Chapter 146: Worm Potion
No. 8 Cave was nothing more than a crude auction.
However, anyone who wanted to enter had to additionally hand over ten thousand Alliance Coins to the guards at the cave entrance.
Regarding this, Zhou Ming could only say that they truly knew how to make money.
After entering No. 8 Cave, Zhou Ming swept his gaze across the surroundings. Nearly a hundred people were already standing inside the cave, calling out bids and competing in the auction.
The item being auctioned was a chameleon gene potion. After use, it allowed the body to change color and achieve optical invisibility.
However, this kind of optical invisibility could not be used while wearing any clothes.
Zhou Ming had encountered this both at Qinshan Base and in the Northern Wasteland.
Once, it had been Mei Fox from the Cunning Fox Hunter Squad. Her figure had indeed been very good, but she had still died at Zhou Ming’s hands.
The other time had been the man who stole the Half-Beastman class advancement materials. He had been discovered by Zhou Ming’s Radar Sensory Domain, and in the end Zhou Ming had reaped the benefits as the hidden mantis stalked the cicada.
“Four hundred and fifty thousand.”
“Four hundred and seventy thousand.”
……
Inside the cave, interest in this item was not particularly high. Only a handful of people were increasing the price.
After all, gene potions carried great hidden dangers. There were certain risks during consumption, and their usage was also somewhat limited.
If used by a martial arts expert, it could be employed for close-range assassination, or to save one’s life while being hunted down.
If the Alliance had not prohibited the research and development of gene potions, the chameleon potion would have been worth at most three hundred thousand Alliance Coins.
In the end, once the chameleon potion broke past five hundred thousand, no one continued to call out bids.
“Next auction item, one Vampire Healing Injection.”
“Starting price, one million.”
As the Black Market staff brought up the next auction item, the auctioneer wearing a mouse mask immediately began the auction, as if not worried at all that no one would bid.
Upon hearing Vampire Healing Injection, the atmosphere inside the cave instantly became lively, and acquaintances even began conversing with one another.
Even Zhou Ming, standing in the corner, felt a trace of interest.
Within the Alliance, semi-finished secondary potions generally did not exceed one hundred thousand in price. Low-grade potions ranged from one hundred thousand to one million, while high-grade potions ranged from ten million to one hundred million.
As for transcendent-grade potions, they could no longer be measured in money. Even purchasing them required settlement in source crystals.
Even precious high-grade potions were also settled using source crystals.
The effect of the Vampire Healing Injection was very simple. It was similar to a high-grade healing potion, capable of saving someone even when gravely injured.
However, the Vampire Healing Injection was refined from the essence blood of the Vampire race among the foreign races. After use, it carried the side effect of developing blood addiction, so the Alliance had issued orders prohibiting the production of such hazardous potions.
Yet the reality was that such things were very difficult to ban.
The reason was simple. The number of high-grade potioners within the Alliance was less than one thousand, and high-grade healing potions rarely appeared.
Meanwhile, producing Vampire Healing Injections was comparatively simple. As long as Vampires could be captured, their essence blood could be extracted using various high-tech devices, allowing for large-scale production.
Although every adult Vampire possessed strength comparable to a Professional Beast Tamer, the cost was clearly far lower than refining high-grade healing potions.
As soon as the words on the auction platform fell, people immediately began calling out bids.
Compared to contracting blood addiction, one’s own life was obviously more important.
High-grade healing potions were expensive and required special purchasing channels. The Vampire Healing Injection naturally became their first choice.
“One million five hundred thousand.”
“One million se—”
“Two million.”
……
Compared to the chameleon gene potion, the price of the Vampire Healing Injection rose sharply, quickly breaking past three million.
“Three million five hundred thousand.”
As a deep, resounding voice rang out, the chorus of bids finally came to a halt.
The price of the Vampire Healing Injection was already set there. Continuing to increase the price would no longer be worthwhile. After all, this was not a high-grade healing potion with better effects and no side effects.
The auction concluded, and both parties completed the transaction.
The auction continued, with various problematic or unidentified items appearing in turn.
There were even exquisite antiques preserved from before the Doomsday Era.
Perhaps Beast Tamers did not like them, but wealthy individuals or those of the upper class always liked such items to display their background and heritage.
For these things, Zhou Ming merely watched from the sidelines, as if he had come purely to broaden his horizons.
……
“Next auction item, one high-grade Worm Potion.”
“Starting price, ten million.”
It had arrived.
Upon hearing the item introduced by the auctioneer, joy immediately surged in Zhou Ming’s heart.
The Worm Potion was a high-grade potion refined using Fusion Worms as material.
This type of creature was extremely special. Its initial form looked like a silkworm larva. Once it came into contact with the genes of another organism, it would redevelop using the absorbed genes as the main body.
To refine a Worm Potion, an initial-state Fusion Worm had to be used as the material, making it exceedingly rare.
The effect of the Worm Potion was very simple: it reduced the rejection between two fused genetic bloodlines.
This potion was also something Professional Beast Tamers urgently needed.
This was because most Beast Tamers’ beasts came from low-grade Ferocious Beasts, whose inherent bloodline potential was limited.
After a Beast Tamer advanced to an official profession, if they wanted to continue improving their strength, they had to consider the potential of their beasts.
Replacing a beast would damage Spiritual Power, and would also require enormous amounts of time, energy, and resources to re-cultivate their beast.
Their strength would even fall into a trough, barely stronger than an Apprentice Beast Tamer.
Their combat style, beast system, mastered secret techniques, and so on would all need to be overturned and rebuilt from scratch.
Thus, a method was born to enhance one’s beast potential through the fusion of other bloodlines.
This kind of cultivation method was also the non-transmitted secret of every major power, because how to cultivate, the direction of cultivation, would all affect a Beast Tamer’s development.
Major powers with long-standing inheritances all possessed their own unique legacies.
These legacies were not advancement systems, but complete supporting frameworks of secret techniques, combat skills, cultivation directions, bloodline selection, and bloodline fusion methods and ratios.
If a family controlled Ferocious Beasts of the same species, then there was a high probability that this family had mastered a complete corresponding legacy.
The Blue Star Alliance had been established for several hundred years. Its development of the Beast Taming system was no longer like the early days of the Alliance, where beasts were purely treated as hired muscle.
Moreover, as the trend of genetic research rose, the price of such potions had also increased considerably.
The most crucial element of the Half-Beastman class advancement ritual was precisely the Fusion Worm.
And the effects brought by the Worm Potion were clearly better than directly using a Fusion Worm.
However, the appearance of a Worm Potion here meant that its origin was certainly problematic. It was most likely spoils obtained through murder and robbery.
But for Zhou Ming, he did not care whether it was stolen goods or not. As long as the potion’s effect was not an issue, that was enough.
He had not purchased the Thunder Type-3 Revolver merely to deal with low-grade Ferocious Beasts, or ordinary Beast Tamers engaging in Black Market infighting.
Even if he had to spend all the money and resources on his body today, he would still bid down the Worm Potion before him.
While Zhou Ming was lost in thought, the price of the Worm Potion broke past fifteen million.
There were few bidders, but the frequency of bids was not low.
Seeing this, Zhou Ming also immediately opened his mouth.
“Twenty million.”