The Primal Hunter

“Is he…?” the plump old alchemist asked as he looked at the screen.

”Yep,” Vilastromoz confirmed.

“This scene is a bit odd, isn’t it?” Duskleaf questioned.

“Not gonna question it,” the snake god shrugged, not seeing anything wrong with the admittedly weird-looking scene.

They were naturally watching Jake give Vesperia head pats, the prideful True Royal sitting perfectly still but, based on the antennas shaking slightly, clearly enjoying it. If any outsider saw this, it would look like a younger man patting the head of an older woman, perhaps even finding the entire scene indecent.

“You know what Jake and I talked about?” Vilastromoz asked his disciple. ”About him coming out as Chosen?”

“Yes, and I also know what you are going to argue,” Duskleaf shook his head.” Him revealing it purposefully does not mean you win our bet on when he would leak it on a technicality.”

“Well, he can’t leak it if he openly reveals it, now can he? Something already well-known can’t be leaked, can it? Or did the definition of the word leak somehow change within the last few minutes?”

Duskleaf just looked at him for a few moments before shaking his head.” Fine, you win, happy?”

“Not really when you act like that,” Vilastromoz pursed his lips. Still kinda happy.

“Our stupid bet is meaningless before what Jake managed to accomplish today anyway. I had assisted him in the ritual and based on the Sylphian and that cosmic worm, I had begun to hope he could perhaps even hatch a Quasi-Royal, but to see a True Royal be born… one of a fallen Lineage too,” Duskleaf said in awe. ”This truly is unprecedented, and I feel fortunate to have been involved in her creation. Rewarded too.”

“Wait, you don’t mean?” the Viper asked, surprised.

“I did not expect to gain levels from a C-grade succeeding in a ritual I assisted with either,” Duskleaf shrugged and smiled.

Vilastromoz nodded and smirked to himself. So I wasn’t the only one.

Jake had to admit that his thought process when he decided to pat Vesperia on the head had not been all that sound. He had spent far too long considering what he wanted to say and not what he would do, but as he saw Vesperia clearly feeling sad, he did the first thing that sprung to mind: head pats.

loved head pats… so… yeah, not the

sat there, eyes closed. Jake had no idea how long he was supposed to keep things up, but considering her lack of

he considered if she needed a hug, but that seemed a bit too much. Jake had never been the type to show much physical affection, and head pats were already

speak but just stared. Jake, sensing some confusion, shook his head and

I… am unsure… but

and did the only thing that made sense. He

more proved super effective. Jake remembered his dad used to do it all the time whenever Jake got upset or if he needed him to calm down. It worked back then, and

why she felt as she did was partly because she didn’t really know Jake and that he often didn’t act with thought, and Jake had to also admit that he didn’t truly know Vesperia very well. They had just met, after all. So he thought it only natural to have a good conversation that wasn’t about history,

about himself, and Vesperia sharing her own thoughts on different topics. Being a True Royal only born that very day, Vesperia had a personality primarily formed from her Lineage Knowledge and innate disposition, making her appear aloof

superior to pretty much everyone else, but he had spent his entire life working on not acting on this

manipulating others socially, he just went with hiding how he really felt by suppressing it entirely. It had made him come off as meek and unopinionated to others and resulted in them often walking right over him, with Jake seemingly not caring. All done to try and

others treating him as better than them in order to not stand out too much. He didn’t necessarily view this as a bad disposition to have, and he himself felt like he had found a good middle-ground by not thinking he was innately better than anyone else while also not thinking anyone else was better than him. This went against his nature and even Bloodline, but shaking off his entire upbringing was not that easily done, and he did believe it helped ground him. Sim-Jake had been many things, and overly arrogant towards anyone that wasn’t his literal clone in the real

to lead her Lineage, born to be a decisive leader that would put their own existence over others. If she died, her hive would die, and

Jake did have something to learn from that. Vesperia also seemed to think so and was gleeful when

stoicism. Some will give you gifts, so accept them. These gifts are as much for the giver as they are for you. It is to openly display their support and respect towards you and the Order, and to reject

and the broader implications of him sticking to his personal feelings on the matter. He had little sense of decorum or knowledge on how to act like a proper Chosen, and he knew that he would never truly be

Primordial and always wore a mask. Going out in public while staying incognito was still

could also make the big announcement with Villy while

Yeah, fuck that.

he had gotten better at dealing with social situations, but that didn’t mean he felt comfortable at some big announcement where he was the center of

more intimidating. A lot more like the Chosen of

available, she still wanted to work on her skills and potentially spawn some proper guards for herself. She would only work on the eggs for now, but

least had a heads-up. He did not doubt Reika, her roommate, all the alchemists from Earth, Irin, Draskil, as well as Meira and Izil would get hounded after his big reveal. It was only proper to at least allow them to make preparations for what was to

as everyone else and hopefully scramble in panic. He did want to be a fly on the wall for whatever emergency meeting they would have, but he would just have to ask Villy for an update as he was

he really had to do for now was address his equipment. Something he had honestly neglected for a while. He was missing a lot of potential stats, and the

took status of what he already had, fully aware he would probably have to replace or upgrade everything. Starting from the top, he got

Verdict: utterly useless for a long time and only functioning outside of combat. He would just replace this one. Also, he didn’t need to go into that much detail with every piece of equipment if he didn’t care much for