The Primal Hunter

Jake looked on as the life of the other Jake progressed at a steady pace, far more detailed than before, and it even included sound now. In fact, it was as if Jake himself was present and standing in the room and could even move around.

Many of the first memories after simulation-Jake - or sim-Jake for short – went into the foster system were of him being thrown into new environments surrounded by other children in equally unfortunate situations.

Such children tended to not be the best. They were emotionally underdeveloped and immature and often had no way of handling their situation besides acting out. So when a new kid entered a foster home of twelve kids – one younger than many of them – it was natural to make him a target.

A scene like this was one of the first major things that the simulation deemed an impactful event.

Sim-Jake, no more than seven years old, stood surrounded by children between the age of seven and ten. There were six of them in total. Jake was smaller than all but one of the other kids.

”Give!” one of the larger kids screamed as he reached towards sim-Jake’s toy. It was a foam dagger that Jake remembered his grandmother getting him before passing away. It appeared that it was a gift he would receive in both the simulation and real life.

Sim-Jake pulled away but didn’t say anything. But Jake saw the eyes of the other version of himself. He was ready. The larger kid moved in closer and pushed the far smaller child, sim-Jake stumbling backward. The other kids just laughed at the bullying as sim-Jake fell to the floor. Another kid came over to try and take the foam dagger while the large kid walked to Jake and prepared to kick him.

Now, even children have some kind of natural limiter on them. Grevious injuries when children were in scuffles rarely happened, as even when so young, they understood not to do it. Be it out of a fear of getting in trouble or inborn empathy, or perhaps a limiter imposed by society and early nurture.

Something sim-Jake clearly did not care about.

Out of nowhere, a dinner fork appeared. The kid trying to take the foam dagger didn’t even have time to react as he was stabbed in the arm, making him scream out in pain. Rolling up, the far smaller child-version of Jake caught the leg of the bully and stood up, making him fall backward. Most would end there, but the small Jake ran over and stomped the larger kid in the head repeatedly as the ten-year-old started crying.

It only took a few seconds before a disheveled woman came yelling into the room and dragged Jake off the kid. Still holding the foam dagger tight as he stared daggers at the kid nearly twice his age on the ground.

As the scene was about to end, Jake noticed that the small version of himself seemed to almost look in his direction. Hm? Jake questioned, but the scene had already been completed.

A few more scenes appeared after that of Jake growing up. Each scene was of a different foster home, and all of them were of others trying to make trouble for Jake, and Jake using what could only be described as the use of excessive force in self-defense.

Where usually a kid would shove someone, Jake tackled them to the ground and began punching. Where one would punch someone, Jake broke an arm or a leg. His violence landed him in repeated trouble… but it was also effective. One instance was all it took, and no other child dared cause trouble for him.

Jake – the real one – had to admit he related to a few of these things. He didn’t remember exactly when he began to truly suppress his Bloodline, but he still had it in some parts of his childhood. Even after it was suppressed, some of the effects were also still retained but far weaker. However, rather than slowly suppressing it more and more, this version of Jake embraced it. He grew into it.

Scenes continued, and the next most noticeable scene was of a fifteen-year-old sim-Jake. Rather than be in a foster home this time, he lived in an old abandoned warehouse. Homeless, most likely. Maybe the authorities had given up on him, or he had run off himself, but either way, he was clearly out of the system.

Jake first noticed the body of this version of himself wasn’t what one would expect of a homeless fifteen-year-old. He had more muscles than kids of that age and looked more like an athlete in training. In the scene shown, he was also doing push-ups as two men walked over. Both looked to be in their thirties and were not happy.

”Hey kid, get the fuck up,” one of the men sneered.

Sim-Jake barely reacted and kept training as he just turned his head. ”What do you want?”

for our boys,” the other man

other way around. Them trying to rob me,” sim-Jake said as he finally stopped training and stood up. He was smaller than the two men by quite a bit, but not a trace of fear was on his

large men would usually be viewed as a foregone conclusion. Facing little more than a child, the adults naturally didn’t take sim-Jake very

”Listen here ki-”

looked him in the eye. ”I am

swing. Sim-Jake effortless dodged it as he took a step back to avoid a follow-up. The man looked like he had some minor boxing experience, but it

man made a wide swing and twisted it. The attacker yelled

already,

who had yet to

thousands from us. We aren’t leaving,”

party pulled out a switchblade. The man raised it threateningly and spoke

switchblade looked like he had hoped to just intimidate. No one wanted to kill someone and potentially land themselves in legal trouble over what could not be that much money. Yet when the man saw Jake clearly wanted to fight, he sneered and jumped. Sim-Jake dodged the

someone with actual

several wounds. When he made it behind

and dodged, once more showing he was no push-over. The first man had also

asked as he stood there with his rebar

but had clearly decided to kill him. It was answer enough. The simulated version of Jake dove forward, taking the men by surprise as he

dropped his blade as sim-Jake tried to swing again but had to stop and jump back to avoid getting stabbed in the gut. The second man came at him again, and sim-Jake managed to

who were just average humans go at each other. His simulated version was in many ways at a

but was bleeding from his thigh, while the other man… didn’t get up. He was lying there with the knife stuck in his own chest, straight

was clear sim-Jake had not done it on purpose. The real Jake also saw how it was just ”luck,” if one can call it that. Sim-Jake had tried to block while the man tried to

not the fastest, but neither was

looked at the fleeing man and picked up the metal rod from before. With an impressive toss, he hit the man on the knee as he tried to flee and stormed over, his bleeding thigh leaving a trail of blood after him. Sim-Jake picked

as sim-Jake swung down, hitting him in the head. A few more blows sealed the deal as sim-Jake dropped the weapon and wheezed. He looked at his hands and started shaking a bit as

Shit…

real Jake noted how they both had the habit of cursing a lot. He also understood the frustration… this was his first time killing anyone. The simulacrum, that is. But… it was a necessary kill. If he hadn’t

simulation version limp away as he kept cursing and looked incredibly panicked. For some unknown reason, he also kept looking nervously around, primarily in the direction of where the real Jake was

clearly older now. An older-looking gentleman in a suit handed him

knife in his hand. He cleaned the weapon a bit with a

to, as there was movement in

in the simulation, his Sphere was fully functional and showed him the world as genuine. He could

stopped at the door as he knocked. ”Hey

it appeared like simulacrum-Jake had just killed the boss of the establishment. Real-Jake honestly felt a bit relieved that if sim-Jake was

knocked again before finally opening the door a bit

inside before sim-Jake snuck up from behind and slit his throat while he covered the guy’s mouth. He fell limp to the floor as sim-Jake shook his head and went out the door casually, wearing