Chapter 172 - Preparation Work
Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios
The second floor of City of Light Central Auction House was originally a warehouse to store the items awaiting to be auctioned off. It was enhanced with Space Magic by a Space Arch Mage; as a result, the space that could store the player’s goods for auction was almost unlimited. However, now, it seemed to be a bit crowded.
In between the dazzling items for auction, there was a layer of soft beast skin laid on the ground. Lin Jie and Zheng Ziliang sat down with crossed legs, the area around them was filled with a huge pile of beer bottles spread all around.
Kacha, kacha…
A crisp sound echoed within the space. Zheng Ziliang was holding a huge piece of Lion Meat, which was from its thigh, and enjoyed himself while taking huge bites off the meat. His teeth were like pile drivers. With a fling of his right hand, a Lion thigh bone that was gnawed cleanly was thrown up into the sky and fell to the ground with a thud.
“This auction will tire me to death.” Zheng Ziliang gulped down a large bottle of beer. As long as one was willing, one could be a hollow log in the game. He also drank as much as he wanted. Zheng Zilang wiped his mouth and muttered, “The investments in the early stage, just the drinks alone, over 1,000 gold coins were spent, the expenditure is too high.”
Lin Jie laid on the ground without a care for his image and flipped through the account list that was as tall as half a person before saying, “This time, the auction gathered a large number of rare items, exempting the service fee and giving out rewards were still a bit too much. However, correspondingly, the transaction taxes obtained can make up for it with much to spare.”
Zheng Ziliang chuckled and said, “That’s right, oh yes, I brought some presents to greet the Holy Church Bishop. He agreed to lend us a set of Lighting Magic equipment; that set was all created by Engineering and can allow us to undergo multi-angle refraction processing.”
“Yo, good job. You even know how to use connections now.”
“Hehe, of course!” Zheng Ziliang grinned and added, “I have also booked all the city square’s system column to live broadcast our spectacular auction.”
Lin Jie was shocked. “You even booked the system column? I remember putting up a message on the system column takes at least few hundreds of gold coins per day right?”
“Hahaha, that fee is paid by the officials.” Zheng Ziliang stretched out his finger and said mysteriously, “With the development of The New Age till now, there is a player base, high popularity, and good reputation. Just one thing is missing, the pulling of real-life economics into the game, attract all those financial giants that were on the fence all along! We now play such a role. Just yesterday, Archangel Anubi found me and claimed that the Holy Church wants to give us a certain benefit. Ha, who doesn’t know that it is the officials who want to give it to us?”
Lin Jie was astonished, he did not expect that the officials would help to publicize the auction!
In his previous life, he recalled that the first super large-scale auction was apparently held three months later. It had been widely publicized around the whole country, even the televisions had been broadcasting reports about it!
Lin Jie probed. “Do you think it is possible that it will be broadcasted on television?”
Zheng Ziliang thought for a while and shook his head. He replied, “It’s temporarily impossible, I checked. Although there are many good items in this auction, the one that is anticipated the most is the City Leader Token. If by any chance you can slaughter a dragon and directly pull the corpse of a dragon here, then maybe it will be broadcasted.”
“Alright, then I’ll go and slaughter a dragon in a few months.”
“Deal, you slaughter, I sell!” Zheng Ziliang was delighted. “Okay, the matters on the auction are almost all handled already. Come, let’s go! Continue drinking! After ten hours, the auction will start. By that time, we will not be as laid back as we are now.”
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“Seven Ears, I’m prepared to go now.”
“Alright, good luck.”
Sky Provisions Shop had closed for the first time.
Bella looked at the magical mirror and carefully tidied up her dress. She was still wearing a full body fiery-red cheongsam, without exposing anything—she was glamorous and enchanting.
Recalling one month before this, she herself was dressing in an exposed bunny costume, willingly posing with her body to beg for some pity and empathy from others. Bella could not help but shake her head.
There was no fixed path for destiny, it had always been so.
Seven Ears walked down from the potion creation room and passed a pale purple potion into Bella’s hands. He smiled and said, “This is for you.”
Bella opened the potion bottle and carefully smelt it, a delicate fragrance surrounded her nose, elegant and seductive.
“Thank you.” Bella smeared a little of it gently. She took a look at the familiar Provisions Shop and said softly, “I’m going.”
Seven Ears smiled and said, “Go!”
The door was pulled open, and Star Kill took out a huge bouquet of flowers from behind him with a grin. “I wish Ms. Bella good luck and nail your first auction!”
Bella chuckled and took that bouquet of beautiful white flowers. She took a deep breath, it was very fragrant.
Star Kill broke into a smile as he hurriedly pulled back his hands behind him, his palm was covered with dark-purple wounds.
He had snuck into the Ice Snow Shrine Great Snow Mountain and stolen the Snow Goddess’ sacrifice flowers. Although he relied on his superb technique and ran out safely, he still received a curse. Within 24 hours, his attacking speed would decrease by 300%; basically, he could not level up anymore on that day.
Bella walked step by step towards the Central Auction House, she held her head and chest high and took leisure steps. Her small white hands flipped over, and a butterfly mask as white as snow landed in her hands, gradually covering up her coquettish face.
Meanwhile, Star Kill followed behind her closely, just like he was her escort to protect her.
At the Central Auction House, the crammed crowd surrounded it so tightly no one could even move. The Central Auction House had set up a total of 10,000 seats, and on top of that, they even had another 30 VIP seats. Even so, it was still unable to satisfy such a huge crowd.
