The Primal Hunter's
Building the Base
Jake knew that he had a few long days of alchemy before him. Looking at the window of the dungeon challenge, he walked out of the bedroom into the laboratory.
Leftover time: 26 Days – 6:21:57
He had only spent a little over three and a half days in this dungeon. He had, in his mind, plenty of time to find a cure, but not enough time to slack off. With his evolution out of the way and completely refreshed from the process, he had no reason not to.
He has a hard day of work ahead of him. There's no way he's gonna die here. A plan had already begun to form in his mind about how to get through the challenge. He could only laugh at his stupidity. But unfortunately, the plan did not include him leaving early. He knows there's a whole tutorial going on outside, but it can wait. Inevitably Jake thinks of his colleagues who are still outside and decides to check out the tutorial panel.
Panel Tutorials
Duration: 58 days & 11:22:58
Total Remaining Victims: 754/1200
A little over a third have died now. Jake desperately wishes his comrades weren't among them. Although he did not love Richard, the man seemed to be quite competent, and he knew that if Jacob was good at everything, it was to gain the good of others. He believed their chances were good unless something very unexpected happened.
Shaking his head, he threw away the thought. It was a waste of time to worry about others when he was already fighting against death. He'll be looking for them when he gets out of there. For now, there was nothing he could do to help them in any way. The best way to help them is to help yourself.
Determined, he cleaned the bowl, obtained the ingredients, and instantly went back to making more poisons and potions. He has a long life ahead of him.
Jacob dragged his fingers to his chin, feeling the beard that had now grown into a full beard. He had no beard for many years now, always appearing in a neat style. It's not that he thinks there's anything wrong with having a beard. He avoided it mainly for professional reasons because, although the company's dress code did not directly prohibit beards, it discouraged them greatly. That is a silly rule, but company directors are quite conservative and believe beards are unprofessional for some reason.
Not that it's all that important anymore. The world is fucked. Jacob did feel a bit sour for having spent years climbing the corporate ladder because all of that turned out to be a waste of time. That time would be better spent going to martial arts classes. Fencing or archery or just about any sport that teaches you only small combat skills will be more useful.
He was never a fighter. At least not in the literal sense. He had never fought in his entire life outside of a possible petty quarrel as a child. Instead, he focused on studying, excelled in academics, graduated with the best grades at the university, and became the youngest department head the company had ever seen.
But now, in this tutorial, he's under the stairs. As it turned out, Richard owned a private security company before his initiation and came here with many of his employees. Of anyone Jacob has met so far in the tutorial, Richard is the most superior.
He was also the first person Jacob knew to have evolved and then even the first to also develop his class. Jacob himself was still level 19 in his class, but he had developed his race. The whole thing of race evolution is a confusing.
As one evolved, they would disappear for a few seconds before appearing again in the same place. The effect of evolution is also interesting. After evolving, one could vaguely sense something in the air. Some kind of energy. It didn't take long to conclude that this new energy was mana. Not that anyone knows what to do with these new senses.
Now, they've been in this damn place for just over two weeks. Even at first, Jacob was well aware of his own lack of combat power, but it only became clearer. He was not the lowest level among his peers, but far from the top.
Of the original 10, they were only 7, maybe only 6, left because he had never heard or seen anything about Jake since he left their group.
Theodore was the first of those who died. They had fought again with the cursed badger when he was unlucky and almost tripped, letting one of the beasts bite his neck. He did not die instantly, but they ran out of health potions. Without a visible healer, he bled out on his way back.
Caroline, the main healer in the entire Richards group, was not with them at the time. In fact, they only had four healers in their entire camp, despite having surpassed a hundred people. The highest leveled healer was Caroline, after upgrading her class a day or two ago.
According to all who had ever done it, leveling became much slower once again after that. The first 10 levels were relatively easy, then it became a little more difficult between 10 and 25, then it became a little more difficult, and then it was even harder after that. Jacob did not know what level Richard had reached, only that he was most likely still the strongest member of their stronghold.
The other two former colleagues who died were Dennis and Lina. Jacob still remembered the two excited young men when they parted ways. Both of them were stronger than him at that time. But they died. And not by animals either.
