Bab 10: Ch. 9- Weekly Continental Auction
My plan for the day, having already woken up early today despite all of the events that occurred yesterday is to go out to the core exchange to get some cores for my new earth slime named Emett.
When I get to one of the empty terminals near the entrance I go ahead and buy a stockpile of 10 slime cores, a tier 2 boulder ant core, and a tier 2 goblin miner core (rare but not valuable due to the weakness of the variant of a normally tier 3 monster).
I bought all of these for Emet to guide its' evolution towards a humanoid and defensive earth-based summon. My hope for him was to evolve him into a golem or golem type monster considering the similarity in their constitution. If he had a more humanoid shape, he would be much more versatile in combat compared to his current lumpy and amorphous form.
I don't know yet what abilities he has, but I'm hoping it's something more than just slinking around looking like a rock. If that was the case, then I'm afraid his only use would be as a decoration in a garden or as an oversized paperweight.
I'm taking a big risk bonding to a slime which is typically regarded as a low-class monster, but I have hope that his rare variation will give him an advantage compared to what slimes usually end up as, which is often just a bigger slime.
The total came to 30 credits after not finding anything else worth buying, which I was happy to pay after spending nearly thrice that for my other two summons. I then went on to have brunch after feeding each of my summons a basic core to tide them over.
As usual, Jareth nibbled on his core as if to savor it, he even wiped his mouth with a handkerchief that he seemed to have pulled out of nowhere, he was becoming quite the gentleman despite his savage appearance. Brutus wolfed his down, (forgive the wolf pun), while Emett seemed to assimilate with his core as slimes typically do.
A section of his rock carapace moved as if he was revealing his mouth, he then just sat on the core and dissolved it within his body. Despite his lack of human characteristics and higher brain function, the jiggle in his movements seemed to convey contentment or happiness at having been fed.
While paying for my lunch, I checked my credit total and found that I still have 1,051 credits remaining in my account. Never did I imagine in my wildest dreams that within the first two weeks as a summoner I would earn more money than I had received through my two years as a minor getting pension from the diety that threw us into this mess of a world.
Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful to the diety for ending the war and saving our lives, I even occasionally pray to him every now and then when I remember to. My life has improved drastically since entering this new era, but even with the upgrade in living, the world is still a mess, it's just more within our control depending on our personal strength or ability.
Seeing the number of credits in my account reminds me of the weekly auction going on at noon at the auction house on Saturdays. I never even thought of it till now, because I never had the money to even consider going to it.
But now that I do, and seeing as I don't really need to go out hunting today, I decided to go and see if I can find anything worthwhile to buy. Entry into the auction house requires a down-payment of 100 credits as collateral for buying goods and serves to limit entrance to those with money.
This policy is meant to keep civilians who want to enter out of curiosity and have no intention of buying from taking up space within the auction house. The credits will be returned at the end of the auction automatically if not spent, so auction goers have no worries about having their money stolen.
After paying the steep entrance fee, I enter the ostentatious looking building with its marble walls and columns and red velvet carpets and find a seat near the back with no other people around me.
I'm not much for people in general, but I especially don't care for strangers as I have no idea what their intentions are. Living as an orphan has disillusioned me to the world, I've seen the best and worst of people, and at least in the old world people were more often ill-intentioned.
Now I avoid all of that conflict and avoid others, for the most part, the only person I really have any meaningful contact with regularly is my big sister Mira.
I love her to death as she is the only family I have left, I also recognize all of the sacrifices she has made for me, which is why I'm working so hard to make money now. My current goal is to give Mira the life she deserves and keep her safe, and the only way to do either of those things for a regular person like me is to get stronger.
After getting settled in and more people sitting down as noon approaches, the auction finally begins. As the bell toll for noontime, the white and gold curtains part to reveal a short plump man with an odd haircut almost a mix between a mullet and a pompadour.
He smiles a wide smile bright enough for me to see even from where I am at the back. He begins to introduce the start of the auction with, "Welcome ladies, gentlemen, and summons, today is as you know the day of the weekly continental auction. We have all sorts of rare goods, materials, and cores gathered within the North American Continental city and today we will be giving you the opportunity to be the new owner of one of these treasures."
With that introduction, he gestures to the side and in comes a pretty woman in a sheer black dress with a cart full of cores of all colors and sizes, each has its own socket on the cart and by each is a small placard for the auctioneer to read off of.
