Ascension of the Immortal Asura

"Ah...you sly devil. That's quite devious," Caz praised John's actions. "But what if she figures you out and you lose out on a large bid?" he asked.

"That's simple then. I only plan to bid on things I truly want, and I'll bid up to my absolute maximum I'm willing to spend on the item. If Vivian outbids me, then I get to drain her funds by overspending on item after item, and if she eventually figures me out, it's just me overspending on a single item I want, which at that point she'll be much more wary to bid against me. This should make the future prices on items I want more reasonable, as she won't want to get into a bidding war against me once she knows my intentions of draining her funds. Either way, I win," John explained his thoughts to Caz.

"That's actually quite genius," Caz replied after thinking it over, while his eyes lit up as if he had just had a spark of insight. "I would never be able to come up with a plan like that, as I've been trained for years to think only of obtaining things at the most optimal of values while also maximizing profits. Something like swallowing shit upfront to make the end result much better never occurred to me before. Thank you, I think you've just expanded my insights into the Dao of Business," Caz replied thankfully.

"It's really quite simple actually, but you're welcome regardless," John replied, not thinking his plan was anything masterful.

After Vivian won the bid on the Eternal Spirit Forge, the auction continued, with item after item coming out and being bid on. As the auction progressed, the items continued to become more rare, while the bids on the items slowly but surely climbed in value.

The next two days continued with bids flowing out ceaselessly, many placed by John himself. Several items caught his eye, namely a Netherdeath Lotus, which would have been useful for his master, a Heaven-Dao Seizing Pill, which was useful for breaking through to the Dao Transformation Realm faster, a flying ship, the 'Sovereign of the Sky', which was incredibly luxurious and also very fast, an Ocean-Soul Pearl, which nurtured ones soul and even caught John's eye, and a Nine-Convergence Lightning Core, which was used to nurture one's lightning insights.

John had bid on all these items, which naturally attracted the gaze of Vivian, who counter bid everything instantly. While he would have liked to obtain these items, they weren't so eye-catching as to be a must-have for John. As such, a bidding war between the two broke out every time, which the others in the crowd quickly realized.

"Something seems to be going on between those two private booths!"

"It seems like that boy pissed off the wrong people! He's been outbid every time by that booth!"

"That closed off booth doesn't seem to care about money at all! They've already bid over four billion spirit crystals just to outbid that boy. I wonder what's going on between them?"

Various discussions broke out within the crowd as they discussed the most interesting thing of the auction so far. Every time he was outbid, a greatly displeased look appeared on John's face, which only further enticed Vivian to outbid him. It was as if the greatest joy in life for her at the moment was to see the look of anger and despair on John's face, which she didn't know was nothing more than a show put on by John to goad her into further bids.

While watching the bidding take place, a thought came to John, who turned to Caz to ask him a question.

"Hey, what's the typical bid amounts for the items at the very end of the auction?" John asked curiously.

"Hmm? The items at the end of the auction? It depends on the year I guess," Caz mused it over, "but the final item prices have ranged anywhere from one billion spirit crystals to fifty billion spirit crystals, depending on what was auctioned that year," Caz replied.

"Fifty billion!" John exclaimed, shocked to hear that a single item had received such a high bid. "What could possibly be worth fifty billion spirit crystals?" he asked curiously.

"The location of an ancient unexplored pocket realm, and the means to get inside," Caz replied.

"What? Even things like that are offered in this auction?" John exclaimed.

"Yep, anything can be auctioned here, as long as its value is high enough. That year, someone in the Dao Transformation Realm stumbled upon a very well-hidden entrance to an ancient pocket realm, but was unable to get more than a few hundred yards into it, as the danger was beyond what he could handle. As such, he decided to auction it off instead. As I'm sure you know, ancient realms can hold an unimaginable wealth within, and so the price is actually quite reasonable when you think about it. The price would have been even higher if the ancient realm was confirmed to have treasures inside, so it was a fifty billion spirit crystal gamble, which lowered its price."

"I guess you're right," John replied as he thought it over, but a frown appeared on his face.

'It seems my current funds are insufficient to bid on the final items if they follow previous trends. While I gave Caz tea leaves to sell, since he only wants to auction in batches of one hundred, and based on their previous price, I'll only get several billion during this auction, but I need more. Even if I drain Vivian's funds, I still have to compete with all the other bidders out there, who surely have even more money than Vivian...'

After thinking over this issue, John turned to Caz, who was the only one who could help him out.

"Caz, do you-"

"Apologies for the interruption, Young Master Caz," the middle-aged male attendant who had greeted John outside the city entered the private lounge and called out to Caz.

A joyous expression appeared on Caz's face as he quickly stood up and walked over to the attendant, who handed over two spatial rings to him. Caz quickly inspected the rings, and a look of overwhelming joy appeared on his face for a moment.

"Thank you, that is all," Caz thanked the attendant, who bowed his head slightly before removing himself from the private booth.

Caz quickly walked back over to his seat, an excited smile lingering on his face the entire time.

"What was that about?" John asked curiously as Caz sat down next to him. However, Caz seemed to ignore him, as if he were entranced by the spatial rings in his hands.

"Caz!" John called out again, snapping Caz from his thoughts.

"Ah, sorry!" Caz apologized quickly.

"What's gotten you so worked up?" John asked curiously, while a smile returned to Caz's face as he heard John's question.

"Take a look for yourself," Caz replied as he handed John one of the spatial rings. John cast a dubious gaze at Caz before taking the ring, and sent his divine sense inside to inspect its contents.

His eyes nearly popped out of his skull as he saw what was contained within...mountains of spirit crystals so large that he could never imagine it was made from nothing but spirit crystals.

"This! What is this?" John asked, his voice full of shock.

"That's the down payment for the...items...you gave me last week," Caz replied cheerily, "As agreed upon, seventy percent of what we expect to make as a minimum off your items is there, based on the price they sold for previously."

"What? I never expected to get paid upfront for the...items," John replied, keeping the nature of the tea leaves vague in case of prying ears.

"Normally you wouldn't get anything until the items are sold, but I jumped through many, many, many hoops to get you these funds in time for the auction," Caz replied as a large smile appeared on his face.

John stared at Caz for quite some time, shocked and unable to think of what to say. For a mere disciple to get this amount of spirit crystals, the hoops he had to jump through must have been tremendous, even for someone like Caz. John felt the warmth of friendship between him and Caz grow from this action, which was both incredibly helpful and sincere.

"Just how much is this?" John asked, unable to count the mountain of spirit crystals quickly himself.

Caz's large smile widened as he paused dramatically for a moment, and leaned forward to whisper the number in John's ear.

"Thirty Billion!"