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HELHEIM SCANS
[Translator - Night]
[Proofreader - Gun]
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Chapter 115: S-Rank (1)
Skuld said that Odin would check, but I didn't expect him to come so soon.
Well, it's not like I know the prophecy either.
And since I'm A-rank, I have the system's protection…
There's no need to be intimidated.
"What do you want?"
Still, it's a bit rude to speak informally to the king of gods.
Odin, who had possessed Aria, responded to my words.
"It would have been easier to simply execute Skuld, but I wondered if she had revealed too much unnecessary information."
"I was going to hear the third prophecy after listening to the second one, but lightning kept striking so fiercely. In the end, she just begged to be killed."
Then, his left eye gleamed red.
[You are bound by the Mimir’s Eye of the Supreme God, Odin.]
[You cannot resist.]
And suddenly, words spilled out of my mouth on their own.
"But she said that I am your adversary and the Soul God who will open a new world. Doesn't this relate to the third prophecy?"
As soon as I met Odin's gaze, I found myself speaking without control—adding my own opinions on top of it.
What the hell?
Is this Odin’s Mimir’s Eye’s power...?
Bang!
Suddenly, Odin's red eye burst.
Blood splattered everywhere, and fragments of the eyeball dripped down.
However, Odin remained unfazed.
He calmly raised his left hand and brushed over the wound.
A black eyepatch materialized over the empty socket.
"No matter how exceptional a Valkyrie may be, she is still mortal. This is all she could manage."
[The power of the Mimir’s Eye drastically decreases.]
[You resist the Mimir’s Eye.]
Only after his eye burst did I finally regain control of my body.
"What the…?"
"Ho. Regaining your freedom so quickly despite the injury to my eye… You truly are a Soul Awakener."
Odin didn't seem particularly surprised, even after hearing that I was his adversary and destined to open a new world.
Did he already know?
Hmm… If he knows I'm his adversary, shouldn't he just get rid of me right away?
But he's just watching.
Aria, still possessed by Odin, smirked.
"You seem puzzled."
"You don’t seem particularly hostile despite me being your adversary."
"I don’t care about that. As long as you don’t know the third prophecy, everything else is irrelevant. Just continue as you were."
He genuinely didn’t seem to care.
Rather, as long as the third prophecy remained unknown, he was fine with letting me be.
He really didn’t care at all.
"This Valkyrie’s body has reached its limit. I shall take my leave."
With that, Aria's body collapsed.
Did he really just come to confirm whether I knew the prophecy or not and then leave?
Now I’m even more curious.
Aria, who had been unconscious, soon got back up, clutching her eye.
"Ugh… My eye…."
As soon as she regained consciousness, pain overwhelmed her, and she held her injured eye.
"Jiho…? What happened? Why is my eye…?"
"Odin descended."
"Odin descended? Ugh… Then my eye… Why did he descend?"
"It was something to do with Skuld’s death."
Aria looked at me strangely.
"What does killing Guan Yu have to do with Odin descending?"
Guan Yu?
"Skuld. Skuld, the time god of your pantheon. The one who sees the future."
"Jiho, you don’t need to keep calling him Guan Yu. I understand you."
No matter how many times I said Skuld, she kept hearing it as Guan Yu.
"Forget it… If you don’t want to explain, I won’t press."
Realizing her eye couldn’t be healed since Odin’s power had been involved, Aria sighed and touched her wound before disappearing into light.
Oh.
She usually sends me back in the elevator, but this time, she teleported herself instead.
Was she that shaken by losing her eye?
Hmm, could Odin have done something to her?
Is it just Aria who can’t hear Skuld’s name, or does this apply to everyone?
I didn’t want to stay in this place any longer, where the Einherjar statues were glaring at me.
Now should be a good time to use Heimdall’s Return.
"Heimdall’s Return."
I activated the ability and teleported home.
Now, I needed to figure out whether this only affected Aria or if it applied to others too.
So, I summoned Diana.
"Jiho, you’re back. How was your trip?"
"Skuld. Skuld."
