Upon seeing the message from the same player who had bid that absurd amount, Zich was naturally curious, so he quickly opened it.

"I will offer 50 soul stones for an exclusive private rental outside the auction. Contact window: fifteen minutes."

Zich stared at the message.

Sixty was significantly above the current bid.

Private rentals also meant no public record, which suggested the buyer did not want other players knowing what they intended to use the summon for.

That alone narrowed the possibilities considerably.

They either needed it for trap clearing in a dangerous zone, aggro manipulation during a boss attempt, or something less straightforward that they preferred keeping quiet.

He thought about it for eleven of the fifteen minutes and then pushed through. Whatever they wanted to use it for wasn’t any of his concern.

Pulling up the keyboard, he typed a reply.

"Sixty."

The response came in less than thirty seconds, faster than he had expected, without much negotiation.

"Agreed."

When he saw this, Zich—who had studied the auction and knew that he had captured a potential recurring cash cow—ahm client—closed the auction abruptly, causing the chat to erupt immediately.

"HE CLOSED THE AUCTION."

"What happened to the Silverback? Did someone buy it?"

"Master Shady canceled a forty-soul-stone bid for what?"

"Private deal. Has to be. Someone paid more off the books."

"This man is going to get himself robbed."

"Good. I hope someone robs him."

"I was about to bid fifty."

"We were all about to bid fifty."

Zich read the last line with the closest thing to genuine amusement he had shown all evening. Naturally, he knew they were simply talking based on the prices they were calling; he doubted they would have bid up to sixty.

Still, he knew he needed to appease them in some way, so he typed.

[Another auction will be held soon, and this time, the monsters will be significantly more powerful than Silverback Grunt!]

The chat did not calm down immediately after his announcement. If anything, the outrage simply changed direction, and instead of insulting him for canceling the auction, people now began demanding proof that his future summons were actually stronger.

"Master Shady is bluffing again."

"No way he has something stronger already."

"Even the ape almost reached fifty soul stones. If he really has better summons, this marketplace is finished."

"Scummy methods... but the summon was real."

"Yeah, I hate this guy, but his summon was good."

"Next auction better not have junk items again."

Zich leaned back slightly against the bed while reading the flood of comments, and despite the insults being directed at him every few seconds, his expression remained perfectly calm. People were angry, but anger only mattered if it stopped them from spending, and judging by the way the bids had climbed tonight, that clearly was not happening.

’As long as they need what I sell, they will adapt eventually.’

If players wanted clean business practices, they could buy rusty swords and expired potions from the normal marketplace vendors. Zich’s goal from the beginning had been very simple: make as much money as possible while holding the advantage, and currently, the advantage belonged entirely to him.

The marketplace notifications suddenly changed.

[Ding! Transaction complete.]

A small black chest appeared directly on top of his bed.

Zich’s eyes narrowed instantly, and when he opened the lid, the faint glow of soul stones illuminated his face. Several neatly stacked stones rested inside the container, each one radiating concentrated energy strong enough to make the surrounding mana fluctuate slightly.

"Sixty..."

His voice came out lower than expected.

Even after mentally preparing himself for the amount, seeing that many soul stones gathered together physically still felt absurd. The Blink skill alone had already seemed expensive before, but now not only could he buy it comfortably, he could buy it more than two times.

The realization made his heartbeat quicken slightly.

Beside the soul stones, the bed itself was already filled with piles of gold coins from his earlier treasure sales. The metal reflected the dim shelter lights in uneven waves, and after emptying several marketplace deliveries throughout the evening, the mattress now looked more like a merchant’s vault than a sleeping area.

Zich stood there quietly for several seconds.

This was the first time in his life he had ever seen this much money gathered in one place, and the ridiculous part was that he had earned most of it without risking his life directly. Compared to digging graves beside his parents for long exhausting hours back in the real world, tonight almost felt criminally easy.

His parents’ graveyard business did not even make this much profit in an entire year.

Yet he had earned it in a single evening through one ape and several shameless decisions.

Containing the excitement threatening to spread across his face, Zich immediately crouched beside the bed and began organizing everything carefully. His obsessive habits surfaced naturally during moments like this, and within minutes the scattered coins had already been separated into clean stacks while the soul stones were lined neatly beside them.

After counting everything twice to make sure there were no mistakes, the final total settled at seventy soul stones and twenty-eight thousand four hundred gold coins.

A ridiculous amount for someone who had only recently entered the mountain.

Zich exhaled slowly before opening his backpack.

One by one, he stored the soul stones carefully inside separate inner compartments while arranging the gold coin bags beneath them in balanced rows. He even adjusted the angles twice afterward because one pouch leaned slightly to the left, which irritated him more than it reasonably should have.

Only after confirming everything looked properly arranged did he zip the backpack closed.

Meanwhile, in the privileged area...

Two exhausted men hurried through the hallways quickly enough to attract glances from nearby players. Both carried weapons at their waists, and sweat covered the backs of their clothes despite the cold temperature around them.

They finally stopped in front of a familiar room. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

One of them knocked twice before speaking through the door carefully.

"We found a lead regarding Rael."