The Primal Hunter

Outside Nevermore, in the Order of the Malefic Viper, the old mansion that the Chosen of the Malefic Viper used to live in looked much the same as before he went to the World Wonder. Despite not really having permission, Meira and the others kept using the place for all of their meetups, and Meira lived there full-time. It was simply the best meeting spot, even if the majority of the library was locked off to them.

This wasn’t because Meira didn’t have her own place now… it was more that she only really ever felt at home within the mansion. Whatever bad memories she had from the place were long replaced with good ones. Besides, she had taken care of parts of Jake’s garden for so long and had several experiments ongoing there, so moving would really be a hassle.

Teacher also said it was fine to stay, and Meira saw no reason to question that.

By now, it had been a few months since she evolved to C-grade and threw off the last traces of her former identity as a slave. She still had some parts of her past that lingered, and it was about high time to address them. It was also just something she wanted to do… something she had looked forward to doing.

”I’m surprised you didn’t wait for the Chosen of the Malefic One to return before doing it,” Izil, whom Meira had invited over, said. ”I’m sure he would have agreed to come along if you asked him.”

”I know,” Meira nodded. ”But this is something I have to do myself, okay?”

”Are you sure it counts as yourself when you take me along?” her fellow elf teased.

”It’s different, okay?” Meira said, a bit flustered. ”Anyway, there is no need to bother him with something that trivial. Besides, it’s about time I do it. I’ve delayed enough, and Teacher said that going would be good for my mental state. Records of who I am and where I come from are there, and… I want to go, okay? I want to do what I can.”

”I understand, trust me. But, I have been wondering, how will we get there? It is quite a distance away based on what you told me, and there is no gateway leading anywhere close,” Izil asked.

Meira just smiled. ”Well… I am the Chosen of the Grand Elder now…”

It still felt weird to say, even after several months, but it would be silly not to take advantage of that fact at least once in a while, right?

The spear shot past his temple, Jake barely avoiding the hit by tilting his head to the side and twisting his body. He dove into close range of the spearman, but his opponent was ready and stepped down hard to release a shockwave of wind, spewing up sand while propelling himself backward, trying to land another stab during his retreat.

Jake deflected the spearhead and gave pursuit, closing in and trying to land a solid blow. The hobgoblin quickly reacted as a gust of wind pushed him backward even more as he raised his other hand and released a blast of condensed fire mana toward Jake.

With a swipe of his katar, Jake pushed away the fireball, stabbing forward into the chest of the spearman. The katar penetrated slightly before Jake was forced to retreat away from a swiping spearhead, aiming to separate his head from his body. Almost like an echo, a flaming wind followed the spear, making Jake block with a surprised look on his face.

he had an advantage, the hobgoblin attacked once more. Jake smiled, having predicted this, and acted surprised on purpose as he slightly side-stepped the spear, turning

appeared around it. He clearly intended to either make Jake let go or break his wrists,

arcane energy swirled around his gloves as he had infused them with it to trigger the enchantment, effectively freezing his own hand. He

to avoid Jake’s attack, but with him disarmed, he knew the fight was over. Considering his body already had plenty of wounds covering it from all

surrender,” the hobgoblin said with a sigh as

and let the mana fade from his left glove as it disintegrated from the far too potent arcane energy before he tossed the spear back

like I managed to land a single hit, though,” the poor guy said in a defeated tone. ”Anyway, thanks for

exited the arena to the usual commentary from the announcer. Despite wishing him luck, Jake wasn’t so confident in the guy going

actually pretty damn good. He didn’t find himself fearing for his life, and his consistent performance meant he walked out of all fights where his opponent couldn’t make some large-scale attack he chose to tank unscathed. There were even a few times, including versus this spearman, where he used his Fear Gaze defensively to

injuries, it didn’t mean it was all easy. The hobgoblin was a great example of someone who was just strong. He had good stats, could do a lot of different things, and was

with the Emberlight Blademaster illuminated how important experience fighting against certain weapons was. Even if C-grades were far faster, more skilled, and had more tools, the basics were still the same, and all of these fights allowed Jake to get a good basis for fighting against a

ground. One that allowed every person who progressed through the Challenge Dungeon to build up a wealth of experience in

still found them a lot easier than the matches against other combatants. First of all, because he could kill whatever he fought without thinking twice, and second of all, because Jake was uniquely talented at fighting against multiple opponents. Also, while he had a lot to learn when it came

as he was – liked practicing day in and day out, having a single fight every day to look forward to was nice. He was also only a single week away from having his promotion match to

also began to do one other thing to practice, something Jake had

Spectating.

definitely a teaching experience, and he surprisingly learned a lot just from being an observer, once more proving that Perception was truly the best stat, even outside of combat. The reason he hadn’t really gone and seen many matches before, only sometimes checking out Owen’s fights, was due to a rule of the Colosseum that said one was not allowed to watch matches above their own rank… a rule that made absolutely no sense if this was a real place, but as a Challenge Dungeon in Nevermore, Jake

the opponents Jake faced in the promotion matches would be too big of a reward for doing nothing, not to talk about the monsters Jake didn’t doubt were in the Champion rank. If one could just spectate anyone, Jake could see many people enter the Challenge Dungeon just to spend a few years watching pinnacle individuals fight each other rather than fight themselves, completely eliminating the entire challenge part of

some ways, one could even view this ability to spectate higher-level matches as a reward, and upon reaching Warlord rank, Jake found it worth it to watch at least

Jake suspected this was not something that would really ever happen to someone actually doing the Challenge Dungeon. If it did happen, it would be the reward for some side objective. No, instead, it was probably there to allow the challenger to invite whatever mates they made during the dungeon to go watch stuff together. Or maybe Jake

the match of two other combatants Jake had faced before, namely the Earthborn Faithful and the Benevolent Monk. Both of them were also Warlords at his point and were definitely top contenders to get promoted to Paragon. Maybe even

wanted to go watch. Based on the Battlemaster, there were some people in charge of scheduling that tended to avoid putting peak fighters against each other before the truly high ranks… and it seemed like Warlord qualified as a truly high rank, seeing as they had matched

exciting match. While it was true the two of them were roughly equal

toward the dwarf. ”Greetings, he who serves and is served by the earth. May I propose

yelled loudly. ”I ain’t doin’ ya stupid bloody competition, ya freak. Face me properly… or imma