The Primal Hunter

Factions in the multiverse varied widely. Some factions integrated themselves nearly everywhere quite easily, such as the Court of Shadows. The Court of Shadows found themselves present even in territory and planets run by the Holy Church as long as they kept themselves covert. It was an unspoken agreement that the two factions had agreed upon for many eras and allowed the Church to get rid of individuals they would prefer not to send members after themselves. Let’s just say there were many circumstances where having assassins for hire was just more convenient.

Valhal was also the sort of place that could have ”halls” or small groups operate within other’s territories without dominating land themselves. They did occupy some land – unlike the Court of Shadows, where none knew the true location of their headquarters – but not as much as others. The reason for this was simple.

One could be born into the Holy Church. Born into the Risen. Born into the Altmar Empire. But this was not true for Valhal, the Court of Shadows, or the Order of the Malefic Viper for that part. One could have an easier way in, but that did not mean one was born into it. They were organizations that people could join and leave, closer to companies or guilds than empires and countries. Granted, their member contracts could be limiting, but there was always a way out.

Most organizations were also reasonable to some extent. They respected some universal rules set in the multiverse. But… some organizations could not truly be classified. One, in particular, stood out largely due to its power.

Ell’Hakan had been warned that in Haven, there was one person he was not to interfere with no matter what. One person he should even actively make sure the United Cities Alliance did not bother either.

Because some factions were what could only be classified as utterly insane. Usually, factions like these would crumble and break apart as insanity was not a good attribute for a leader to have, but there was one major organization in the multiverse that, despite its insane methods, managed to thrive.

An organization that had wiped out entire species for looking too much like one of the gods they prayed to. One that willingly had its members go to the domains or sacred sites of their gods despite half dying in the process. One that would be crazy enough to start a war in which trillions would die and swear an eternal blood oath to wipe out you and anyone with a karmic connection to you from the multiverse… over a statue. A work-in-progress statue.

It was naturally the Primordial Church. And the one person Ell’Hakan had been warned about was none other than Felix, the sculptor who was apparently working on a statue of the Malefic Viper - a statue shown by the Chosen himself. This mattered particularly much because the Chosen had, according to rumors, been the first person to see the Viper in Eras. This meant that in the eyes of the Eternal Servant, the Chosen was the only one who had truly ”seen” the Malefic One as he had met him both before and after he returned.

Ell’Hakan had been told all this directly by his Patron after the Eternal Servant himself had come to warn him. Warn him that the sculptor was to remain undisturbed until his task was complete. The Nahoom had not known what to think about this as he had honestly not even heard about this sculptor before arriving on Earth. In fact, he had been on his way to meet someone he had heard about and taken a particular interest in.

A certain man of technology by the name of Arnold.

A common misunderstanding was that spiders are insects. They weren’t but were instead distant relatives of insects, being classified as arachnids. Another common misunderstanding was that scorpions were insects, but they were arachnids and far closer related to spiders than something like an ant.

On second thought, most people probably did know this, but Jake didn’t. At least not the second part about scorpions being arachnids.

Post-system, these things were often mixed together, and these classifications kind of stopped mattering, but it was fun trivia nonetheless. One difference also did remain in the number of legs. Like spiders, scorpions had eight of them, and like spiders, these legs were honestly kind of weak and their joints rather exposed.

Jake leaped backward as he dodged the incredibly fast stinger aiming for him, quickly gaining distance from his large foe.

The scorpion had a sand-colored body, and its stinger stood more than twenty meters tall. It was an utterly monstrously large body, and the pincers were large enough to snap a human in half if caught. Several humans at once, probably.

Plating covered its entire body, making it look like an invulnerable tank, and Jake did indeed discover that trying to damage its armored parts was useless, with even his Powershot blocked and only leaving a nick. Now, for the far smaller scorpions, Jake could still blow them apart, but the C-grade in question was the real deal.

Sandstream Scorpion Lord – lvl

across the sand after dodging another attack and heard the cheerleading voice of the worm in the back of his head, despite it hiding several hundred meters down and kilometers away. Yes, these worms had a very impressive range when

had landed dozens of stabs with his katars, and it wasn’t hard to hit the gaps between the armor with the occasional arrow. Their

probably what gave the massive scorpion its name – whirled around the scorpion and gathered as spear-like weapons that stabbed forward to try and catch out Jake. He easily dodged backward and took to the air as he bombarded the scorpion below with

it tried to heal itself of some of the poison in its body. Jake smirked and simply began charging Arcane Powershot, having already seen

in the stinger, making it screech in pain as even more poison was delivered into its system. Now, Jake mentioned issues, and one issue was that he

due to the far larger Soulshape, and the scorpion also had significant innate poison resistance. Enough for him to not be able to build up a proper charge before triggering it. This is why he had just returned back to hemotoxins to at least make it bleed a bit more. Oh, another funny fact was that scorpions had blue blood. This had no impact on the fight besides the sand taking on a new color. It was just a bit of

The first had been the Phantomshade Panther and the second the mushroom man he obliterated together with Draskil. No, he didn’t count the termites. And as the fight with

further, then the scorpion was not that well matched up against Jake due to his ranged options. It seemed that these scorpions nearly only fought melee foes, and those they fought with ranged options, their sand magic could face. He had noticed a distinct lack of flying creatures anywhere in the desert, but that was

allowed Jake to whittle down the massive scorpion a little at a time. Still, it wasn’t entirely one-sided and definitely

Jake had just been flying above. A black liquid was excreted that

to avoid it was not touch the sand, making Jake never stay on the ground. It was also smart to

no C-grades were – and knew it was in a very disadvantageous situation. After Jake managed to blow one of its legs off, the scorpion decided it was time to leave as it attempted

find incredibly wasteful. Flying down, Jake smashed both his fists into the ground as he released massive amounts of stable arcane mana into the sand. The scorpion tried to manipulate the sand but found itself unable to move it as Jake had effectively

Jake saw parts of it turn into sand. Jake frowned as the stinger seemed to disintegrate and simply become one with the desert below. Soon after,

sand went towards him, and he dodged out of the way, only for a pincher to

both claws were entirely gone as it just looked like just a big mound of armor, its joints also gone. Yet it still moved its amputated limbs, and in tandem, these limbs were summoned from any sand

and probably how it had hunted down so many worms who dared enters its area.

the job as its armor seemed even stronger in this form, leaving not a single opening. All

its body. Touch of the Malefic Viper activated, and the poison went straight into the armor and began corroding it. Dark green cracks appeared within

expected. Sand appeared on both sides as two massive pinchers appeared and tried to rip Jake off, making him dodge under them and smirk as he kept pumping in poison. The stinger then regrew instantly, but not on the tail as expected but out of

pumping more poison into the scorpion.

and his insides began turning to mush. Emphasis on began. Nearly all other D-grades, even peak D-grades, would find themselves turned into piles of goo within a second of being struck with the stinger. It was a true kill-move that sadly relied

was summoned as he punched straight down. It penetrated the armor of the scorpion after it had been weakened and made cracks spread. Several more hits shattered a huge part of the armor as Jake finally

He used Gaze of the Apex Hunter as a large arrow appeared from

the arrow. It hit right in the weak spot and sank into the scorpion’s body, creating an even bigger hole and sending

struggled and writhed in pain, but it was too late. Jake activated Mark of the Avaricious Hunter as the scorpion flashed with arcane light for a

building-sized scorpion finally collapsed on the sand as

202] – Bonus experience