Chapter 515: The Beginning of...(7), Grand Dimensional Auction Begins

The Grand Dimensional Auction’s central continent rose into view through the ship’s forward viewport as Tenebria’s vessel descended toward it. A single vast disc of polished obsidian sat at the center of the void, ringed by docked ships flying the colors of every major faction across the four Super Worlds. At the disc’s center stood the spire. A hollowed mountain of forty floors, each one cut from black crystal and lit from within by floating lantern arrays that drifted lazily like fireflies caught in slow water.

The ship slid into a private docking slot near the spire’s base. The slot was one of twelve reserved for delegations of particular standing. Three of those twelve were empty.

The party disembarked.

A six armed attendant in pale robes waited at the platform’s edge and bowed deeper than was strictly necessary.

"Lady Tenebria. Your booth has been prepared per the standard allocation. One Reverend, five registered players, additional accompanying spectators on the rear tier."

"How many delegations have arrived."

"Three hundred and forty seven, my lady. Final count expected at approximately four hundred and ten before the auction commences."

"And the Black Sun delegation."

The attendant’s smile did not flicker.

"Black Sun House has formally withdrawn this cycle, my lady. Their booth was redistributed to a lesser house on the waitlist."

"Mm."

"The registration desk for your five is to your right. Please finalize before the third bell."

Tenebria gave a single nod, and the attendant melted backward into the crowd as if he had never been there.

Erix exhaled slowly. "So Black Sun pulled out."

"Twelve fled with Houndez’s body. Word has had time to travel. None of them want to stand on a stage where I could see them," Tenebria said.

"Their backers won’t have pulled out, though," Lilith said quietly.

"No," Tenebria agreed. "They won’t."

***

The booth was a crescent platform jutting out from the upper tier of the central hall. A front tier with six high backed chairs, one for the Reverend leader and five for the registered players. A rear tier with cushioned benches for the accompanying spectators. A pearlescent veil of Aethir hung across the booth’s front edge, hiding the interior from outside view while letting those inside see clearly.

Tenebria sat at the leader’s chair, center of the front tier. Erix and Rin took the two seats to her right. Lilith, Korin, and Nira took the three to her left.

Isabella, Lily, Sameira, Kenshin, and Maleina settled on the rear tier. Amu, who had been riding on Erix’s shoulder, plopped onto a low table between two tea pots and slung himself across the lid like a furry blue scarf.

"This is a good booth," Amu said. "Tea is hot. Cushions are soft. Ten of ten."

"You don’t have a body that uses cushions," Lily said.

"I have one when I want it, brat."

Isabella suppressed a smile and turned her attention to the hall.

The auction hall opened below them like a great inverted bowl, dozens of booths lining its inner curve. At the center, a raised dais of black crystal held the auction stage, ringed by sixteen pocket dimension anchor pylons that pulsed with quiet readiness.

Lilith leaned forward, her crimson eyes scanning the booths one by one.

[Lilith: I count four hundred and thirty Reverends already seated. Another thirty or so masking their auras. Four Super World banners hanging on the upper rings.]

[Tenebria: Adriax, Korivax, Solmark, Veranthar.]

[Lilith: All four.]

Erix followed her gaze.

The southern rim held the rest of Adriax. Sable Vault House sat in the highest booth there, their sigil a closed black coffer crossed by twin keys. Eternal Pyre House sat beside them, their matriarch in pyre cloth, turning a black coin slowly between her fingers and looking at nothing in particular. The Golden Bell Faction sat two booths over, and a purple haired figure in their front row was openly staring up at Tenebria’s booth.

[Rin: That’s the Vex Linous boy Tenebria mentioned, isn’t it.]

[Tenebria: Yes. Their heir. They had been grooming him to take the War of Thrones rank one before Erix took it.]

[Erix: He’s been quiet for four months.]

[Tenebria: Patient. Not quiet. Golden Bell has long arms.]

To the east, Korivax. A tall antlered Reverend at the front of his booth, arms folded, eyes closed, as if meditating through the entire process.

To the west, Solmark. A lean woman with hair like white smoke. Her four Empyreans behind her sat in identical postures, breathing in identical rhythm, like the same person copied four times.

