The Primal Hunter

For the record, Jake had never opened any system menu related to him being a City Lord or the World Leader of his own volition. The only times he’d touched them was when Miranda asked for him to do something, and that something was more often than not just transferring rights and permissions.

In Jake’s defense, he blamed the bad UI of the system. How was it his fault the system didn’t have an “allow all” button? At least these existed for some major categories, and shortly after Jake became the World Leader, he went over these and granted rights to Miranda.

The problem was that the UI wasn’t static. New things would be unlocked with time, and how much the “country” or “kingdom” or whatever expanded. At least when it came to all the City Lord stuff, Miranda did have pretty much every permission available, but the permissions given had begun to fall behind severely with the World Leader stuff.

Also, because Jake didn’t have any profession related to City Lord stuff, he had to actually touch the Pylon of Civilization to activate it and see the system interface. Was it enough for him to just touch it with a bit of mana, or potentially even just his presence, allowing him to do it from hundreds of meters away easily, including during all the time he’d spent in his lab?

Well, yes, but Jake didn’t think about it, and that was the defense he was sticking to after he’d gone to talk to Miranda.

Jake was right nearby, so he’d been the first to arrive for their meeting after Arnold contacted him, with others like Arthur, the Fallen King, and Sword Saint needing a bit to get ready.

“So we both agree that we’re going back to your lodge to get this fixed here and now while we still have some time?” Miranda asked after a very enlightening conversation.

“Yes, ma’am,” Jake said in a semi-joking, semi-meek tone as he scratched the back his his head. “But… can I just add that I think you’ve done a brilliant job?”

“Well, thank you,” Miranda smiled. “Now imagine how much more brilliant it would have been if I didn’t have several options unavailable to me as your stand-in World Leader. To clarify, if you wish to take back full control and manage the planet yourself, I would more than happily-”

“Oh, would you look at that? I can give you World Leader permission stuff right here and now without going to the Pylon!” Jake quickly said as he hurridly found the system menu and began allocating all the new features to Miranda. Seriously, why didn’t it just automatically allow her to do all that stuff? He had officially made her his stand-in even by system standards, yet some things were still not granted by default.

After Jake was done, he couldn’t help but sigh. “Can I blame the system again? All this should just be automatic…”

“If I may,” Lillian, who was now sporting a cool mask – great fashion choice, by the way – spoke up. “Some new features for World Leaders become available that hold quite a lot of power most World Leaders wouldn’t ever want to unilaterally grant others. So a manual granting of permissions is likely implemented to avoid problems.”

“I kind of get it, but it isn’t like the permissions do anything overly dramatic,” Jake shook his head.

“You just gave me permission to control practically every single Pylon of Civilization on the planet, and not just their associated defensive barriers, but the ability to simply blow them up, which would cause worldwide panic and the resulting explosions kill thousands,” Miranda added.

smiled brightly. “Now, let’s go to the lodge

they proceeded to do, as Jake and Miranda quickly popped by his lodge and got all that sorted. On the way, Jake even proposed maybe asking Villy if he had a solution to automate all this granting of permissions, but Miranda made

like the Prima Guardian were handled and Jake had fully become the World Leader by laying claim to Earth’s Planetary

that had happened to Haven’s resident witch. Miranda already knew pretty much everything Jake had done as she got updates every single time they’d stopped by a City Floor. Jake hadn’t known much about what Miranda had been up to, though, and he was pretty curious about how she’d handled the

the three of them, and a few others who would arrive shortly, would be physically present,

own stuff and pretty far away. Even if they could just use the teleportation network, that would still take some time. Besides, going somewhere for people like Arthur wasn’t as easy as someone like Jake. He also needed bodyguards and stuff to come along, making

kilometers away and could get to the meeting room in a few minutes if he wanted

two people Jake didn’t recognize. One of them was a beastfolk man, while the other one was a scalekin. Both of them acted overly polite toward Jake, but he had honestly gotten used to that by

Jake was impressed by everything he saw. It was designed like one of those big board rooms rich people had board meetings in before the system, except they now had the technology to project holograms and

as it was only considered proper that the one with the highest status would sit there. Jake’s offer of just standing in the corner with Unseen Hunter active was also rapidly shot down, so Jake surrendered himself to his fate and took a seat. Beside him, Miranda and

seated, Miranda officially began

table as Miranda activated a crystal in the center. Jake saw the Fallen King, Sword Saint, Sky Whale, Arthur, his little brother, and many more familiar faces. Even the pretty shady merchant Renato, who ran Paradise, the city Jake had visited with Carmen during

the meeting. “Let me begin by saying I am more than pleased to see how well Earth is doing even in my absence.

like as if he was there in person. “I would also like to welcome Ms. Wells and everyone else back, and I hope you have had a fruitful journey.

overly long meetings Jacob sometimes dragged him to before the system. That was, in some ways, lucky, as that meant Jake was

a whole bunch of other things. He even had graphs and stuff to show, making it clear he had prepared for this meeting for a while… or he just kept

Holstred touched on the integration of former slaves, joined by the beastfolk and scalekins, who outlined some of the challenges they faced, including quite a bit of xenophobia from humans who didn’t like anyone who didn’t look enough human for their taste. Elves didn’t really face any problems, nor did the few dwarves who had come to Earth. It was primarily the more monstrous races who faced discrimination. Lots of

open-minded solutions. In the end, the conclusion was pretty much that they would actively try to quell these harmful sentiments, with a realization that the more time passed, the smaller the problem would get. The younger generation showed way less apprehension toward dealing with other races, and

free one-way trips to the moon if they got too annoying. Just an

about all the overly complicated stuff, they finally got to the topic of the Prima Guardian Preparation

would definitely be some hidden monsters somewhere that could cause trouble for humanity should they side with the Prima Guardian, but there shouldn’t be too many. At least not close to human lands. The further they got away from where humanity lived, the less anyone knew of what lived there, though Arnold had tried to map out most things. Jake even came to learn that Arnold had worked with a dozen or so parties specializing in exploration to create a map of the planet with

had been quite a help, having spent nearly all the time since they returned from Nevermore hunting down problematic monsters or convincing them to join the light side. Then, there was the entire underground world, which was definitely the least explored overall. Earth was simply too large now, with the planet having tunnels leading all the way to the core. Efforts had been focused on mapping only the upper layers while setting up methods of detection shouldn’t anything deemed too dangerous

been, especially over the last many months. Someone like the Fallen King had also been busy as hell dealing with monsters and effectively setting up a huge

Minaga and how great that was. Oh, and then he mentioned how he had people go over everything he had gathered in Nevermore within his spatial storage to

he was waiting for Miranda to return to make the dungeon wasn’t just him making up a reasonable excuse on the fly. Nope, Jake would never forget

could only conclude that things were going pretty well, even if there were some major issues they had to address. Jake was honestly impressed

heavy-handed approaches wouldn’t work on any of those problems. The only place he could help was with the Prima Guardian preparation, and it didn’t particularly sound like they needed help,