As soon as his voice fell, someone raised their hand.

  “Seventy-five merit points!”

  “I bid one hundred merit points! The sword is mine!”

  “Shit! One hundred and one!”

  “Damn trolls! I’ll pay 120 merit points!”

  “One hundred and twenty-one!”

  “&*%$#@!”

  The bidding war raged on until the price soared to an astonishing two hundred merit points—an exorbitant sum for what seemed like an ordinary piece of equipment. It exceeded the price for a similar weapon of higher quality sold in the smithy. Yet, it was no secret that the workshop’s output was quite low because there was only one blacksmith. Eleanor was oftentimes preoccupied with crafting magic tools under his order, making new weapons available for purchase small in quantity and far in between.

  For this occasion, Victor had taken out a gavel that he found inside a drawer in the Headmaster’s Office just to make this look legitimate.

  “Sold to EclipseKnight for two hundred merit points,” Victor declared, punctuating his announcement with three firm knocks of the gavel. Turning to Lizbeth, he instructed, “My assistant, please see to it that the longsword is delivered to the winning bidder.”

  “Me?” Lizbeth’s eyes widened in surprise. “Fine.”

  Naturally, she didn’t attempt to carry the longsword with her tiny fairy hands; such a sight would have been rather comical given the vast difference in size. Instead, she used telekinetic magic, a skill she had only recently manifested. Its emergence coincided with the development and the leveling-up of the academy.

  “Here you go.” Lizbeth passed the longsword to a black-haired player of average stature—Eclipse Knight.

  “Thank you, Miss Fairy!” He accepted the weapon amidst the envious stares of those surrounding players.

  Moving on, Victor retrieved a second item—a mace. This time, it was a special weapon, as it belonged to one of the mercenaries’ squad leaders, Rylan. The design was exquisite, featuring a signature minotaur’s head carving, and the craftsmanship bespoke the work of a fine blacksmith. It was definitely a custom-made weapon.

  “This is a steel mace. The previous owner was a prominent figure among the bandits named Rylan. Though he may have been on the wrong side of the law and has done evil all his life, his weapon is innocent. Also, there’s a minotaur’s head engraved on the hilt, making this piece a weapon to behold,” Victor announced, showcasing the weapon to the players as they looked at it in awe.

  “For the starting price, it will be 250 merit points—”

  “Five hundred merit points!”

  “…?” Victor was momentarily taken aback.

  Five hundred merit points right off the bat for an ornate mace—it was utter absurdity. After all, Eleanor should have been capable of crafting a custom-made mace of similar quality and ornate design at a fraction of the cost. Curiosity piqued, Victor searched for the person who made the bid and discovered that it was Auralise. That crazy rich woman…

  Suddenly, another voice shouted from the crowd. “Six hundred.”

  “You…!” Auralise’s eyes narrowed at the new bidder, having seemed to know who it was. Indeed, the perpetrator was the sole Bloodline Magus in the academy, Butterfly.

  Taking up the challenge, Auralise upped the ante. “I bid 750 merit points.”

  “Eight hundred,” Butterfly countered, a mocking smirk playing on her lips. The other players remained silent, daring not to join the bidding war. Or perhaps they were just afraid of the retaliation of the two female players.

  Refusing to yield, Auralise clenched her jaw and escalated the bid once more. “One thousand merit points!”

  “Holy shit! That’s one thousand merit points! These gals are crazy.”

  “We could get a spell model with that amount; there’s not much reason to spend it on a mace…”

  The murmurs rippled through the crowd as the bidding reached unprecedented heights. It couldn’t be overlooked that the price of a single Aleph-tier spell model was one thousand merit points, making it rather imprudent to expend such a sum on such an ordinary weapon. At the current stage of the game, most players would have one or two spell models at the maximum. Maybe he should have set a maximum price for every item, but that wouldn’t be fun. Well, Auralise was loaded anyway, so Victor wasn’t too worried.

  The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

  Despite that, Victor smelled a conspiracy behind this. The mace in question was the very one wielded by the bandit who had clashed with KuroUsagi and Butterfly’s group. Thus, it was very likely that she must have recognized it. In this case, the one thousand merit points taken from Auralise’s account should naturally go to her and the participants of that battle.

  What a cunning move, Victor thought. It was highly probable that it was something that KuroUsagi considered and conveyed to his party members. Of course, since Victor was the one who retrieved the mace, a significant portion would come back to him. He thought perhaps this could simply be regarded as robbing the rich and helping the poor.

  Seeing that no one else dared to raise the bet, Victor brought down his gavel with three resolute knocks and announced, “Sold to MissRichLadyAuralise for one thousand merit points. My assistant, I’ll let you do the honor.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Lizbeth seized the mace with her telekinetic magic and passed it to Auralise.