To the north, Veranthar. Heavyset figures in plated robes. Their aura was the densest in the hall after Tenebria’s own.

[Lilith: Veranthar fights for hire, but their hire price is high enough that nobody ever buys them in a hurry. They’ll be neutral tonight unless paid mid auction.]

[Korin: That can happen.]

[Lilith: That can absolutely happen.]

Scattered between the Super World banners sat the smaller delegations. Houses Erix did not know. Auction veterans, mid tier factions, and three booths flying the Auction’s own house colors rather than any faction’s.

[Tenebria: The auction itself runs slate players. They enter games to keep prices from being rigged by Super World collusion. If we draw an auction slate player in a round, expect them to play to win, not to lose politely.]

***

*Ding.*

A single bell rang through the hall. Every Aethir veil dimmed by half. Every booth interior remained hidden, but the outline of each delegation’s seating became visible to all.

Auctioneer Velmoth rose from the floor of the central dais as if drawn upward on a thread. Tall, cowled, robed in white that bled into gold at the edges. His hood obscured his face, leaving only the suggestion of a slow thin smile underneath.

"Welcome, esteemed delegations, to the four hundred and seventeenth Grand Dimensional Auction. I am Auctioneer Velmoth, presenting tonight’s slate on behalf of the standing house."

His voice landed in every booth with the same crisp clarity, as if he were speaking directly into each person’s ear.

"For those new to our format. Each Reverend delegation has registered five Empyrean order players. When a lot is revealed, any delegation that wishes to bid sends one player to the stage. A random game is opened in one of our pocket dimensions. Players compete. Player Coins are awarded by rank. First rank earns enough coins to acquire the lot outright."

He paused, the smile suggested rather than seen.

"You may also choose to bank earned coins instead of spending them. Coins do not expire within the auction. Coins do not transfer outside this hall. Each player may enter only one game per cycle. Five players. Five entries. Strategize accordingly."

A holographic manifest scrolled upward above the dais, listing the night’s lots by category but not by content. Twenty seven entries.

"Game formats are randomized at the moment of pocket dimension opening. All formats are combat capable. Death in a game is the participant’s incompetence and the Auction House bears no liability. Outside interference voids the offending delegation entirely. Reverend orders may not enter the stage. Spectators may not advise during a game. Soul links between players and their booth are severed the instant the pocket dimension seals."

[Korin: That last one is new for me. Master, did you know.]

[Tenebria: Yes. Once you step into the pocket dimension, you are alone. We watch the feed. We cannot help.]

[Nira: Understood.]

Velmoth’s hood tilted with what might have been amusement.

"Tonight’s headline lots arrive in the final third of the auction. Among them are the Ascension Anchors. Ten Anchors will be auctioned tonight, in ten consecutive rounds. Bid accordingly."

The hall did not stir loudly. The hall stirred in the precise way four hundred and thirty Reverends stirred when all of them leaned forward by exactly the same degree at exactly the same time.

Tenebria’s lips curved.

"Now," Velmoth said. "Lot one."

***

The first pedestal rose through the stage floor. A small crystal vial cradled in a velvet cushion, its contents shimmering between gold and silver.

"Lot one. Stone of Aethir Clarity, refined by a Veranthar pressure formation. Suitable for breaking through Aethir circulation deadlocks in early Empyrean transformation. First rank earns three thousand Player Coins, sufficient to acquire."

[Tenebria: Pass.]

[Korin: Master, we have a young disciple back at the Sanctuary who could use that.]

[Tenebria: We have five entries. We do not waste them on stones we can synthesize at home given a week.]

Three booths sent players forward. A Sable Vault disciple, a Korivax junior, and an auction slate player. The pocket dimension opened on the stage as a shimmering bubble of mist that swallowed the three players whole. Velmoth narrated the format for the watching hall.

"Format. Endurance pillar. Three players, one pillar, the player who holds the pillar’s apex longest within five minutes wins."

The match played out on the projected feed above the dais. The auction slate player took the pillar within ten seconds, defended it with quiet efficiency, and held it for the entire five minutes. Sable Vault placed second after a brief skirmish with the Korivax junior.

"Lot one acquired by the Auction House slate."

Velmoth bowed politely as the bubble dissolved and the three players returned to their booths. The Auction House did not move the lot to any particular booth. The slate simply pocketed it.

"Lot two."

***

The next four lots passed in similar fashion.

A crystallized Empyrean spirit core. A Bloodline Catalyst Slate. A pair of dimensional anchoring threads. A Way of Unfettered cultivation incense that twitched Tenebria’s hand but did not move her to bid.

"We can synthesize that one," she murmured. "Given time we do not have. Pass."

[Lilith: If you pass on the Way of Unfettered incense, I’m going to remember this.]

[Tenebria: Sulk later. The Anchors are coming.]

[Lilith: I’m not sulking.]

[Lily, from the rear tier: She’s sulking.]

[Lilith: Be quiet.]

Lot six.

Velmoth raised a black slab the size of a forearm, traced with white veins that pulsed like a sleeping heart.

"Lot six. A Rule Slate, inscribed by the late Sovereign of the Veranthar Stillwater Court. Contained Rule, Stillwater. Defensive, absorption and redirection. First rank earns five thousand Player Coins, sufficient to acquire."

A heavier stir from the hall.

A Rule Slate inscribed by a peak Reverend was the kind of resource that could lift an Empyrean’s defensive ceiling for years.

[Lilith: Tenebria.]

[Tenebria: There is a better Rule Slate in the headline lots. Lady Wisteria gave me the manifest before we left.]

[Lilith: ...]

[Tenebria: We use Korin here. If he places, we earn coins for later rounds. If he wins, even better.]

Korin straightened in his chair.

"Yes, Master."

"Place well. Do not over commit. Do not waste blood essence on something that is not the prize you came for."

"Understood."

Korin stood, walked the length of the booth, passed through the Aethir veil, and descended to the stage by the booth’s private lift.

Five other booths sent players. Sable Vault, Eternal Pyre, Korivax, an Adriax neutral house that Tenebria flagged as Verdant Crown, and the auction slate.

Six players took the stage. The pocket dimension opened, a cube of white stone with six raised platforms arranged in a hexagon and a single pillar at its center. On the pillar’s tip, a floating coin.

The format text shimmered into existence above the cube.

"Format. Crown. Six entrants. The player holding the central coin at the end of three minutes claims first rank. The coin may be taken by force, surrendered, or stolen. All combat methods permitted within the cube."

The cube sealed.

The booth’s soul link to Korin cut.

Tenebria sipped her tea. "Watch."

***

The projected feed showed the cube from multiple angles.

Korin did not move first.

The Sable Vault disciple lunged for the coin within the first half second, took it, and immediately came under attack from three of the other four players. He held it for ten seconds, lost it to Eternal Pyre, and was beheaded on the rebound by the Verdant Crown entry.

Five remaining.

The coin moved twice more. Korin still had not engaged.

[Rin: What’s he doing.]

[Erix: Mind Zone. He’s reading patterns.]

[Nira: Master taught him well.]

At the one minute twenty mark, the Solmark entrant held the coin, deflecting attacks from the remaining four. The auction slate player and Korin had not yet engaged anyone or anything.

Korin moved.

It was not a charge. It was not a step. It was a single shift in the cube’s geometry that placed him directly beside the Solmark player with the coin already half in his hand. The Time element at the tenth realm did what it was designed to do. In the slice of time Korin walked through, the Solmark player’s defensive response had not yet been initiated.

The coin was in Korin’s hand.

One minute fifty remained.

The Eternal Pyre player, the Verdant Crown player, and the auction slate player all converged at the same time.

Korin did not run.

He activated his Mind Zone. The cube’s atmosphere shifted in the way Mind Zones always shifted, a faint pressure on the feed that Lilith identified by tilt of the air. Three skills bloomed into existence around him, defensive, compact, anchored to him alone.

The three attackers ran into the new skills as if into walls. Eternal Pyre got through the outer shell and lost an arm to whatever Korin’s second skill did. Verdant Crown reached the third shell and stopped. The auction slate player did not engage. She circled.

[Erix: That slate player is reading him.]

[Lilith: She’s waiting for his Mind Zone to thin.]

[Tenebria: She’ll wait the whole match if she has to. She placed second on lot one. She knows how to play long.]

One minute remaining.

