The Primal Hunter

The treants had both grown significantly more powerful after the infusion of power from the Ethgleam Mothertree, making it apparent there was great synergy between them. It did not come as a surprise considering the treants were called Ethgleam Elderbark Treants, but it was still fascinating to see how two completely separate races would end up influencing each other as such and end up becoming intimately linked.

It was good too. As that meant Jake at least got some entertainment value from the fight. The two of them barreled at him like two hulking monstrosities, a faint layer of magic protecting their bodies and a shimmer of soul magic revolving around their vine-like appendages.

One of them reformed its hand as it came to resemble a club, and it swung down hard in an attempt to squash Jake, missing as he teleported away. Soil flew everywhere from the powerful impact, and Jake felt the ground shake a bit beneath his feet where he had just stepped.

As he looked at the flying soil, he got an idea.

”You know, this will likely be my last major fight before C-grade,” Jake spoke to the tree that didn’t respond anymore. ”Which means I should probably begin cleaning up some of the things I no longer need. Like these.”

Jake teleported and waved his hand as several bottles appeared. A blast of mana sent the liquid splashing forward, all of it hitting the soil and slowly seeping into it. He repeated this as Jake began to make it rain, even throwing some of the better ones straight at the treants or soul tree.

What he was throwing was some of all the poisons he had stocked up throughout his entire time in D-grade. Jake tended to use his best first and work his way down, resulting in a stock of hundreds of bottles of poison that wasn’t even that good when he was in early D-grade. It was creations he would never use anyway and would be even worse once he reached C-grade.

So he decided to do some illegal dumping to fuck up the local environment. It was completely wasteful and inefficient, and quite frankly, not even super effective… at least not right off the bat. Because all he wanted was to get some poison into the tree, something that immediately succeeded as the Mothertree absorbed energy from the soil itself and was too slow to cut off its absorption.

What poison it did absorb would be easily eliminated. If Jake allowed it to, that is. Reaching out, his hand began to glow dark green as he took hold of the poison within the tree and infused it with energy. Cultivated it using Touch.

The treants still came for him, but Jake simply threw more bottles at them. He had some leftover fungicides that they seemed to really not like, and while things like necrotic poison or hemotoxins sucked against non-flesh and blood lifeforms, it still did some damage simply due to the energy within.

With so much poison thrown out, the environment itself began to change, and the created barrier by the soul tree became a detriment. The poison vapor that rose into the air impacted it, draining mana from the soul tree’s resources.

Jake soon stopped using Touch of the Malefic Viper on the tree as he found it not that effective. He was also already out of poison bottles, having thrown them all wastefully at the two treants, doing barely any damage. What it had done was distract them all long enough for Jake to get a great opportunity to get close to the tree once more and take it by surprise.

With full speed, he flew into the Ethgleam Mothertree as he infused all his Hunting Momentum built up so far into a Descending Dark Fang. He punched forward and penetrated the passive barrier of the tree, the katar digging into the bark and wood. With the barrier gone, Jake easily pushed it in all the way to the handle before he retreated, leaving the weapon in there.

What? It had worked great against the bear, so why not give it a shot again. That you could kill a tree by hammering a nail into it was common knowledge, and Jake had effectively just hammered a cursed nail into the Ethgleam Mothertree.

From a distance, he felt the influx of energy as Eternal Hunger absorbed more resources than usual. The curse seemed to really like the soul tree and drank to its heart’s content. Jake made it his mission to ensure that the treants couldn’t assist their boss and attacked the two treants that rapidly charged him.

The first was blasted back by a quickly charged Arcane Powershot, and the other one tried to punch Jake but found itself restrained by his gaze before he walked forward and punched it in the chest, making it fly back to its comrade.

his knuckles hurt from the punch, his bones thankfully not damaged due to the gloves. Switching back to his bow, Jake pelted the two trees with even more explosive arrows as he let loose, not caring about saving resources. He really didn’t have

the tree screamed in desperation from behind as Jake felt it try to push out Eternal Hunger in vain. The weapon seemed to almost entrench

hard for one of the treants, arrow after arrow firing it back. They had no good ranged method of combat, allowing Jake to shoot them away faster than they could approach. It

and just protectors of the soul tree. They were pawns made to act as its agents, so even if they were C-grade, they had no ability to adapt or formulate a proper

from behind as Jake felt a pulse wash over him. Then came the sound of wood exploding as Eternal Hunger was thrown away,

twin souls!” the tree said in a clearly

it would go for mutual

Hunger disappeared mid-air and appeared within his Soulspace

naturally referring to the Mothertree and two treants. ”You lost all chances of not becoming a pile of timber the moment you decided that trying to forcefully make me serve

kind of expected another attempt from the Mothertree to make him leave, but it seemed to finally become a bit more decisive. It knew killing Jake was not an option unless it went all-out… and

he believed they were going to blow themselves up and was ready to retreat, but once more, they defied expectations. The glow turned almost blinding as both treants suddenly crumbled, and two beams of light flew toward

[Ethgleam Elderbark Treant – lvl 211] – Bonus

– Bonus experience earned for

souls” turned out

moment as he felt like a hammer whacked him straight in the brain, making him all wobbly. The light before him only grew more and more

and while he felt like he had moved, he stood completely still in the outside world. Around him, the white void began to warp as hundreds of trees sprung up all around. Thousands of vines shot at him from all directions, far too many for Jake to evade. His foot was caught first,

reconcilable with what all his other senses felt. It

was consuming him, and Jake’s mind kept telling him it was okay. That struggling was a waste of time and that it wasn’t that bad. The vines around him slowly began entering his body, merging with it. Seeking deeper and

He began fighting back against the many vines as it

sky as his head cleared. Massive large vines surrounded the world of his Soulspace in all directions as if he was on the inside of a snow globe. While Jake was in full control of everything within… he had no influence on anything trying to crush the glass

Jake muttered within the Soulspace as his mind jumped to the first and most strenous approach – a direct battle of wills. While he did think he could

real world, standing in front of the Ethgleam Mothertree, a katar appeared in his hand. While he was unable to move his body, that didn’t mean he was unable to do anything. With quite a bit of effort, Jake telekinetically pushed the katar towards

tree was utterly occupied with its attack and failed to put up any defenses, allowing the weapon to embed itself only a few centimeters into the exposed wood. Within the white void, the

from his katar toss. The vines all weakened more, and Jake went all-out as his eyes glowed yellow. Gaze of the Apex Hunter activated, not on anything specific, but simply the exposed

roared as his body exploded with destructive arcane energy, tearing them all apart. Free to move, Jake planted both his palms on the ground as they

out from Jake like black color in water. It invaded everything, making its way up the trunk of the many trees surrounding him and rapidly had them

Jake released another pulse of destructive mana, tearing them apart before they could reach him. His mind was finally clear, and he knew allowing the vines to touch him

white void was soon overtaken by the corruption from Touch of the Malefic Viper. The Ethgleam Mothertree seemed to realize it had failed, and in a flash of light, Jake was thrown out of the