Savage Awakening 154. The Auction (II) (Patreon)

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Zane woke in the astral plane. That fuzzy, slightly blurry place. Nothing felt fully solid here—like if you ran into something hard enough, you might just pass through it.

He stood on what looked to be a flying saucer made of polished, gleaming silver. A circle of runes ran along the edges. It all floated in space. A little air bubble wrapped around them. It was eerily quiet here—he looked left. A few dozen feet off, there was another one of those flying saucers. And there were folk there too.

Their masks shrouded them in a weird haze. It smudged the rest of their features. All you could tell was how big they were.

They might’ve gone up to Zane’s knees, maybe? They looked like garden gnomes to him.

He looked right. There was another saucer there too.

“They’re auction booths,” said Reina. She sounded squeaky and warbly, as though underwater. She looked up at him—he could see her blinking wide, warm-brown eyes through the mask. She barely cleared his hip here.

The booths went on and on, making a wide ring, circling all the way around—it must’ve been a few miles across, peppered over with booths.

There was a ring underneath their layer of rings too. And another, and another, stretching all the way down. It felt like standing on the balcony of one of those grand winding staircases and looking all the way down—except much wider. And deeper, too—he couldn’t see the bottom.

Zane and Reina’s booth seemed to be on the uppermost ring. 

Each booth was filled with little people. People in white cloaks and bloodied armor, some shirtless, of all kinds of skin tones. There were the ones he was familiar with on Earth. A few folk were blue, and green, and light purple. A few had pointy ears. A monkey-like tail, even. 

These must be the aliens. Huh. 

He looked up. There was nothing above but a scattering of white stars, drifting clouds of twinkling, violet-blue galaxies, long swirling arms outstretched, hugging the breadth of the sky. He hadn’t done much stargazing, but he was pretty sure this was nowhere on Earth.

There was a sudden flash right in the middle of this strange floating stadium.

And a gold saucer burst into being. At the center of it all.

Standing on top of it was a plump, smiling old man. He had a thick white beard. His hair floated around him like a kind of halo. He wore robes of gold embroidered silver. An intricate bronze coin symbol shone on the lapels. The same coin on his Merchant’s Guild Seal. 

It was hard to make out just how big the man’s soul was from this distance, but it didn’t seem all that much different than anyone else’s. Size-wise. But it shone far brighter. Where they all drifted like ghosts, he seemed fleshy and ruddy and solid.

Yultan Fai 

Signature Title: Master of the Mint

Essence Level 433

Even Zane had to do a double-take. 

This man was one of the strongest beings he’d ever seen. Definitely the strongest he’d ever met in person. 

Yultan cleared his throat. “Welcome, one and all, to the Dragonspire Merchants Guild’s End-of-Year Auction!” he said. He gave a broad beaming smile. He had a booming voice that spread easily through the void. He spread his arms wide like he was trying to hug everyone there.  

“My name is Yultan, a Senior Auctioneer of the Merchant’s Guild. It is my great honor to serve you today.” Yultan gave a smooth bow. His belly somewhat hampered him. He frowned at it, then chuckled, gave it a pat. He kept talking. 

“This is a very special edition of the End-of-Year Auction. It is an Auction specially hosted for those undergoing the centennial Integration! Every party here has come from one of the hundreds of thousands of planets selected to join the Dragonspire galaxy…”

He paused. “But this is not just any Centennial Integration. This is a rare occasion indeed. In this crop, there are two Ur-planets: Planet Earth and Planet Thain!” he chuckled. “If you were wondering why there were so many giants among you, there’s your answer.” 

Zane did look around.

There did seem to be a pretty big divide. Most folk on some of those lower rings, now that he looked at it, were even smaller—they barely went up to his shins. And the lower rings made up most of the place. The higher you got, the more often bigger folk popped up. Though they seldom got past Zane’s thigh.

