The Primal Hunter

One had to skip back a few weeks to find out why Jake and company chose violence.

They had traveled with the Caravan Guard Captain and the caravan for around a week by then and had learned a lot more about the world. They had even entered the territories of two factions and traded with small local villages. The caravan they were on transported primarily people, but it also had foodstuff, herbs, and metals. All in all, everything seemed pretty normal. At least when they were on the road.

Sure, every other person than the Guard Captain didn’t ever say anything of substance and generally gave off powerful NPC energy. They just made small talk with each other, with the Guard Captain more than happy to only talk to the five of them, as clearly, he didn’t even view the people he traveled with as people worth interacting with.

One thing they did discover was that teleportation circles did not work on the planet. One Step worked as normal, and none of the others noticed anything either, but upon further inspection, Jake did find that the spatial mana in the environment felt slightly distorted. He reckoned it had something to do with the entire “isekai” thing.

Anyway, the truly odd things began to appear when they interacted with the Otherworlders.

Throughout this all, Jake thought things felt… off. He observed the natives quite a lot, and he did even question if they were slaves or something at one point, but the Guard Captain shot that down, saying there weren’t any slaves on the planet as far as he knew, and the nobles had strictly outlawed any kind of slavery.

Again, this just felt weird for a planet with a medieval style, but it wasn’t something Jake wanted to question. So he and the others just continued their travels.

In the first village they had arrived in, not a single person had gone to meet them. They just ignored the massive caravan with nearly a dozen C-grades and hundreds of D-grades on it. It was only when they had fully entered the village there was some recognition of their presence outside of a few random stares when the biggest building in the village had its doors open.

Out walked a large man together with a woman, both of them showing intelligent eyes beyond the natives, making Jake instantly recognize them as Otherworlders.

“Captain! Good to see you come by!” the large man said as he laughed.

“Oh my, I see you brought friends?” the woman at his side spoke, looking curiously at Jake and company.

“Yeah, Otherworlders I met on the way here. They just got isekai’d to Tri-World before I arrived,” the Caravan Guard Captain answered with a light smile.

“Pretty rare for five people to come together like this, but I guess it happens,” the man shrugged as he greeted Jake and the others. “We are the Village Chiefs of this little place. Welcome to Tri-World; I hope you all enjoy your stay, even if it does take a bit to adapt to the planet.”

Jake nodded as the Sword Saint took charge and responded with courtesies. Jake was too busy using Identify and trying to figure out where this odd feeling of wrongness came from.

[Village Chief – lvl 230]

[Village Chief – lvl 232]

Their levels were a bit higher, but they were still low. Far too low to be any threats, which made Jake question why the Wyrmgod found it a good idea to guide them to this place using the caravan. Sure, they could just start blasting, but for now, Jake kept calm.

He looked as the female Village Chief kept chatting with the Sword Saint as the man walked over to one of the barges.

“So, people on barge three. You should all get down and settle down here,” the male Village Chief said.

Jake looked on with a frown, thinking that was the worst sales pitch ever to make someone move the-

“Oh, that sounds like a wonderful idea,” the elderly man on the barge said with a nod as every single person there stood up and began jumping off. No one else spoke but just followed the elderly man down onto the ground as the Village Chief yelled for some of the villagers there to carry over large pieces of timber to load onto the barge.

Do they… just follow orders? And the Village Chief knew, considering he had already planned for that timber to take its place, Jake concluded.

and headed onward toward their next destination. The Sword Saint questioned the Caravan Captain on the way about the odd interaction there, but the Captain didn’t

honestly pretty freaked out. At this time, right as

the

meant it was something worth looking into and not just the natural setting of the floor. The “people” in Minaga’s Labyrinth had also been one-hundred percent fake, but that was clearly done in a semi-jokingly manner, and it was so damn obvious and comical at times. This

them that they would stay in a small village for a few days as a shipment of ores was delayed.

planet’s geography. The three factions controlled roughly seventy percent of the landmass on the entire planet, with the rest remaining unclaimed. The unclaimed area were due to there being too many monsters to make it worth trying to control, or simply land with little to no value. Of these seventy percent, thirty-five percent was controlled by the Enlightened Republic, twenty-five by

on the planet were also only mid-tier C-grades, which should be more than manageable. Of course, it was possible that the people they questioned didn’t know

five continued their exploration for a while, and it was only when separated from the Caravan Guard Captain they could truly understand how

Saint had visited a small village by themselves and tried to talk to the people there, and while they had reacted, they only ever answered questions and never asked anything themselves. They also answered incredibly truthfully,

didn’t seem capable of saying

to discuss what the hell was

than actual people. Calling them slaves wouldn’t even be accurate…” Dina said in a slightly horrified tone. “I… I don’t know what it is, but something is

As if a part is taken out, or perhaps blacked out,” the Fallen King said. “Why or how that is, I cannot say, but I do estimate it to be from outside interference. Though it is odd that it affects everyone equally, including

seems to have almost conditioned them somewhat,” the

deep in thought for a while, thinking until suddenly, a light bulb went

No, I know, I know,” Jake said with a deep frown as he shared his

had only read about briefly after chatting with Villy about Eversmile once and getting referred to a book. It was a book that the snake god described as “very much not common reading material,” even if a lot of what it said wasn’t exactly secret. It was a book about a special kind of karmic magic that was outlawed in the multiverse and that even Eversmile no longer

Karmic Plague was – as the name implied – a type

direct transfer of Records and karma came from parents to children, so if

possible to infect

ran out of energy, but if someone or something kept feeding the original power source of this magic? Moreover, each

explaining as

the true nature of

looking at the notifications. “But how was

muttered. “And if they are used, it will be hidden. I did know about them, but I never imagined we would

not the most active in these kinds of discussions. She questioned why anyone would even make this kind

these things aren’t made with an express purpose but just to see if the creator could. Also, I don’t think we needed to figure out it was a Karmic Plague,

possible we would encounter some Otherworlder who knew,” the Sword

did not share the part about Eversmile having originally made it. Nor

was about to talk again when another prompt came

gained: Locate the source of

know what we are doing, then,” Jake

city. Not the capital of the Enlightened Republic, but a pretty major city that, according to the map, had around fifty-thousand living there. Yeah,

city, and after only a bit of

Well…

city, with the others spreading out and annihilating surrounding villages and towns. On the way, they had already discussed that there likely only was one way to “cure” the natives of the Karmic Plague, but they were still not

their first encounters after entering the

find some more Otherworlders. They soon spotted two walking together, a man and a woman. They were walking down the street, chatting, when three natives walked toward them. It was a man, a woman, and a small kid. All five in the

the street as the kid walked into the leg of the Otherworlder woman. It was obvious that the woman had, on purpose, walked into the kid, and Jake already thought she was