The Primal Hunter

Jake had been to enough medieval worlds already, so he found the second mission quite boring. The letter delivery did allow him to explore quite a few places, but nothing really caught his eye. Level-wise, there was a good spread, ranging all the way from F-grade to around level 240 in C-grade.

Race-wise, the diversity was even better, as Jake saw pretty much everything one could imagine. All the way from goblins to high elves lived in the medieval world, with many races having their own small kingdoms. Oh, and when Jake meant small, he meant small. Each kingdom was a highly condensed area, with the open area between each only like a hundred meters, meaning Jake could easily jump from one village to another if he wanted to. All this, despite the “lore” of the world dictating they were actually in conflict.

His primary objective for being there was to try and find someone he thought it could be interesting to teach, but he ended up leaving disappointed. While it was true Jake genuinely had no idea what he was looking for when looking for a potential student, he still felt like he would know it when he saw someone.

After getting done delivering all the letters and leaving the world, he went to the final world he wanted to explore. This one truly was the most unique of them all, as it was a kind of world he had never experienced before. Going through the portal, Jake found himself standing on a terrace of sorts, overlooking a vast megacity.

Skyscrapers of metal, glass, and what looked like some kind of ceramic material towered into the sky, many of them several kilometers tall. Lights were everywhere, from billboards and whatnot, as flying vehicles traveled between these many large skyscrapers, all of them having docks for these ships to land in.

On other lanes, Jake saw people flying inside tunnels of light formed to dictate traffic. Closing his eyes for a moment, Jake sent out a Pulse of Perception and nearly felt overwhelmed by the result. For hundreds of kilometers in all directions, the city continued endlessly, with the number of living beings in the billions just within the area he could see. If this was an entire planet filled with such population density… trillions, no, tens of trillions, could be living there.

As he stood there and looked around, he thought it all looked impressive as hell, but after a closer inspection, he finally saw it.

Ah, there are the dystopian elements one would expect of a futuristic megacity, he thought as he saw the ground deep below all the massive skyscrapers. It was naturally the slums, a place for all the undesirables and poor people to be allocated. Down there, he also saw many factory-like constructions and deep holes in the ground that led into vast underground mines or other production-related facilities.

Looking upwards, he also saw what flew above even the skyscrapers. Large discs floated up there, some of which had only single massive mansions on them. These mansions made any personal residents Earth ever had look like a joke, as these compounds easily had buildings more than a kilometer wide, with so much luxury it had long surpassed the level of being moronic.

This entire world was truly unlike anything Jake had ever seen before, and while he was curious about the place, he also got some very bad vibes. Alas, he was there to do a mission. He had to find five lost pets and return them, which shouldn’t take that long. The mission window even told him where he could find the first pet owner to talk to, which was naturally inside one of the big mansions floating above.

Flying up there, he wondered why this mission gave the most Merit Points out of all of them. It had to have something to do with the difficulty, right? Maybe the pets were actually semi-powerful C-grades or something. That, or creatures who were really good at hiding. Either way, he would find out soon. Jake was quite good at finding stuff, after all.

Getting close to the first floating island, a magic barrier sprung up around it right as Jake approached. It was a pretty weak one, but Jake still stopped as he saw a figure flying up toward him. Based on a cursory scan, this was the strongest person in the mansion… not that it was saying much.

[Mansion Security Captain – lvl 212]

“Halt! What is the purpose of your unannounced visit? If you do not have any valid reason for-“

“Something about missing pets,” Jake cut off the captain.

“Ah, you’re here for that,” the guard said, sounding a bit relieved. “Let me bring you to the lady of the house.”

Being a really shitty security guard, the guy just believed Jake right off the bat and took out a token. Activating it, the guard made a hole in the barrier and invited Jake inside. Following the guard, Jake quickly made his way to the main building, where he saw hundreds of servants milling about doing stuff. They all bowed when they saw the security captain but mostly ignored Jake as if he didn’t exist, while those who did look his way did so with disgust in their eyes. Jake quickly had a guess as to why.

They all wore pristine clothes, while Jake walked in wearing his usual armor, a mask, and his good old boots. In their eyes, he probably looked poor, and based on how damn materialistic everyone seemed around here, Jake wasn’t surprised. He did kind of want to point out how Eternal Hunger was probably worth more than the entire world they were living in, but he restrained himself with the hope of just getting things over with.

Walking up the way-too-long staircase, Jake entered a large living room where a single woman was lounging on a couch as she watched a large screen that was playing some soap opera or something based on how damn dramatic it was.

The woman was a human, similar to most of the beings on this planet. Jake had also seen other enlightened races, but most were humans, especially those of the richer echelon. She was level 201 and looked to be in her early forties, which indicated she had evolved very late in life or was at the later stages of her natural lifespan.

the one who will bring me back my dearest,” the woman said as she saw Jake and

to guess, it was probably gonna be some large fat cat named Mr. Snuggles or something else dumb and stereotypical

dramatic voice. “I have barely been able to rest at night when he isn’t there. I… I fear he may have fallen into the slums or something! Imagine what they might be

over the top, and he sure as hell didn’t like her, but he just sighed and wanted to get this over with so he

as she took out what looked a lot like the type of tablets

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tablet from her and give it to Jake. Jake took it and looked at the picture

What the fuck?

He looked baffled as to how he had gotten found that fast but refused to give up. Continuing to run a bit longer,

are and why you’re here, and I’m not going back!” the young man yelled as he backed up against the wall but still raised his gaze and met Jake’s eyes

shit? Waste of human life?” Jake came with helpful suggestions as he observed the young man. “Come on,

was saying. At the same time, Jake also

[Half-Elf – lvl 188]

out a hidden dagger behind his back. “I already told

closer. “Not the most subtle form of communication. Pretty sure nobody else could pick up on it, but you really need some better magical encryption if you wanna communicate long-distance

a single step. He lowered his head as if he was giving up, only to quickly stab forward with the knife. An odd yet recognizable black energy revolved around the

said with a smile as he looked at the dagger and felt its energies try to invade his body. “No… you despise not

and dense curse energy, born from within the young man himself. Only a high level of natural talent in curse energy and a deep-seated negative emotion could give rise to something like that, not much differently from how Casper had originally realized he could also wield the power of

case, Jake felt the pure hatred within the curse energy being the source

man stammered. “Why would

one before,” Jake muttered. “As for your question? I am not serving her.

now, as Jake had already made his decision. “Say, kid,

yes?” he stammered out as his eyes darted to the knife Jake was still holding by the blade in his

“Ever done any?

“No…”

than ever,” Jake grinned as he leaned forward. “You want revenge, right? On her

gather his thoughts, the young man didn’t

to the half-elf. “Revenge is a great motivator, and

bit of his Bloodline to really seal the deal. He looked down at the young

began to be emitted as his nails dug into his flesh, and he gritted his teeth. “If I can

him. “I’m talking about teaching you alchemy and

you’ll help me. How exactly this will help me you

nodded, and just like that, Jake had

he saw the picture of a twenty-year-old-looking young man on the tablet as he quickly realized exactly what was going on with this entire

run away turned out to be involved with some rebel group or something

innate talent. When Jake detected the curse energy within him, he got intrigued, with the determination in his eyes and his ability to stay upright under Jake’s gaze sealing the deal. To summarize, the young man had determination, a decent level of talent, and he was even pretty close to C-grade. This meant that

on a shitty “pet owner” along with the rest of