The Primal Hunter

”Lucky bunch! Found your way to the first room right off the bat without encountering any dead ends! Now to find the key… if there even is one here!” Minaga said with his usual glee as Jake and company walked out of what looked like a wall of fog and entered a massive chamber. As their host had explained, these large chambers did not have any of the usual mist, and it felt liberating to finally be free of the restrictive environment.

On second thought, merely calling the chamber they had entered massive was a bit fallacious. It was pretty darn humongous and seemed to be at least a good hundred kilometers deep with a width of about two kilometers. This narrowness was heavily used, as what appeared in the distance was a derelict-looking massive castle with plenty of defenses in front of it.

In front of the castle, a dozen rows of ramparts went from wall to wall, with every one of these walls filled with creatures. Taking a deep breath, Jake could practically smell the death energy emanating from the chamber, which made sense considering the enemies he saw on the ramparts.

Using Identify, the theme was pretty damn obvious.

[Skeleton Swordsman – lvl 240]

[Skeleton Spearman– lvl 240]

[Skeleton Marksman – lvl 240]

[Skeleton Mage – lvl 240]

[Skeleton Captain – lvl 245]

“Skeletons, huh,” Jake muttered. ”So original.”

He and the others waited for a few seconds, but nothing came. Jake looked at the ceiling of the chamber, wondering if their dear host had decided to leave, but he still felt them being observed. Maybe he didn’t talk while they were inside the chambers?

“I assume there is some kind of boss here,” the Sword Saint said.

“Let me check real quick,” Jake said as he jumped and summoned his wings. He flew all the way to the ceiling in little time and peered past the many ramparts towards the castle. There, standing on a large tower atop the castle, he saw a large skeleton in fine ivory armor surrounded by several Skeleton Captains.

[Skeleton Bonelord – lvl 250]

”Found it, level 250 at the central castle. Likely the one with the key. If not, it should be easy to find if we make it to the castle,” Jake said through the golden mark left by the King.

Now, why was Jake so sure the key was there in the room?

Finding the room itself had been pretty simple using his Pulse of Perception. Throughout the last fifteen months in Nevermore, Jake had to use far more Pulses than ever before, allowing him to slowly build up more and more resistance to the point where he could now do it pretty comfortably at regular intervals without getting a headache.

dozens of dead-end paths, traps, and hallways that would make you walk in circles for a few

he had bothered entering, which leads back to the original question… why was he so sure the key was in this room and not any of the prior ones? The answer was

Intuition.

advantages. His intuition had told him this was the room to

an Arcane Powershot. He saw no reason not to rush through this room and move on quickly, and on the way there, he and the others had agreed to do things fast.

of destruction surged forward. Jake had expected it to soar toward the boss and potentially even blow it off the tower, but things did not go as expected. The second the arrow appeared above the first of the many defensive ramparts leading further into the room, a barrier sprung up,

with their staffs, led by a Captain also holding a staff. The barrier extended up from the ramparts but did not cover the gate leading below, making it quite apparent you were meant to through there and not use ranged attacks from afar. In essence, Minaga wanted to force them into a

like we will have to go through each rampart individually,” the

the barrier until it breaks,” Jake

it will be faster to just go through directly,” the old man

concur with the swordsman; trying to destroy each barrier individually is a waste of time,” the Fallen King agreed. “It isn’t

the first rampart. When they got close, the mages stopped channeling energy into the barrier to face them in combat as nearly a hundred melee-focused skeletons stood in defensive

One with hundreds of skeletons twenty to thirty levels above their opponents, and the other three humanoids, a bird, and a Unique Lifeform. The result was as

cut bones apart and sent limbs flying, arcane explosions bombarded all the skeleton mages as

a hundred Skeleton Marksmen released a rain of arrows, but the attacks were all met with a green whirlwind that scattered their attack. Without even bothering to make sure they finished off all the skeletons, their party moved forward while staying close to each other to

as a fully-charged Arcane Powershot one-shot the Captain of the skeletons while blowing up several more skeletons unlucky enough to stand too close. Joining in on the fun, the Sword Saint went in first on the seventh as he used his Rainblade and released a torrent of slashes, killing dozens of skeletons within a minute while also taking down the Captain. Sylphie and Dina didn’t get to take down a rampart solo as Jake, the King, and the Sword Saint all felt competitive while facing the remaining five, going all-out until they finally

of buff. The Captains around the boss also seemed to get stronger as

before it had even gotten a quarter of the way, with a second getting embedded by a substantial wave of force. The Bonelord seemed angry and jumped off the

otherwise pristine armor but was otherwise unharmed. What little injuries it had taken rapidly healed as it released a dense white aura of pure death energy. All around it, the death mana from the many slain skeletons began to gather and empower the Bonelord as

his boosting skill. Jake ended up joining in as the constant

around them. It was burning through energy at a ludicrous pace as Jake counted himself blowing off the Bonelord’s head at least ten times.

blow, and soon enough, the Bonelord stopped regenerating and died. The second it fell, the wisps of deathly fire burning within the eyes of all the skeletons were also snuffed out as they crumbled like

up from its body before flashing and disappearing. Jake faintly saw that a small tattoo of the same rune had appeared on the back of

they rushed out of the room towards where the next key was. As they made

damn good! Made it look easy. There was even a key for you! Three more to go, and you can open the gate and continue. You got lucky once, but I shall still wish you luck

of the second room with the second key in hand, a crumbling volcano, and hundreds of dead elementals of the lava and earth variety in their wake, their dear host

must say, you are quite a lucky bunch! Straight from one room holding a key into the next! Almost makes me think you found a way to circumvent all my checks and

but three times? Now, that is a pattern. Then again, some people are really just that lucky, you know? Even I cannot get around some of the more intangible aspects of this world, and I guess it is entirely possible you

you clearly found a way to not only be aware of the layout of the labyrinth but also correctly determine which rooms hold keys, which is honestly impressive. See, if you, my dear guests, could do one of these things, that would be one thing, but both? Really? Isn’t that a bit too much? This is why designing a perfect dungeon is impossible and why we can’t have nice things. Damn

the gate that required the four keys at a brisk pace as they listened to Minaga complain about their group. It had to be noted that he only complained. There was no interference or even direct questions posed to any of them. It was more like he was just voicing his own thoughts while forcing Jake and company