The Primal Hunter

Hawkie and Mystie had been busy birds as far as Jake knew. His visits to Haven had just never really intersected with when they visited, and after Sylphie left with him and Carmen, the two hawks bothered visiting even less as they didn’t really have any reason to go.

Instead, they focused on leveling, hunting as a pair in the sky and in the vast forest Haven was on the outskirts of. Jake knew that neither of them were particularly strong for their levels, but they weren’t weak either. He would place them firmly in the mid-to-high-tier level of beast variants, primarily due to Mystie’s unique type of magic and Hawkie’s high striking power. Together they were especially strong with their developed combo-attacks and skills, bringing them firmly in the high-tier category.

Yet, even knowing this, Jake was surprised when he saw them from afar as the two of them waited on a branch just at the entrance to the forest.

[Stormsong Hawk – lvl 178]

[Mystsong Hawk – lvl 176]

You go, mate! Jake thought when he saw Hawkie had surpassed Mystie in level. It did make sense; Mystie was more of a supportive fighter, with Hawkie being the one going in and dealing most of the damage. But, damn, them both having reached such a high level so fast was impressive to him.

Neither of them were living cheats like Jake, Sylphie, or most of the other people around him. They were just kind-of-strong beasts. Well, okay, that wasn’t entirely accurate. They were the parents of Sylphie, and in the same way that Jake’s parents benefitted with Records by being his parents, so did Hawkie and Mystie benefit from Sylphie. Them being friends with Jake also helped them quite a bit, though Jake reckoned their relationship with Sylphie meant more. Then again, Sylphie benefitted a lot by being close to Jake, so he did help quite a bit by proxy?

Anyway, Records were complicated, and even if he helped, it was still their own effort that brought them to high-tier D-grade.

Jake smiled as he saw them and raised a hand to wave. Sylphie remained cradled in his arms, clearly content with not having to move as Jake flew over to her parents.

Mystie looked a bit judging down at her daughter while Hawkie flew down towards him. What looked like a fork of lightning appeared and floated in mid-air in front of Jake as Hawkie landed on it at eye height with Jake.

”Good to see you again, mate,” Jake greeted the hawk. His first monster friend, if you didn’t count the King.

Hawkie simply nodded his head and looked at Jake holding Sylphie.

”Does feel a bit bad to be surpassed by your own daughter, huh?” Jake asked.

To his surprise, Hawkie didn’t agree. Quite the opposite. Jake felt only happiness at how strong Sylphie was, with not a shred of jealousy. This only made Jake smile more. Here’s to healthy family dynamics.

What was the saying… Jake couldn’t remember, but he remembered the gist of it. Celebrate the success of others and mourn their losses. Feeling jealous or angry because someone you proclaimed to care about experienced success was just a sign of you being an egotistical asshole. It was fine to feel a bit miffed, sure, but that should be trumped by the happiness of seeing someone you care about succeed.

”Or maybe not,” Jake corrected himself as he looked down at Sylphie and nuzzled the feathers on her stomach. Like an angry cat, she fought back with her talons, but Jake just grinned as he adeptly dodged them to tickle her. ”She sure has grown, eh?”

”Ree!” Sylphie screeched in agreement as Hawkie just gave a slight nod. Hawkie was as reserved as ever, and Mystie still seemed a bit cautious around Jake even after all this time. At least she seemed happy to stay at a distance and just observe what happened.

”Should we head back?” Jake asked. ”You can tell me what you two have been up to in the meantime. How about you join us too, Mystie?”

He looked up at the hawk with a smile. She quickly relented, not due to Jake, but the wide eyes of Sylphie staring up at her, making her fly down and join them as they slowly made their way through the forest. He already kind of knew what Hawkie and the others had been doing and what they hunted, but it was always good to hear it from the primary source.

