but if he just sold off things like materials or elixirs or potions at a steady pace, he could have probably made a few hundred million.

Then again, what would the fun in that be? Jake didn’t really like just grinding out the same mass-produced potions over and over.

Looking at the prices, he saw that the cheapest epic rarity item had gone for only thirty thousand and was some nugget of metal apparently super hard to work with. The most expensive was that god damn Focusing Iris from earlier, which went for over fifty million.

If this entire auction event had taught Jake one thing so far, it was that rarity really wasn’t everything. Equipment with many potential users had a somewhat predictable price of between two and eight million for epic items, but those specialty items could go for either insanely high prices or barely anything.

He had also been told that epic rarity equipment was kind of in a weird spot currently on Earth. On the one hand, they were rare and powerful, but on the other hand, not rare or powerful enough to not give out and actively use. This meant that most epic-rarity items were actively used by their factions, leading to fewer on the market. According to Sultan, they would still see a way better ratio of epic to ancient items, despite the incredibly low rare-to-epic item ratio.

System Announce-

Jake quickly skimmed it and saw it was pretty much the same as last time, telling him of a one-hour intermission between this phase and the next. Jake considered having some fun with his new bracers but decided not to. Instead, he should probably go talk to Casper to figure out future plans with that entire Root of Eternal Resentment business.

Sylphie communicated with him she was going to chat with Carmen, and Miranda passed by and said she had a meeting with some independent cities about something. Others also quickly left, with Sultan only spending a bit of time putting the altars and coffins up for sale.

With no reason to stay, Jake quickly teleported out of his booth and appeared on the ground below it. He scouted the chamber and spotted the booth housing the undead faction, with Casper and Priscilla both appearing below it.

On a side note, Jake came to learn that not all of the booths were actually being used. Reika and the Sword Saint had both earned a booth as an example, but they used the same, leaving one empty. The undead faction might have been the same as Casper for sure had earned one, and maybe Priscilla too. Either way, it was good they were together as that made things simple.

With a few steps, Jake appeared close to them. It was easy enough to find and approach them, especially with how humans still tended to avoid the Risen. Jake honestly didn’t get it, but then again, he wasn’t racist.

Casper spotted him when he got close and just waved for him to come over. Jake walked over and greeted them both, and after exchanging pleasantries, they began walking towards a side chamber to discuss things.

Once inside, the door shut behind them. The ones who had gone were Jake, Priscilla, Casper, and four other people. Two whom Jake recognized as members of Priscilla’s party, and two that looked and felt more like administrative personnel or traders.

“So, gotten anything good?” Jake asked Casper first thing.

“Eh, a few things here and there, but nothing massive. Saving my Credits for the ancient rarity auction coming up. How about you?” his undead pal asked.

of the same. I got some cursed epic bracers but haven’t bought anything else, though I have buy-orders

said, smiling. “Isn’t that why we

perk up. “Now,

conduit of curses that-“ one of the businessmen

tree that is the cause of the special mist within Yalsten and was a natural

other Risen did not hold back their slightly annoyed looks directed at Casper, as Jake ignored them. “So, what exactly do

as she explained. “The Root of Eternal Resentment has all of the curse energy from within Yalsten and is naturally a treasure of immense value. Yalsten had unique energy, improving and sometimes even creating items and natural treasures due to it, making it an incredible land of treasures and one of the reasons why A-grades and even an S-grade cared so much about it. Some even say the world itself was a natural

We Risen are inherently in a risky position, and it will allow us to potentially flee or relocate off the planet entirely in a worst-case scenario. In a best-case scenario, we can make a land especially suited for our kind and even transform the natural environment to be more suitable for us and the treasures we need. We need far more death-affinity treasures and materials than anyone else, and

off as a dick, but I had honestly assumed something far more nefarious considering it

has no clear-cut target and is thus aimless and undirected. It is only under rare circumstances where directionless curse energy does not simply

Jake recognized. “But I am still not sure what you need the curse energy for and not just the properties of the Root itself. From what I can

“What? I know stuff! This is just like alchemy, but with a

jab. “But yeah, you’re right. The curse energy itself is not needed, but we can

“For real?”

the divine item left by Sanguine could turn our entire solar system to dust if extracted and turned into a weapon. It is a bit of a moot point, though, as anyone actually capable of doing that would be able to do so anyway,” Casper said, shaking

a bit as they no doubt didn’t like Casper and Priscilla sharing so much, but Casper looked like he honestly didn’t give a

I mentioned, there are several ways to do that. All we need the Root and tree itself for is the properties

long time to suck out all the

condensed. I believe it could be great fuel for one of my existing curse weapons, or maybe I

he got an idea: “Speaking of which, got any

were damn rare as far as he knew, and to him, it seemed like the damn scimitar just kept getting sharper and more durable the stronger the curse got. Considered that he had a curse-expert right in

the weapon in Jake’s

was quasi-Soulbound due to Jake using his arcane affinity and Touch to

also cursed,”

“Yep.”

were the requirements when you got it first?”

explained, not really seeing the need to hide anything. He briefly summarized the weapon, how he got it, how he changed it, and how it now grew from absorbing vital energy. Casper seemed very interested throughout as he asked some follow-up questions like if it wanted to compel him to do stuff – big yes on that one –

from the time he was mid-tier E-grade to now. He also explained that not once had he repaired it.

says it was made of steel soaked in blood… indicating some ritual… and then you destroyed the souls it had absorbed… yet the

won’t get stronger. The Records and curse energy are constant unless it absorbs curse energy, an exact

asked, confused at the term he had never

is more accurate to say that it is a weapon created based on a concept rather than a cursed weapon created to fulfill a specific goal. In your case, it went from the concept of Debauchery to the concept of Hunger. Also, you mentioned that

words as he tried to summarize them. “So, I got a growth weapon of sorts based on

a larger concept. Well, that or you can transfer it to a new medium. And to call it a growth curse should kind of set off some red flags… Sin weapons are fucking dangerous. One does not normally use Sin curses in weapons due to it having a user

and this time Priscilla jumped