Chapter 21  

The Lion Bear Clan, the dimensional merchants. It was hard to tell whether these creatures were bears or lions. However, they were definitely merchants. But, why were they so cute yet arrogant?

‘I’ll say it’s just this guy who’s uniquely arrogant.’

The cute appearance of the Lion Bear clan was also reflected in the original novel. Although each of them had different colors of fur, many aspects of them resembled common teddy bears on Earth. The book explained that some female players treated these cute creatures as pets.

There was only one thing to watch out for. They hated to be called either a bear or a lion. Because of their pride in their clan, the most important thing to them was to be recognized as a ‘Lion-Bear,’ like the name of their clan. Anyway, as long as players paid attention to that point, members of the Lion Bear Clan were cute, chatty, and provided high-quality service.

That was why Yu-Seong chose the Lion Bear Clan as his dimensional merchant.

“Why are you just staring at me after summoning a great being such as myself?”

The story never mentioned them being arrogant, as was shown by Ping Pong.

‘He’s so cute that I can’t be angry with him.’

Ping Pong's short limbs, soft-looking pink fur, and glossy black eyes were cute enough for Yu-Seong to forgive some of his rather arrogant behavior.

"Well, first of all, nice to meet you, Ping Pong," Yu-Seong said as a warm smile appeared on his face without him knowing.

Ping Pong shook his head as he extended his little front paw toward Yu-Seong.

“Call me Mr. Ping Pong.”

It was weird. It seemed that the cuddly bear did not care for formalities in speech, but still wanted to be addressed as mister. Didn’t it matter whether he was formal or not? With a slightly confused expression, Yu-Seong corrected himself.

“Sure, Mr. Ping Pong.”

“Good. Human, your name is?”

As expected, he didn’t really care for formalities.

“I’m Choi Yu-Seong, Mr. Ping Pong,” said Yu-Seong with a smile. He was getting a rough understanding of Ping Pong’s character.

"Choi Yu-Seong, that's a great name!" exclaimed Ping Pong with a sniff.

There was a cotton candy-shaped tail sticking out from behind Ping Pong. For some reason, it appeared quite puffed up.

‘Oh yeah, there was a detail saying that the ones from the Lion Bear Clan puff their?tails?when they feel happy.?‘

It was unexpected that Ping Pong felt so happy that his tail puffed up just from Yu-Seong introducing himself. It was a good thing for Yu-Seong.

Once they signed the contract, they would be together no matter how good or bad their relationship was, unless things went terribly awful. It was better for Yu-Seong to build a good relationship with the Dimensional Merchant from the beginning.

"Oh, this is a gift for the first contract," said Yu-Seong while peeling off the cover and handing over the lollipop from the table.

“This is…”

"I heard that members of the Lion Bear Clan like these kinds of sweets. I thought it would be nice to get these for you. First impressions matter, right?”

Perhaps he didn’t hear what Yoo-Seong said because Ping Pong had his arms crossed and looked as if he were somewhat in a trance by the sweet smell from the candy. Without giving an answer, Ping Pong uncrossed his arms solemnly and took them before hugging the candy, as if he were hugging a stick.

Subsequently, the fur around his nose and snout—the only part of his body with white fur—fluttered, as a pink tongue popped out and licked the strawberry-flavored lollipop. Immediately after, his round black pupils sparkled like the stars in the night sky.

“ I-it's delicious-"

A huge wave of admiration exploded from Ping Pong and filled Yu-Seong’s room.

"It's extremely delicious! It’s just like the rumors say. You were thoroughly prepared human. You have managed to greatly impress someone like myself."

“You’re gonna drool. Slow down.”

Disregarding Yu-Seong’s words, Ping Pong started licking the lollipop in a frenzy. After a short period, he looked at the empty white stick with awe in his eyes.

"Amazing. This is the treasure of the Earth made by humans."

It sounded strange when one from the Lion Bear Clan, who sold countless items, treasures, and even the goods of gods from various dimensions from distant parts of the universe, called a single lollipop a treasure.

‘Is there no candy in the other dimensions?’

Perhaps it was another error in the original novel or something else. Yu-Seong raised five more lollipops he prepared in advance with a shrug.

“Ohh!!!”

"You already got one for free, but from now on, I’ll need to charge you. You know what I mean, right?”

