The Primal Hunter

Jake had many ways to approach the fight with a Prima Guardian. Usually, he just killed the creature quickly with everything he had, with the majority of those he had killed so far unable to survive even a single fully powered blow.

Out of everyone in the ninety-third universe, Jake legitimately believed he was the one with the most powerful opening attack. For his level, that is. He was also fully aware of how intimidating it was to see a boss you had made preparations for or had even battled and lost to meet its end from a single arrow.

The question was if this approach would be the smartest in this situation. It would reveal quite a lot of what Jake was capable of, and he also had to consider that it wasn’t like Ell’Hakan had to ever make any of these recordings public. He could keep them for personal study, use them for blackmail if he thought that would work for some reason, or even just destroy them if he felt like the recording only made Jake come off looking good – which him showing off his ability to one-shot a Guardian would surely do.

However, Jake saw another possibility. A chance, if you will, to do something that would be fun, confusing, and perhaps even a bit helpful in the future. Mostly fun, though.

He had wanted to mix up these Prima Guardian battles for a while, and this time around, he wasn’t in any particular kind of rush, so he decided to put on a show for the audience. A show that wouldn’t actually show off that much, but what he did display, he believed would prove both puzzling and useful to Ell’Hakan. Though likely not in the way the other Chosen had hoped.

First of all, Jake wouldn’t use a bow. That would just make it way too easy, and he would show off his growth with his primary weapon, which he saw no reason to do. Secondly, no Malefic Viper skills. This was for his plan of potentially making the recording useful in an unexpected way. Third, he would fight it using a style he hadn’t explored in a long time. One he had deployed the last time he was to face a stream of weak enemies to keep himself entertained.

That’s right… it was the return of the man, the myth, the legend: Doomfoot.

Alright, Jake would also use his katars, definitely some other stuff, but he would still be doing a lot of kicking here and there! Granted, things did depend a lot on the power of the Prima Guardian, but if it was at the level he expected it to be, this very basic plan of his should work. No matter what, he couldn’t forget the most important aspect of this entire show he was about to put on:

To have fun.

Jake waited patiently as all the followers of Ell’Hakan, along with the two World Leaders, retreated, leaving the magic circle and temporary structures behind spread all around the Prima Vessel. The wife of the scalekin was also with them and seemed way too chummy, but oh well.

Soon enough, everyone had retreated and now just stood back and watched. The scalekin was to purposefully not release the Guardian immediately, primarily to give Jake time to prepare, but now none of that was necessary.

The observers also looked perplexed when Jake just stood there, only a hundred meters from the entrance to the Prima Vessel. He had his arms crossed, waiting patiently while seemingly not preparing anything. It took about two minutes before a figure flew out of the Vessel. It was the scalekin, and he looked like he had blocked a few blows but was otherwise unharmed.

A second after he appeared, hot on his heels, a very humanoid Prima Guardian appeared. It looked like a mix of many different kinds of beastkin and scalekin, with a few pure monster features mixed in, though it was hard to tell.

Jake took a few steps forward while activating Arcane Awakening in its balanced state, getting a running start before he stomped down hard, teleporting and appearing in between the scalekin and Prima. The observers had likely expected to see many things during this battle… but Jake would bet none of them had dropkicking the Guardian in the face on their bingo cards.

His feet made solid contact with the monster that tried to bite down on his boots at the very last second but only ended up doing more damage to itself in the process. His dropkick sent the Guardian shooting back, smashing into the Prima Vessel with a large thunk, Jake using Identify on the boss while it was still mid-air.

[Honored Prima Guardian – lvl 301]

Truly, it wasn’t worthy of his bow. Jake didn’t let up his assault either as he charged forward, the Prima Guardian roaring loudly as it met his charge. Dodging its first swipe, Eternal Hunger appeared in his hand as he stabbed the creature two times before large fangs sprung from its hand and swept down.

Pivoting around it, Jake kicked the Prima in the side, sending it stumbling as a follow-up kick hit it in the head in a nice one-two combo. Throughout, Jake couldn’t help but smile a bit as he felt the impact left by his kicks. He didn’t really do any impressive damage, but it did something.

Angry, the Prima Guardian tried to catch Jake, but he was an elusive specter and danced around its attacks while landing counters. These Primas varied widely in quality even when they shared the same name, and this one certainly wasn’t anything impressive… not that he could say any of the others he had killed recently were.

