The Primal Hunter

Clones… Jake knew a bit about them. Making a clone was something many, if not most, would learn to do eventually. In most cases, making a clone was to more or less cut off part of yourself to act autonomously. It could also be to just create a copy that shared all senses and that you still had to somewhat control, but these were often classified as puppets instead.

This varied further from illusion or mirages, which were entirely fake and often only existed for brief periods, while many clones could persist permanently. Illusions and mirages did not need to be intangible either but could often interact with the world around them to some extent. Naturally, they were usually far weaker than the main body, but they could help.

What the Phantomshade Panther did was a high-level cloning technique. Each clone could exist independently, and from the looks of it, the Panther used them for hunting on their own, indicating shared experience. It was pretty much just one beast split in five for improved hunting speed and to consume five times as many natural resources. A brilliant optimization, even if each copy was weaker.

Splitting in five did not necessarily mean splitting power five-way either. Each could easily retain half or more of the primary body’s power from before the split. Considering how much stronger they had gotten after he killed the first and second one, Jake reckoned each had around seventy percent of the true body’s strength… maybe closer to sixty. High-level clones did also mean they were far harder to form, and it likely took a long time to make just one for the Panther.

Either way, considering just killing one clone was a pain when there were five, it only got worse with three. It was limited how much synergy four or five beasts fighting together could reach even if they were the same creature simply due to the limitations of the jungle and to avoid hitting each other. It wasn’t like one was a support Panther and the other a ranged attacker. In fact, their pure magic kind of sucked.

But… reduced to two fighting purely in melee, they no longer had to care as much. With the two of them now even more powerful in addition to this, Jake soon found himself pressured more than before. Their level of recklessness had also increased as they chose to sacrifice their own bodies to try and injure Jake.

Jake was continuously pushed back by two aggressive felines swiping and biting at him as space warped all around. He held Eternal Hunger and Bloodfeast Dagger tight, but his arms were hurting from blocking, and he got no indications of the Panthers stopping their assault or saw a path to escape.

He tried several times to disengage, but every time he did so, space around him contracted, and when he used One Step Mile, he teleported a far smaller distance than he wanted with the two cats still hot on his trail.

Worse yet was that even if he handled these two, there was still the one flying in the air above the jungle. A completely uninjured copy, and with the energy transfer from the clones, Jake understood why it did this. Wounds did not heal when a clone died, so if he had managed to damage all of them heavily and then killed them one by one, he would win far more easily. By saving one clone, the Panther would always have a spare to absorb everything and return to full power.

As for if it had a sixth one hidden somewhere, Jake was certain it didn’t. He had spent enough time interacting with them to feel the subtle connection between them. It was faint, but it was clearly there, and he only sensed the three remaining ones. There also had to be some limitations to using clones and the energy transfers. If not, why would the Panther have even shown up with all its bodies and not kept one far away? Even with his senses, he could not rule out the connection was only there due to their proximity… but his intuition told him he was right.

This won’t work, Jake still gritted his teeth as he was pushed back by a Panther. He dodged its next attack and managed to stab it before he was hit on his shoulder by the second one as he was knocked away. A nasty gash was left there, but Jake had accepted that to get a chance.

He and the beasts had exchanged many blows, and while he was winning the battle, he was losing the war.

Panthers chased, and Jake barely dodged one as the other teleported right next

not meant to be chewed. The saying that something was like chewing leather when it was too tough did

Jake’s old leather boots.

the bones in his foot broke, but at the same time, he heard something else break. One of the long fangs of the Panther had snapped in half when it failed

moment’s hesitation, Jake swept up the broken fang with a string of mana and caught it in his hand. He kept flying upwards as the beast refused to let go, so he tossed the fang he had already made into a weapon with Fang of Man. He hit one of the Panther’s eyes, finally making it let go as he managed to get some height. The second Panther was already hot on his heels

heavily injured and were infected by quite a lot of poison. Taking them down was not too difficult. The problem was the final one. If he killed those two, he would be left with

him with the two remaining ones. Jake flew towards it with great speed and saw it just stood still in the air far above

shit on the injured foot. He even managed to inject the two cats with even more

more steps as his danger sense suddenly spiked. Spiked intensely. Not realizing why, Jake took out his bow and drew an arrow as Steady Aim activated, slowing down

had been formed between the Panther up in the air and the two chasing him, no more than five meters across. When within it, Jake didn’t even notice it. Not even

to release his arrow as his senses returned to normal. There was no

the backlash in this situation weren’t clones. From below, small black tunnels of dark magic and space formed before

happened

Something cracked.

if a plane of glass had been cut down the middle. A black bullet-like form was the cause of the crack, and as reality shook, a second crack formed that shattered the horizon, caused by a second bullet. A cross-shaped rift in space tore

down at the cracked space before it - the rift perfectly torn in a straight line. The only remnants of the human having ever been there, a single arrow fired just before the collapse.

was no notification or sign of the human’s death. The beast realized

just stared at it as blood bled from his eyes, and his entire body was filled with cracks, blood seeping out of them, with scattered broken scales spread throughout his skin. One of his arms was gone as several holes marred his chest, some of them even cutting straight

consumed it for extra effect. He also activated the Second Wind enchantment from his pants. His body was flooded with

Jake had

had suddenly become incredibly rigid. Then, without any warning, a Panther teleported up right next to him. It didn’t even attack, but its entire body was burning with black flames as space