âH-How do I look?â Aria asked, fidgeting from the side.
âNo need to be so nervous,â Rael said, looking her up and down.
Ariaâs clothes seemed a little tight, but that was the main selling point. Oh, and of course, the bunny ears did their magic as well.
Her hair was usually straight, but sheâd put in the effortâtied it back, curled the ends, and let some bangs fall over her face. Coupled with that, she had put on professional-looking glasses over her white eyes.
Safe to say, she looked like the perfect host.
âYouâre ready,â Rael said with a grin as he stood up, walked over to her, and patted her on the shoulder. âYou did memorize the lines, right?â
âIâm not an amateur,â Aria stated, puffing her chest.
âI believe you can do this, Aria. And donât worry, you can be as vulgar as your innocent heart desires,â he added, and before she could voice her concerns, he pushed her onto the stage.
While he was pretty cheap, he added a single bright light right above the hostess, Aria.
And of course, the moment the players saw her, they all fell silent.
Stun locked, pfft⌠Rael thought with a smile.
However, Aria was clearly nervous, much more than she let on. Yet despite that, she collected herself, digging her nails into her palm, and finally, she looked on at the players inside the auction.
âGreetings, everyone. Iâll be your host today, Aria Virelorn,â she introduced herself with a curt bow.
âForget the auction, Iâm bidding my soul.
âWhoâs recording!? Who knew there were such beauties in this game!
âThy walk the path of a monk⌠so why art thou hardâŚ
âSecurity! Thereâs a perverted bald guy next to me!
âItâs as chaotic as I imagined,â Rael whispered with a faint smile.
Soon, Xavier approached and sat beside Sweepus. It also wanted a bit of the popcorn, but first, it reported the numbers.
âThere are 6,439 people inside the venue.â Xavier cleared its throat. âOf them, 4,204 purchased the Basic Buy-In, 1,294 the VIP Buy-In, 918 the VVIP Buy-In, and lastly, 23 purchased the MVP Buy-In.â
âThatâsâŚâ Rael did some quick calculations in his head.
â487,000,000 Trell⌠shit⌠this really was a good idea.â Rael grinned.
âIndeed. Youâve outdone yourself.â Xavier nodded and began eating the popcorn alongside Sweepus.
As for Rael, he returned his gaze over to Aria, who, after the crowd quieted down, began speaking again.
âOur g-gracious benefactor, Rael Sutekh, has graced all of you with 221 armor sets. We will be selling these sets in bulkâ20 sets per roundâand the starting bid will be 15 million Trell,â Aria stated, and walked to the back of the stage.
She flashed him a shaky nod and then came back out with a cart which had 20 small boxes on it.
All of them had the sets he made, just their effects were slightly different. However, that was the main selling pointâthe randomness of gacha.
They would either get shit or get slightly better shit.
In the end, Rael wasnât losing out on anything since he could craft dozens of those sets very quickly.
The only problem was that he estimated the 100,000 players allowed into the beta test had only accumulated roughly 5-7 billion Trell combined.
And if he considered the fact that the top guilds, as well as the richest people, gathered here, then their total sum of money was around 2â3 billion Trell.
Itâs not bad though. Just any more would make me less money since there wouldnât be any bidding wars, Rael thought.
In the meantime, Aria cleared her throat and fixed her bunny ears before nodding at Rael and turning back to the players.
Thatâs the signal⌠he swiftly tapped the auction interface, and in the very next momentâŚ
â˘âRaelâs Dark Auctionââ˘
Category: Auction/Bid
⢠[x20] Prism Set (Uncommon): 15,000,000 Trell
âLet the first round of the auction begin!â Aria said with excitement, and not even a moment later, the first bid came in.
<Player: Manny_5 has bid 20,000,000 Trell>
<Countdown: 00:30>
âHuh? Arenât those countdowns usually longerâŚ?
âWhy do I feel like it wonât reset after a new bidâŚ
Soon, the next bid came in.
<Player: liljay439 has bid 25,000,000 Trell>
<Countdown: 00:27>
And of course, the players were right.
What better way to add stakes than when the players would be in a rush to buy the item first?
Thankfully, his plan didnât backfire, as the people who previously thought of waiting it out began bidding like crazy.
<Player: PhoenixTheShiba has bid 25,889,190 Trell>
<Player: AssassinsLife has bid 28,528,920 Trell>
<Player: xx_Kittygirl has bid 30,000,000 Trell>
<Player: Mangostick has bid 31,000,000 Trell>
<Player: TheeReaper has bid 62,000,000 Trell>
That shot up real fucking fast. Rael whistled in amusement.
In the meantime, he watched as Ariaâs jaw practically hung on the floor.
She must really be regretting taking that 10 million, huh? Rael grinned.
He was going to give her a bonus, since the amount of money he would earn from this would simply be crazy.
And of course, he was a bit too shy to be up there himself, but he wouldnât tell her that.
Nonetheless, the bids continued coming and going until finally, the countdown hit 0.
<Countdown: 00:00>
<Round 1 Winner: (Player) RagingFist â 129,000,000 Trell>
<Auction Leaderboard Updated!>
1. (Player) RagingFist: 129,000,000 Trell
2. Empty.
3. Empty.
âW-Well, round 1 has concludedâŚâ Aria muttered in disbelief. âYou may pick up your items after the auction concludes. Until then, we still have 10 more rounds left, and a single sub-round where weâll be giving away a single armor set for free to a certain s-streamer!â
âStreamer? Shit, should I open up my stream?
âIâm taking my clothes off!
âIdiot⌠itâs no use, donât you know Asimov, PinkGirl, and BlackDragon are here? Their viewcount is literally in the millions!
Oho⌠I guess I got my targets then, Rael thought with a smirk as Aria rolled the cart to the opposite side of the stage.
After she rolled it away, Dirt Vader and Dust Trooper secured all the boxes in a special container and put it to the side.
With that, Aria walked back, approaching the area Rael was in and grabbing one of the many carts before rolling it onto the stage.
She looked up at the ceiling, turned toward him, and then back to the players.
Rael quickly set up the dark auction interface, and in the very next momentâŚ
âLet the second round of the auction begin!â
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