"We will be beginning the auction off with some of the lower-tier cores, but don't be turned away by word low-tier, these cores are all from valuable variants or rare monsters that may be exactly what you need to raise or strengthen your summon to their next evolution."
He began selling off each core, with most being tier 2 and going for around 50 credits, that's 5 times the normal price of a core. I tuned most of this out until I heard something that immediately caught my attention and seemed to be almost too perfect for me, "Next up is a rare core from a rather strong tier 3 rock golem, the starting price is 50 credits..."
I knew I needed this core despite its' steep price, and without any hesitation raised my betting number for the initial price. A few others tossed in their bid, each going up by 5 incrementally towards an increasingly higher price.
Thinking quick I decided to cut off any competition with a large sum and called out, "125 credits". The auctioneer seemed giddy and any competitors decided to give up after seeing how intent I was to get this core, he did a last call for any buyers before declaring that I was no the owner of the rock golem core.
The auction continued on until once again I heard an extremely rare tier 3 core being auctioned off once more, this time it was a multi-armed hobgoblin core, which to me seemed perfect for Jareth and his close-quarters combat style.
He began the bidding and espoused its unique and advantageous qualities to any interested in a humanoid core for their summon. The competition was fierce and the bidding soon eclipsed what I had to pay for Emett's core.
When it reached 180 credits I knew that I would once again have to raise the price by a large margin to cut off any potential competition. I drew in a deep breath and stifled any apprehension at how much I would have to pay for this core and shouted loudly, "220 credits".
Once more the auctioneer gave me a look as if seeing a walking bag of money and tried to drum up any competition to raise the price further, after a few seconds with no takers he gave up and announced that the core was mine as well. At this point, I was now down to 706 credits in my account after starting off the auction with 1,051 credits.
For Brutus, I purchased a precious tier 2 blinking wolf variant for 105 credits, it likely would have gone for much more had it been a tier 3 core, but I was happy regardless as the ability of the blinking wolf is what I was after. It was a wolf variant known to be extremely hard to kill as it had the ability to teleport within a limited range, so it could avoid just about any attack sent at it.
With only 601 credits I'm more hesitant to buy anything else unless I really need it or likely wouldn't come across something like it any time soon if I didn't buy it now. So I just sat back and watched the auction continue until they begin to start selling some lower tier but still relatively valuable weapons as the way to end the first quarter of the auction.
This first quarter of the auction was to sell to all of the lower-tier summoners so that they could leave and make room for the richer clientele to bid. They brought out a curved sword made from the bladed forearm of a tier 3 bladed mantis, its' appearance was similar to a curved scimitar.
The auctioneer started the bidding at 250 credits, which is the base price of normal bladed mantis swords, and continued to ramble on while upselling the sword driving the price higher and higher. Eventually, I decided to bid for the unique sword and managed to win it from another summoner who was extremely upset at being outbid for the price of 500 credits.
This boy I was competing against looked extremely arrogant with a better than you attitude that could be gleaned from the way he held himself, he was lanky with sandy blond hair and was dressed in nicer dress clothes, making it apparent he came from some money but apparently didn't have enough to outbid me.
The sword was more expensive than I was originally willing to pay, but I figured good weapons at this level are hard to come by and I wouldn't get another chance at something like this for quite some time. Despite hearing the cursing and seeing the dirty looks the summoner I outbid was giving me, I pay him no mind and go to collect my prizes of the day.
I went to the auction checkout to pay and receive my new items, and after receiving the items, I placed all of them safely in my storage for later appreciation and use, I figured it was better not to flaunt my new treasures lest someone attempts to rob me.
Left with only 101 credits, I decided to relax for the rest of the day and spend my time with Mira who had a rare break from work today, we spent most of it playing monopoly until I grew angry at always being thrown in jail by unlucky rolls and flipped the board.
It's true what they say, monopoly really can tear a family apart. We spent the rest of the day once I had calmed down talking about her research and apprenticeship at the potion shop with Mr. Eric.
I then updated Mira on my newly acquired items and my future plans for my summons, she was gobsmacked when she heard how much I had spent on the items but could see the logic in having bought the items that I did.
We ended the night by going out to a nice restaurant selling orc steaks for 10 credits per plate and then ice cream for dessert for 2 credits each, the icecream was delicious and extra-creamy due to it being made from monster cow milk.
With only 77 credits in my account, we decided to end the night and go to bed. I fell asleep with a smile on my face after being able to treat Mira to the life she deserves, this only cemented my conviction to grow stronger not only for the money, but to protect Mira and the life we had built for ourselves.
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone