Ch.21 Part 1 – Bidding War (I)

 August 1, 2020March 16, 2021By koffeam

THDP sponsored chapters (1/3) by Slaaneshi Tentacles from ko-fi. Thank you for your support!

Xue Jinwen stopped talking. The two of them focused their eyes on the middle-aged cultivator on the stage. With a wave of his hand, a pale blue porcelain bottle appeared in the middle of the air. The bottle was very simple. Not the slightest bit looked special or expensive.

Meng Qi recognized that was the porcelain bottle for storing medicine that she bought at Cloud Immortal Pavilion. The cheapest one, ten first-grade spirit stones per bottle. Meng Qi’s spirit rose up. She had participated in auctions in Three Thousand Worlds before, and was wondering if the process would be different here.

The middle-aged cultivator said loudly: “The first lot from Profound Auction House today, twelve second realm Beiming pills.”

“Pfft…” As soon as his voice fell, someone laughed. There was not much irony in the laughter, as if it was just an instinctive reaction.
Xue Jinwen glanced in the direction of the voice, but could only hear the laughter of a young woman. Meng Qi sat indifferently, as if she had heard nothing.

The laugh seemed to have opened the jar, and soon other people followed. Many kinds of laughter spread endlessly. Although they didn’t contain much malice, the majority of the people who came to participate in today’s auction weren’t amateur on their first trip. Obviously, they felt that the style this time was a little different.

After a while, someone finally stopped laughing long enough to say, “This porcelain bottle with the Beiming pills…is it the one Cloud Immortal Pavilion sell for ten first realm spirit stones?”

The voice of the young male cultivator had just fell, and an even bigger wave of laughter instantly exploded. The auction sites of Beyond The Heaven, even the lowest-level Profound Auction House, never auctioning ordinary goods. These people actually knew it. But twelve second realm Beiming pills, inside the cheapest porcelain bottle… these cultivators who were so knowledgeable couldn’t imagine what kind of value did this thing have.

Another kind of medicine might still be okay, but it was Beiming pill! That was the pill that any medical cultivator of second rank and above could refine. Everyone here used the Beiming pill frequently, and they were all very familiar with it.

Especially the people from medical sects, even if they didn’t laugh out loudly, still couldn’t help to smile and shook their heads slightly.

The history of the Beiming pill was almost as old as the medical cultivation itself. Not long after its invention, its formula became widespread, and countless medical cultivators poured their effort to improve the formula for thousands of years.

The current Beiming pill was the improved version by a certain great predecessor from several thousands of years ago. Compared with the original formula, the speed of spiritual aura restoration was doubled.

If there was a possible improvement for the Beiming pill, it could only be the speed and amount of aura restoration. In the past thousands of years, new versions of Beiming pills occasionally appeared. The medicinal effects might be improved a little, but it was often because of the usage of more precious medicinal ingredients. However, that would also increase the price, but the efficacy improvement was limited, which ultimately wasn’t cost-effective.

Most of the medical cultivators did not laugh like the others. Almost all of them spent their entire life intensively researching medicine and medical art, and vaguely guessed that this Beiming pill that could appear in the Profound Auction House might be different.

However, most of them guessed that the pill used some kind of expensive medicinal herbs, just like the new versions Beiming pill that occasionally appeared. Using more precious, higher-grade ingredients would increase the efficacy of a medicine. But no matter what, it was still only a second realm.

Those elderly medical cultivators couldn’t help but shook their heads in a smile. People who did such cost-ineffective and heavy consuming methods were generally young medical cultivators.

There was a lot of laughter in the auction hall. Since the beginning of the Profound Auction House, there had never been such a relaxed and joyful atmosphere. After all, no one thought that Beyond The Heaven’s first auction lot today would be something like a second realm Beiming pill, which was more similar to a joke. Some even thought that this was a deliberate performance staged by the auction house.

Surrounded by laughter, the middle-aged cultivator, who was in charge of the auction, was standing unmoved. A faint smile was still bright on his face, and even his voice didn’t lose the initial calmness. “Twelve second realm Beiming pills. The starting price is fifty sixth-grade spirit stones.”

“Pfft…” Someone laughed again, “Fifty sixth-grade spirit stones? Pretty cheap. They seem to still have some self-awareness.”

Meng Qi glanced towards the place where the voice came. Did she set the price too low? Xue Jinwen had asked her before and suggested that she set the starting price to be at thirty to sixty sixth-grade spirit stones for twelve Beiming pills. Meng Qi chose the price to be fifty.

Still cheap? Indeed, there are so many rich cultivators in the world!
“If fellow Daoist purchase second realm Beiming pills from the Cloud Immortal Pavilion for fifty sixth-grade spirit stones, you can eat them as much as you can, and still cannot finish it for more than half a year.” Someone commented. His words incited another burst of laughter.

“The third realm Beiming pill only costs twenty third grade spirit stones.” Another person chimed in.

“It makes me a little curious. What is the difference between these Beiming pills with the usual one?” Someone quickly said: “Anyway, it’s cheap. I’ll take it back to try. Maybe they are as delicious as the legendary dragon liver and phoenix marrow. Fifty one sixth-grade spirit stones.”

Meng Qi: “…”

Even like this, some people really made a bid.

Meng Qi didn’t know that fifty sixth-grade spirit stones were nothing to the cultivators who could come here. Although the Profound Auction House was the lowest-level auction venue in Beyond The Heaven, after each auction, the money flowed in and out of the venue would amount to trillions if converted into the sixth-grade spirit stones. Fifty sixth-grade spirit stones, for the people here, might be worth less than a glass of spiritual wine they casually drank.

“Then…… I began with a fifty two sixth-grade spirit stones.”

“If you said that…… I also want to try. Fifty three!”

“Ah…… then fifty four!”

Everyone was laughing and joking. They added one sixth-grade spirit stone per bid and did not really take this auction seriously.