The Primal Hunter

Just after Jake was contacted and told his teammates were done, he just happened to find himself standing in front of a large gateway that he didn’t doubt led to the next floor. One thing did confuse him a bit, though. There was also another smaller teleportation circle of some kind near the wall of the cavern, but it was slightly damaged.

“Pretty sure I found it, but there is also this other teleportation circle. It looks like a short-range one, though,” Jake sent through the link to the others and even included a mental image.

“Peculiar,” the Sword Saint answered and sent the mental image of an identical magic circle down at the south pole. This one wasn’t broken, though. “Is yours operational?”

“Nope, is yours?”

“Appears to be, but with yours broken… we shall begin making our way north now,” the Sword Saint sent.

“Eh, gimme a minute,”Jake said as he looked at the magic circle a bit. He tilted his head and went closer. Touching the circle, he closed his eyes and studied it for a minute or so while comparing it to the one at the southern pole.

“Pretty low-level one, huh,” Jake muttered as he infused his energy. Analyzing it and finding the flaws had been easy enough, and soon enough, the broken lines were restored as the entire magic circle hummed to life.

“Ours just seemed to activate. Did you do something?” the Sword Saint asked, surprised.

“What can I say? I know a bit about formations,” Jake grinned.

A minute later, the party of five all appeared in the cave on the north pole. The second the last person was there, the large archway that served as a gate activated as a portal appeared.

First floor completed. 10 Nevermore Points earned.

Achievement earned: Complete the first floor before the light of the sun could have ever reached the Lord of the Dunes. 5 Nevermore Points earned.

Nevermore Points: 26

“That’s one floor down,” Jake smiled as he turned to the others. “Anyway, what did you get from that treasury?”

The Sword Saint proceeded to take out two rare items, and a bunch of stuff clearly meant to help battle the Floor Boss and the environment, such as crystals that gave resistance to the sunlight and what looked like a grenade. These items would disappear upon entering the next floor, so, honestly, the only reason to even do the bonus objective was for the points.

Without further ado, the five of them entered the portal to the next floor. Upon entering it, the party found themselves in a large square room about fifteen meters on each side with a gateway in front of them, one behind them, and one off to the side. The walls were of dark gray stone, and Jake’s sphere informed him that there was nothing outside of them but the empty void of nothingness.

Jake instantly understood what this room was. The gate in front of them had a sign saying “second floor,” while the gateway off to the side was an exit. Mind you, if one exited Nevermore before one reached a city, then they would have to go through the first floor once more to progress. And not “go through” as in do the boss again and whatnot, but literally travel through the already completed dungeon, making it just a waste of time.

Anyway, In the middle of this new gray in-between-floors room was a small platform with a lockbox on it. The loot from the first floor.

“I must say, it is a bit underwhelming,” the Sword Saint said as he looked at the lockbox. “Though we must consider this is simply the first floor, and it only took us a few hours to clear it all.”

“True, true,” Jake said as he walked over and unceremoniously opened the lockbox. Within was a rare rarity sword, and Jake could only look teasingly as he went over and handed it to the Sword Saint in an overly formal way, even going down on one knee as he held it up. “For you, our resident swordsman. It is only proper you receive this bounty. I hope there are no complaints?”

“Will… will he use it?” Dina questioned, looking confused.

“No, no, he won’t,” Jake grinned as he stood up.

“Then… why?”

move on to

was still confused as they all moved

stepping into an entirely new world. Probably because they did step into an entirely new world. Jake’s sphere spread out, and he saw a familiar-looking environment filled with greenery and trees as far as the eye could see. At least in

overlooking a valley filled with trees, the entire place utterly massive, stretching thousands of kilometers. When the others came through the gateway, they also just appeared standing beside him with no actual gate to come out of, making it clear there was no way back. The only way to proceed was to clear

to the second floor of Nevermore: The

objective: Defeat the Lord of the

objectives: Find 10 Illusory Lotuses

the Valley (0/1),

or objectives may be hidden

Current Nevermore Points: 26

Only ten lotuses this time, but going by their description, these lotuses would be a bit harder to find than the Sunlight Fragments, as their name indicated

the

desert,” the Sword Saint smiled, looking

King. “Sad this floor isn’t called the Evergreen Forest. Then we could have had a Floor Boss called the Lord of the

is far from as funny as you

is just

no one else here has known me as anything other than the

last time. Find the ten lotuses, find and kill the end boss, and move on to the next floor. I can handle finding the lotuses while you all search for the boss. Sounds like

boss is over there,” Dina pointed northeast into the nearly endless forest spanning before them. Jake was about to question as as

entire patch of land around five meters across being carried by vines by handing the patch off to one another. Within a few minutes, the patch was dumped on the ground just beneath them in the valley, and looking down, Jake saw the small landmass had an odd rock on it. After squinting

did you just?”

agreed. They were very nice and even offered to bring the lotuses to us, so we didn’t have to go through the forest and potentially ruin anything. Oh, and

as he stared at tens of thousands of vines extending endlessly into the valley to slowly carry lotuses toward them. This was… kind of overpowered, wasn’t it? Like, pure cheese of an entire floor. Would the Wyrmgod penalize

job, Dina,” the Sword Saint smiled and gave the dryad a proud

it your Bloodline that allows this?” the

way of blushing – which did make Jake wonder what color the

does make life easier,” Jake smiled and gave her a thumbs up. Even Sylphie gave a happy

the forest also tell you where

pointed in the same

will pass the boss if we go for the

around… but if we hurry, yeah,”

on,” Jake said. “Can you handle

vines were fast. They were pretty damn slow, actually, so it would likely take them a few hours at least to bring all the lotuses to their group, and while waiting for them at the entrance to the floor would be faster than searching themselves, it would

Jake didn’t feel the movements of any energy

“Okay, they will help.”

“Then let’s

something Jake could only call cheating. Along their way to the boss monster, they encountered upheld patches of land with lotuses on them, and by the time they reached the boss, they had six of the ten. Killing the boss took them less than thirty seconds as the five of them

the Sword Saint cutting it apart with wind and water blades, respectively. It never even had a chance to fight, and the only reason it stayed alive as long as it did was due to its high health pool. On that note, after encountering it for the second time, Jake was pretty sure these Floor

Valley before it manages to return to its

the Valley within 12 hours