With the awakened hunters avoiding Jackson, and Jackson himself avoiding any monsters roaming the outer forest, the journey of a hundred kilometers—which should originally have taken a couple of hours—ended much faster than expected.
By twelve in the afternoon, Jackson was already standing at the border of the outer forest.
That was two full hours earlier than his original estimate.
Jackson immediately slowed his pace.
From the information he had gathered, there had been sightings of a corrupted twelve-legged iron spider at the border between the outer and inner forest.
He ran through the details in his mind again.
The spider itself was a Peak First Sequence monster, one of the weakest corrupted monsters found in the inner region. Its power was roughly the same as the minotaur he had previously killed, but...
Thinking up to this point, Jackson’s eyes narrowed slightly.
Unlike the minotaur, which moved alone, the corrupted iron spider traveled with multiple underlings.
Without a doubt, the fight would be Jackson against many.
That was exactly why he had been hesitating.
If he was being too impatient, maybe it would be smarter to wait one more week. By then, his stats might inch closer to the peak of First Sequence, and the hunt would be much safer.
But as soon as that thought appeared, Jackson shook his head with a decisive look.
"That may be true in an ideal world. But while I wait, others could be thinking the same thing. Time waits for no one. I’d better make use of every opportunity I have."
Although it was risky, this much risk was something he was willing to take.
With that, Jackson’s resolve hardened completely.
He no longer hesitated and simply started tracking the clues, moving deeper into the forest.
Without realizing it, the forest gradually became denser, eventually turning into a shallow swamp filled with water.
That environmental shift was a clear sign that the spider was close.
Then Jackson suddenly halted.
The sound of weapons clashing intensely came from afar.
Immediately, his face darkened as a possibility flashed through his mind.
It seemed someone had beaten him to it and reached the corrupted iron spider first.
Just like him, others also considered the iron spider worth the risk.
Although he realized that, Jackson had no intention of giving up so easily.
He quickly moved closer to the sound of battle, his figure deeply hidden among the shadows of the tall trees. Unless someone looked directly at him, it would have been difficult to detect his presence.
That was one of the benefits of moving alone.
A single person caused barely any disturbance.
Soon, Jackson saw an empty clearing in the distance.
A group of four hunters, dressed in high-quality alloy armor and holding sharp weapons, were clashing head-on with a monster that stood seven or eight feet tall. Its more than a dozen legs slashed through the air like sharp swords, while its malicious eyes tracked the movements of the awakened hunters in real time, giving them almost no chance to land a lethal strike.
Around the battlefield lay the corpses of multiple smaller monsters that bore an eerie resemblance to the iron spider.
It seemed the hunters had come prepared and had first eliminated the spider’s underlings.
Jackson’s eyes swept across the scene.
He quickly realized that the hunters seemed to have the upper hand.
Although the iron spider still looked dangerous, he could already see its movements slowing in real time.
If nothing unexpected happened, the team of four would soon slaughter it.
He didn’t want that.
He didn’t care whether those people had found the spider before him.
In his eyes, the monster belonged to him.
Thinking this, the air around Jackson turned slightly chilly.
Even so, he did not immediately attack.
Instead, he continued to watch.
He was waiting for the right outcome.
Meanwhile, the eyes of the four hunters had also lit up with excitement as they saw the iron spider nearing doom.
One of the slender hunters could not help but comment out loud, "Boss, we’re going to strike it rich. The carcass of this monster goes for as high as fifty thousand mana stones on the open market..."
However, the team leader, a man with a steady gaze, simply grunted.
"Don’t get distracted now. The battle isn’t over until the monster is dead."
Although the leader said that, the way he licked his lips showed that even he believed the battle was practically won.
Anyone with a brain could reach that conclusion.
Jackson was thinking the same thing and was already preparing to act when he noticed something strange.
Suddenly, the spider’s movements became insanely ferocious, and a slightly heart-palpitating aura radiated from its body.
Seeing this, Jackson’s heart skipped a beat.
He had a rough idea of what was happening.
The spider was trying to advance to the Second Sequence in the middle of battle.
The monster had already been at the peak of the First Sequence, which was actually rather low for a monster living in the inner forest. No one doubted that it possessed the ability to ascend to the next sequence.
But the fact that it had chosen to do so in the middle of battle left everyone stunned.
Leveling up in the middle of a fight—wasn’t that a little too fierce?
If Jackson could notice it, then naturally the four hunters fighting the spider also sensed the change.
The leader shouted at the top of his lungs,
"Not good!"
But his warning came too late.
One of his men, who had been standing too close to the spider, was suddenly blasted backward into the forest, his fate unknown.
Jackson, who had been waiting all this time, realized he could not remain hidden any longer.
If he continued to wait, he would lose his only chance to kill the spider.
His sudden appearance startled the hunters, but once they noticed the aura radiating from his body, they paid him no further attention.
Jackson also did not care about their reaction.
His focus was entirely on the iron spider, a chilling killing intent erupting from the depths of his eyes.
Without hesitation, he made use of the Golden Brush.
The next moment, the spider exploded into a shower of blood from within, leaving behind two objects that fell to the ground.
Looking at the scene, Jackson let out a sigh of relief.
Thankfully, he had reacted in time.
If he had been even one step later, and the spider had managed to rank up...
Jackson did not even want to imagine such a scenario.
Ignoring those thoughts for now, his gaze settled on the three remaining hunters.
Now the question was—
how was he going to deal with them?
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