Chapter 200: In Death, We Can’t Even Reincarnate as a Pig
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
One by one, as other artifacts and medicines were entered into the auction, people noticed a phenomenon — aside from Vigilante A, there was another person on the VIP seats who had yet to indicate his interest.
A plaque was placed on the table in front of the seat which said, ‘Chen Xiang, Vice President of Tian Qi Energy Ltd.’.
A kind-looking sixty-something man sat on his seat, watching smilingly as the treasures were snagged by other people one after another, yet he still did not participate in the bidding.
Observant people already knew his role in this convention. He was an agent of the Truth Department, a leader of a state-owned enterprise with a background in being an official…
As the host of the Treasure Trading Convention, it was not appropriate for the Truth Department to bid for items openly, so they chose to do it with a proxy.
Such a person would only bid for the items with special tactical usage, like storage artifacts and medicines with breakthrough-inducing capabilities…
In the Treasure Trading Conventions of previous years, these items were basically unreachable for other people.
Storage artifacts had always been synonymous with ‘difficult to create’, ‘troublesome procedures’, ‘expensive consumption’, and ‘low chance of success’…
On top of that, the demand was high. It would not be an exaggeration to say any Extraordinaire would want one of their own. Even if it was just one cubic meter of storage space, it would still be a dream to obtain such a treasure, as it would be a necessity in any travel arrangeme- pillage and plunder operations.
Needless to say, the Limit Breaking Pill was a huge investment for any forces. The sooner one broke through their limits, the more advantage they could gain in all sorts of competition for resources.
Outwardly, it was all a fair game in the Treasure Trading Convention. However, as soon as Vice President Chen had started bidding, normal people would only symbolically raise the price for a little before giving up.
Operating on the Truth Department’s ground, no one dared to oppose the Azure Mountain, but no one could go against the Truth Department as well.
The reserve price for these treasures was set really high by the Azure Mountain. There were only a few who were able to afford the reserve price aside from the Truth Department. Most people could only look at the items greedily.
One of the few was the Chinese Taoist Alliance. The strongest person in the alliance was Master Ma of Mount Indigo Monastery. He was a Pond-level powerhouse and one of the four folk powerhouse cultivators. It was said that he had been on the verge of breaking through.
However, he was wholeheartedly devoted to the orthodoxy of Mount Indigo Monastery, so his position in the CTA was only a phantom one. Master Ma would show up when it necessitates his presence, but the real leader was someone else.
The other organization was the Chinese Buddhist Association. It was led by Tianjing Fawang as he was the most powerful of them, a Descended One, and an honorable man. As their leader, he would command the Buddist sects of China.
They were a conglomeration of Buddhist temples and orthodoxies of various sizes, aiming to coordinate the internal interests, collect resources, support elite disciples, and inheritance of Buddhist orthodoxies.
The third was called the Hundred Herbs Clan, led by a hermitic miraculous physician who called himself Hundred Herbs Geezer. They specialized in accepting people with extraordinary talents in the art of healing for further education.
According to rumors, the Hundred Herbs Geezer was also a Descended One, but his clan had never participated in any combats. They maintained an excellent relationship with the Truth Department, and like Fang Ning’s Harmony Powers Ltd., they were also a triple-A-grade associate.
Since the Truth Department’s agent did not join the bid, it would be these three organizations to bid for the tactical treasures.
However, as time passed, the three organizations realized something and their pace slowed down in bidding for the items.
Even at the bidding for Limit Breaking Pill, there was only one party who raised their paddle, and Vice President Chen was still not acting on the lot.
“I can understand if it were storage artifacts, they may have their own way of creating those. But even a hard currency like Limit Breaking Pill? It has a high failure rate, every failure would mean a total waste of many ingredients to the point where it wouldn’t be considered a waste to hoard as much as they can. Vice President Chen actually abstained from bidding on it?”
“I heard Qiao Zishan was trying to advance to Grade-A, no wait, Pond-level according to the dragon power rating. They should actually need this.”
“That’s right, I wonder why they didn’t?”
No one there thought of themselves as dumb. On the contrary, they all thought they were pretty smart.