Korin held the coin. The cube held three engaged attackers and one patient circler. He had constructed a small fortress around himself out of his own freshly built skills, and the fortress was holding.

Forty seconds.

The Eternal Pyre player burned a Rule Thread.

The hall’s collective breath hitched. Eternal Pyre’s matriarch in pyre cloth tilted her head a fraction.

A thread of compressed fire Rule wrapped itself around Korin’s third defensive shell and began to eat through it. Reverend Rule channeled through an Empyrean body was technically forbidden in auction games, but the auction system only enforced what it caught, and the threads burned out on activation.

[Rin: That’s dirty.]

[Tenebria: It’s expected.]

[Lilith: He’ll handle it.]

Korin sensed the Rule Thread. The Mind Zone gave him a tenth of a second to react before the third shell fell. He used the tenth of a second to construct a fourth skill in real time. A reflective layer. Not a defense. A redirection.

When the third shell broke, the Rule Thread did not reach him. It hit the reflective layer and turned ninety degrees, lashing into the Eternal Pyre player herself.

The Eternal Pyre player screamed once and crumpled. Her own Rule Penalty wave finished her on the ground.

Three remaining. Korin. Verdant Crown. The slate player.

Thirty seconds.

Verdant Crown shouted something across the cube. Some kind of last second alliance offer. The slate player ignored him. Verdant Crown charged Korin alone. Korin’s fourth skill, still active, redirected the charge in a small loop that sent Verdant Crown skidding across the cube and into the slate player’s range.

The slate player did not seem to do anything visible.

Verdant Crown collapsed mid stride, his core simply ceasing.

[Lilith: Soul attack. She’s a soul specialist. Watch out.]

Ten seconds.

The slate player turned her gaze on Korin and finally began to approach.

Korin did one thing.

He threw the coin.

Up.

Straight up.

The coin floated, caught on the cube’s gravity null point at apex, suspended for three full seconds.

The slate player flinched. By the rules of the format, no one was holding the coin. If the timer ran out with the coin in the null space, the round defaulted to second rank, and there was no first rank winner.

Five seconds.

The slate player lunged for the coin.

Korin’s Mind Zone gave him three of those five seconds in his own time. He used them. He constructed a fifth skill, anchored it to the coin itself, and the moment the slate player closed within range of the coin, his fifth skill triggered.

The coin disappeared from the null point.

The slate player’s hand closed on nothing.

Two seconds.

The coin reappeared in Korin’s hand. The fifth skill had been a brief teleport keyed to his own Time element.

One second.

The slate player lunged at Korin instead of the coin.

Korin sidestepped, the coin in his fist.

Zero.

The pocket dimension chimed.

"First rank, Korin of Adriax. Five thousand Player Coins awarded. Lot acquired."

***

The cube dissolved. Korin walked off the dais, back through the lift, back through the Aethir veil, and sat down in his chair without speaking. There was a thin line of blood at the corner of his mouth from biting his cheek somewhere in the last thirty seconds, but he had walked off the stage on his own legs, with the Rule Slate now stored in his ring and five thousand Player Coins banked into Tenebria’s delegation total.

The hall was silent for a beat.

Then, from the east, the antlered Reverend in the Korivax booth opened his eyes for the first time all evening and began to clap.

Slow.

Deliberate.

Once.

Twice.

Three times.

Two other booths joined. Then the Auction House’s own slate booth, in the kind of polite applause that signaled professional respect. Then most of the lesser Adriax houses.

Sable Vault did not clap. Eternal Pyre did not clap. The pyre cloth matriarch was looking at her ruined player’s body being collected from the cube’s residue with an expression that did not change at all.

[Tenebria: One round. Four remaining.]

[Korin: I am sorry, Master. I planned to place. I did not plan to spend that much.]

[Tenebria: You did not spend more than you needed. You read the slate player correctly. She was the only one in that cube who could have beaten you, and she could only have beaten you on long time. You broke the long time. Good.]

[Korin: ...thank you, Master.]

Lilith leaned over and ruffled his hair anyway.

"Don’t get a swollen head."

"I won’t."

***

Velmoth’s hood tilted in something resembling appreciation.

"Lot seven."

The pedestal rose again.

The auction was just beginning.