From the reactions he saw from the audience, they still looked plenty impressed, though. Keeping up his aggressiveness, Jake continued damaging the Prima Guardian with his barrage of kicks and stabs, the fight looking incredibly one-sided as Jake willingly proved his skills as a melee combatant. He showed off how the Prima Guardian seemingly couldn’t land a single blow on him, no matter how hard it tried. The two of them flew across the entire area, having an extremely intense battle, tearing up the surroundings in the process and really making a spectacle of it all. ℞𝘢NỔ𝖇Εʂ

This was just the first part of Jake’s plan, though. He was waiting for something to happen… and as expected, it did when he had done enough damage. The Prima Guardian slowly began to change. It got thinner, more lithe, grew longer legs, and overall its speed increased to new levels. In return, it lost some of its raw power, but, really, did any level of raw power truly matter if it couldn’t land any blows?

With its newfound speed, the Guardian went on the offensive for the first time in a while. Jake was seemingly pushed back and could only focus on dodging while barely landing any counterattacks. Finally, he saw a good chance as the Prima attacked from above, and Jake decided to block as he was launched downward toward the ground.

He slowed his descent and landed, the Prima Guardian floating above as it seemed to be gathering mana for some kind of magical attack. Jake was more than happy to see the Guardian be so cooperative, as it gave him plenty of time to act in front of his audience.

Jake made a show of glancing about before going and picking up a metal pole that was about three meters long that had been left by a tent that broke during their fight. Such a pole wouldn’t really be useful for anything under regular circumstances… but Jake had a way to make it into a valid weapon.

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Purposefully speaking in a low and unassuming tone – that he was certain would still be picked up by the recorders – Jake activated the skill as he claimed the weapon as a tool of humanity.

“Fangs of Man.”

As he spoke, Jake infused energy into the pole as it became one with him, strengthening it significantly in the process and, for a brief moment, made it give off a very faint golden luster that faded as quickly as it had come… but it had been there.

This was the most important aspect of what Jake was doing. The secret option of what the recording could become. Fangs of Man was not usually a skill that had any real visual indicator, and even if Valdemar seemingly could detect some trace of it during their encounter, he hadn’t been entirely sure. Now, Jake wouldn’t leave anything up to doubt.

He could already imagine it. The murmurs spawned from the Chosen of the Malefic Viper battling a Prima Guardian like a battle maniac in a brawl, not using any skills related to his Patron but those of another Primordial.

Jake wasn’t afraid of Ell’Hakan not knowing what he was seeing either. Jake knew that while Fangs of Man was far from a normal skill, the energy he had given off while using it had the all-too-familiar glow of a skill related to Valdemar. Even if Ell’Hakan wasn’t certain what he was looking at, Yip of Yore would surely know once he was shown.

The two of them wanted a world where Jake bailed on the Malefic Viper and potentially joined Valhal, right? He would more than gladly play into that fantasy to mess with the two of them. The only thing he felt a bit bad about was potentially fooling Valdemar into thinking Jake had a genuine interest in joining his glorified fight club, but if the god felt too sad or disappointed about it, he was sure they could settle any bad feelings over a beer.

It was clear none of the observers put any significance in what Jake had done, which was just what he wanted. He didn’t want people to think this was staged and something Jake purposefully wanted others to see. Instead, he wanted it to look like a battle junkie, not really thinking as he was engrossed in the heat of battle, experimenting and going wild.

A role he would gladly continue to enjoy playing, as the Prima Guardian released a massive bolt of pure mana that split apart in mid-air into over a hundred crystalized homing bolts. Focusing, Jake shot upwards, dodging many of the bolts while using his new metal pole weapon to smash away a few others.

The Prima Guardian wasn’t idle either but charged down to meet him while using its swarm of crystalized mana bolts. They reminded Jake of a shitty version of his own stable arcane mana, and he easily broke them apart one after another.

They did add a bit of pressure as Jake and the Guardian clashed, but not enough for Jake to bother increasing the output of his boosting skill. The moment they met, Jake swung the metal pole hard, the Prima Guardian seemingly not even seeing it as a threat. This proved to be a big mistake, as the hand it tried to swipe the pole away with had a finger broken while not even slowing down Jake’s swing and earning itself a metal pipe to the head.

Using the pole as a weapon, Jake kept up his assault, swinging recklessly. The weapon very quickly began deteriorating, as despite the effects of Fang of Man, it was still just a regular metal pole. Luckily for him, he had plenty of replacement weapons in the rubble below.

Before the pole even fully broke, Jake held out an open hand as he used telekinesis to yoink a shorter metal pole from below. The second he caught it, he once more actively showed off his use of Fangs of Man, and just in time before his first pole snapped in two.