He spent a whopping 100 Karma points for the contract alone.

In order to buy the item that Yu-Seong currently wanted, he needed at least twenty more Karma points. “What a good sense for business, human. But I heard that lollipops are not worth much in this world. Let’s make it one point for each of them..."

Yu-Seong made a gesture to put the lollipops back on the table with a disappointed expression.

"Two points. No more bargaining.”

“All right then.”

While Yu-Seong smiled and handed the lollipop to Ping Pong, a system message popped in front of his eyes.

“I gave you the price of the lollipop along with a gift to commemorate our first contract.“

This was why the Lion Bear clan was known for its high-quality service. Yu-Seong smiled as he immediately received his needed points. As a result, he got thirty points back after spending one-hundred points from the summon.

‘I got ten more points than I expected.’

According to the original book, the refund point—the points given back as a commemoration— for the contract was about ten percent. However, Ping Pong gave Yu-Seong twenty points, excluding the price of the lollipop, which was double the price of the original refund point.

Ping Pong did not say anything, but it looked like he was showing gratitude for the lollipops.

‘Anyway, what does it mean by the name, Ping?Pong?of Golden Mane?’

Yu-Seong was questioning Ping Pong’s title. He was a member of the Lion Bear clan, who had the appearance of a bear, but no mane. Whilst, Ping Pong looked dissatisfied with the deal and once again opened his mouth.

"Take the wrappers off, Choi Yu-Seong. What kind of hospitality is this?.”

"Oops, sorry."

Yu-Seong turned his attention to Ping Pong again and peeled the wrapper off of all five lollipops for him. He absent-mindedly handed over the lollipops. It took less than ten minutes for Ping Pong to finish the lollipops. After that, he looked at the empty table with longing.

‘He sure has a good appetite.’

Yu-Seong briefly thought about bringing more lollipops from the kitchen, but he shook his head. He almost fell for Ping Pong’s cuteness but he needed to remember to not be charmed.

‘I shouldn’t bring these out too often…’

It was a clever move for him to use the lollipops as leverage for future transactions between them.

"What a shame. I wish I could bring this treasure back to my dimension but for some reason, it completely breaks apart if I try to cross the dimensional wall carrying this."

This was new information Yu-Seong hadn’t read in the original novel. However, there was a mention in the book saying that members of the Lion Bear Clan were crazy about the Earth's lollipops and devoured them on the spot. Yu-Seong could now understand why.

‘But why would the lollipop be the only thing that breaks down when crossing over to their dimension?’

It seemed like it was treated as a special, limited commodity of Earth. Yu-Seong let go of his thoughts about the plothole in the original book. Instead, he called Ping Pong.

“Mr. Ping Pong.”

“Yes, Choi Yu-Seong?" answered Ping Pong.

"We better get started. Why don't you open the dimensional bundle? I have a few things I’d like to buy right away."

"Oh, I almost forgot about my job. I was pretty distracted by the treasure. Let's see. As you may know, the current dimension bundle you can use is level one. To level up...." explained Ping Pong.

"First of all, the purchase price must exceed one thousand Karma points." Yu-Seong interrupted Ping Pong.

“Human, you must have done a lot of studying. Well, if you're a contractor of great being such as myself, you should definitely be at least this knowledgeable.”

Yu-Seong had simply taken his time reading and enjoyed the novel.

Yu-Seong stopped himself from blurting this out. Ping Ping suddenly shoved his hand into his stomach.

‘What are you, a kangaroo?’

Members of the Lion Bear Clan even had a pouch in their stomachs.

Ping Pong truly was a mysterious aspect in this story. He reached into his pouch and pulled out a pink bundle that was the same color as his fur.

"Here you go. I have everything here. Now pick a set you’d like, human!"

Ping Pong threw the bundle to Yu-Seong. By the time the bundle reached Yu-Seong, the pink bundle had grown as big as him.

'Oh, this is pretty interesting to see for yourself.’

He couldn’t hide his amazement when the scene from the novel was actually happening. Inside the bundle, the name, effect, and price of the items were written in dark letters. There were even scroll bars and search engines to organize numerous items.

It was a bundle carrying not just a bunch of items but showed item information as well.

