The Ultimate Evolution

Chapter 1049: Auction House

Translator: Sean88888 Editor: Elkassar1

[ Sorcerer’s Stone ]

[ Other Names: Nicholas Flamel’s Sorcerer’s Stone, Philosopher’s Stone ]

[ Rarity: Mid-Tier Legendary Main Storyline Item ]

[ Item Effect (Passive) : Maximum MP Value increased by 40%. ]

[ Item Effect (Passive): MP recovery speed increased by 50%. ]

[ Legendary Item Effect (Passive): ‘Death Reversal’ — When the next attack may cause your death, the base damage of this attack will be converted into a healing effect by the Sorcerer’s Stone’s terrifying power. This effect will only work once in 60 minutes. (For example, if you only have 100 points of HP left, and the enemy’s next strike will cause 200 points of damage, not only will you survive, your HP will also recover by 200 points.) ]

[ Item Effect (Active) : Immediately restore 350 points of MP; cooldown 15 minutes ]

[ Item Usage Requirement: At least 40 Intelligence ]

[ Details: I solemnly swear to never tell you that the only reason Harry Potter could resist the temptation of this invaluable treasure was because he was too young and too ignorant…. ]

***

Sheyan heaved a long sigh as he stared at the string of properties that popped up in front of him. After that, he immediately did two things.

The first was to forget the specs of that damn stone, because he was afraid that he would be crushed by the intense feeling of regret that had abruptly crept into his heart. Such an insane item was once only thirty meters away from his reach!

The second was to suppress the desire to check the price of the stone, because he was afraid that he would start taking off the equipments he was wearing to join the bidding war. That would truly be unwise. Anyone here could see that the Philosopher’s Stone was a very useful legendary storyline item. In truth, its rarity was on par with Divine equipments. To win it from the auction, Sheyan would have to sell everything he had, and even then, it might not be enough.

After Sheyan chased all those unnecessary thoughts out of his mind, he calmed down and checked out the bidding war from an outsider’s perspective. Upon a closer look, he realised that the bidding war revolving around the Sorcerer’s Stone had become a prolonged battle. The bidding had already lasted for an hour, mainly because an official Major General had brazenly used his privileges to stop the deal of the Sorcerer’s Stone from happening and frozen its transaction.

“Major General…” Sheyan felt like a frog in the well in this auction. While he was still striving towards the rank of a Colonel, some others were already miles ahead of him and had stepped into the rank of an official general.

Even if Sheyan succeeded in his upcoming promotion mission and managed to become a Colonel, there was still a gap separating him from a Major General.

(TL: Second Lieutenant < Lieutenant < Captain < Major < Lieutenant colonel < Colonel < Major General < Lieutenant General < General)

A gap as wide as a canyon.

That’s the divide between a Colonel officer rank and a General officer rank. It was surely no less difficult than to raise his rank from a Major to a Colonel.

Just look at the privilege given to a Major General. Everyone had to wait obediently for an hour regardless of who they were! Just look at how domineering a Major General could be! Of course, the Major General had to pay the exorbitant price of 200,000 utility points in order to do so.

Since the Major General would spend the terrifying amount of 200,000 utility points just to interfere with the normal proceedings of the auction, he must be preparing for a major deal worth up to two million, maybe even four million utility points!

When the Major General finally made his bid, the price he named could be described with one word — MADNESS!!! COMPLETE MADNESS!!! A million utility points, plus five pieces of dark gold equipments! After the five pieces of hidden gold equipment were evaluated by the realm, the total price given was 1.94 million utility points.

As soon as the number was shown, the whole venue fell into an awkward silence, as if the cold wind of Siberia had just blown past.

Still, Sheyan felt that the legendary effect of ‘Death Reversal’ alone meant that the Sorcerer’s Stone was priceless, so it was definitely worth the price of two million utility points! This effect theoretically gave the holder an extra life every sixty seconds, and it was even a passive effect which required no activation.

Every person understands that life is priceless. For the contestants, who had more frequent and in-depth contact with death, this saying held an even deeper meaning.

Finally, the Sorcerer’s Stone was handed over to the Major General, who spent more than 2.1 million utility points in total. It must be noted that the evaluation of the dark gold equipments made by the realm was quite objective, and the market price for them would have been much higher. Therefore, the final price the Major General paid was actually around 2.5 million utility points!

Seeing such a grand sight, Sheyan could not help recalling the saying that was previously held as the truth in the realm:

A dark gold shield can only raise the strength of an MT by a notch, but selling it can raise the strength of the whole party by a notch.

Now it seemed there should be something else following that:

A legendary item can only let a person be reborn anew, but selling it can let the whole party be reborn anew!