There were a few bigger ones on this uppermost layer. A few got up to his chest, even… one of their souls felt quite familiar. A few dozen booths down—he swore that was Eze, though it was so blurry it was hard to tell for sure. Then there was another one farther off who nearly got up to his shoulders. A cat-eared guy.

Otherwise, though…

Out of what must’ve been tens of thousands there Zane seemed to be the biggest, to his surprise. By a fair amount too. 

Then he noticed folk were starting to stare at him—more and more, as others went to see what they were looking at.

They stilled. Lots of eyes went wide. He saw folk turning to one another, pointing at him, saying things he couldn’t hear. Their mouths were moving but no sound came across. 

Zane did seem to stand out a little… he scratched his head.

“For most of you,” continued Auctioneer Yultan. “This will be the last chance to stock up on rare, exclusive items before your planets’ final trials: the Superdungeons! Fail that, and your homes shall be forever lost to Monsters. Succeed, though, and you’ll become another haven for life in the Galaxy…”

He paused again. “For those of you from Ur-Planets, this Auction will be especially critical. The Darkness the System confines—the Darkness that corrupts all Monsters, the latent yin of the Universe…it despises those from Ur-Planets most of all. Since it knows that should you be allowed to reach maturity, you will become its greatest threat. Your dungeons are already higher ranked than usual. But your super-dungeons… they’ll have the worst horrors an E-Rank planet can sustain! Whether you survive may well hinge on which treasures you take home today.” 

This was news to Zane. Reina stiffened.

“’ The worst horrors an E-Rank planet can sustain?’” she said. “What’s that supposed to—” 

“And lastly,” continued Yultan. “A special welcome for our friends from the Nine Great Factions! It’s always good to get an early start on the scouting—but do remember, no tampering is allowed. No bribes, no treasure drops, no offers, no contact of any kind with the candidates until after they’ve cleared the planet’s final trials, and become officially integrated into the Galaxy! Rules are rules.” 

Zane and Reina exchanged another glance at that. Reina started looking around—“They’re watching us? Right now?” she said. Her voice was rather tight. 

Yultan cleared his throat. He bared blocks of perfect white teeth. “With the announcements out of the way… let the End-of-Year Auction officially commence!”

At his words, a golden podium burst up in the middle of his saucer—an item popped up on top. A wicked curved black helmet, smoking darkness; a projection of it floated in front of them too.

Reina was still frazzled, trying to make sense of everything—Zane reached out, held her hand. “The Auction,” he rumbled. “Focus. The rest we can talk about later.” 

Zane wasn’t sure what to make of any of it. He just figured they had to take it one thing at a time. 

Reina hesitated. She met his eyes. He felt her settle a little. She nodded, took a deep breath. “The Auction,” she said. 

She turned toward the podium. He felt her start to focus, start to think. 

One important thing Zane had gotten out of that big speech was that they were competing against other folk in a similar position. Other folk getting their money from clearing dungeons. Also—their dungeons were higher ranked than everyone else. 

But higher ranked dungeons gave more money. 

Which was all to say. Zane was pretty sure of all the tens of thousands of folk here… he and Reina should be among the wealthiest. He nodded as he looked to her. He had complete faith in her.

“Starting with the B-grade Artifact: Tarnished Helm of Morgoth!” cried Yultan. “This helm, forged in the bowels of a volcano, boosts all its wielder’s Darkness Skills. Especially those with demonic attributes… starting bid: One Auction Credit.” 

*** 

Scout Zhang, Level 391 Sun Sniper, had been a longtime Outer Faction disciple of the Azure Flame Faction. He’d cleared his fair share of dungeons in his own day—he’d even earned the Title’ Skypiercer,’ awarded only to those who’d cleared over five hundred Sky-rank dungeons. A rare honor even among Outer Faction disciples.

Then he retired to raise a family. He decided to take on less dangerous work. He’d been a scout for nearly six millennia now, bumbling about the Galaxy, assembling rankings, making reports for the Faction. 

