The Primal Hunter

It was coming from the walls!

Mana seeped into the chamber passively, as the pylons also began giving off a bit of pure mana. The mana coming from the walls seemed harmless at first and began interacting with what the pylons gave off, mixing with it.

Nothing was absorbed, but Jake exerted his will as he poured some of the mana from the walls into the pylons and saw it be successfully absorbed. He also tried to pour a bit of his own mana in and found that successful. The problem was that by his rough estimates, he would only be able to fill maybe one pylon with his entire mana pool.

He began directing the energy coming from the walls, but a new type soon came. A small stream of dark mana suddenly invaded the room and went straight for one of the pylons. Jake instantly took hold of it and directed it away, as it just floated in the outer parts of the room.

Then came fire, water, and even just pure light mana. Some affinities were difficult for Jake, especially the light mana, but he managed that by encapsulating it in stable arcane mana, really making use of his own affinity. The good thing about his stable mana was that it didn’t react with anything, so there was no loss in energy.

At some point, Jake had taken a seat as he entered meditation. Relying on only his Sphere of Perception and Sense of the Malefic Viper, he took charge of the room as more and more changes happened.

One of the pylons turned red as the pure mana around it no longer worked to restore but destroyed it instead. It now needed fire mana as Jake took the streams he had been keeping away and infused them into the pylon.

Another one turned black as it wanted dark mana, another began glowing as it wanted light mana, and the final one turned green as it wanted nature mana. Jake swiftly took charge as every bit of mana within the room remained under his control, but the issue was that more entered than the pylons could absorb, making the density increase for every second.

As time passed, the pylons also shifted between affinities, and more difficult types entered. Soon time affinity mana came, which was tricky as hell to control, space mana seeped in, which Jake found a bit easier, while life and death mana both felt incredibly resilient to all control, almost as if they had a will of their own to resist.

More exotic mana also entered, a lot of which he didn’t recognize, but luckily Sagacity and Sense made him aware of at least how they worked. Some he did recognize, like Myst mana, Storm mana, and other merged elements, but some were just out there, like one that seemed to make things lose their color and be weakened and another that kept splitting itself up into smaller streams that then merged and split again without warning.

But… no matter what happened, Jake remained in control. Jake was overqualified with nearly ten thousand Perception and a test no-doubt designed to be based on his level. When it came to applying his Willpower, Jake also wasn’t a slouch.

Over an hour in, and Jake felt he was soon done as the difficulty kept climbing. More and more mana came in a constant stream. The entire room looked like a mix of colors, fire, solid boxes of arcane mana, streams of glowing mana running in currents around the perimeter of the chamber, and so much more.

At this point, Jake felt himself begin to be faintly challenged, and remaining in control of all the streams seemed impossible… so he kicked it up a notch. Pride of the Malefic Viper activated as Jake’s presence blanketed the entire chamber, and everything came under his vice-grip of will once more.

On a side note, Jake had tried to use Arcane Awakening during the beginning to try and remain in control but found it actually made things harder. It was because of something the platform beneath him did that forced Jake to manually control the skill, making the usual system assistance that trivialized keeping it active disappear. Not that he was certain using it would be a good idea anyway due to the fact that it made all his energy a bit more volatile.

He did use his arcane affinity a lot, though. It was just better pure mana and allowed him to more easily direct the mana where he wanted it to go and isolate energies he wanted to put on hold until needed. In the end, Jake had nearly repaired all the pylons without allowing any noticeable damage to any of them.

As he thought it was about over, he felt a pulse.

From everywhere, a wave of pure destructive energy came, aimed straight for the pylons. It managed to destroy a bit of the mana Jake was controlling as it approached the damn crystals he had worked so hard on repairing.

Oh no, you fucking don’t!

Pride activated at full power as his own mana was summoned into the room. Barriers sectioned off all the mana as he sent out a counter-wave of destructive arcane mana, utterly destroying the wave from the room. A second later, a second pulse came, but it barely had time to enter before it too faced destruction.

A few more pulses came, but some of them were of beneficial energy too, which Jake quickly noticed and chose not to destroy. This final phase continued a bit longer, until finally, the last pylon was fully repaired, and all four of them hummed to life.

inside the room and waved

this test to be easy for you, not trivial,”

energy unintentionally destroyed here and there, but it wasn’t that bad. Overall he wouldn’t call it trivial, but it definitely hadn’t been overly challenging either. Oh, but it

doing that. I do have some questions about the mana you used, though. It was

arcane affinity,”

affinity? At D-grade?” the

I got it in E-grade,

is a simple affinity, the fact it taps into the

wide. A moment passed before the projection focused again

the projection disappeared, leaving Jake alone sitting on the

confused but just shrugged. ”Did kind of want a break

as he entered meditation again,

Probably Villy… definitely Villy.

once more as all

the hold-up? Did something happen?” another

the Malefic One, we are to not include any in-depth details related to the arcane affinity in the final report, and overall strip the report of all information given by dungeon-assisted tools,”

him with confusion for a moment before one asked: ”Are we to change anything else

”We are to proceed as usual but keep certain elements ambiguous or hidden once done. It will not affect the final score

is his relation to

ensure certain things are kept confidential. There are also some other minor

back to the testee, but he couldn’t help but wonder what had happened. He had felt the attention of the Malefic One on him. He had been placed in the dungeon since the second Era, and when the Viper’s

the real world, he was already long dead, and no matter how many Eras passed, he would do as ordered. No, the reason why he was a bit shook was due to feeling the presence of the Viper gave him. He had felt it before when he volunteered to leave a projection in the dungeon, and he had interacted with the Malefic One several times before, but the difference

the ninety-third Era was far calmer. Collected. Moreover, he had felt genuine interest and even a trace of care from his Patron god. Something the Viper certainly never possessed back then. But more so than anything, his power had grown to entirely new levels, as he no

but kept it all to himself. Primarily because his thoughts could be interpreted as heretical, but also

of his theory that the Malefic One saw a D-grade

opened his eyes as

questions, and the look in the projection’s eyes was the same as before, meaning that even if Jake’s “cover” had been blown, the projection

the next phase. The following three tests will be voluntarily selected based on your own specializations. Identification of herbs, knowledge of

what kind of specializations? Like transmutation

option. Transmutation, arrays, magic circles, potioneering, poison concoction, flasks, elixirs, body augmentation, herb grafting, growing, cultivation, perhaps something within the

other things, my abilities are highly specialized. As an example, I can do some pretty powerful transmutations, but only really do it properly with one affinity… that being

depth in your skills matter. As for the products you craft, it honestly doesn’t matter much as it is more technique and ability

three things Jake even knew how to do. Magic circles? Eh, he was clueless for the most part, even if he had done a bit of studying recently. Elixirs, he kinda knew, but only a few. Anything gardening-related he knew nothing about. Geology? Was

potion brewing, and transmutations,”

you wish to start with?” the

Jake said, shaking