When they realized the Truth Department did not participate in any of the tactical treasures, they knew something was up.
The people from the Chinese Taoist Alliance (CTA) had raised their paddle first before they realized their old rival, the Chinese Buddhist Association (CBA), did not even try to raise theirs.
Someone noticed that their leader, Tianjing Fawang was sending a message telepathically in the direction of Vigilante A and immediately understood.
The people from CTA was furious. After all, the Azure Mountain’s reserve price had always been very high, and they would rather be bought-in than selling it cheap…
They dared not break a contract. As bad as the auction deposit be confiscated sound, it was not as bad as offending the Azure Mountain. If they take that as an insult and paid them a visit to tell one of their disciples “we’re fond of you”…
Hundred Herbs Clan had never bought any medicinal end products. The most they would do was to purchase a sample or two for research and to try to reverse engineer the process…
The Limit Breaking Pill was already in their list to research, so naturally, they would not have bid for it.
As everyone had seen, Tianjing Fawang was communicating with Vigilante A through telepathy without being discreet.
“The pills that you needed, not a problem. Please send someone to talk to Butler Zheng afterward. I’ve told him to give you a Gold VIP treatment… Don’t worry, I have always delivered what I promised. Its effect is definitely stronger than those of the Azure Mountain’s, and it’s cheaper than theirs.”
“Ho ho, Venerable One, of course I would trust you. I shall entrust you for the future source for the pills for the Chinese Buddhist Association.”
“No worries. As long as the ingredient is complete, there’s no problem.”
Following that, many of the artifacts and medicines were not able to meet the reserve price.
This had rarely happened in the previous conventions. Most of the smaller organizations could not even afford the reserve price, only the Truth Department, CBA, CTA, and the Hundred Herbs Clan had enough money to spare.
Gu Buwei had been pretty stoic even after being extorted by Vigilante A.
However, when the treasures began to be bought-in one after another, he finally frowned.
The previous Treasure Trading Conventions had every piece of items being in the hot seat, but they had since become like trash that no one was even asking to buy.
As another highly-priced quality artifact got bought-in, he waved his hand, motioning the staff members to cover up all the rest of the treasures.
Beckoning at the treasures, all of the plates disappeared before he said calmly, “Looks like no one was interested with the items we, the Azure Mountain, have for offer this time. So be it. The February session of the Treasure Trading Convention will enter the free trading stage. I shall take my leave, we will meet again in March.”
The rest of the people exchanged glances, thinking, ‘We are very interested, but they were too expensive, we can’t afford them…’
‘Those who could afford them had probably found a better supplier.’
At that point, it was in tacit understanding that the Venerable Dragon God was the new supplier.
The dragons hoard treasures, that saying had to be the truth. The Venerable Dragon God was going to enter the high-end playing field.
However, that was still a business of larger organizations, they did not think they could afford the Venerable Dragon God’s wares either…
That assumption was right. The System had no reason to supply for lower-end consumers, it would only take on clients of Pond-level and above.
After his little speech, Gu Buwei disappeared from the stage the same way he appeared in the beginning.
At that moment, an employee of the Truth Department spoke into the microphone, “Everyone, please follow the usual routine and enter into the computer in front of you the list of treasures you would like to purchase, as well as the ones you would like to offer up for trade. After that, we will show a reference trade chart on the screen before you will be allowed to trade freely.”
The trading of cultivation materials had not had a standard currency due to the difficulty in exchange for many of the rarer materials. Everyone could only trade according to their own needs, engaging in the ancient barter system. It was up to them to decide if they were incurring a loss.
For example, the materials needed to create a Ring of Storage would be three portions of Starstone with other supporting materials. However, at the auction, the reserve price of this artifact would be fifteen portions of Starstone with similarly proportioned supporting materials…
Everyone knew the creators could make at least two or three of the same items with that quantity of materials, but they had to take it.
Many people began to type into the screen in front of them, leaving only Fang Ning to look at the huge screen on the stage. There was a rolling list of cultivation materials and their information, like their place of origin, their use, trading records, and others.
