The Primal Hunter

Jake appeared somewhere he had not expected to. A vast wasteland stretched out towards him, and he recognized it instantly.

The Divine Realm of the Malefic Viper?

Why had he been teleported here, of all places? Jake frowned as he considered if perhaps the situation was far more serious than he had first thought, and Villy wanted to protect him by sending him there. But that didn’t quite seem to fit? Because something had definitely been wrong during their dick-measuring contest.

The Viper had shown himself as weaker than the aura Jake had felt before. While Jake couldn’t really distinguish between two extremely powerful gods, he could compare auras. The sheer level of power he had felt that time within the Viper’s realm was far beyond what the god had shown during the ceremony. However, even then, Yip of Yore had been a lot more powerful than Jake had expected him to be.

“You know, I really hoped not having to explain stuff to you,” a voice said from behind as Villy appeared. “But it seems like not saying anything is an even bigger risk.”

Villy looked serious, also making Jake adopt a serious demeanor. “What do you mean?”

“You noticed Eversmile in the crowd before he appeared,” Villy sighed.

“Yeah?” Jake nodded.

“I couldn’t.”

“What?” Jake asked, confused.

“You may think I am good at stealth, but Eversmile is number one in the entire multiverse. If he does not want to be recognized, you won’t. Do you know what his race was before he became a god?” the Viper asked as he waved his hand, summoning something to sit on.

“He looks pretty human, but I have no idea,” Jake admitted.

“Eversmile was a Doppelganger. A shapeshifter. When he changes, everything that isn’t the very core of his Truesoul changes with him, making him impossible to spot through any normal means. If he displays none of his power and wants to hide, nobody in the multiverse can find him, period. Even someone like Oras can’t. That is how he can be such a mystery despite having lived so long. He can be anyone at any time,” the Viper explained.

“That’s something. But doesn’t it kind of ruin his disguise that he is always smiling?” Jake asked, surprised that Eversmile had always been a cloak-and-more-cloak kind of guy.

“Perhaps, but I wouldn’t ever want him to stop,” the Viper shook his head.

“Why not?”

“Him smiling is part of his karmic Path… if he released that smile, one of two things will happen. One would be that his Path will break, and as a god, he will be significantly weakened. That or something that has built up for ninety-three eras will be unleashed. I frankly don’t care to find out either way,” Villy shrugged.

“Anyway, this is a sidetrack. The reason why I dragged you here is that a larger game is going on, and you can, annoyingly so, see flaws in what is happening. Your damn intuition may lead to something getting fucked, so rather than risk you saying something dumb or revealing something you shouldn’t, rather just get you up to speed.”

“Alright,” Jake nodded. He had known some stuff was going on behind the scenes and that it was related to Ell’Hakan and his Patron god, Yip of Yore. However, some things really bothered him. “Can I ask some things first?”

“Go right ahead.”

“I remember you said Yip of Yore is from the ninety-second universe, literally the last one before this. Which makes him only an era old at max if he lived during the integration… how the hell is he so strong then? Or is he not actually that strong?” Jake asked.

“Hm, this isn’t really common

“Sure,” Jake nodded.

era, it gets easier. The reason for this is indeed that we now know more, and there are more Paths, but that isn’t

level caps is often just a question of time, and as we are all immortal, we got plenty of that. But in order to raise our level caps, we need more Records. There are many ways to get those… but the further you go, the harder it becomes. Your options are simply limited, and you exhaust all opportunities. What is left is but an incredibly slow and arduous grind to try and improve just

thought he understood as

the first place. All you have to do is stay true to your Path and gain levels while continuing to work on your skills and abilities. The level cap also varies from

to close the gap?”

power and, quite frankly, one of the most ambitious ones I have ever seen.

would genuinely become as powerful as a

be a legend but simply common knowledge that he had the power of a Primordial. He wants to claim the innate power and Records of a title given to the gods seen as the most powerful in the multiverse. To slay a Primordial has never been done before, and if he does become the first, he will establish himself as one of the most

you, right? Why not just go full power and fight him to prove that isn’t the case, ending his stupid story prematurely? Or, you know, just kill him

we wanted to. That is also why he fought Valdemar first. Because if anyone could kill him, it would have been Valdemar, but Yip knew he wouldn’t. So now it is common knowledge Yip of Yore can escape a fight with the Primordial often recognized as the most powerful in pure

grinned. “I wouldn’t want him to stop. If I did, I would have done things differently already. And, Jake, while I will give you some rough ideas of what is going on, I cannot tell you the full truth. You merely knowing may ruin everything, and let’s not kid

Jake said, faking

wouldn’t call you the most careful with what you say. Shit, my level of carefulness should be quite clear just from me wanting to

“So, the thing with

it would happen

“Yip showing up?”

I set up

“Eversmile?”

he would appear and break us up. In fact, pretty much everything today was planned. Granted, I believe both Yip and I agree it was planned as we currently want the story to progress in similar veins,”

end badly for you?”

it will, maybe it won’t. Time will tell, now won’t it?” the Viper smiled,

that entire deal with

why it had such an impact. It had the outcome I wanted.

you have a hand in the deal being signed

a second

who have shown up and displayed loyalty are still not really dedicated. They are testing the waters, and their levels of belief in my abilities are lacking, to say the least. You saw a lot of factions have already left this ceremony, and the reason why I gave everyone an hour was for them to reconvene and decide their course of action,” the Viper

of loyalty?”

belief. Do they truly think Yip of Yore will be able to kill me? If they do, then abandoning the Order only makes sense. If they don’t, and they only see the words of Yip as the delusional bullshit of some upstart, then they will stay. Of course, things are a bit more muddled

automata was going to take advantage of everything that happened and would

also decided to kill you so you couldn’t

“Back when

“Yes.”

looked at the Viper. “Give it to me straight. Yip does have a point, doesn’t he? You

leaned back in his chair. “Remember when you asked how strong I was, and I said there wasn’t anyone in the multiverse I believed could truly beat

having asked something like that a long

happened in the past. Actual knowledge other older gods are aware of. He is running on assumptions, which, granted, are good enough for him. He doesn’t need to actually operate based on the truth or facts, he simply needs to convince enough people of his bullshit and have a strong enough delusion, and his abilities

his lack of knowledge then a weakness?” Jake asked. Yip just seemed more and more overpowered