Jack Carter is a man who has accomplished nothing—he seems to have no talent, and clearly no luck either. After graduating from college, he struggled to find a few jobs and dated a few girlfriends. Maybe he was just born with that kind of aura; anyway, things like being made a scapegoat, getting laid off, and getting dumped seemed to follow him everywhere. In fact, Jack Carter always worked hard, he just lacked the ability to put what he learned in school to practical use. Well, to be honest, what he learned in school was of no use to him at all. That year, after losing his job, he was killing time in his dorm playing the famous online game "Gods and Demons" when he suddenly received a string of spam messages: XX Studio is hiring gold farmers and power-levelers. If interested, please add this QQ number to contact us... Such spam is very common in online games. At the time, with no prospects, he decided to give it a try—and to his surprise, he was hired smoothly—being unemployed was his biggest advantage. He submitted his personal account, registered as a member on their studio website, and that was it. Who the boss was, how many people worked at the studio, what other business the studio had—he didn’t know, nor did he need to know. He was just a bottom-level gold farmer with no base salary, only needing to complete the orders assigned by his supervisor each month.

He ended up doing this for three years. Jack Carter was physically and mentally exhausted, but had grown content with the status quo. At least the job provided a stable income, there was no office politics to worry about, and he didn’t have to go out and deal with traffic or being late. However, owning a house or a car was out of the question, and a wife was even less likely. In the blink of an eye, he was thirty, and his body could no longer handle all-nighters. Living like this long-term wasn’t a solution, but what could he do? Other than reading novels and daydreaming about what he would do if he could be reborn, he just went back to doing what he always did after waking up.

Now, time has gone back five years.

Jack Carter had just recovered from the ecstasy of time travel when he was immediately overwhelmed with regret: It really happened to me! Why did I never pay any attention to stocks? If I had at least kept an eye on the general trends over the past few years and invested in a few mid- or long-term stocks, I could have made a fortune!

But five years—what could he really change? If it were ten years, he could have started his life over. The only thing he could truly rely on to turn things around was the old job he’d done for three years. Although Jack Carter wasn’t exactly decisive or ambitious by nature, now that he had the honor of becoming a member of the time-traveling club, he really couldn’t justify wasting this hard-won second life by doing nothing.

The current date was May 31, 20XX. Jack Carter couldn’t help but sigh—just his luck, "Gods and Demons" had already been officially running for a month! Oh, come on, if I had to time travel, couldn’t it have been a month earlier? Other people who time travel always manage to catch the game’s launch and take full advantage of the timing!

Apparently, at this time he was running errands at some small company? Faced with the huge opportunity of time travel, of course he had to quit such a boring job. He had to be willing to spend money to upgrade his broadband and computer as well. After a busy day, everything was ready; the money left was only enough to cover three months of utilities and porridge. If he didn’t succeed, he’d go down trying.

After dinner, Jack Carter began registering and creating his character. Youth is wonderful—he was full of energy.

Character name: Jack Carter

Race: Elf (Racial specialties: Archery, Light Magic, Nature Magic)

Class: Paladin (Class features: Proficient in various weapons, armor, horsemanship, proficient in Light Magic, forbidden from learning Dark Magic)

Let’s briefly introduce the online game "Gods and Demons."

"Gods and Demons" is a game developed by converting cutting-edge military technology for civilian use, with the entire game process managed autonomously by the supercomputer "Gods and Demons." Besides monster-hunting quests, as players level up, the game gradually unlocks systems like mercenaries, pets, arenas, marriage, and territories.

There are many playable races in "Gods and Demons"—humans, elves, dwarves, orcs, undead—these are all standard options available to everyone at registration. As for hidden races, such as vampires, werewolves, and fallen angels, the methods to obtain them remain a mystery even after many years. There are plenty of rumors on the forums: some say you have to complete extremely difficult hidden quests, some say you need to spend a lot of money to apply for a VIP account, and some even claim that if you level a character to 100 and then delete it, you’ll unlock one. But probably no one dares to try that.

The game’s story background is a clash between the gods and demons, with mortals taking sides as the Light Alliance and the Dark Alliance.

There is no level cap for players. According to the game company, players’ levels can eventually reach the heights of gods and demons. Before Jack Carter time-traveled, the highest player level was 188, already close to the lowest tier of the 200-level angel. This shows how hard it is to level up, which is the fundamental reason why the power-leveling industry has flourished. What’s more, mercenaries and pets share their owner’s experience, making leveling up even harder. Because leveling is so difficult, when a character dies, they don’t lose a level directly, but lose experience instead. If their experience drops to zero, then they lose a level.