Chapter 457 Auction Start! (Part 1)
As his upperclassman, Kai had never really interacted with Blake Hunt. The former had only known the latter due to being Westbridge’s rugby ace, making him famous in their school. Only later did he find out the younger teenager’s double life as an Altered Hunter, and that was mostly from Gary.
During Slough’s big gang war, involving the Underdogs, the Grey Elephants and the Howlers, Blake Hunt had come out to help. One could argue that he had merely acted as an Altered Hunter, who wanted to get rid of the Infected Altered, but it was undeniable that his intervention had helped out their entire town.
‘Have the Altered Hunters sent him on his own? No, I doubt that. He would make too easy of a target if that were the case. I should assume that either the ones next to him are Altered Hunters, or they’re somewhere else hidden in the room. Have they come here to buy Anti-Altered weapons… or are they here for another reason?’ Kai wondered.
They were in a room with many Altered. The more Kai thought about it, the more perfect the location seemed for a large-scale attack. The only thing was, that wasn’t how the Altered Hunters operated. They attacked isolated Altered in small groups to avoid the risk of anyone else interfering.
Besides, the unknown number of Altered would also pose a giant risk to them, as there was no guarantee the Altered Hunters could take out everyone involved, and if they failed, the retaliation was bound to be very bloody.
“Sold!” The auctioneer announced before he slammed a mallet down on the stand that was placed in the centre. “For 1.2 million.”
“Sh*t, if a single weapon costs a fourth of what we have, do we even stand a chance to get an Altered solution at all?!” Innu was left flabbergasted at the kind of money being thrown around.
The others were also beginning to doubt the likelihood of winning anything. The further this auction went on, the more expensive the items seemed to become. Before those various pieces of land and buildings had come out, things had been relatively tame. At least with the batches of weapons, it had seemed less shocking, since they could justify the high prices due to the quantity of sold goods, but now…
A couple more weapons followed, and one of the adults next to Blake Hunt had actually managed to win the bid for two weapons. Unfortunately, he was unable to purchase a third one, as the trident he was interested in, had also attracted the attention from a patron above, and perhaps due to their earlier acquisitions, they had ended up conceding the following bidding war.
‘Considering that the Altered Hunters are regarded as a terrorist group, it’s a bit surprising to see how much money they appear to have. I’m not even sure if they gave up because they lack the funds, or simply because they wish to avoid standing out.
‘Either they have very rich members among them or someone must be backing them? Perhaps a private company? Hmmm, it actually also be one of the Tier-1 gangs or even a King. I suppose there could be a symbiotic relationship between them. They would make the perfect pawns to take out a rival gang’s Altered.’ Kai realised, though he was also aware that most of it was wild speculation on his part.
It was hard to do research on such an elusive target. Just like Blake, their members were leading quite a normal life during the day, so it was near impossible to find out who was a member and who wasn’t. Up until this point, Kai had also focused mainly on other gangs or organisations who they might have to fight at some point, but now that they were delving into Altered territory, they were bound to become enemies with the Altered Hunters at some point. Assuming, they weren’t already on. After all, only Blake knew that about Werewolves not being Wolf Altered.
“And with that, we’re out of weapons. Let’s move on to the next category of items.” The host declared as he wiped the sweat from his head. The bidding had been quite intense on the last item, and he knew there was more to come. “The first Altered solution of the night.”
Rolled out from the back came a tray table with a solution. It was further protected in a glass container, displayed on a red cloth.
“Thanks to recent developments from labs around the world, nearly everyone can become an Altered with but a simple injection. This item will let you become a cat-type Altered, granting you fast reflexes, better night vision, power climbing abilities among other perks. All who watch the AFC fights should be aware of the prowess of feline Altered. The bidding starts at 500,000!”
The people at the front cheered a bit, and nearly the entire room put up their paddle, each one trying to be the first to shout out the starting bid.
“700,000!” A man shouted as he lifted up his panel.
“750,000!” Another shouted.
“800,000.” The gang leader next to Kai shouted. He had a large smirk on his face, and looked at the masked teenager, seemingly challenging him to participate.
“Hey, should we go for this one?” Marie asked. “I think I might be suited to be a Cat Altered, and the bids are quite low at the moment.”
While discussing the bids were continually going up, if Kai were to make a prediction, then this solution would sell between 1.5 million and 2.0 million in total. So far nobody from upstairs had made a bid, else the others would have backed out.
However, there was a good reason why they refrained from doing so. As much as the auctioneer had hyped it, it didn’t change the fact that this was a rather simple Altered solution. Sure it increased one's strength greatly, and depending on the person, one could utilise it better than others, but a cat just wasn’t the same as a lion.
It just didn’t have an impressive enough track record to warrant the current bids, and perhaps the crowd had merely fallen for the silver tongue of the Dark Guild’s representative.
‘The auction house is truly clever, not telling us how many there will be. This way, we’re being pressured into spending more for fear it might be the last item, eventually. ’
“Sold!” The host announced, pointing towards the No Land gang. “For 1.1 million.”
*****
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