The two of them had mainly focused on safe hunts and not biting off more than they could chew. Mystie was damn good at stealth by now, from what he gathered, and allowed them to ambush foes or escape areas with dangerous monsters they could not beat. Jake also came to learn that, apparently, the massive lightning tree in the sky had died several months ago after Hawkie had gone for a round of absorption. That made Jake a bit sad until he heard Sylphie chip in about how there were many more of those trees up in the higher cloud layers where C-grades lived. Bigger ones, too, making Jake wonder where the hell they came from.

a tree. He had assumed that the massive lightning tree had been the ”main tree” and the smaller crystal trees spread around were its seedlings, but now Jake began to wonder… what

parents had explored far more of the forest than anyone else. Jake had already known that C-grades existed deep in the forest, but they had indeed confirmed their presence and how there

Haven, Mystie even joining in and

presences within. Everyone had gathered, it seemed, the group now also including Carmen. He did not detect another monster with the King but kind of assumed he had thought of one. Not that it mattered, they could always find this last council member

as she wrestled herself free and flew up

it has become clear to me that the true leader of Earth should not be me but the mighty Sylphie,”

Carmen answered

be the same? Not like you plan on actually

no complaints either,” even

response, while Arthur looked genuinely confused for a few

and confidence, everyone,” Jake chuckled as he went to take a seat. Hawkie and Mystie had both chosen to stay outside and had flown towards the good old lodge.

get to work,” Miranda cut in to actually get

a bit of pushback, things seem to be on track, with most understanding the nuance of the situation and choosing to support us. During the Congress itself, we should be able to convince the rest by actually displaying a

down,” the Sword Saint sighed. “There shall at least be no opposition to voting you

and expanded, and naturally, all shall vote according to my will,” the King said. “When it comes to this final member of the council, I have attempted to seek out this whale you spoke of, but I

asked, surprised.

direction, one living far away in an area filled with C-grades that you expect

and stealth. Got it. I guess I will just have to call the divine hotline to try and get this whale guy on board. After the Congress, of course,”

time on such a pointless task, then,”

a brief pause. “Eh, those from Valhal will vote for you; at least Sven, that bastard, told me so. He also told me to apologize to you, so I am sorry that Sven and the moronic moron higher-ups fucked up like

is not getting out of this scot-free, but we can talk about what form of compensation I find agreeable. Quite frankly, it

sit on well over eighty percent of the total votes. Remember that many of the nobles who are on the

Valhal decides to be assholes again, we’re good,”

had nothing to do with what they did. I

Jake said comfortingly. “But Valhal still needs to pay some kind of recompense. I am sure Sven

really listen to much of what he said after he told me to go apologise.

Jake nodded as he turned to Miranda again. “Anything

did confer with my Patrons, and it appears like they have left Earth for good. Which was, according to them,

Jake frowned. “Why?”

have left by themselves at some point anyway or only left a small outpost at most,” Miranda explained. “At least they would have gone for another

reminded him of the final force he wanted to ask about: “What about the Church? They still have some cities, as

to accept what happened and still waiting for the Church to call for them. They have fallen one by one in the last month, and only a scarce few remain, all of them in

dying down, things would have gotten far worse. The cities the Church used

for a bit longer, but there really wasn’t much to discuss ahead of this World Congress. They didn’t even know what kind of votes would happen besides the one for World Leader, so it was

Hawkie, or Sylphie spoke actual words using telepathy or something like that surprised him a bit, but then again, did they have to? The only one Hawkie and Mystie seemed to care about talking to was Jake, and he understood them. And if they didn’t bother learning telepathy, he also doubted they would

never bother. Then, finally, there was the fact that many beasts saw the human form as inferior and it as a slight to their honor to adopt one for even a second. Villy once told a funny story about why all dragons always chose to retain draconic features in their human form without having to:

travel around places built for human-sized individuals. Big beasts not

Jake was thrown out of his thoughts as he saw the two hawks again, having indeed stolen some of his bananas. They were lucky he