Nowadays he looked like a middle-aged man with a bit of stubble, mild-mannered and unassuming. He nursed a bit of a belly. His breath was a little smoky from a pipe habit he struggled to kick. You would’ve never guessed he was a Warrior with Tier 5 Laws. 

Zhang usually skipped the pre-Integration Auction. It was a chance to get a first glimpse of that century’s talent pool—but since they were anonymized, he didn’t get much useful information. It only told him how talented the overall field was.

Only… this year’s Integration class was the most stacked in millennia. He was here out of curiosity more than anything. 

He sat there in the Azure Flame Faction booth, playing cubes with Scout Haelin—another old veteran. Smoking, chuckling, drinking—waiting for the Auction to begin.

It was these kinds of Integrations that excited Zhang most. Some years no one important emerged; those years, Zhang watched essence recordings and dungeon feeds until he felt like bashing his head against the nearest wall. The most interesting part of the job was finding those diamonds in the rough. Discovering legends before they became legends.

The proudest moment of Zhang’s career was discovering the Sunset Sage back when he was just a sickly boy called Crow, thin as a bamboo pole. Zhang was the one who’d secured a monster offer for the guy, despite many a skeptical Elder. 

He liked to brag to his daughter Sai—“He wouldn’t be here if not for me, we would’ve lost him to the groundhogs! Now there’s a statue of him in the Hall of the Ancients!” 

Zhang smiled as he played a move. He was nearly giddy. “Two Ur-planets this year, Hae. Two!” 

Scout Haelin set down a cube, blew out a puff of smoke. “Don’t get your hopes up,” he grunted. “This could very well be another Class of M18. Let’s see them make it through the Final Trial first.” 

Zhang gave him a look. “Aren’t you a ray of sunshine.” 

“I’m being realistic.” 

“Still. Two Ur-Planets! When’s the last time that’s happened?!” 

Haelin paused. “... It’s been a few millennia,” he admitted. “But I’ve seen it before. I’ve seen a thousand thousand prodigies come and go. So they can cultivate a little faster. Their souls are a little bigger.” 

“Nothing impresses you anymore,” sighed Zhang. “Why do you even do this?” 

“Pays well.” Haelin shrugged. Then he peered over the balcony. “Looks like things are getting underway.”

They made their way to the edge of their observatory. Started taking in the recruits—just their soul sizes. Zhang nodded, whistling. “Some big ones out there, eh?” 

“Decent, I suppose,” grunted Haelin. 

“Look at that one,” said Zhang, pointing. “I swear I haven’t seen a soul that big in a century! With some Fire affinity that could very well be our top contract offer right there.” 

“Perhaps,” said the old man. But Zhang could tell he was a little impressed. He was frowning too much not to be. 

Zhang felt quietly satisfied. It took a lot to impress an old fart like Haelin. 

He kept going down the rows. It felt like every few dozen booths, a massive soul popped up… 

“Zhang,” croaked Haelin. 

“Yeah?” 

“Zhang!” 

Zhang turned to his partner. Haelin’s lined face was slack, pale. One trembling arm pointed to the topmost row. 

“What. The hell. Is THAT?!” 

Zhang looked—and went very still. For a few seconds, both of them just stared wide-eyed in quiet awe. 

“Heavens,” Zhang whispered at last.

“Look at the size of that lad!” cried Haelin. “The—the girth! What the hell are they feeding him down there?!” 

“Integration was hardly a year ago too,” said Zhang. He felt rather numb. “He’s not even at soul maturity—he’ll grow for another hundred years!” 

“He's already the size of some the Great Ancestors—and he’s not even grown!” Haelin’s eyes looked about to bulge out of his head. 

//

A/N:

Will be taking down the first 102 chapters of this story on April 13 in anticipation of the Kindle Unlimited release of book 1 of this story! Just a head's up in case you want to reread some old chapters. Will be making the announcement for RR in a few days as well.