Choi Yu-Seong returned to his daily life after taking a day off to rest his tired body and mind. He woke up early in the morning and drank coffee made by Jin Do-Yoon while thinking about the day before yesterday. He still had many things to take care of even after the exam.

First, he needed to think through his response to Odin's proposal. Choi Yu-Seong still did not regret his response.

‘Sorry, but it’s not time yet.’

There was only one reason why gods gave players skills, which was like giving away a portion of their own power.

‘The only reason why they would do such a thing would be to increase their shares in a player they like.’

One might wonder why it was important for a god to invest in a player. This was the only part in the original novel, [Modern Master Returns], that was explained in great detail. Because of that, Choi Yu-Seong could clearly remember this detail. For the record, there was one ultimate thing that all gods wanted.

That is, building up karma points for themselves, which was why they invested in players. Then why did they spend their own karma points if they wanted to increase them? It appeared unclear why at first glance, but there was a reason for this.

‘Just like anyone else, gods also want to grow.’ 

Karma was the resource they needed to grow. However, once they became gods, it was not an easy thing to build Karma. This was because the rate of accumulated karma was lowered to a ridiculous degree due to the penalties they received as gods. The power and the authority they gained as gods worked against them in this aspect.

For instance, Thor—the god of thunder—was known for his battlefield prowess, his mighty hammer, and his resounding victories. If he hunted a dragon, he would gain about a thousand karma. What if an ordinary human such as Choi Yu-Seong hunted the same dragon? Since hunting a dragon would be counted as a legendary feat, the Karma he would get would be about a million—a thousand times higher than Thor, maybe even more.

Gods who invested in a player would receive a portion of the karma points, according to the percentage of sponsorship, every time that player performed an outstanding achievement. This was similar to a relationship between an investor and a corporation.

That said, there was one thing that was very different from the original concept of stock investment. It was safe to say that the corporation—in this case, the player—(had almost nothing to lose in their trade with the investor, the god.

‘It’s because according to the setting of the original novel, karma points apply equally to gods and humans.’

In other words, the transaction did not work by splitting the karma points between humans and god. Rather, the god received a ‘duplicate’ of the karma points earned by the player. All in all, it was what could be called a ‘win-win situation.’

Therefore, when gods saw players with outstanding potential, they did not hesitate to support them with karma or by bequeathing a certain still. Sometimes, gods even gifted their unique skills to increase their return on investment as quickly as possible.

If that were the case, why were gods in a hurry to earn more karma? This could be explained as well by comparing it with stocks: if the entry price was too high, it would be difficult to receive decent returns on the investment. In other words, there was considerably less chance for a new god to make a karma profit from a player who had already received considerable investment from other gods. Naturally, such a thing wouldn’t be a problem for a god with sufficient capital, who would have many strong skills or a large amount of Karma points.

In the concept of modern stock investment, the sellers could only trade if they released goods for sale. In contrast, the competition between gods to acquire such ‘stocks’ could be overthrown if one god put forward enough capital.

However, as investors, they wanted to gain as much as possible with as little expenditure as possible. Therefore, it was natural for the gods to pay attention to the players with great potential—those known as super rookies, who could be compared to start-ups. Ultimately, discovering talented players as fast as possible and investing in them was one of the skills necessary to become an outstanding god.

Choi Yu-Seong had already committed to memory the details and explanations regarding the gods found in the [Modern Master Returns]. Although Odin’s proposal was surprising and tempting, he did not want to hastily accept the offer, considering the possible risks.

‘There are many gods in the world who have a better reputation than Odin or are more favorable toward humans.’

As a god, Odin couldn’t help but covet the karma that could be earned from a human’s achievements. He had no intention to suppress his greed either.

The investments that gods provided to the players were not little, considering that only a small part of their accumulated karma was spent.

In the first place, humans could only use Karma in special shops, unless they were gods or they received the sponsorship of gods.

Simply put, the player gave away some of the resources that they couldn’t use right away and received something they could use in return. There was nothing to lose.

