The Primal Hunter

It turned out that poor old Polsted had been held up at home by a fourth accomplice of the people trying to rob his store. Everything had been part of some big conspiracy where the young man had been a new employee who was just there to scope out the place, and after learning where the jeweler lived, they followed him home one day and held him at swordpoint. From there, they would spend the next day robbing the store, and the reason the young man had been the only one in the store was to inspect the magical seals on the display cases and eventually dismantle them.

The Darkeye Diamond hadn’t even been part of the expected haul. It was pure coincidence Jake had come by that day, and the thieves had assumed they could just rob the stupid Courier along with the rest of the store. That, or Jake’s insistence on seeking out Polsted had put a target on his head.

Of course, Jake knew there weren’t actually any coincidences going on, but a carefully crafted scenario that tested the Courier and kind of set the stage from the get-go for how these jobs would work. Jake wouldn’t be surprised if the easy option had been to just deliver a letter in a mailbox, with the medium option being something in between that and what Jake had to do.

Jake’s takeaway from the first job was that he had to be careful while delivering stuff, as it was pretty damn easy to mess it up and fail the delivery. It also made a lot more sense he wouldn’t lose one of the three lives if he did mess up, as it would have been so easy. In fact, Jake would guess quite a few would just have given the package to the young man who appeared to be working in the jewelry store. The only reason Jake had been suspicious was because of the very minor clues the young man had given off and the fact he remembered the dwarf calling the one he had to deliver to ”old man Polsted.”

Unless calling him an old man was some weird inside joke between the dwarf and Polsted, Jake had a strong feeling something shady was going on.

After being done with the job of delivering the diamond to Polsted and teaching another robber the literal definition of the phrase ”if looks could kill,” Jake headed back toward the Guild for another job. On the way, he also took the time to reflect a bit on the newly upgraded mythical rarity Primal Gaze. He hadn’t really had a good opportunity to test it since the upgrade, and he had to admit it had gotten a lot stronger than before, especially when it came to the soul-killing part.

In truth, he hadn’t thought it would actually work. He had just hoped to either do some serious damage or knock them out, but the skill turned out to do a bit more than that. True, he had used it with the intent to kill, so it wasn’t like he felt bad about the outcome. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Killing someone around twenty levels below him with a single look was damn good. Before, killing any C-grade outright wasn’t easy, but now it had worked effortlessly, and he got the feeling it would still have been lethal even if they had been a few levels higher. They were pretty weak for their levels, yes, but they were also enlightened and tended to have a bit stronger souls than the average monster.

Then again, it wasn’t like killing them without Gaze would have been hard. A single well-landed stab with Eternal Hunger on each would have gotten the job done just as well. An arrow from a few dozen kilometers away would definitely have, too. But Primal Gaze was definitely the best way to kill them for a few reasons, one more important than the other.

First of all, it was as fast as a kill could be, making it by far the most efficient. Secondly, killing someone with a look had a damn great intimidation factor, and convincing the young man to not only tell him where Polsted was but even turn himself in for his crimes to the guards had been easy as pie after seeing his two friends die from a glance each. It also helped that Jake very much implied the young man could share the same fate as his friends if he didn’t go to the guards.

Third, and most importantly, with the way Primal Gaze worked, Jake would effectively pit his own soul against someone else’s when using the skill. This was actually pretty good exposure training for his own soul to potentially experience a bit of growth simply due to the practice, though he wasn’t sure how much it would help, especially when the targets were so weak.

Oh… and finally, one incredibly vital reason: killing with weapons was messy, and Jake was a good Courier who didn’t also leave the client with an extra unnecessary clean-up fee.

As Jake was still deep in thought, he arrived back at the Guild. It had only been a few hours since he left the first time around, with the only reason it took so long because he had to deal with guards who came to Polsted’s place for a statement after everything was done.

Entering, he went to get a number as the same dwarf he had talked with the first time called him over.

”Hey, new Courier, over here!” he yelled.