While Sheyan’s mind was drifting, a man suddenly sat down beside him and said to him with a smile, “You mind if I sit here?”

Sheyan snapped out from his daze in surprise. He did not expect to meet an acquaintance here. He turned his head and replied, “Well, hello. The seat’s not taken, so feel free.”

The person who appeared in front of Sheyan at this moment was actually the strange contestant he once met in the Lord of the Rings world, the one claiming to be a “miner” of a neutral faction! He had the unbelievable ‘Absolute Defence’ ability which could absorb all damage for a short period of time, and his nightmare imprint was situated inside his body.

Technically speaking, the miner had ended up helping Sheyan back then.

Sheyan suddenly realised something. He turned to the miner and asked, “That’s strange, I thought everyone had their faces blurred in this place. How can you recognise me?

“This is one of the privileges the realm grants to non-combat members,” answered the miner with a smile.

Sheyan could only shrug his shoulders to that. He continued staring at the Sorcerer’s Stone in the Major General’s hand.

The miner appeared to be a very talkative person. He followed Sheyan’s gaze and when he saw what Sheyan was looking at, he smiled and said, “Such a tempting legendary item. Expensive, but it’s worth the price.”

Sheyan sighed. “You definitely won’t believe me if I told you that I was only thirty meters away from it once.”

The miner laughed and said, “Of course I believe you, but you’re lucky you didn’t cross those thirty meters to grab the stone. You probably didn’t know that there’s actually a curse hidden on the Sorcerer’s Stone. If the stone falls directly into a contestant’s hand, it’ll prove to be a very unfortunate and maddening thing. This curse will make the stone unable to be brought out from its world of origin even after all the effort the contestant had put in to get it.

Sheyan scoured his memory and recalled that the information of the Sorcerer’s Stone he had probed back then did state that it could not be carried out of that world without the proper approval.

He could not help but wonder, “Then how was this Sorcerer’s Stone brought out?”

The miner stared at Sheyan with a profound look in his eyes. He told Sheyan honestly, “A world mission, which will shake the world, must be triggered first in order to let out the curse on the Sorcerer’s Stone. The longing for life and youth is the dream of all the elderly, and Dumbledore is no exception, but he has always buried this desire deep in his heart. In order to get a Sorcerer’s Stone that can be brought out of the world, one must make Dumbledore succumb to temptation and so that he would carry the Sorcerer’s Stone with him for a period of time. Let him trigger the curse on the Sorcerer’s Stone, and then take it away from him.”

Hearing the miner’s words, Sheyan could not help but laugh bitterly. He spread his hand and said, “I suddenly find that two million utility points for the Sorcerer’s Stone is quite cheap.”

Because something big like the Sorcerer’s Stone had just been auctioned, the next item was naturally something a bit more ordinary to lighten the atmosphere a little. In order to create the next climax, there must be a low point beforehand. Therefore, the next thing to be auctioned was a collection of twelve strange and eccentric items, to be auctioned off simultaneously. Some were unknown mysterious items, some were extra mission items…. These things may not be useful to most people, but if they happened to meet someone who were in need of them, they could still be sold for a decent price.

(TL Note: Unknown mysterious items can be used to exchange for achievement points from the realm.)

Among these things, Sheyan was checking out a pair of items called the high-energy Ni-MH nuclear batteries. The description for the pair of items stated that they could be used for various forms of energy transfer, and could greatly increase the energy reserves of the target.

Sheyan’s current plight was that, although his ‘Planetary-Grade High-Energy Mechanical Power Gloves’ were very nice, their high energy consumption was a huge source of headache! Sheyan had already inquired about this pair of batteries and received confirmation that they could indeed be used to recharge his gloves. Not only that, they could actually fully recharge the gloves at least four times! Sheyan was determined to get them!

The batteries had a cheap starting bid of only 3,000 utility points, and no one had made a bid after so long, so they seemed like they may not be sold today. Sheyan was naturally very happy to see this. He straightaway bid a price of 3,500 utility points, thinking that he would surely get them.

Unexpectedly, as soon as he made a bid, various other bids immediately followed after his.

Four thousand utility points.

Six thousand!

Seven thousand!

…

…

Sheyan was also stunned to see this development. He never expected there to be so many people aiming for the batteries!

He only found out through the enthusiastic miner’s explanation that the batteries were actually very advanced technology, and they could even recharge exoskeleton armours! This, of course, led to the bidding war. The reason no one had bid for them before was because they were all observing the situation quietly, unwilling to expose their buying desire.

Sheyan was a very decisive person, so when he saw that the situation was going out of control, he immediately called out the maximum price he had in his mind.

“Twenty thousand utility points!”

(TL: This is bonus chapter #4 for January. Enjoy!)