Other large camps have emerged, with the toll almost equal to theirs. Negotiations have been going well for a while, and there are even plans to merge the two. Then the group of Lina and Dennis were ambushed by another camp.
After that, everything went awry for a while. Someone from Richard's stronghold must have taken the initiative on his own to strike back, as the group from the other camp was also annihilated, and from the state of the battlefield, it was clear that weapons had been used.
This angered the other factions as they firmly claimed that they had nothing to do with the first attack. Fights broke out every day after that.
Looking at the tutorial panel, it is sad to see the number of survivors going down day by day.
Panel Tutorials
Duration: 49 days & 14:45:06
Total Casualties Remained: 599/1200
The number of dying survivors had slowed down for some time after the first four or five days, but it is still rising in the days where the larger groups of the two camps are meeting each other. On the worst day, 21 people were killed divided between their two factions, and that did not even include random deaths on ferocious beasts. Of course, there are also other unaffiliated parties out there.
However, both factions had done a lot to attract the survivors. Smoke signals, casters firing spells into the air, and more have been done. It worked for the most part and was probably why their two factions were within such a close distance. They've drawn each other.
Jacob was currently standing on one of the many flames spreading around their camp. They had reached deep into it at this point, and finding a savage beast below level 10 was impossible at this point. Most of the nearby areas were around level 20, but it was only a short walk away, and one would meet many above level 25.
The reason for the growth was not just because of the change in geography. It was across that line that the animals grew parallel. Jacob doubted there were even beasts below level 10 in the entire forest at the moment. While this is generally considered a positive aspect for those who want to grow stronger, it is clearly a negative for those who just want to survive.
The beast once again grew extremely strong at 25. It was manageable because they also had people with classes above level 25, but for lower-leveled groups like his, ferocious beasts were formidable. Many of them had magical abilities or just extremely powerful bodies.
Speaking of profession, Joanna, who first got it, was still the highest level of craftsman. While he was still some distance away from his profession improvement at the age of 25, he gained his racial evolution at the age of 10.
While many are disappointed by the effects of evolution, Joanna's case is far from disappointing. His feet have grown back. The wooden leg had just been taken away, and the newly formed leg had appeared.
He was far from the only individual with lasting damage or disability in their camp, and his case had given them all new hope, and give everyone with the strength of a profession like never before. Even Richard was very pleased and went to congratulate and offer him to become the official leader of the crafters.
Joanna rejected it at first, but she eventually gave up on the insistence of the other crafters around her. It was only two days ago, but he held quite a bit of political power throughout the camp now, as the value of the profession came into view. He had thrown most of his new responsibilities to Jacob, whom he gladly took upon himself to be useful.
As a group, they had learned a lot about the usefulness of the profession, with Jacob primarily tasked with gathering information about what people were now capable of. No one could make potions or anything like that, but some had gained the cooking profession. Food cooked by them allows wounds to heal faster, and many can even help the body fight off potential infections or toxins. In addition, foods tend to provide additional bonuses, such as mana enhancement and stamina regeneration, the best of which even provide temporary bonuses for endurance stat.
However, the most outstanding craftsman of them all was not Joanna. It was one of the people who joined their camp later. He was a great man who had worked as a foreman in a steel factory before the tutorial along with being a heavy fighter, who had even chosen a hammer as his starting weapon. As it turned out, the man even did smithing in his spare time and chose the hammer as it felt more natural in his hands.
With all those factors coming together, it was no wonder that the man obtained the blacksmith profession. But more than that, he was also a talented fighter. He was the second person to develop his race after Richard, and if Jacob's prediction was correct, he was currently the highest in terms of races in their entire camp, although it had yet to improve his class. However, he was likely still above level 20 in his class. Even with the profession taking longer to level up, Jacob considered it still around level 14 or 15, if not higher.
Jacob did not know the name of the man; he was simply gone by The Smith. Without a doubt, he had proven himself to be extremely valuable as time went by, and many of their weapons began to require repairs. Many upgrade tokens have been discovered, giving away their own repair equipment, but only accounted for less than a quarter of their weapons and armor.