And that was why Yu-Seong thought that it was a foolish choice to accept the offer right away from someone like Odin, who was such a complicated, hard-to-understand god.

What if Odin gave him an S-rank skill that Yu-Seong couldn't even use right away? S-rank skills could be only used once a player reached the S rank. Yu-Seong had just gained the hunter license, and he needed at least a few years to climb up to S-rank from E-rank. In that case, Odin’s S-rank skill would be useless to him at the moment.

‘I’m sure it'll be nice the day I can actually use it.’

But in the meantime, would there be a possibility that another god appeared and provided support that could rival Odin’s S-rank skill?

It was simply a matter of chance. If Yu-Seong was lucky enough, another principal god might appear to sponsor him, but he didn’t know for sure.

It was likely that the majority of the gods would give up on early investment and back off when a principal god like Odin was to present a player with a skill.

In this situation, what would happen if Odin left Yu-Seong to fend for himself since Odin had already raised his own share by throwing him a skill? Yu-Seong would be no different than a duck egg left along in Nakdong river[1]. He did not want to limit his growth potential like this.

Yu-Seong didn’t know if it was a good thing or not, but Odin had not sent him another message after being rejected once. Instead, making the situation more interesting, another god sent a message to him.

-[Private] A Joke-loving Prankster said he likes you. He is willing to give you a skill.

Y/N

At first glance, it seems like a random nickname. However, Yu-Seong knew that this god was someone to never look down on.

‘Loki Laufeyarson.’

He was one of the most famous gods in Norse mythology along with Odin and Thor, one who could be seen as the key figure in Ragnarǫk.

He wasn’t a principal god like Odin, but no one could ever say he was below Odin. In fact, in the story of Ragnarǫk, didn’t Fenrir, the son of Loki, kill Odin by swallowing him? The interesting thing was that Loki's message was sent right after Yu-Seong had rejected Odin.

In a way, it could be considered a rather slow reaction, unbefitting of the character of Loki in Norse mythology. Yu-Seong thus formed two hypotheses about this situation.

First, Loki was happy that Yu-Seong had rejected the support of Loki’s enemy, Odin.

‘This is almost impossible.’

In the original novel, it was explained that even gods could not spy on private system messages. Of course, since it wasn’t explained properly, it was possible that there were flaws in his understanding. The likelihood that there was a way to see private messages only increased if the person was Loki.

The second hypothesis was that the one who had sent the first message was actually not Odin.

‘I did fight quite a lot, but I don’t think that was enough to attract the attention of the principal god. ‘

There was a reason why principal gods were called principal gods. They were literally the gods who were the centerpiece of the mythical world.

They were already so powerful and at a level so high that climbing any higher was almost impossible, even if they received Karma points from humans!

It was not easy to stand out to such an existence, and it was even harder to be given their skills, rather than just sponsorship.

Unlike the lesser gods that fought to increase their profits through sponsorship, a principal god didn’t have to hurry or rush to give a skill to a person who wasn’t quite a super rookie they could actually use. Of course, if there was such a person worthy enough, Odin could have completely dominated the sponsorship and blocked other gods from sponsoring like Yu-Seong had hypothesized before, but something like this happening was very rare.

Even Kim Do-Jin, the main character of the original novel, received a proposal from a principal god only after he achieved B-rank. With that in mind, Odin's proposal for Choi Yu-Seong had come too early.

‘Of course, there is no difference even if it was Loki who made the offer.’

In the first place, Loki was enterprising and fast-moving compared to other gods.

But why did Yu-Seong think that Odin could be fake even after the latter had revealed his nickname?

‘It’s because it’s possible for Loki.’

Loki was good at disguising, no, transforming himself, and it was quite common for him to use another god’s nickname as if it were his own.

In fact, Loki was the god who placed Kim Do-Jin in a difficult situation several times by impersonating someone else and playing tricks in the original novel. There was no reason for him not to do the same to Yu-Seong. Because of that, Yu-Seong did not reject Loki’s proposal as fast as Odin’s.

'If Odin's offer was also from Loki, it means that he’s reaching out again after being rejected.’