Jake didn’t need to be told twice that he could cut the line as he hurried over. Surprisingly, nobody gave him any nasty stares. The dwarf seemed to notice Jake’s surprise and explained as he arrived in front of the desk.

”People give some extra respect for Couriers; it’s a dangerous job, after all, and few want to walk down that road but prefer to just do other odd jobs,” the dwarf explained. ”Something I am sure I don’t need to tell you after that last job of yours. Things got nasty, eh?”

”Definitely did,” Jake confirmed. ”Say, can you tell me a bit more about this odd treatment of Couriers? I also noticed how the guards seemed weirdly… I almost wanna say hands-off with me and just told me that you guys at the Guild would handle it.”

”Because they are hands-off,” the dwarf said. ”For someone who entered the Courier industry, you sure know little about it. Oh well, you are promising, so let me give you a quick rundown. Couriers are neutral, unaffiliated individuals who do not answer to or work for any specific faction outside of the Guild. This means you have some levels of diplomatic immunity dependent on the rank of your Medallion, and the Guild is in charge of taking care of any potential trouble you get into. Of course, there are limits, so do control yourself, but in a case like this, you acted in the interest of your client and didn’t go overboard, so things are fine. Just know that if you do go too far, the Guild itself may send an enforcer… you don’t want the Guild to send an enforcer.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

”I’ll be careful… but I’ve also been wondering, what exactly is the Guild?” Jake also asked, knowing full well that if he was a native to this world, he would have just outed himself as either a complete moron who had lived under a rock his entire life. Or maybe it would have outed him as a transdimensional traveler. Well, or, you know, someone just doing a Challenge Dungeon inside of a World Wonder.

Luckily for him, the dwarf didn’t at all comment on Jake’s lack of any common knowledge but just answered:

”The Guild is a massive organization that operates on every single continent, has affiliates in every major city, and has managed to remain entirely neutral despite the political turmoil. Not to say there aren’t internal problems, but those aren’t for you to deal with. Suffice to say, the Guild has enough power to rival any faction and we are quite respected.”

”This is a bit cheeky of a question, but who is the strongest in the Guild?” Jake asked for fun, wondering if he could take them.

”The Founder,” the dwarf said with a sense of respect. ”An absolutely legendary adventurer. Rose to power about forty thousand years ago after he managed to single-handedly beat back the dragon tribes, even slaying the the Dragon King in the process. He made the Guild after retiring and still rules it today and is one of only five known S-grades in the world.”

Jake was nodding along mentally to the explanation until he got to the end. There were fucking S-grades in this world. That meant there were also plenty of A-grades and B-grades around. All of this is to say that fucking around could quickly lead to finding out if he somehow managed to piss off the wrong people. This was definitely good to know.

It also left him with one other important question.

”Any gods?”

”Gods?” the dwarf asked. ”Well, some people do refer to the Founder as a godlike entity, but I am not sure if calling him a god is right despite his overwhelming power.”

”I see,” Jake nodded as he conducted a minor test. Purposefully, he began to let out a bit of aura from his Shroud of the Primordial. It was the part that signified his Blessing as the Chosen of the Malefic Viper. The aura with divine quality slowly seeped out, but the dwarf didn’t at all react as he just looked at Jake, who stood there quietly.

”So… any more questions? I also got some more clients waiting if you wanna take another job, or do you perhaps want to take a rest first?” he asked after Jake hadn’t said anything for several seconds.

Jake fully retracted his aura and smiled. ”Yeah, let me look at the jobs available.

His small test had naturally been regarding Blessings. He wanted to see if others could feel his Blessing, as that could potentially have allowed him to use it to mess with people at some point. However, it seemed not a single soul could detect it, making Jake believe the Wyrmgod had cut off using divine auras from being a thing. This restriction was probably for the best. It would be an absolutely massive advantage for those with Blessings as they could use the aura to intimidate practically everyone, especially in a world with no actual gods. Jake could only begin to imagine the ways one could exploit Blessings… and he wasn’t even that crafty compared to others who could have no doubt found far more ways to take advantage.

