Auction
Tie Dao Ku waits over an hour outside the sealed secret room. When the door finally opens, he finds the banquet table smashed and the Bai clansmen ashen-faced, their agreement with Fang Yuan already locked in place by a poison vow Gu. Fang Yuan leaves with a bare farewell. Bai Feng tells a bewildered Tie Dao Ku only that Bai clan is withdrawing from the pursuit, claiming its assets are too thin to risk further trouble. Tie Dao Ku’s attempt to keep the alliance together fails, and Bai clan departs, leaving him to vow he will still hunt Fang Yuan alone through the battle stage. A waiter then stops him: the banquet was never paid for, and the bill is his. ch. 296
On the road out, the Bai clansmen work out how to raise five hundred thousand primeval stones in a day. Bai Feng will borrow three hundred thousand from loan sharks on his standing as an elder, and pawn his own core Gu, small tornado, for part of the rest. The others volunteer their own Gu, lotus cloth, fountain thoughts, little wind drill, a three forked bone spear, to close the gap. Bai Feng resolves to shoulder the blame for the humiliating bargain himself, so the younger clansmen’s standing back home survives it, and his speech about sacrifice for the clan’s future leaves the group moved. ch. 296
Three days later, Fang Yuan watches a large auction from a private room his purple thorn token buys him, though at this scale the token cannot secure goods in advance the way it does at smaller sales. A frost breath Gu sells for thirty-eight thousand primeval stones and a flame heart Gu for forty-two thousand. A rank four grass tree army Gu goes for two hundred and fifty thousand, more than an ordinary rank four Gu commands, matching what an ordinary rank five Gu costs. Fang Yuan wins an instant success Gu for over a hundred and eighty thousand, then a white silver relic Gu and a golden shield Gu together for eighty-three thousand, and stops bidding after that. He still wants a bitter strength Gu, but its low fusion success rate keeps it scarce even in Shang clan city, and he may end up refining one himself. He decides to hold the white silver relic Gu in reserve now that Bai Ning Bing fights alongside him. With over two hundred and seventy thousand spent today, a little over two hundred and twenty thousand remains, set aside for the super sized auction Shang clan city holds every two years. ch. 296
Li Ran confirms Bai clan has truly left the city. Fang Yuan does not let the three million he extorted lull him, though: in his previous life this same clan rose to power abruptly through exactly this kind of silent endurance. They are already using the Bai Gu inheritance search as cover to hunt for a new spirit spring at Bai Gu mountain, faster this time than in that previous life. Tie clan and its demon suppression tower he marks as a concern for later, though Tie Dao Ku himself does not worry him now. ch. 296
Outside Shi Zi restaurant, eighteen foreign courtesans stand at the entrance while Tie Dao Ku, unable to pay for the ruined feast, works off the debt guarding the door. Mortified, he prays no acquaintance will see him like this. A voice, unnamed, greets him as “brother Tie Dao Ku”; in fury, his silent response names Fang Zheng as the one behind it. ch. 296