  Auralise shot a mocking glance toward Butterfly, as though claiming victory in their bidding duel. But Butterfly didn’t seem provoked, confirming Victor’s earlier assumption.

  After that, the auction continued at a fast pace. The remaining bits and pieces were priced similarly to the initial longsword, around fifty merit points each to start. There were approximately seventy weapons and pieces of equipment up for bidding, and astonishingly, they were all sold within two hours, with Auralise and her group buying nearly half of them, to the displeasure of everyone else. Because of this, only twelve borderline useless pieces were left unsold, and the total amount of merit points ended up being a staggering 11,120. These unsold pieces would be put on the new store in the update and sold at a much lower price.

  Nevertheless, there was still one final piece left for sale, and Victor had intentionally saved it for the last.

  “…This pair of dual swords belonged to the notorious bandit boss, Connor. While he was by no means a good guy like Rylan, I have to admit that his weapon is pretty good. These dual swords have seen countless battles, carving a name for him until he reached his past status,” lied Victor through his teeth. “Furthermore, it has skull engravings on both of the hilts and even his name on it. Truly an item worth collecting.”

  Some players joked about the dual swords just as he mentioned that.

  “Damn, we could be like Kirito with those dual swords. Heck, I may unlock a secret skill like the Starburst Stream.”

  “What Kirito? Their slightly curved blades made them look more like the cutlasses used by pirates.”

  “Hush, you weebs should take your conversation elsewhere.”

  Really now? These players didn’t give him the chance to finish this weapon’s fabricated story. However, it would definitely fetch a sky-high price due to its intrinsic value—which was his true intent all along.

  “Ahem, you need to know that using two swords simultaneously would be quite difficult unless you’re ambidextrous. Its starting price is four hundred merit points, and you may start the bidding n—”

  “One thousand merit points!” Auralise’s voice cut through the air.

  Her again? Victor secretly creased his eyebrows.

  The players who were preparing to call out their bids all cursed loudly.

  “Fuck!”

  “Not her again!”

  “She’s too damn loaded!”

  As the players hesitated to challenge Auralise’s bid, a surprising contender stepped forward. Surprisingly, it wasn’t Auralise’s anticipated rival, Butterfly, as Victor had initially expected, but rather a player with light brown hair and a fair complexion—Storm.

  “Twelve hundred merit points!” Storm declared confidently. One must know that the game had been open for more than a month, and he was among the first batch of players who had accrued thousands of merit points in their Shadowlink Marks by now. He must have thought that this was a good opportunity to use it.

  “One thousand and four hundred merit points,” Auralise responded.

  “Miss Auralise, please, I really need this weapon,” Storm appealed to her before raising his bid. “Fifteen hundred merit points!”

  Victor was unsure of Storm’s intentions. Was he aiming to add the weapon to his collection, or did he have plans to use it in battle? Whatever the case, this was a weapon with a name, and its value would only appreciate over time. Additionally, it was of sufficient quality to be reforged into a magic weapon, although he hadn’t broached that possibility with the players yet… Could it be that he figured that out, and that’s his true intention?

  “Very well, I can concede this one,” Auralise agreed, a crafty smile plastered on her face. “But in exchange, how about collaborating on future dungeon explorations with me and my group? Or you can provide information alternatively.”

  “Certainly. We can discuss the details later.” Storm nodded in affirmation.

  Having bid for almost half of the items, Victor suspected that Auralise’s merit points reserve was running low anyway. Hence, she must have decided to seize this as an opportunity to make a connection. A businesswoman through and through.

  “Any other bidders?” Victor inquired, scanning the crowd.

  Some players were contemplating bids but ultimately refrained, as they seemed to be in a tacit understanding. Without further delay, Victor proceeded with the auction. “Going once, going twice… Sold to Storm Bringer for 1,500 merit points. As usual, my assistant, if you please.”

  “’Kay.” Lizbeth lifted the dual swords with her magic and floated them over to Storm, who then thanked her with glee.

  With the sale of that weapon, the total accumulated merit points reached 12,620. After deducting the 10 percent transaction tax and the hidden recovery fee for certain items, the final amount tallied to 10,100 merit points.

  Not bad at all.

  Unfortunately, Rowan’s axes weren’t recoverable. Even if they were, Victor wouldn’t have included them in the auction because the players never encountered the real leader of the mercenaries. Besides, he had turned Rowan into a mindless NPC, so taking his weapon for sale would be like putting the cart before the horse.

  Still, the auction was far from over. Victor had yet to unveil the main attraction—additional items that would steal the spotlight.

  Taking out a red vial from his interspatial ring, Victor announced to the crowd, “This is a health potion, and it is used to heal injuries you may sustain in battle. There are only five of these potions available in the auction. The starting price is five hundred merit points. You can bid for it if you find this useful.”