A blacksmith can also temporarily upgrade weapons and armor, and according to The Smith, he can also improve his performance permanently if he has the right materials. He did all the work for free because of the experience he gained from doing so, which led Jacob to consider the impact of leveling systems on pre-employment market systems.
Throwing away that thought, he started walking into his cabin. The cabin was built by one of the newly discovered professions, named 'builder'. As the name suggests, they can build houses and even have landscaping skills that are a bit reminiscent of earth magic.
Speaking of magic, Ahmed had managed to raise his class a few days ago. He had chosen to become a caster accustomed to ice magic. After his evolution, he flapped quite a lot of punches, throwing away sharp ice shards. In addition, the new ability is also quite useful for cooling drinks and preserving food.
Of the six survivors in their group, only Jacob and Joanna had not received a class upgrade. Bertram, who has been on Jacob's side so far, had reached 25 early on the same day and was a defense-focused class. Casper has also gone through the evolution of his class.
Casper never felt comfortable with the bow and instead gained a trapping skill at level 5. He still used his bow, but now mainly to lure his enemy into a trap.
The reason why Casper leveled up before himself was due to the conflict with the other factions. The night raids began four days ago, and Richard had increased the number of people standing guard significantly. Jobs were mainly given to archers because of their high perception and the Archery Eye skill.
What Casper had done was set up many traps around their camp, and yesterday it came to fruition. He single-handedly killed four attackers above level 20 and captured the other two.
Neither Jacob nor Casper liked the thought of killing others. One could understand why the archer was shocked when he was woken up in the middle of the night due to a system message telling him that he had killed people. The impending evolution of the class passed as he was filled with negative emotions.
Jacob himself hasn't taken anyone's life. Something he hopes will not change before this tutorial ends.
After checking in with some builders, he arrived back at his cabin. He opens the wooden door and is greeted by Caroline, who must have just returned from another trip with Richard and his army.
“Hey, how is the trip?” Jacob asked as he walked over and sat on the bed beside him.
Caroline, leaning on her shoulder, replied. “Same as usual. Did something happen today? Is Casper okay?”
“Yes, he's holding her. We are all, I guess, ” he said, after hearing the worry in his voice.
“This will be fine, Jacob. We'll be fine,” he comforts her as she curls up closer to him.
Sensing his intention, he wrapped his hands around her shoulders as the two of them fell back onto the bed, hugging.
Another significant change is their relationship. Jacob had known that Caroline loved him more than a coworker for a long time. However, as his superior, he had chosen to try and ignore it, because the brotherhood had never looked good. He also did not want to make her submit to his family's politics.
But here, no one cares. So, when Caroline made a move, she had no reason to reject him. Jacob had never even considered it before because of their professional relationship. She has to admit that she's attractive, with evolution at 10 just making her prettier. It might just be the hanging bridge effect, but he didn't really care at the moment.
Caroline being a 'breadwinner' in the relationship hurt her vanity a bit, but she could see the humor about how their roles had completely changed compared to before the system.
You can say a lot of bad things about Richard, but he treats people he considers important well. With Caroline at the very top of her list, she was naturally treated very well. The fact that they have their own cabin just for the two of them is a living proof of this.
His status had come down to Jacob also being treated better, although his abilities were lacking in combat. Jacob is not a dead weight, but. When a camp grows to three digits, a certain amount of management becomes necessary.
One can say many things about Jacob, but if he is good at everything, it is management. This led to him being responsible for building camps, making shifts, and tracking down all of their members. He was a little disappointed because he had not yet obtained the profession of manager. She has been offered skills related to management, despite being a tailor, which is rather interesting.
Their camp has grown, not only in people, but also in complexity. With individuals able to build buildings quickly, cooks, blacksmiths, etc., the need for more permanent solutions becomes necessary. A wall had been built for several days now, traps were laid mainly by Casper and one other archer who had to upgrade his class, and several other plans were underway.
As he pondered, he looked at Caroline. He looked back at her, looking into her eyes. He smiled as he leaned over and gave her a kiss on his forehead.
“Ya, we will be fine.”