The Primal Hunter

Vilastromoz appeared just as he saw Jake pass out. He crouched down and placed a finger on his Chosen’s forehead, making the hunter twitch slightly as an instinctual response, but otherwise, Jake did not move. The Viper scanned his body briefly before nodding.

He had thoroughly exhausted his own resource pools, and his soul seemed more feeble than usual. Health Points were dangerously low, stamina too, and even his mana was thoroughly drained. The core of his soul remained firm, but the outer layers showed faint cracks all over, indicating low levels of self-inflicted soul damage. Nothing that wouldn’t heal within the day, but it showed how much he had overstrained himself. Vilastromoz also felt something else was missing, but he could not quite place what, so he turned his attention to the result of this entire thing.

The Viper looked down at the core still cradled in Jake’s hand, and frowned as he scanned it. He felt the Records pulsing within, and he did a simplistic divination to see what it would do and what its effects would be if used on the Bee Queen or any other ectognamorph for that matter.

Peculiar.

It was immediately obvious that Vilastromoz would not be able to take the item away. In fact, he felt it only remained stable while in the vicinity of his Chosen, making the Viper believe whatever concepts allowed it to stay whole would disperse if he took it away. Proof it was an item tied directly to Jake. Right now, a feeble balance had been reached, but more than that, the Viper felt movement within the core.

It feels… alive. Yet not.

Vilastromoz could only grin. His divination had failed when it came to showing the actual effects of the item, too, proving that it truly was related to Jake’s Bloodline. He kept scanning it for a while, questions appearing with every passing moment.

In the end, he sighed and shook his head, displaying an even wider grin. ”What a wonderful sensation.”

The Viper felt an emotion that had been oh-so-rare until recently. Curiosity. Interest. It was amazing as he realized he only got more and more questions the longer he looked at the odd core – the longer he spent with his utterly baffling Chosen.

”I have no idea how it works. How he works.”

He waved his hand as a faint mist spread out around him, entering his Chosen’s body to restore him faster. Vilastromoz felt impatient as he wanted to see what would happen next. After observing Jake for a few more minutes to make sure everything was as it should be, the Viper teleported away, excited to view the conclusion of the ritual. The resulting creature he would spawn.

And Jake’s reaction upon seeing his creation.

Jake felt like he had a massive hangover as he slowly awoke. He felt oddly weak, and not the kind of weakness that came from overusing his boosting skill, but something far more… foreign. He inspected his own body thoroughly and found things were not as they should be.

Somehow his resources had fully regenerated, and he sensed remnants of energy in the air and the lingering presence of Villy.

”Thanks for the heal,” Jake muttered to the snake god, continuing his self-inspection.

He moved his limbs a bit and found strength rapidly returning. Yet he still felt like he had lost something. Like something was missing. Within a minute, Jake felt back at full power, and he knew that his combat ability was not affected in the slightest. The fogginess and feeling of having a hangover also faded as he moved about, making his mind clear.

down at the item between his legs. It looked nothing like a core from an ectogna anymore, but more like some crystal ball

core at regular intervals like whatever was within tried to escape. Jake looked at this spark and knew what it was. Pure energy and Records. Stabilized… at least

related to the Hundred True Royals of the Ectognamorph Lineage. This vast amount of energy and Records will allow any ectognamorph Queen that consumes it to embrace its Origin related to the Hundred True Royals. The core desires to

Requirement: Soulbound.

Its rarity of unique also further added confidence to this. The last two sentences were a bit odd, especially as it talked about the item having a desire and what he could only read as a warning that the item had a limited window of opportunity before it would cease to be.

the fact that it used the term ”the Primal Hunter” and not something like the creator or alchemist or any other such generic term. This reliance on Jake was further established by its status as a Soulbound item, which did kill all

about the nature of what he had made. Such as what the hell the Hundred True Royals of the Ectognamorph Lineage was? Jake took the educated guess that it was those hundred Queens he saw during the odd vision, but that didn’t make all that much sense to him. He had clearly felt like it was the cosmos itself that had given birth to them, but… maybe it did kind of make sense it turned

transform it into

had hoped to see his Core Manipulation skill

the Records within the broken soul shells with the goal of refining them. Refined cores will, in most cases, be more effective, and you can also choose to amplify certain effects. Having taken it further, you have learned that the layers of souls can be malleable in some circumstances, and applying this knowledge, you have

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and the Records within the broken soul shells to refine and even fuse them for increased effectiveness or amplification. Infuse the essence of your being into a core, allowing its Origin to awaken, resulting in an unpredictable transformation of Records. Be warned that being the harbinger of primeval origins comes with

elephant in the room. Core Manipulation of the Primal Hunter. This was Jake’s first time seeing a profession skill carry that name, but perhaps more than that, it was the first skill Jake had consciously made

skill also included some explanation as to this odd weakness. It looked like Jake did expend some intangible energy, be it Records or something else, whenever he made these

interpret this one

him at the system’s recognition and looking at the item he had created, it didn’t look like the system had nerfed him too much, if at all. If nothing else, it had turned the skill more useful. The general upgrade to the Core Manipulation skill was also more than welcome, as he instinctively knew all its existing effects

did as being the harbinger of primeval origins and called him the Primal Hunter in the description, which was

skill upgrade had naturally also come the sweet,

[Origin Core of the Hundred Royals (Unique] – A new kind of creation has been made. Bonus experience

Profession: [Heretic-Chosen Alchemist of the Malefic Viper] has reached level 201 - Stat points

…

[Heretic-Chosen Alchemist of the Malefic Viper] has reached level 204 - Stat points allocated,

has reached level 202 - Stat points allocated,

reached level 203 - Stat points allocated,

surprised by the four levels he had gained. Upgrading a skill directly from epic to legendary in C-grade was no easy feat, and Jake did not doubt for a second that it was a high-tier legendary

like he was on a roll, and since he was on a roll, he wanted to keep going.

he was fully regenerated and felt sharp as ever, he saw no reason to delay his actual objective: awakening the

than a formality at this point. Jake had prepared for it so much, and the ritual circle had been primed in case whatever

headed towards the circle, speaking to