The NPC and staff were trying their best to evacuate the players. Although the auction would be broadcasted at the squares of all larger cities, that could not satisfy their mentality of wanting to watch the fun with their own eyes.
“Bella, am I correct?” asked a Paladin wearing a lion helmet respectfully as he went up to Bella.
Bells nodded her head, and the Lion Paladin made a “welcome” gesture, but he looked towards the Bandit beside Bella. “Please follow me. You are…”
Star Kill calmly revealed his name.
“Codename… Codename Star Kill! Savage Blade’s member!” Lion Paladin was astonished and said excitedly, “Please follow me, welcome.”
Star Kill took a look at the crowd and asked curiously, “What about these people?”
Lion Paladin shook his head and said, “I am only responsible for guiding VIPs after I received the message. It is said Boss Lone Wolf went to the Holy Church. It seemed like he was discussing the problem of evacuating the people.”
Star Kill blinked his eyes. “He went to the Holy Church to evacuate the people? Boss had such an unbelievable ability? It can’t be he went to invite a Holy Arch Mage to come and kill all of them, right?”
“This way please, there is a space enchantment three steps in front of you, entering it will teleport you into the auction,” said the Paladin respectfully.
Bella and Star Kill looked at each other and were about to step forward, but one could only see that there was suddenly a commotion within the crowd in the distance. They crazily ran towards the City of Light square! No sooner had one fallen, others stepped into the breach, shocking everyone!
The crowd dispersed, the Warrior wearing the Lone Wolf Helmet stood there with a majestic look, he curved his mouth into a smile.
It was Lin Jie!
Star Kill looked at the message, then he understood what happened: All the cities’ squares had temporarily become a Holy Light Ground where one could be bathed in Holy Light under the arrangement of the Archangel. As long as one stood on that ground, they could receive EXP once every 10 minutes and every hour, there was even a chance to receive additional rewards!
Many players had already received their first reward of EXP. Although it was lesser than farming monsters in the wild, there was not much difference.
Since one only had to sit there to receive experience points, where else could one find such a good thing? There were also rumors that the better the position, the more the experience points. Thus, the people that surged towards the square became even crazier.
“F*ck, Boss is really too awesome!” Star Kill was so shocked his jaw dropped.
“Let’s go.” Bella gave a thoughtful look at Lin Jie. Then, she turned and entered the space enchantment. A ray of light befell upon her, and the space around her became like glass, while cracks appeared. When the cracks healed, they were already inside the auction.
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“Viscount Fu Sheng, I have already satisfied all your requests.” The Archangel’s voice could be heard beside Lin Jie’s ears, and Lin Jie smiled slightly.
When he learned that the officials were also promoting the auction, he understood that a part of the game’s strength could be exploited by him. For example, the Holy Church!
What kind of status did the Archangel have? In the Guild of Light Holy Church, there were 26 Archangels and three Presiding Judges. The Presiding Judges did not appear all year round, so the whole power of the Guild of Light Holy Church was almost held in the hands of the 26 Archangels! They even had the ability to change part of the laws within the Holy Church.
Creating a Holy Light Ground was a matter that was as simple as it could be.
The Central Auction House had already sent out invitation cards, only those players that had invitation cards could enter the auction. That invitation card had already become some type of symbol, the symbol of honor!
Currently, there were still a few invitation cards in Lin Jie’s hands, since distinguished guests were coming, he had to personally welcome them.
“Brother Lone Wolf! Long time no see!”
Dumb Fox, Ghost Eyes and Heaven Plume walked towards Lin Jie with gloomy faces.
Dumb Fox was the most tactful person, he grabbed Lin Jie’s palm as if they were old friends meeting, he laughed heartily, and said, “I never thought that Brother Lone Wolf would be the owner of the auction behind the scenes. In the future, we will need to ride on your coattail.”
Lin Jie laughed, flipped his palm over, and three elegant-looking invitation cards could be seen in his hands.
The paper used was from the extremely precious Uniform Pear Ore. This type of rare ore would give a wooden sensation, which made it a costly and luxurious raw material. On its surface on could see three small magic runes, artificially added, which would envelop the people holding the invitation card with a layer of fragrance. In the center of the invitation card was a Space Magic Rune.
“I have long awaited for your arrivals, this way please.” Lin Jie passed the invitations to the three people. When he distributed it to Heaven Plume, his action paused for a while. Heaven Plume’s face instantly turned ghastly pale, was Lin Jie trying to warn him?
“Hahaha, look at Brother Heaven Plume’s face, I’m joking with you.” Lin Jie stuffed the invitation card to Heaven Plume, then patted his shoulder, and laughed as he said, “Don’t mind, don’t mind, this way, please.”
Heaven Plume forced out a horribly ugly smile. “Brother Lone Wolf is so humorous.”
Heaven Plume took two steps in front, he could not wait to run further away from that devil’s hands. Dumb Fox and Ghost Eyes looked at each other and followed behind one after the other.
Lin Jie calmly played with the invitation cards in his hand, and his eyes floated into the distance.
Firstly, he was there to welcome Dumb Fox, Heaven Plume, and Ghost Eyes, the three of them.
Secondly, it was to see who Baili Xuanyuan… Would come with?
“Baili Changcheng, I hope you did not lie to me,” murmured Lin Jie as he looked into the distance.