It could be surmised that the information was concluded with the data collected from countless cultivators in the past twenty years. They were so precious, the only people in China who had access to this information directly were only about a thousand people.
A moment after, the huge screen no longer showed descriptions of cultivation materials. Instead, they started showing the treasures each organization needed as well as the items they have to offer.
There were materials and ingredients, as well as end products.
No one was talking, murmuring, or whispering, but not many were looking up either. Most of the people were staring at the table in front of their own seat.
Computer screens were embedded in the tables in front of them that showed different transaction routes. It determined with whom they should be trading before they could use the traded items to trade for what they really wanted. Additionally, the items past transaction records…
It was tedious, but there was nothing they could have done. The circulation of cultivation materials had only been around for twenty years, and furthermore, it had only been popularized in the past few years. There was no generally accepted currency.
The Truth Department wanted to issue some sort of a currency note to fix a price for different Vitality materials. However, aside from using them internally as a currency to exchange for different cultivation supplies, no one else would acknowledge the validity of the notes…
After watching for some time, Fang Ning realized that he had finally entered the era of cultivation. At the same time, he had an unexplainable thought, ‘In my obliviousness, most other people had been left behind by me and Sir System…’
…
On an unnamed mountain in Southeast China, on the outskirts of the jungle where Gu Buwei and Qi Mei appeared.
Gu Buwei had reappeared there as the Treasure Trading Convention was still ongoing.
At this point, a Pond-level young man about twenty years of age was waiting outside of the jungle.
As soon as the young man saw Gu Buwei, he shook his head while breaking into a grin as if he was truly happy.
“Haha, Ancient Abacus 1 , I can’t believe Spicy Plum Qi 2 would have met with such a hitch. That’s so funny! She was trying to challenge me when she returns? Nice going, she’s only left with a spirit now. At least twenty years after this, she wouldn’t need to think about this at all.”
Gu Buwei kept his calmness and said, “Stop laughing Chen Tianxiao, if my master and mistress knew you had been laughing at Qi Mei behind their backs, I don’t think even your master could save you.”
It was then that Chen Tianxiao stopped. “Fine, fine. I know you were only being nice, Senior Brother Gu, I will bring Qi Mei’s spirit back. It’d be funny if she was reincarnated into a pig… The Celestial Swine Demon on the mountain had just become pregnant. It was incredibly talented, and its body was not comparable by humans. If she started cultivating in her fetus form, she could probably challenge me again in three years…”
Gu Buwei passed him a brocade box and said without an expression, “That’s not impossible. Normal core disciples don’t even have the fortune to experience that.”
Chen Tianxiao took the box and said while pouting, “That’s right. Those who fight on their own like we do can’t even be reborn as a pig… Right, senior brother, you mentioned in your message about a variable appearing and wanted me to report to grandmaster, can you tell me what the variable is? Could it be the Venerable Dragon God who killed Qi Mei?”
Gu Buwei shot him a glance. “Why would you ask me if you guessed it? I will begin my meditation here. After reporting, go get the second batch of treasures for me.”
Chen Tianxiao asked curiously, “What a drag. I wouldn’t have to run back and forth all day if we could just get a few more of the core disciples to come with us… Hey, on the last convention, we only sold out a batch by the third month of the Treasure Trading Convention, are you sure you want the second batch now?”
Gu Buwei said, “The first batch of treasure can no longer satisfy the bigger organizations.”
Chen Tianxiao instantly understood and smirked. “Looks like it’s caused by the variable, the Venerable Dragon God. Should we take care of him, now that he stopped our livelihood?”
He had just been grinning really joyfully, it was surprising how easily he was willing to kill like he was just eating rice…
Gu Buwei replied calmly, “Neither us nor our masters can make that decision. It has to depend on grandmaster.
Chen Tianxiao’s brows unfurled as he heard that. “Mm, up to now, no one who descended in China was able to avoid grandmaster’s Precognitive Divination, not even the Venerable Dragon God. At most, he’d be able to be smug about it for now, hahah…”
Gu Buwei ignored him, choosing to stare introspectively at a floating cloud on the edge of the sky instead.T
