The Primal Hunter

”Good, now adjust the energy output… slowly… good, now do not forge- ah, you remembered, good. Alright… watch the outer circle, do not let the resonance fade. You need to maintain the equilibrium until a perfect balance is struck. Keep it up now… good, good… and the final part… perfect!” Grand Elder Duskleaf said in a proud voice as he inspected the magical formation.

Meira was covered in sweat and felt exhausted, yet proud, as she looked at her creation.

The large formation stretched out in front of her, lighting up with intense mana from the nine catalysts acting as batteries. In the center of it, energy gathered, and a small hole had already been pre-dug.

“Now for the seed to be planted,” Duskleaf said happily as Meira smiled and took out the tree seed from a lockbox she had left off to the side. It was a silverish seed, and she was excited to see it grow. Meira used mana to levitate it into the air and guided it into the hole. She proceeded to fill the hole with some special soil from afar, her Teacher standing encouragingly beside her. She then took out a watering can and took flight to get above the formation, and watered the entire thing. The formation responded to the magical water and pulsed with power as it fully activated and began feeding the seed energy.

“It’s done,” she smiled. She heard the sound of a notification as she gained a level, making her even more excited. One step closer to C-grade.

“Indeed it is,” Duskleaf nodded proudly. “The Silverpine Astral Tree should be able to reach at least ancient rarity with this formation, so it is something to be proud of.”

Meira smiled a bit and shook her head. “I am sure Teacher could do far better when he was my level.”

“Master used to slap me in the back of my head for failing to produce a single epic rarity plant while in D-grade,” the old god chuckled.

“That’s…” Meira said, fidgeting with her hands. She knew that her Teacher repeatedly said he wasn’t that good at lower grades, but… she had a hard time seeing it. Because today, no one would dispute he was one of the premier alchemists in the entire multiverse. How could he possibly have struggled to produce products at epic rarity?

Seeing her doubt, Teacher shook his head.

“I told you already, talent is a bonus, not a requirement, and that is only in cases where the talent does not become a handicap. The most important thing in the multiverse is work ethic. Nothing else matters if you do not have a good work ethic,” Duskleaf said. It was something Meira had heard many times before. She understood it from a logical perspective, but it was still hard to imagine. Could one really become a god just by working hard?

Everyone around her growing up had worked hard in the mines, day in and day out. They had toiled away endlessly to survive… but she did know why that didn’t count. One still had to challenge themselves. Something her Teacher could help her do.

“But you still need to know what to work on,” he continued, elaborating on her own thoughts. “If you decided to just replicate formation at or below your skill level over and over again, you will get nowhere. No, you need to constantly improve and challenge yourself. Without Master, I would have never even made it to C-grade. He was the one who guided me, gave me challenges, and whenever he felt I was stagnating, he gave me a push in the right direction. A guiding hand that made sure I would always face new challenges and be forced to improve. And I knew that he would have abandoned me without a second thought if I fell into complacency, for he did that with so many others who studied under him.”

“I understand, Teacher,” Meira said with a nod. She did not know if Grand Elder Duskleaf would also abandon her if he believed she was stagnating, and she did not intend to find out.

With Lord Thayne’s true identity as the Chosen of the Malefic One revealed to all, Teacher had finally taken her as an official disciple and even given her a Divine Blessing. He had gone so far as to allude to him not having a Chosen himself and hinted at her potentially getting her Blessing upgraded if she proved herself worthy. Meira couldn’t even think about becoming a Chosen as she was already overwhelmed by her current Blessing and elevated status.

No, no, she had something far less impactful she wanted to accomplish

Because… Meira had found her own goal. One separate from Lord Thayne and even her Teacher.

She wanted to free her clan.

to go there with her head held high. The

to go and “save” them. She wanted to bring them to the Order or perhaps even claim the entire clan as her own to protect it. Something she likely could do right now…

no longer a slave, her profession and class both bore marks of her being one. Both made it clear she was still a servant. If all went well… then none of her evolutions

had become and not

scheme of things… but it was perhaps the first goal she had set entirely for

first goal of many,

was sleepy, so Sandy

had eaten

within the Order of the Malefic

begin to feel better after a few days, only to

in a cruel loop of consumption due to all the evil people having given Sandy too much stuff to

with the current situation

sucked before the system. At least most people seemed

relax until he had to sleep to get up for work the next day. This

It was only now, after a few years had passed, that Jake could truly understand how much life had sucked for him back then. How boring and meaningless the entire world had felt. Work had, ironically enough, allowed him to have something to focus on and get through the days until, finally, the initiation arrived,

and sitting still just never really worked for him. Jake would begin to feel restless if he did nothing for too long, so even when he was on “holiday” and visited his parents and Caleb, he still

gave him some flashbacks to those calmer periods of his life, both before and after the integration. Life was incredibly simple here on the city floor, and the days blended together

fight there once a day versus monsters. One could also fight other people, but it didn’t reward anything.

into the middle of the arena, where a timer of one hour would begin. Monsters would then enter the arena, and as long as you killed all that were alive, more would come. This meant that someone more powerful would manage to kill far more monsters than anyone else. It also had

as some good exercise, and it helped him practice finishing foes faster. Sylphie and the Fallen King naturally went to this arena every day, and it had become their

it did seem harder for monsters to obtain coins compared to those with professions. The two of them could still do other stuff besides the arena, but it gave little compared to just crafting. There were different facilities in the city that one could work for by assisting natives with all sorts of tasks. The Fallen King had found one that asked

only on this floor that Jake learned Dina had an amazing technique to make what was effectively genetically modified plants. She would communicate with herbs to accomplish this, and through this, she created

crossbreeds. However, Jake and she quickly discovered that if they used materials they had gathered inside Nevermore in crafting,

These Brokers were all cloak-wearing humanoid creatures that dwelled within many near-identical shops spread throughout the city. These Brokers could be spoken to and negotiated with, and Jake did see some people get away with more Minaga Coins

though. Illusion magic or any kind of mental magic was also not an option, as these Brokers had one tiny little detail about them that made it unfeasible for

They were all A-grades.

so Jake guessed it made sense. Luckily for Jake, he never planned on manipulating them; he just sold his alchemical creations. Someone who could still kind of “manipulate” them was the final member of Jake’s party… because the old man had taken the coin lead by quite

That Jake, who had also worked his butt off, was still thirty thousand short was not at all something to complain

Current Minaga Coins: 184,190/214,000

This meant they had spent well over two years within Nevermore so far, with nearly half the time spent on this city floor. Jake would lie if he said he wouldn’t have preferred to do without… but the time was

out that just grinding out alchemy products every day

of the Malefic Viper] has reached level 211 -

…