Leo continued with his antics up-till item 42, pissing the entire room off and converting the system auction from a cordial event to some sort of a fish market.
There were some players now, who were vehemently against letting him win a single bid, while there were others who wanted to stick him with a bid and prevented others from bidding on the same items as him.
"Number 98 you bastard! Meet me outside this auction hall and I'll show you the power of my blade!"
"Number 98 you have cost me over 2 million gold coins! Your seven generations won't be able to pay me back!"
"Number 98, stop bidding on all the items, it's not wise to make an enemy out of everyone here!"
The players who were initially only mumbling amongst each other about their frustrations regarding number 98, were now threatening Leo openly, as half the room was facing the items displayed while the other half was staring holes into Leo's head.
"Item Number 42…. The blueprints for a better carriage that can carry as much as 1 tonne of goods using only one horse.
It has inbuilt weight reducing runes and is extremely durable.
It can revolutionize the logistics industry with ease.
Bidding starts at 1 million gold coins. Minimum increment is fixed at 50,000 coins–" Raya said, as she tried to talk over the chatter and display item 42, however, her task as the auctioneer was getting progressively more difficult as the night went on.
As soon as the item was displayed, Leo glanced towards Big Dawg for advice, who put up 4 fingers indicating the item was worth 4 million gold coins.
At this point, the entire room expected Leo to make the first bid, however, before Leo could make an offer, it was number 97 who made the first bid for 1 million gold coins.
"We have 1 million from number 97–" Raya announced, as Leo glanced towards the shy guy sitting to his left, who seemed very nervous about Leo placing a high bid.
Seeing how the guy shrugged away from his gaze as soon as he looked towards him, Leo felt that the man was amusing and just this once decided to not mess with him.
"I'll let you have this one, but you must give my friend Leo Skyshard 50% off on your products.
Consider it as me helping you save 2 million now–" Leo said, as he winked at the guy sitting beside him.
Jace, who wanted to ask Leo for this favor but was too shy to speak, was elated when he heard Leo say this as he gave Leo a grateful thumbs up.
As the rest of the auction hall waited for Leo to make his usual nonsensical bid, nobody placed a bid over Jace, as to everyone's shock the item sold for just 1 million without anyone placing a second bid on it.
Shockingly, Leo never intervened and this left many stumped as they wanted to bid on the item but were waiting for Leo to show his hand first.
"Wait a minute? What just happened here? Number 98 did not raise the price of an item?
Are number 97 and 98 friends?"
"Dang it! I really wanted that item, but did not bid on it because of number 98…."
"Is number 98 finally frightened? Has he really taken our threats seriously?"
"Hahaha! I guess he got scared by my name, I'm RedMetal after all, I'm ranked 277th on the global leaderboards!"
The murmurs in the room went insane once Leo did not bid on a item with some assuming that he had improved, however, as item 43 was unveiled Leo returned to his old tactics, bidding an outrageous amount from the get-go.
"Son of a bitch! He's back! He just did not bid on an item to make a fool of us!"
"Somebody bid more! We can't let that fool win anything! We must not let him win!"
"Kyaaa! I only have 4.1 million, but I'll bid it all just to not let that guy win.
I don't really have any use for this item, but it's better than letting number 98 win"
"Number 98! I'll beat you to a snob once we walk out of here"
Leo got another wave of hatred as he placed a bid on item 43, with some people even openly cursing his seven generations.
To add fuel to the fire, when everyone was busy cursing him, Leo began to laugh out loud and point towards the crowd seated below him, as he started to act like a complete maniac.
"Hahahaha, look at you broke people trying to steal items from me. Only fools bid in increments of 100,000, real men raise millions–" Leo said out loud, stunning the crowd, before returning to laughing maniacally.
Of-course this was all a part of his calculated act as he was trying to get the crowd enraged, as he wanted to empty the pockets of as many people as possible for the last 7 items up-till item 50.
And to his joy, his act worked perfectly as the riled up crowd threw money like water just to satisfy their ego.
The next 7 items sold for a range of 5-7 million when their worth was between 3-5, with almost everyone paying at least 150% of the item's value.
By the time item 50 was introduced, the majority crowd had gone broke, as those who had gathered more than 5 million gold coins for this auction had all spent their money.
The only people who were itemless now were those not having more than 2 million to spend, or those who were biding their time like himself and Cervantez.
"Let the real show begin…." Leo muttered to himself, as item 50 was unveiled, as from this point onwards he actually had the intention of winning bids and taking items home.
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/// A/N - This bonus chapter is sponsored by Patron Bookworm0711, please thank her in the comments for the same.
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