”Here ya go, three more jobs available,” the dwarf said as he took out three papers. Right as he did so, three system messages also popped up in front of Jake’s eyes.

Courier Job 2 (Easy): Deliver five letters to their respective destinations within the city.

Courier Job 2 (Medium): Deliver the shipment of Minor Vitae Ruby to the Merchant’s Union within the city.

Courier Job 2 (Hard): Go to the Firesteel Blacksmith and pick up the Governor Blade. Then, deliver the Governor Blade to the Governor’s office. Both locations are within the city.

After skimming them all, still working on getting a better idea of how this entire Challenge Dungeon worked, he naturally picked the hard option again. The only new revelation here was that old jobs would disappear if he didn’t pick them and that a Courier Job could be chained. That is to say, have multiple steps and not just a point A to point B delivery.

The dwarf once more infused Jake’s Medallion before the newly appointed Courier got to work. The second job turned out to kind of be easier than the first one, with the only added difficulty coming from Jake having to enter the Governor’s Office which was well-defended. The defenses were at least a lot better than elsewhere, with guards around level 250, and they gave off decently strong vibes for their levels. The magical formation protecting the office was even better, likely laid down by a high-tier C-grade.

This job took a bit of socializing, but not enough to put Jake off. If he had to guess, this entire mission was to hammer home the concept that Couriers had a unique political position in this world. Just flashing the Medallion was enough for the suspicion of most to fall away, and while Jake didn’t get to meet the Governor directly, he was attended by a direct aide and seen immediatly.

With another job done, Jake saw no reason to stop as he headed back to the Guild again and accepted a third hard job that required him to deliver items to three different people across the city. That seemed easy enough… except this one was on a timer as it was an urgent job.

Alright, it was still easy as hell, Jake not having to rush at all. This Courier Job did teach Jake that Couriers were allowed to fly freely, even within cities. So that was a nice snippet of information to get as Jake completed the rush delivery to all three clients.

Like this, the Courier Jobs continued for several days as Jake stayed within the first starting city for all of them. Every new job introduced minor new elements or twists to add to the difficulty or teach him new job concepts. One of the Courier Jobs was even to deliver a person. No, not some fucked up slavery shit, but an escort mission as someone had to enter the slums and didn’t feel safe going there. Mind you, there wasn’t anything in the slums that was actually dangerous. The client was just a posh lady who acted entitled throughout, with the biggest difficulty during this job coming from resisting just punching her in the face and leaving.

Besides that, it was a lot of small interesting twists. In one, he had to find the client he had to deliver the item to himself as he had gone into hiding. In another job, he had to deliver a letter without being seen by any of the neighbors of the client, but Jake’s favorite one was a job where he was attacked by a dog in a yard.

That one sure brought back memories from his old delivery job days, and the same solution he used back before the system also worked wonders here. Needless to say, Jake couldn’t and wouldn’t hurt a dog that was just protecting its territory as it was supposed to, so he always just made dogs back down by staring them down.

Sure, Jake did know staring into the eyes of a stranger’s dog was heavily advised against, but in Jake’s case, it had always been a great way to make the dog go away. His Bloodline was truly versatile even back then.

By now, Jake had completed nineteen jobs already, and he was honestly beginning to feel more than a little bored despite the new elements introduced. It honestly just felt like a normal job, which even made him suspect that the initial Courier Jobs being this mind-numbing was also part of the experience somehow.

However, when he returned to job number twenty, something finally changed.

”Back again, I see,” the dwarf said with a big smile. ”You are definitely the most hard-working Courier I’ve seen in a good while! Listen, the third job this time around is a bit different from those prior… it will require you to leave the city for a while.”

That’s right, Jake was finally allowed to not just act as a small-time in-city delivery man, but had graduated to become a… not in-city delivery man? Jake wasn’t sure there was a term for it, but damn, did it feel good to finally be let outside.