Would Diana also hear it as Guan Yu?
"Huh? Skuld? What’s that?"
Fortunately, she heard it correctly.
Diana tilted her head, confused.
Since she’s an Olympian god, I guess she wouldn’t know about her.
"That’s a relief. Here’s what happened today."
I explained everything—how I was trying to hear Skuld’s prophecy but had to kill her because Odin interfered, how Odin appeared the moment I left her prison, and how Aria kept mishearing Skuld’s name.
Diana’s expression hardened.
"A god of the future making such a prophecy…"
"Seems strange, right?"
"Yes. Zeus attacking Odin, you destroying Odin… The details are too contradictory."
"If Odin had simply defeated Zeus, it’d be one thing. But if Zeus attacked him, wouldn’t that mean their alliance is over?"
"Exactly. But there’s no sign of that happening…"
Diana fell into deep thought before speaking again.
"How about testing Loki? Since he recently offered you a lower deity, he might not know about this."
"Loki? Yeah, since he’s a higher god, he shouldn’t hear Skuld as Guan Yu."
I tried contacting Loki.
However…
[Connection unavailable.]
A message popped up, saying the connection was impossible.
But just yesterday, I could communicate with him just fine.
Why is it suddenly not working?
Could this be related to what happened?
"Loki isn’t responding at all."
"Then maybe you should ask someone else. Since this involves Earth, why not ask the gods of Earth?"
I should try calling my father.
[Jiho, you’ve been raking in an insane amount of SP lately. Thanks to you, Gabriel will wake up soon.]
"That’s good to hear, Father. But…"
Unlike Loki, I could contact my father through the system.
After explaining what happened, my father’s expression darkened.
[This isn’t something we can ignore.]
"It’s strange, right?"
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HELHEIM SCANS
[Translator - Night]
[Proofreader - Gun]
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[Hmm… If the conflict between Zeus and Odin is real, that would be good news for us… but Odin’s behavior is too strange. Hmm… Michael is asking if you could check whether the system message actually displayed Odin’s name.]
Could it be that it wasn’t really Odin?
But the system message I saw within the Authority clearly stated Odin.
“It definitely said ‘Chief God Odin.’”
[Hmm… then it must be Odin.]
“But isn’t it possible to deceive the system messages? Loki pretended to be a goddess, after all.”
[Loki disguised himself as Aurelia, who is a lower-ranked deity, while Odin is an SSS-rank supreme god. It’s easy to transform into a weaker god, but impersonating a high-ranking god is much more difficult—especially a chief god like Odin.]
A white light swirled around my father’s head, and suddenly, a brilliant light burst from his eyes.
[It’s been a while, Soul Awakener.]
“Have you descended directly?”
[Yes. This is not a situation where I can afford to remain idle.]
Behind my father, shimmering wings of light appeared.
Damn, this really gives off the feeling of an avatar of the Archangel.
[A god of Odin’s level cannot be impersonated by another god of equal standing. If the system also identified him as Odin, then it must be him.]
“I see.”
[I don’t understand why he would purge Skuld, but I do know why we can’t contact Loki.]
“Why is that?”
[Because Odin has descended. Since a chief god has descended and even used his Mimir’s Eye, the aftermath must be significant.]
So Odin’s sudden descent must have caused it.
And yet, after descending, he just said I didn’t know about the third prophecy and disappeared.
[Still, his descent wasn’t long, so communications shouldn’t be down for too long. It should resume in a month or two.]
“I see.”
[In the meantime, it will be difficult for them to interfere. So, can we count on your help?]
“Help? How?”
[We need assistance in subduing Pollux.]
Michael then explained.
Michael mentioned that although Asura was regaining his strength, completely subduing Pollux would be difficult.
[Normally, comparing Asura to Pollux would be like comparing the heavens and the earth. But Asura was only recently unsealed and doesn’t have much SP. Meanwhile, Pollux, as a guardian god, must have an abundant supply of SP.]
“But he still managed to appear even when Indra was present, and Pollux was also around…”
[Pollux had already noticed the escape. He even dragged along Guan Yu, China’s god of war, saying it was time to leave.]
