The Primal Hunter

Jake decided to find a nice tree and take a seat as he opened his notification window to go over the last few days of hunting. There were many kill notifications, all of them giving experience as naturally a stealth archer was always the one engaging, and why would Jake choose to engage lower-leveled foes?

As for levels… well, it was pretty good as his hunting speed kept picking up, and in his fervor to upgrade the skill through trial and error, he probably ended up hunting faster than before. Especially when he considered the ever-growing level of power of his prey.

Checking it out, he was at least satisfied.

*’DING!’ Class: [Avaricious Arcane Hunter] has reached level 161 - Stat points allocated, +10 Free Points*

…

*’DING!’ Class: [Avaricious Arcane Hunter] has reached level 164 - Stat points allocated, +10 Free Points*

*’DING!’ Race: [Human (D)] has reached level 165 - Stat points allocated, +15 Free Points*

*’DING!’ Race: [Human (D)] has reached level 166 - Stat points allocated, +15 Free Points*

Jake looked at the notification and saw his level. 166. Having gained four class levels and two race ones from that. This has to be enough, right?

He believed it was. Draskil had done it at 173.

That’s right…

With a bit over a day left till the system event, it was time for this stealth archer to take down his biggest prey yet:

It was C-grade hunting time.

Now the issue was just finding one. No, not just finding one, but finding one suitable to hunt. One Jake was good against would be preferable. This meant it needed to be flesh and blood, probably a beast of some kind, and if it was not on the more durable side, that would also be nice. He wanted to avoid prey with healing powers if possible, as Jake knew that he would risk running himself dry. Fighting any C-grade would require Arcane Awakening to be active from start to end, putting him on a timer, so facing a foe able to turtle down and wait him out would suck.

The reason why It needed to be flesh and blood was naturally for his rare Hemotoxin Poison, his most potent toxin to date. He had made it with C-grade hunting in mind, so finding an elemental or something like that would be inadvisable.

His other requirement would be a good hunting ground, but honestly, the jungle was fine if not downright great for him. He had a lot of space to kite, and he had already tried and tested the effectiveness of striking from above to land Stealth Attacks with excellent results.

With all of that in mind, he set out on his hunt.

and nodded as he saw Jake’s recent skill upgrades. Nothing was overly unexpected so far, not because what Jake was doing was normal, but because Vilastromoz had gotten used to it. Pointing out the fact that usually it could take months of deep meditating to identify and become familiar with the conceptual changes brought on by such a skill would be a waste of time. Jake’s level of perception was truly disgusting, and the Viper was not just talking

help him upgrade it now, but

back a small smile as he recalled his old days. A skill starting at low rarity was just that – a starting point. While getting one that was higher rarity was all fine and good - in most instances the preferable choice - there were also cases where it was not. Stealth Attack was a case where picking it was clever. The Viper had never wanted to ask or question Jake about getting the skill, and he

a long time had been called Scale Armor. Instinctually the Viper had passed it back in F-grade before he even had anything close to

been a magic-focused beast, so getting magical

the way to C-grade. Late C-grade that is. His decision-making then had spawned from interacting with some humans who had theorized these low rarity skills could be worth it. As he had no other skill choices he truly wanted at the time, Vilastromoz

damage reduction on every blow that is. Its effect was so weak right when he got it, but it got stronger and stronger as time progressed. He adapted the skill, made it his own, fused it with Dragon Scales when he reached B-grade and refined it more… until one day,

the Malefic

was quiet. Incredibly quiet. Far more so than in any other areas of the jungle. Rather than encountering beasts or Vinewood creatures every few minutes, he now barely saw any, and those he saw were all towards the peak of

They had just grown up in an environment with high mana density, making them grow powerful just by time passing and hunting each other. Nothing compared to genius-level beasts like Sylphie or the hydra Snappy had been back in

already powerful to him, and he knew he didn’t stand a chance against something like the Termite Hive King. No, he needed a lower-tier C-grade, and

of metal and used light magic that Jake did consider as a target, but it had taken off before he got a chance to properly assess it. A third had been a Vinewood Elephant that was also

he had found his current target that he had been tracking

was no larger than a regular specimen of its species. Its entire body was black with sleek fine hair covering it. Four paws soundlessly hit the underbrush as

the name

Panther –

capable of, and he had to say… it was weaker than expected. It was undoubtedly a C-grade, but the fact that it hunted peak D-grades should already be evidence enough it was struggling to fight others of the same grade. Compared to the three other C-grades he saw, it was far

an hour, he had seen it kill three opponents of the Vinewood variant. It seemed to use a mix of dark and space magic, coupled with incredibly high Agility to take down its foes. The Panther was a bit of a glass cannon, though, and he saw it take a few minor wounds here and there, and even if these did rapidly heal, the mere fact

find it peculiar how its flesh, even beneath the hair, was black and how it bled entirely black blood. The way the wound healed also looked weird, but who was Jake to

eleven hours left till the system event. Smiling a bit, Jake knew it was enough time as he made all his preparations. He marked the Panther as he kept tracking it and waited as he took to the air. It had just engaged a beast to fight, and he would wait till the moment it stopped to relax after the kill –

had yet to understand its physique, but he could still land quite the opening blow. He had prepared his arrows already with his rare Hemotoxin Poison and now pulled one out. He

a moment before impact as it rapidly dodged, but the arrow was too fast, and the

nocked

Panther had teleported right up to him. Jake quickly stepped down again as the beast rushed him with anger in its eyes. Space distorted in its wake as it charged, bending everything between them as a dark streak

again as he used Gaze of the Apex Hunter,

can do

to emit black smoke. The smoke absolutely obscured the form of the Panther as it charged once more. Jake smirked a bit as it entered his Sphere, and he easily side-stepped

and followed a moment later. Jake blocked the paw and found his arms buckling as he was pushed back. Another swipe left a nasty cut on his arms as his bracer was torn apart, but before it could land the third blow, Jake used Gaze once more and, with a Descending

it tumbling down even further. Four black crescent waves were sent in return as a swipe tore up space itself, but Jake managed to dodge between two space tears as he fired an Arcane Powershot rapidly charged through

and smashed

C-grade would go down that easily… no matter how weak it was. And damn, this one was weak. The mere fact that Jake had time to properly consider how weak it