In other words, there was no urgency for Yu-Seong.

Considering the various situations he had thought through before, it was okay to take some time and carefully consider Loki’s proposal, because it was proven that Loki was very interested in Yu-Seong. In fact, Loki was showing interest in Yu-Seong even at this moment.

-[Private] A Joke-loving Prankster is winking at you. He sponsored 20 Karma points. 

In many ways, Choi Yu-Seong had no choice but to lean toward his second hypothesis even more. So there was nothing wrong with putting this problem on the back burner for a bit longer.

Instead, he thought about how he couldn't catch Choi Min-Seok, even though he had decided to beat Min-Seok up.

“I really should have warned him this time.”

When Yu-Seong visited his house, he couldn't even see a trace of Min-Seok. It was as if he had realized that Yu-Seong would come and had run away. If Yu-Seong had stubbornly waited by the front door, then he might have caught Min-Seok, but he didn’t go that far.

'I'll let go of you this time. If you try to pull any other stunts, I won’t let you off the hook easily.'

There were two reasons for this decision.

First, the fact that Choi Min-Seok was trying to avoid Yu-Seong. If he chickened out like this, there was no reason for Yu-Seong to stress out or be bothered by him.

Secondly, and more importantly, Yu-Seong could finally relax for a while.

‘I’ve finally got my hunter’s license, and I’m starting to see the results of my training as well.’

Time was on Yu-Seong’s side.

Choi Min-Seok possessed decent talent, but he was rather lazy and arrogant. On the other hand, Yu-Seong continued to grow by always pushing himself. In other words, Choi Yu-Seong would soon surpass Min-Seok. The two of them would be in different leagues.

‘I need to aim higher.’

If he wanted to stabilize his current life and settle down, he didn’t have the leisure to bother about obstacles on the level of Choi Min-Seok.

However, he didn’t want to become arrogant after only taking his first step.

‘Come to think of it, I finally have over 100 karma.’

Choi Yu-Seong had only received 93 karma points until yesterday. However, with the 20 points he had gained from Loki, he was now sitting at 113. Players could use karma points in various ways, but most of the time, they spent them in a single place.

Choi Yu-Seong muttered while recalling how it was used, “Summon Dimensional Merchant. Set Lion Bear Clan as the condition.”

Y/N

The friendly system was asking for the player’s consent, as usual.

“Yes, please,” Yu-Seong said. Although the system was a machine without emotions, Yu-Seong spoke in a respectful way, with a smile. He wanted to respond in kind to the system’s hospitality.

Among the many settings described in the original novel, he remembered that there was someone who had obtained a hidden piece by speaking in a polite tone to the system. Unfortunately, the novel only mentioned it very briefly and did not reveal the identity of the lucky figure until the end of the first chapter. As such, he wasn’t sure which hidden piece he could obtain.

However, he had nothing to lose from being polite, right?

The system responded mechanically, unaware of his true thoughts. Choi Yu-Seong slowly stood up from his seat and headed to the kitchen. He rummaged through a box of lollipops he had bought from a convenience store the night before, then pulled out several before heading back to his room.

He came across Do-Yoon and Yu-Ri on his way back. The two attempted to start a conversation, but he waved them off and went back to his room.

Once he returned and closed the door, a system message suddenly popped up.

“Great timing,” Choi Yu-Seong responded to the system message with a smile, then took a seat in front of a tea table and nonchalantly placed the lollipops on the table.

Exactly ten seconds passed, and a cute little pink door appeared in front of his eyes with a glazing light and a distortion of space. The pink door was similar in appearance to a door made for toy dolls that children would play with.

The handle of the door rotated with a small sound.

A pink bear proudly waddled in from behind the door. He then folded his thick, adorable arms and stared up at Choi Yu-Seong before speaking.

“Nice to meet you, human. I am Ping Pong of the great Lion Bear Clan. You should be honored to make a contract with my great self.”

He was truly charismatic.

1. It’s a Korean idiom describing a situation in which someone is left to fend for themselves without any help ☜