Originally, Guan Yu was the target of divine execution.
So he was extracted from the seal…
Hmm, subduing Pollux.
This isn’t something I can answer immediately.
I did carry out divine execution, but that was merely finishing off a Skuld who was already subdued.
Fighting a fully prepared god—especially a war-related one—requires more preparation.
“I can’t give you an answer right now. I’ll first assess Asgard’s movements, advance to S-rank, and then decide how I can assist.”
I also need to unlock Skuld’s fragment after reaching S-rank.
I don’t want to leave things unresolved and end up getting blindsided.
[Understood. We’ll continue recovering in the meantime.]
With those final words, the light in my father’s eyes faded, and he returned to normal.
Is he back now?
[Jiho, we’ll count on you. Contact us once you’ve advanced in rank.]
“Understood.”
Hmm, so after reaching out to the Earth’s deities, all I learned was the reason for the lost connection with Loki.
Instead, I got a request to help subdue Pollux.
“Diana, it looks like I need to reach S-rank.”
“Yes. Have all the conditions been met?”
“I just need to get all my stats to 1,000.”
“1,000… That’s an insane number.”
I need to reach S-rank and unlock Skuld’s fragment.
If I leave too many unanswered questions, I’ll definitely get blindsided later.
When I opened my status window, my stats in the Order faction were fluctuating around the 300s.
Originally, they had been in the 250s, but thanks to my enhanced absorption efficiency, they had risen to this level.
It would’ve been great if Skuld’s stats had increased in the Order faction as well, but they had only risen in the Neutral faction.
Wait, does this mean I need to max out both status windows?
I enjoyed the double buff effect from having two status windows, but now that I’m trying to advance to S-rank, it looks like the cost is doubled too.
My Neutral faction stats were halfway maxed—maybe I should finish those first—but since the condition is to have all stats at 1,000, I decided to raise my Order faction stats first.
I wonder how much SP this will take…
I currently have just over 20 million SP.
Hopefully, that will be enough.
“Here I go.”
“Good luck, Jiho.”
With Diana’s encouragement, I opened my status window.
Then, I began furiously pressing the “+” buttons for the Order faction stats.
Using both hands, I alternated between Strength, Agility, and Magic, hammering away at the buttons.
Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap.
My stats skyrocketed.
And proportionally, my 20 million SP started decreasing—at first gradually, then suddenly at an alarming rate.
When my stats exceeded 600, Diana gasped beside me.
“Wow… I can feel an incredible surge of mana. To think your stats could rise this fast…”
“I should’ve done this sooner.”
“But you didn’t really need higher stats until now. You were only running A-rank dungeons.”
“That’s true.”
Since SP acquisition was the priority, I had poured all my SP into Soul Mediation.
But raising my stats like this feels amazing.
I feel physically stronger, and my magic is on a whole different level than before.
My stats jumping from the 300s to over 600 is only a numerical doubling, but in reality, I feel far more powerful.
Of course, my SP is also plummeting accordingly.
Feeling good, I kept pressing, and before I knew it, my SP had dropped to the 9-million range.
How did I burn through that much already?
Meanwhile, my stats had entered the 900s.
“Jiho, your fingers are moving so fast I can’t even see them anymore…”
Once my Agility hit the 900s, my button-pressing speed skyrocketed.
And so did my SP consumption.
No… this can’t be happening.
I have to reach 1,000…!
[You have fulfilled all conditions required to reach Divinity.]
[All stats at 1,000 or higher—Condition Cleared.]
Oh!
I did it.
I only have 1 million SP left, but I successfully reached the all-stats-1,000 mark.
If not for the 20-million bonus Odin gave me, this would’ve been impossible.
[You have met the conditions for S-rank advancement in the Order faction.]
[You may ascend to divinity within the Order faction. Will you proceed?]
Of course, the answer is yes.
I pressed the confirmation button without hesitation.
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HELHEIM SCANS
[Translator - Night]
[Proofreader - Gun]
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