The Great Thief

Lu Li wasn’t worried about losing money at today’s auction.

On the one hand, the auction was just a gimmick in order to promote the upcoming Ruling Sword auction house. It wasn’t that important to make money, as long as he didn’t lose too much.

On the other hand, this was just the beginning. Everyone might decide to be polite and bid less, but this behaviour wouldn’t last for long. There were many wolves here and few pieces of meat. When the Epic items started coming out, the fighting would definitely be fierce.

“The second item is an Epic belt. Please get ready to bid. You probably won’t be able to find a better belt for a Paladin than this one,” Square Root 3 announced, then gritted his teeth before saying, “Starting at one gold coin.”

“One thousand gold!”

The bid was made by ‘Tears in the Wind’, who was a Paladin. He was locked onto this item the moment he saw it because of its exquisite attributes and effects.

“1200 gold,” Northern Tang Dream bid as she raised her glass to pay tribute to Lu Li. This woman who was on the Beauty Rankings had once met Lu Li shortly after entering the game, and had taken the First Clear of the Spider’s Lair with him. After that, they hadn’t stayed in contact. There was also the time when Water Fairy invited her to represent Grand Hegemony at the auction, and her bid seemed to be a show of goodwill to Lu Li.

“You know Northern Tang Dream?” Water Fairy asked when she saw this unfold.

“Yep, we’ve done an Instance Dungeon together,” Lu Li revealed. The World Announcement had broadcasted it before, but he continued, “Then we parted ways. Grand Hegemony is just not for me.”

“Many people have joined Grand Hegemony for Northern Tang Dream. She isn’t such a simple character,” Water Fairy said.

Lu Li cleverly decided to keep his mouth shut. His instincts had always been excellent and had saved his life on many occasions.

“1500 gold.”

Tears in the Wind added 300 gold at a time to demonstrate his strength. This price had probably exceeded the market price for a level 50 Epic item. Even if attributes were the best, an item like this was probably capped at 50,000 dollars.

No one else wanted to increase the price any further, so the item now belonged to Tears in the Wind.

In fact, once the System was revised and the level effects were applied, if he could sell this 1500 gold item for 1000 gold, it would already be quite a good deal. As for every player that was higher than level 55, there was no way they would spend this kind of money for that item.

After two items had been sold, the atmosphere became more enthusiastic.

The main items being auctioned were still Dark Gold equips interspersed with Epic equipment. Whenever an Epic item appeared, it would attract everyone to bid and very few were sold below market price. There was basically no Epic equipment in the market anyway, so this was one of the few places you could buy them.

It was just the auction event that was being held today, but just because you had money didn’t mean you would be invited.

“Pay attention to the next item. This is a level 55 Epic Warrior set piece, which is almost equivalent to an ordinary Legendary equip,’ Square Root 3 said, trying to rile up the already exhausted participants.

“Two thousand gold!”

Before waiting for a lower price, a bid of 2000 gold was placed. This kind of offer had obviously been made to shock the latecomers, but the 2000 gold mark would soon be surpassed to reach 3000 gold.

A level 55 Epic set item was the kind that felt like a finale.

Most of the players were currently progressing through the Blackrock Tower Instance Dungeon and even the Blackrock Abyss. Clubs were aiming for the Molten Core, but no matter what Instance Dungeon it was, the level 55 Epic set piece would be a top-level equipment. What’s more, it had Fire Resistance properties.

Ruling Sword was an idiot to sell this item!

This was the opinion of everyone involved at the auction.

“3500 gold!” Innocent Child sneered from the corner of his mouth. This item had been lost by the Gangnam Royals, so now he was responsible for getting it back.

In fact, he had already seen several familiar pieces of equipment.

It could be said that almost 1/5 of the Epic equipment that had appeared in this Auction had come from the Gangnam Royals. They had undoubtedly contributed to the success of the Ruling Sword auction.

Innocent Child didn’t want to participate in this auction. This kind of thing was usually taken care of by Heart of War or Dancing Star Dream. However, Dancing Star Dream had decided to leave the club, so he couldn’t represent them. As for Heart of War...

Innocent Child felt like gloating when he thought of the club and guild’s leader.

Heart of War was still facing the questioning of the board of directors. He could only hope that his skills could continue to play a role, otherwise, he would soon be announcing his resignation.

“3800!”

“4000!”

Innocent Child lazily increased it again. He wasn’t spending his own money anyway, so he didn’t feel bad.

Compared to the money invested to fight the Stronghold, 4000 gold was nothing at all. Fighting the System monsters that were defending the Stronghold, fighting Ruling Sword’s defense of the Stronghold and dispatching more than 100 chariots already cost 5000 gold. The other costs like potions were no less than that. In addition, they had also spent a lot of money hiring mercenaries.

Since they had reached 4000 gold, the others naturally stopped raising the price.

One million dollars was being spent to buy a piece of equipment. Anyone who competed with that had to be an idiot. The only people who would do that were probably the spoilt children of rich families.

Equipment auctions proceeded quite quickly. More than 100 items had been sold for about 5 million dollars. Gangnam Royals, represented by Innocent Child, had contributed 2 of that 5 million.

Water Fairy heeded Lu Li’s advice and didn’t place a bid from start to finish. She had called out a price a few times, but it wasn’t so much a bid than a raising of the price.

No one realized that Ruling Sword had acquired more than 100 pieces of equipment including 40 to 50 Epic items. One of those Epic items was even a level 60 item, but the rest were all level 55 or 50. Even if someone drew the connection after the System update, they wouldn’t think that Lu Li was a prophet, but rather had just been lucky.

The next thing was the shops.

There were about 60 shops along the street.

Ruling Sword retained some of them. There was one kept for the auction house, some handed over to the logistics department, some used to pay off Water Fairy’s debt and the rest were released for the public auction.

From a long-term perspective, a Stronghold could only develop if many people came to inhabit it. If you wanted more people to come, then you had to make sure business flourished.

If the Stronghold only had Ruling Sword stores, then it would only be filled with Ruling Sword players.

The small shops were very cheap. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that they were almost giving them away. At least, it was much cheaper than buying one from the main city of the System. It was even cheaper than renting a room in the bustling main area of the city.