The Primal Hunter

The rest of the thirty-sixth floor proved relatively trivial as Jake and company soon completed the entire thing and entered the in-between room. There had indeed only been six rooms and their accompanying labyrinths, but when they arrived at the break room, he was a bit disappointed at seeing they had only managed to get three achievements along with the usual completion bonus.

At least he was disappointed until he saw the achievements in question.

Thirty-sixth floor completed. 360 Nevermore Points earned.

Achievement earned: Complete the thirty-sixth floor within one day (24 hours). 750 Nevermore Points earned.

Achievement earned: Complete the thirty-sixth floor while selecting the highest difficulty at every room. 600 Nevermore Points earned.

Achievement earned: Complete the thirty-sixth floor without straying from the shortest possible path by any more than 10% of the total distance. 900 Nevermore Points earned.

That was a whopping 2250 Nevermore Points from achievements alone. Counting in the Bonus Objective and the floor completion, they had earned 3110 points from this floor alone. Sure, it wasn’t incredible compared to the Demon Lord, but it was pretty damn solid.

“These are all sliding-scale achievements, right?” Jake asked as he went over to the usual bar in Minaga’s in-between room and poured himself a drink.

“They are indeed,” Minaga answered instantly, ready to jump into the conversation.

“Nice. So…”

“Yeah, you got the best ones. Won’t say if you missed any other achievements, though. Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t.”

“Eh, it’ll be fine,” Jake shrugged as he chugged the beer-like liquid he had poured. It was okay, but not as good as what Villy usually brought.

“Do we need a recovery period?” the Fallen King questioned.

“I do not believe we do,” the Sword Saint answered.

Dina and Sylphie both seemed fine with just getting a move on immediately, so without further ado, they continued and moved onto the thirty-seventh floor, Jake quickly rushing after them while finishing his drink. As Minaga had already mentioned, the next floor was practically identical to the one on the thirty-sixth, though there were a few extra things added here and there.

The traps differed, and one especially nasty trap they ran into would teleport whoever stepped on it to a random place elsewhere in the labyrinth. At least Jake called it nasty until he got an idea. They sent Dina’s vine soldiers through a particular trap, and after seeing it actually put them closer to the exit, they all activated it together and skipped a good forty-five minutes of walking. Sadly not all of the traps could be repeatedly activated like this, with most only working on individuals before dispersing.

Room-wise, it was also much of the same, and Jake would say they got kind of lucky with what rooms had the highest difficulties. Of the seven rooms on the thirty-seventh floor – because yes, there were seven on the floor – they had combat in three of them, collection in two, and another had traps before they got the most interesting option of them all on the final room. It even had a never-before-seen new highest difficulty.

1. Crafting (Hard)

2. Boss (Harder)

3. Combat (Medium)

4. Random (Hard)

Jake just had one note when he saw the difficulty:

“Really? You named the difficulty after hard, harder?” Jake made fun of the dungeon master.

word, like insane or impossible? Seriously, what is wrong with using harder? It perfectly communicates it

your own word or something, too. It is ultimately your choice. Just… at least don’t tell me there is a difficulty even higher

professional dungeon master here, I see no reason to listen to your ridiculous critique. You try and make your own dungeon and then come at me with that kind of “feedback.” Forever the critic, never the creator. How would you feel if I made fun of you whenever you failed to concoct a poison or something?

named it hardest?” Jake wanted

I have to threaten you again?” Minaga said as he made the

make sure,” Jake smiled as he waved the Unique Lifeform off and infused energy

as he joined Jake. “Prioritizing practicality and making

my complaint

wall, revealing a room with mountainous terrain. Rather than the usual rock color, the entire place looked orange, primarily filled with sand and mudstone based on what Jake could see. It was not an

crater in the middle of the entire arena. This crater was over thirty kilometers in diameter, and with the large

the distance. It looked like a large fusion between an elemental, lizard, and scorpion. It had eight legs and a stinger like a scorpion,

Identify, Jake saw its

–

the beast is the source of the impact?” Jake muttered, a bit surprised. Seeing the

cluster of planets where it will then land on one. Upon impact, the egg will shatter, and the newborn Meteorborn Beast will absorb a lot of the energy released from the impact and even some of the matter kicked up from the resulting blast. This makes them take on the properties of whatever planet they land on. Upon reaching

someone with actual education about the multiverse and

we should be wary of?”

magic,” Dina answered. “But its overall

the old man nodded. “So, no

head. “Unless the dungeon did

he began

two people approaching as it awoke. After seeing them, it also noticed Sylphie above. As for Jake and the Fallen King… well, it would be hard not to notice the two attacks that hit it less than a second

from long range while the Fallen King went into medium range and blasted it with repeated waves of force. The Sword Saint dove

foot. It responded by using the exact two types of magic Dina had mentioned. Spheres of condensed space were summoned all around it, making Jake’s next arrows miss as it was thrown

of tons of soil and sand at once. It pressed all of this together, making incredibly durable weapons it could then control

Jake and company at quite an unfortunate time in their lives. See, they had finally been given a good fight after so long on that damn city floor, making them all quite eager to let off some steam. Even Dina seemed excited as she activated her boosting

and despite its durable natural armor, the Meteorborn Beast had its defenses ripped and cut apart within mere minutes. It released its trump cards at that point, and Jake did have to admit that dodging

Sylphie landing the finishing blow

Beast – lvl 285] – Bonus experience earned for killing

has reached level 219 - Stat points allocated, +50 Free

pleasantly surprised to see a level gained, but the fight itself had pleasantly surprised him even more. It had been straightforward, more so than he would have expected. Jake did also notice why. They had all grown in levels during the time on

Jake saw how they had both gotten more refined at using all their magic. The Brokers who asked for assistance with tasks had all required them to push themselves over and over again, leading to subtle improvements that not even constant combat

had spent with the Puzzle Box he hadn’t even solved a

made some difficult decisions when it came to his Free Points. This was partly spurred on by actually talking to Dina while on the city floor, as she had some more experience with the multiverse and stuff. She had said heretical things, like how just sinking all your Free Points into Perception could become a problem for him later on, and despite Jake

1000 points right there, which Jake thought was pretty

entering the next in-between room and licking his

it show all the changes since he entered Nevermore to get an idea of how much he had

Status

Name: Jake Thayne

[Human (C) – lvl

[Arcane Hunter of Horizon’s Edge