Jake decided to heighten the tempo as he upped his boosting skill and used its offensive mode, increasing certain stats by another 20%. His increased speed and power took the Guardian by surprise as it was struck three times in a row with Jake’s metal pipe, and from below, more improvised weapons floated up.

Fangs of Man was the kind of skill Jake never actively used or considered much. It was just there in the background, functioning as Jake’s weapon skill. It could most easily be compared as the melee counterpart to his archery skill. It wasn’t rooted in any particular fighting style or weapon, though, but the nature of humanity and their ability to use or transform nearly anything into a weapon should the need arise. It made him innately understand how to use any melee weapon he picked up, with Jake knowing this stemmed from tapping into the ancient Records of humanity.

The skill even partly worked when he used his bow, except pretty much all the bonuses were overwritten by his actual archery skill, as the stat effectiveness bonus and whatnot didn’t stack. One could only have one such effect at a time, after all.

Either way, Fangs of Man was a powerful skill, and while Jake wouldn’t say he had neglected it, he had most definitely never properly utilized it. It was just really hard to justify testing the skill out and using it in a fashion like this. Finding an opponent strong enough to put up a good prolonged fight to really get into it was hard, and things were only made harder when Jake felt pressure to kill his opponent fast.

However, against this Prima Guardian, he had a very durable opponent that was strong enough to make the fight a little hard, and no time constraints he cared about. Needless to say, swinging random improvised weapons was far less effective than using his katars, but Jake had fun with it as he also explored the Fangs of Man skill a bit more and put on a good show for the audience.

Sadly, all good things must come to an end. Jake’s relentless barrage of attacks had left the Prima Guardian beaten and battered, both its arms broken in several places, with nearly a dozen metal poles sticking out of its back, with an entire leg missing.

Jake went in for the killing combo, as he used Eternal Hunger for the first time in a while but not to kill the Prima. Instead, he dodged one of its desperate blows before cutting off the clawed hand, and while twisting his body, caught the hand and used it as a weapon as he stabbed its own claws into the neck of the Guardian.

Finally, he pulled up one of the remaining metal poles from below, a particularly large one that had been used in one of the bigger tents, the thing nearly four meters long. Jake focused the second he had it in his hand as he recalled the battle he had seen using Path of the Heretic-Chosen. He remembered how Valdemar had caught the broken fang of the Malefic Viper and transformed it into an axe.

That wasn’t something he could do, but with enough focus, he could alter his improvised weapon slightly. A golden luster enveloped the metal pole, more intense toward its tip as it slightly swarped. It sharpened, taking on the shape of a simple spear as Jake smiled.

The still-reeling Prima Guardian couldn’t defend itself properly as Jake stabbed forward, hitting the Prima once in the chest. It roared as Jake predicted, and he took advantage as he used a quick regular Gaze to freeze its body with its mouth open. He pulled back the spear and promptly stabbed the Guardian through its open mouth, the metal pole penetrating through and exiting out the top of its skull. The tip entirely broke during this, but it was good enough.

With a good wrench, Jake shattered the skull of the Guardian even more, not stopping as he flew around the creature and twisted its neck one-eighty degrees before finally twisting the pole to an upward angle, fully breaking the neck of the Guardian and stabbing the improvised spear into the back of the Guardian.

In truth, the Prima had already been a goner the second he had stabbed it through its open mouth, with the rest just a show of violence to fully end its existence. Jake did one last swing as he lifted up and tossed the Prima down onto the ground with the improvised spear and many other weapons still sticking out of its body, the boss dead before it even hit the ground.

You have slain [Honored Prima Guardian – lvl 301]– Bonus experience earned for killing an enemy above your level

Jake, floating in the air while covered in blood from head to toe, cracked his neck as he looked toward the many observers, the scalekin World Leader among them. They got the message as a few flew over, the two World Leaders affiliated with Ell’Hakan naturally among them.

Their facial expressions weren’t hard to read. If they had been afraid before, they were absolutely terrified now. He did also see traces of confusion. Chances are they had been told what kind of fighter Jake was, which hadn’t at all fit what they had just witnessed.

“That was decently fun. Sadly, the Guardian was disappointingly weak,” Jake spoke casually with a smile beneath his mask as they approached.

He was very much looking forward to the reaction Ell’Hakan would have seeing the recording, but more than that, he was interested in Yip of Yore’s reaction. Jake wasn’t sure exactly how they would interpret it, but if nothing else, Jake had at least created a bit of chaos and confusion with his performance.

However, not even he could have predicted what kind of effects this strategy, which was in large part just a glorified excuse to experiment and have some fun, would end up having.

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