The Primal Hunter

Jake truthfully had never expected to encounter a B-grade on the moon. Further away from Earth around Jupiter or something? Maybe, but not so close to Earth that it was practically within striking distance. It didn’t make much sense to him either how a B-grade had appeared on the moon of all places.

He was ninety-nine point nine percent certain there wasn’t a single B-grade on Earth. The World Council had spent years hunting down or making contact with all sorts of beasts, and Arnold had sent drones out scouting to scan much of the underground world, with satellites covering much of what was above ground.

More than that, though… Jake didn’t feel like there were any B-grades, and if he trusted one thing, it was his own intuition.

By all accounts, the moon was far more barren and less energy-dense, but it did have some things going for it. Due to the thin exosphere, it got a lot of energy from space, and generally, high-level concepts tended to propagate as many of the usual ones, like wind, water, and nature, weren’t anywhere to be seen.

However, even with all of these, Jake only really had one good theory of how a B-grade had appeared, one he quickly shared with Sandy.

“I detected a-“

“B-grade,” Sandy quickly said. “I felt it, too. It’s gone now, though, and considering the fact we’re still flying in the direction that we saw it and how we can’t see it yet, I would guess it went underground.”

“Right,” Jake agreed. “Just to make sure, you also think it’s odd that there is a B-grade here, right?”

“A bit,” Sandy said. “Not that much, though. This moon is large enough to have a pretty powerful core but not large enough to have a fully formed Planetary Core, so it’s probably unprotected and open to exploitation. So, if any creature managed to take advantage, that would explain it. The creature would have to be a rather specialized one, though. So my guess is that this B-grade is the one who controls the core, or at least found some way to siphon its energy.”

Jake was surprised at Sandy’s insight, though he probably shouldn’t be. The worm had spent a good while in the Order studying under S-grades and even gods based on what he’d heard, and being a creature predominately made for space exploration, it made sense Sandy knew a lot about space and what one might find there.

“Would it be an issue if a creature is siphoning the energy from this moon core?” Jake questioned.

“Big depends on that one, as it’s entirely up to the method, and there isn’t really any way of knowing unless we go check more closely. Something I would definitely not recommend doing. Better to stay on the surface and the upper layers of the crust, as diving too deep might provoke it and make it think we’re trying to contest the core. I say that, but I’m just guessing, so don’t blame me if we get attacked the second we get too close to the moon,” Sandy explained.

“Yeah, let’s stick topside for now,” Jake agreed. Even if he maybe wanted to give the B-grade a shot, he wasn’t in a rush. Besides: “I didn’t feel any hostility when it spotted us, so I don’t think it will attack us out of nowhere. However, if it does, how confident are you in escaping?”

“I’m gonna be fine no matter what,” Sandy said in a casual tone. “Better worry about yourself.”

“Sure, sure,” Jake smiled. Even if the worm was a tad overconfident, that confidence was well-earned.

The two of them kept flying for a good while, and soon, they reached further onto the dark side of the moon, which was actually pretty well-illuminated right now as it was daytime. Not that the time of day mattered much to Jake and Sandy. Sandy didn’t have eyes, so they didn’t care about light, and Jake had too high Perception to let something like bad lighting or even total darkness bother him.

As they traveled, Jake kept an eye on the surface and every one of the many holes he found leading into the moon. There were a lot of large craters everywhere, too, with some of them even having meteorites within. Around these meteorites, elementals tended to propagate, and Jake even began to see other variants of elementals.

No signs of any biological life yet, though. He wasn’t sure if he should expect to see any, either. The chances of any kind of life appearing on the moon were incredibly small as it was just one big rock without any water or the conditions to facilitate-

that a fucking

eyes opened wide, as far in the distance, above the horizon, he saw what looked like a treetop. Not some crystal tree or anything like that either, but what could be easily confused for a pine tree. Except for the color, as it wasn’t green, but had

what I’m

mean the dense life energy in the distance,” Sandy answered. “Yeah,

expression on his face, Jake picked up speed as he flew even faster than before. All throughout their flight, Sandy had passively helped by creating what was almost a tunnel in space, making them travel faster than expected by

enough for Jake to have a proper look, and he saw it wasn’t just a single tree or even just a small gathering of trees. No, it was an

off to the side. Grass-like blue growths spread out to a certain point before it began to wilt

at the core of this forest that caused the

Sandy said. “It’s… big. Not of super-duper high quality,

into the moon filled with life-attuned energy? That did sound very sci-fi and very possible, if not probable. It could also just be that the system had decided to make a moon forest, but

attention below. Movement. With no wind, thus no swaying trees, any movement was notable, and after scanning more closely, he saw it. Between two trees, he could barely spot a creature moving about. It looked almost like a dog but had six limbs and a tail that was more

the vines running through its body had a slight glow to them. The creature’s entire body was around fifteen meters long, with the majority of that length coming from the tail. It moved rapidly through the land, and when Jake used Identify, he

Stalker –

of some powerful creatures, as there was a good chance this random plant lifeform was at a higher level than nearly anything on Earth. As he kept scouting, he

the life-place?” Sandy asked

third of this side of the moon based on what we’ve seen so far, and we’re only in the

it, so this is a pleasant surprise,” Sandy said after a bit. “A lot more fun than moons without anything

sure,” Jake nodded as he considered what their next move should be. They could keep flying deeper into the forest and aim for the center, or they could take a pitstop here in the outer area and

ask Sandy. “Stay here for a bit, or

taste-test whatever Lifecore those weird plant creatures got,” Sandy simply answered, which was

out his bow. Now, he did have the choice to shoot a Protean Arrow with all his usual bells and whistles, and chances are that would kill one of those Lunewood Stalkers outright,

go for a more prolonged approach. One that did still include a powerful opening attack, but he wouldn’t use everything he had. Shit, to give the poor thing a chance, he wouldn’t even do his opening attack from

a Penetrating Arrow. Jake took aim for a lone Lunewood Stalker as he made sure he had a free line of sight. Arcane Powershot charged for a few seconds before Jake let go of the string, and an arcane explosion erupted in the sky above the moon. Sandy had already retreated away to give Jake

attack. The ground around it erupted as a barrier of stone and vines shot up in defense, proving Jake’s decision to use a Penetrating Arrow the right choice as it pierced straight through and struck the creature, slamming it

not blood… but it seems to have a similar function. Interesting to see that

it quickly recovered and managed to avoid the second arrow, seemingly on accident, though it did struggle when a

it broke through as it shot upward toward Jake. He was flying just inside the exosphere of the moon, many, many kilometers up, but the creature displayed some impressive

magic in there, too, but seems to only

arrows, dealing significant damage to it as parts of it exploded off left and right. Root-wrapped stone bullets also shot up toward him, and with the moon’s lower gravity, they easily

smiled as the creature just tanked pretty much every arrow, as he had pretty high expectations of it… that’s until he noticed something. He had just put blood

late-tier C-grade