Capítulo 14: A Fool and His Money are Soon Parted
After igniting the flame of desire in the heart of the two sisters, things started getting more interesting. Xan also shared the hidden special qualities of the crown with the other participants. The equipment the crown could be paired with were several. The artifacts did not only include the Health and Beauty Cabinet, but things such as the Perception Cabinet, Spirit Qi Leveling Room, and other strange artifacts. The crown could increase the benefits and reduce the cost of each of these artifacts. Although the crown could go wherever the special artifact cabinets and rooms could only use in the guildhall. This meant, repeat customers forever!
Madness overtook the hearts of all of the participants. One after another they changed their bids over and over again. Finally, they started running out of treasures. The most shameless person among them, the Duck Piercing Gentleman, asked Xan if he knew if the artifact spirit would be open to accepting IOUs. With a twinkle in his eye, Xan promised to find out.
Not long after speaking with the old ghost, it made an announcement. "It has come to my attention that some of you wish to use IOUs in order to continue bidding on the treasures. This isn't a problem, but I'll need everyone who does this to sign a spirit contract. The violators of the contract will never be allowed to trade with my guild. Additionally, your guild would be put on one-year probation. Finally, I will not release the artifact until I have received full payment," he said.
The mad flames in the eyes of the participants became suns of solar fury. Round after round, bids were made. Finally, people started coming back to their senses. A few even hoped they would lose the bid at this point. The old ghost announced the winners. The assassin won the knife, the beast tamer won the bow and arrows, and the grand winner for the crown was the two mage sisters, of course. They had the power and financial backing of two guilds. Officially, the winner was the ice mage.
The old ghost was so excited by the profits he nearly peed himself. Of course, he didn't have a bladder so peeing was impossible, he almost did whatever the ghost equivalent was. Xan watched from the side. Things were going as he predicted. Now, it was time for phase two to begin.
"I'm sure everyone is ready for the next round of acquiring treasures," the artifact spirit began. "My lord, artifact spirit, we don't have any more money. I'm not sure how many IOUs our sects would be willing to accept. Perhaps we could put things on hold until we can return to our sects and guilds and get more treasures to continue with our purchases?" The beast tamer asked.
"All of you are out of money?" The old spirit asked. Everyone solemnly nodded their heads. "That hardly matters as you'll be able to acquire endless amounts of treasures without money," the old spirit said as he laughed hardily. People's interests were reignited although they were also cautious. There is no such thing as a free lunch, whatever the artifact spirit said, there was no way they were going to be able to get treasures for free.
"What must we do to acquire these treasures?" The weapons master asked carefully. "Good, good, good, your way of saying things is very intelligent. You said what must we do, "do" being the operative word. I will tell you simply, a crafting guild is nothing without materials. I want materials in exchange for treasures. I have set up teleportation arrays in four rooms. These teleportation portals lead to areas containing rich amounts of materials for crafting. I will provide a list of required materials and how many points they are worth. Collect enough materials and you'll be able to select from artifacts from the third through the fifth level medium-grade," the old ancestor said.
Next, rectangular tablets flew out from behind the old ghost and floated before each of the participants. "These tablets will update you regarding which materials we need and which we no longer need. This will also track the exact points you can receive for acquiring the items. The more points, the more purchasing power you will have. All of our treasures can be bought for points. Not too bad right? In order for the tablets to track your information send your spirit sense into it and mark it." He said.
While the old ancestor continued to explain things to the participants, Xan quietly celebrated as stage two was about to reach its crescendo. Points for prizes, this the scam of every video arcade he ever went to in his life. By the time a person could earn enough tickets to "buy" a prize; they would spend two to three times more on playing the games then they would have if they had directly bought the item.
Each person scrolled through the list of materials and the materials, grades, and point value. Very quickly they realized the scheme behind earning points. To get a level four high-grade artifact, for example, a person would need to accumulate material equivalent in value of a level five high-grade artifact. No one was allowed to trade materials under the level three high-grade artifact for points. The artifact spirit didn't want to give away valuable treasures for a bunch of junk.
The realization of the purchasing scheme didn't offend or bother anyone. After all, they would now have a method for attaining high-grade and high-level artifacts. There was definitely a risk, but for the last one hundred years, even if they had the materials who had the artifacts to trade? The more people looked at the list, the more they began to dream of their futures. Wasn't this an opportunity from the heavens?
"The exchange rate is only for everyone here today, given our beginning friendships. In the future, some of these treasures maybe twice as expensive than they are now. If I were you, I would take this opportunity to get these treasure while you can at our low low prices," the artifact spirit said. He didn't know why he had to add those last words to the end. He was promised by Xan it would increase everyone's interest in buying. He was right! After considering the artifact spirit's words, people began asking how to get to the teleportation relays. None of them, however, were more driven and fanatical about earning treasures than the ice and fire sisters, as Xan began calling them. To them, more treasures meant more sessions in the Health and Beauty Cabinet.
"Each of the materials is color-coded with four colors, blue, green, red, and yellow. If you will notice the lights on the floor, follow the color on the floor matching the color of your material. This will lead you to the teleportation array, he said.
Everyone left to follow the lights to get to their teleportation platform. After everyone left, Xan walked over to the artifact spirit. "Let's you and I have a good talk. I'm no more a disciple of the Supreme Crafting Guild as you are an artifact spirit," he said. The old ghost's eyes grew big from surprise.
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