'That's just like what I read. The dimensional merchant shows the ‘good’ products only if they are about level five.?‘ Ping Pong’s bundle was only level one, so most of the items inside it were miscellaneous and useless. But still, there were definitely some useful items such as the lowest-level recovery potion.

Yu-Seong already knew what he wanted to buy, so he quickly picked the item and finished his shopping.

‘Five bottles of alchemist's empty flasks, half a bundle of cloudy trolls’ blood, two bundles of Kalash's body fluids, a bundle of Halenew's petals…’

Using the search engine, he quickly finished his purchase using forty points from his initial forty-three points.

Yu-Seong bit his fingernails as he tried to think about what to buy with his three remaining points. Finally, he just decided to save it.

“I am done purchasing. This is all that I want.”

At Yu-Seong’s confirmation, Ping Pong reached out with both paws to take back the big dimensional bundle and squeezed it before shrinking it again. Then he placed it back in the pouch in his stomach, folded his arms again, and gave Yu-Seong an arrogant look.

‘Those eyes look like the ones of Kim Do-Jin. No wonder they looked familiar.’

Yu-Seong breathed a deep sigh and wondered why he was surrounded by such egotistical characters.

“Your selections were quite interesting, human. Empty flasks and the Kalash's body fluid. "What are you going to use them for?"

“It’s a secret.”

“Hehe, you, human, are a good businessman. All right, if you tell me that secret, I'll let you know my secret."

“Didn’t ask, don't care!” Yu-Seong replied with a smirk as he wanted to tease Ping Pong somehow.

"...What?"

"I didn't ask about your secret, and I don’t really want to know."

“...”

Yu-Seong almost burst into laughter from seeing a shocked expression on a teddy bear.

“What are you still doing here? It’s time to go back if you're done with your business here. I'll see you later, Ping Pong, you cutie-pie."

“You-you, rude human! You must call a being this great, Mr. Ping Pong!”

"Don't be so upset. I'll give you two lollipops on the house next time."

"I do not need appeasements like that. Bad Choi Yu-Seong!"

However, contrary to his words, Ping Pong's tail puffed up pretty big, though he answered with an angry snort.

***

Ping Pong opened the small pink door and stomped as he returned. After he left, Yoo-Song spread out his purchases. Looking at everything, they could certainly be called miscellaneous. Most of the items were described in the following way.

▂▂▂▂▂▂

[The Kalash's body fluid]

The body fluid of a Kalash, a bipedal animal inhabiting the Altar dimension.

[The cloudy trolls’ blood]

It is troll blood. It is so cloudy that it is hard to use as a potion material.

[Halenew's petal]

It is pretty.

▂▂▂▂▂▂

Not only were there no effects written, but in the case of Halenew's petal, even the explanation was basic.

Naturally, no player would buy these goods from the Dimension Merchant. They would think that their Karma points were too precious to spend on such useless items.

‘But if you use this, it is an entirely different story.’

These seemingly useless items had a pretty interesting effect when combined with the rarely chosen items often purchased by the players on Earth.

[The alchemist's empty flask]

If the correct ingredients are added, a potion will be created through alchemy.All the materials will disappear if it fails.

The price of an alchemist's empty flask was 5 Karma points per flask, just like the lowest-class healing potion.

Obviously, most people would choose the healing potion rather than buying the flask. But still, there were some crazy folks who attempted to challenge themselves by making the potions after reading how the flask works. It tempered their adventurous thoughts.

However, nine out of ten, no, ninety-nine out of a hundred ended up failing—and their flask simply disappeared. In those cases, they never took so much as another glance at the alchemist's empty flask ever again. On the other hand, among the lucky people who discovered the right combination, a majority of them had to give up as they couldn’t find how to make a profit that covered the amount they spent purchasing the raw materials.

In other words, the alchemist's empty flask could be considered the riskiest item unless one possessed the proper knowledge. On the contrary, the flask was a very worthwhile item if one possessed the right recipe.

'And I have the knowledge and information from the original novel. Whoo-hoo.'

With a crafty smile, Yu-Seong opened the lid of an alchemist's empty flask.

. In the Korean raws, Yu-Seong spoke to Ping Pong in ?? banmal, which is to speak informally or familiarly, but instead of wanting to be spoken to formally, Ping Pong just wants to be addressed as ? which is why Yu-Seong finds it odd.