The Primal Hunter

Actual traveling.

Who would have thought that the job as a Courier would include traveling? Sure had Jake fooled after he only ran around a city for several days. Sure, it hadn’t been the worst, and there was plenty of diversity thrown in there to make it entertaining.

Nevertheless, Jake was glad that phase of the Challenge Dungeon was over as he proceeded with Courier Job 20. It wasn’t like he had to go far, but it did feel good to finally be out in the open. He had traveled around a bit in the House of the Architect while in the worlds there, but he didn’t go full speed most of the time as he had to actively scout out the environment and couldn’t just focus on speed.

Now, speed was the only thing that mattered. Jake used One Step repeatedly as the city had long turned into just a blip on the horizon. Every single step passed around a kilometer of distance, having improved quite a lot during all his time in Nevermore. He was still quite a bit from passing a thousand miles like the name indicated it technically could, but with the sheer speed he could trigger the skill, that wasn’t really a problem.

Jake had experimented a bit with actually trying to increase the distance a lot, and it was possible. His record was about a hundred and thirty kilometers – or eighty miles or so – with a single step. However, that step had taken him well over a minute to perform and had been done under perfect circumstances with nothing in between him and his target destination. This is to say that if Jake just wanted to travel quickly, smaller but faster steps were far more effective. Also a lot more efficient, as a One Step taking him a hundred and thirty kilometers consumed way more than a hundred and thirty times more stamina than those taking him only a single kilometer.

With his speed, Jake was the fastest in his Nevermore party when it came to purely traveling, though Sylphie beat him thoroughly in shorter distances. His relatively high stamina pool and constant supply of potions also meant he wouldn’t really ever run out of energy as long as he didn’t push himself too hard.

For his very first job outside of the city, the Challenge Dungeon had even picked something super exciting, too. Jake had been tasked with – wait for it - delivering a tax form for a local small mayor to fill out. He even had to bring it back again once it had been filled, making it twice as exciting!

Alright, yeah, the Courier Job sucked ass, and it was clear the entire intent of this was for Jake to travel a longer distance than usual. Jake wouldn’t really call it long-distance travel, though, as it only took him a bit over five hours to reach the small town in question. It would probably have taken longer if any of the wildlife in the way dared get in his way, but luckily, they were all on their best behavior, as blasting his aura pretty much worked like a max repel.

Reaching the small town in question, Jake saw that there were two guards at the entrance, both barely in C-grade. They looked tired with slightly damaged armor, and observing the area, it looked like they had been struggling quite a bit with monster attacks recently.

I can almost smell it…

Entering the town by flashing his Medallion, Jake headed to the mayor’s office straight away without any problems and delivered the tax form to a secretary there. Right as he did so, the mayor himself exited his office and saw Jake, and it looked almost as if a wave of relief washed over him.

“Ah, you’re the Courier, am I right?” the man said with a bright smile. “Thank you for the delivery. Tax papers, right? I will get to it immediately so you can bring it back, but…”

Here it comes…

“… we have recently been dealing with excessive monster attacks from a nearby monster nest, which have put a strain on the guards. Seeing as you made it all the way here safely, you look like you can handle yourself, so would it be possible to look into it while I do the form?”

A side quest!

Right as he thought this, a system prompt appeared before his eyes.

Courier Side Job: Eliminate the nearby monster nest.

Objective: Monster nest eliminated (0/1)

Accept Side Job?

no reason to refuse as he nodded. “I’ll take a look at it in the meantime. Do you know where this nest is

Courier Side Job Accepted.

all the attacks usually come from the north, so I reckon it is in that direction. As for any details, I couldn’t possibly tell you the exact situation; we simply haven’t had the resources to send out a scouting

good; I’ll find it,” Jake said reassuringly. “Just have those

fifty kilometers to the northeast, he saw a big collection of monsters gathered around a few small hills and rock formations. The monsters all looked to be of the insect type, but with their small number, they definitely weren’t of the eusocial type. If they were, Jake also

and Jake decided to make this an express

quite well from this high up, and using a few quick Identifies, he saw they were all in the 210-220 range. This made Jake feel like one wasn't necessarily meant to fight the robbers in the first Courier Job if

a quickly-charged Arcane Powershot. Right as the arrow was released, Jake nocked another, which he charged ever-so-slightly longer

did this with five more arrows before he felt like it was good enough. Jake didn’t see a need to wait as he began flying downwards, and as he did, the first arrow arrived and split into dozens right before it hit the the monster nest. Due to the difference in charge between each Powershot, the next arrow arrived nearly at the same time,

later, as Jake was flying downward, he got a system notification along

Objective: Nest eliminated (1/1)

Jake quickly made it down to the ground again and reentered the mayor’s building, having only been gone for a handful of minutes. He did so fully expecting the mayor to still be busy filling out paperwork, but to his surprise met the man in front

for the assistance!” the mayor said with a bright smile. “Here is the form, all filled out! Once again, I cannot express the depth of my and the town’s gratitude for your help, and I wish you luck on your way back. Of course, should you wish to rest after dealing with the

Side Job Completed!

Side Jobs Completed: 1

guy and notification a bit before just nodding. “I only did

of admiration. “Truly a man of duty! Even after

as Jake exited the office, a few local townsfolk thanked him, and even the

questions, even if he knew the true answer

hell had the mayor known the nest was eliminated minutes after it had happened? How had he filled out the form so fast? How did everyone else in town also instantly know? What were these Side Jobs actually for? What did they give? Actually, to extrapolate on that point… what did any of these jobs

work or something without knowing? How the hell did the Courier industry even work? Wait… maybe

course, the ultimate answer was just that none of this mattered. Side Jobs and Courier Jobs most certainly just gave more Nevermore Points and a better achievement at the end of the Challenge Dungeon. Simple as that. But Jake did

again took a bit less time than the way to the town as Jake hurried back. Turning in the tax records to the dwarf, Jake picked up another quest to go visit

the easy-difficulty Courier Jobs required him to leave the city. The difficulty also went up a tiny bit as he went to more and more dangerous territories monster-wise. There were also a few cases of trickery here and there, such as someone whom Jake was supposed to collect money

normal, and in most cases, it didn’t end in violence. Just a bit of pressure was enough to make most people crack in this early part of the Challenge

Jake didn’t always get one, but they were becoming more numerous. From what he gathered, these Side Jobs were jobs not directly related to delivery but were auxiliary tasks. Many could even be completed during the Courier Job, such as one time Jake was asked to kill a

timed missions were just a joke. Giving Jake three days to get somewhere he could reach in three hours was honestly just sad. Alas, he was in the easy part of the Challenge Dungeon

two weeks after arriving in the Challenge Dungeon, Jake had completed Courier Job number 35 and returned to the same

in, Jake gave the man a smile as he

“Job’s done,” Jake said.

dwarf gave Jake a big smile. “Here, let me have

it on the table. The dwarf didn’t even try