The Primal Hunter

Spending time with Carmen was always eventful, and Jake thoroughly enjoyed it. Maybe it was because they were very much on the same wavelength, and both had a bit of a screw loose. Then again, which talented individual didn’t have a bit of a screw loose? It was pretty much a requirement in Jake’s mind.

Carmen was just his type of weird. Both were driven, fighting maniacs and were willing to do dumb shit to try and progress. Their little experiment with infusing her with Touch of the Malefic Viper was a prime example of this. Through their brief experimentation, they discovered that the problem wasn’t the amount of energy Jake infused but that Carmen was sitting still while he did it.

If she moved around and punched, the energy would be dispersed faster than even Touch could infuse it. What had happened was simply that the energy piled up too much for no reason. Jake also had to admit that the entire experiment was quite beneficial to him. It was rare he had the chance to use Touch on people without them dying pretty quickly, and especially to use it on someone with such high resitance to the skill.

Overall, it was a great time for them both, even if Carmen ended up losing a few more limbs before they figured stuff out. While she recovered and trained by herself, Jake worked on the Demon Prince ritual, making sure no time was wasted.

Anyway, he and Carmen had spent four good days chilling in the Valhal compound before it was time for Jake to head toward the Demon Prince. He had considered staying a bit longer, but he had gotten quite excited about pulling off the ritual once he had fully formed a plan in his mind. Shit, he had even made a few minor changes to make the ritual suit his particular set of skills better.

When Carmen saw him off, and he left the compound, Olaf was naturally also there, along with a few others who gave him knowing looks. In retrospect, maybe spending all his time alone with Carmen inside her private residence could lead to some unforeseen rumors. Not that it hurt Jake in any way, and these rumors had been around ever since their meetup on Minaga’s City Floor anyway… they weren’t exactly wrong either.

”I guess I’ll see you back on Earth,” Jake said as they stood at the exit of the compound.

”If you remember to show up,” Carmen teased him.

”Eh, I’m pretty damn sure someone will remind me if I don’t,” Jake played along. He had never missed a system event so far… but it had been kind of close a few times, hadn’t it?

”Worst case, we’ll just handle this Prima Guardian on our own,” Carmen said with a shrug. ”Shouldn’t be that hard, though I do expect our Guardian to probably be the most powerful in the ninety-third universe. At least that’s what Valhal’s intel indicates with how many Primas we killed.”

”Let’s hope so! That way, it can put up a good fight,” Jake said, looking forward to the fight in… slightly less than two years now.

”For sure,” Carmen agreed. ”I’ll probably be back on Earth before you, so see you there.”

”See you,” Jake said as he also said his goodbyes to Olaf and those muscly dudes who always accompanied him before he headed off toward the Demon Prince. Even if he was looking forward to this Demon Prince ritual, he was also looking forward to getting back to Earth and seeing how things had changed there.

They had been in Nevermore for just about three years in Realtime with the time dilation, putting the intensity of the dilation at about 16x. It was not extreme but far from insignificant either.

had been a bit misinformed regarding some things with Nevermore. Because one thing had kind of bothered him. When he initially heard about Nevermore, he was told that the time dilation would get stronger

done only went from 14x to 17x or something like that. Jake didn’t know for certain, but he had a feeling this had something partly to do with the upcoming system events and whatnot and to make sure that those who did badly wouldn’t end up being late. Either way, for all the other versions of Nevermore, the

was at what looked more like a grand estate rather than a compound. It was just one large building with two smaller ones off to the side, with a tall wall surrounding

Jake should be talking, with his residence at the Order of the Malefic Viper and vast personal

the opening gate as he approached, ready to greet him. The demon looked elated upon seeing Jake,

a moment you would be preoccupied with more important matters and be unable to visit,” the Demon Prince said with a big

my word, and having looked over the ritual

the Demon Prince continued as he motioned for him to follow. ”Please, this way. I’m sure you’re curious to see the

Demon Prince into the large mansion… and down into the basement. Yeah, Jake felt like someone was pulling his leg. To have a demonic ritual take place in a large creepy cellar was almost too on the nose, but nope, they were entirely serious. What’s more, when he arrived in the main ritual chamber, he saw that everything

star-shaped symbol formed in the middle by drawing lines between all the different opposing sides. The borders also

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one Demon Lord Heart each, while the Cerulean Devil would stand in the very center. The ritual looked complicated at first glance, but it was a lot simpler than it appeared. Simple didn’t mean easy, though. Each of

be the center of the entire ritual and also the one taking the biggest risk by far. Because when Jake gave him the signal, he would remove the crystal from his own forehead, as that gem was what Jake was supposed to infuse with energy. Removing that gem was akin to temporarily severing a part of his soul, and if Jake failed,

with a broken Path that resulted in him never being able to level up again with debilitating soul damage would be him getting lucky. The far more likely outcome was just death. On second thought, maybe death would be the preferable outcome to

”I worked on a lot of it myself with some of the best experts I could find in the field, and this was the best we could come up with. I will also admit it was made after we became aware of your existence, as you gave me and my clan hope to pull something like this off. The entire concept is based on an old ritual that was attempted a long time ago but has never once

at the circle closely, making sure everything matched what the disc had said. It did, and Jake nodded

[Demon – lvl 280]

Jake answered, seeing the Demon Prince’s smile quickly

”If rituals like these were possible with our current means, we would be doing them far more often. If we succeed for the very first time, the gains would be unimaginable. Perhaps it’s foolish of me, but I’m willing

wouldn’t want some junior to pull off a massively risky ritual performed by some virtual stranger. It was peak-gambling. The gains if Jake somehow succeeded

and he was clearly not willing to just be another demon who would become an elite mortal. He was aiming for the peak, even if it killed him, and Jake could respect that. Jake could also respect that

of lacking approval from your higher-ups…” Jake said as he waved his

”A contract between two individuals… personal choice… knowledge of risk… karmic separation… this is a liability waiver and an agreement this ritual does not include either faction in

believe it says,” Jake responded, having to fully admit he hadn’t read the massive contract that thoroughly himself. Seriously, it was so overly long it made no sense it could be on a single piece of paper. However, he had been assured by the Viper this was what he needed, and from what Jake had read, the contract didn’t include some joke clause. Because

I do not have the authority to declare that should any vengeance be sought due to the outcome of the ritual, the Fourth Hell will officially be