A Serpent's Tale
Chapter 230: The Auction (2/2)

Chapter 230: The Auction (2/2)

The item in question was a rare meteor scale that shot down from the sky in the middle of the night and was appraised to have the [Space] element imbued within it. The scale in question was white in appearance and was about half the size of a palm.

But apart form that, there was nothing. Oh, there was the fact that the person auctioning this off was the same person who was auctioning off that egg rock I was interested in earlier.

But aside from that, there wasn’t anything else of note in this list. And suer there were items that piqued my interest, there was nothing that really captured my attention like the rock and the scale.

And when I finished reading the list, I noted that only a few items had been sold. I went back to the top of the list to see which item we were on and sighed as it was only the fourth item and the egg rock was the eighth.

"Is there something wrong ma’am?" The maid inquired dutifully.

"No, just not really all that interested in most of this auction. Only a couple items grabbed my interest. The rest is just junk in my eyes." I commented dispassionately.

And my response seemed to shock the woman as she reeled back slightly from the shock. But as quickly as she faltered, she got back into her professional charade.

"I-I see..." She stammered lightly, still slightly stunned by my attitude towards the auction.

But aside from her initial shock, she did and said nothing else, leaving the booth in silence. The only noise coming from outside as people bid for the current item and the presenter yelling out to encourage people to buy it.

I leaned into my hand as I sat upon the chaise that I was sitting upon which was here when I entered the room. There was also a table with some tea on it.

I drank the tea and found it a little bland. The Gorgon maid noticed and added a small spoonful of extra sugar, how nice.

I took another sip and it was much nicer than before. Was it perfect? Of course not. But it was satisfactory enough to please me for the time being.

The auction continued and I asked the maid if she could go and fetch me some snacks, to which she said yes and left the booth to do.

I almost fell asleep whilst waiting when I heard the announcer announce that the egg-shaped rock was being auctioned off.

So I got up from lying down and moved over to the semi-transparent curtain to have a better look. The curtain wasn’t actually a curtain though. It was more of a veil that worked to block out vision from one direction whilst allowing the other direction to see clearly.

It wasn’t perfectly clear, but clear enough to see the item on stage being presented.

And when I saw the egg-shaped rock being brought up and presented on stage, I felt a desire to have it for some reason.

The bidding started at ten silver, quickly rising to a hundred, then to gold, when I suddenly shouted out my own bid.

"Five hundred!"

"And what a shocker! The owner of the Dune Worm is bidding on an item! Can anyone outbid them?" The presenter yelled out in an exciting fashion.

"Five Fifty!"

"Five seventy-five!"

"Six hundred!"

Several people yelled out their own bids, and some others that were staying out of this bid started to gain interest as soon as I bid for it.

A little disgruntled, I decided to raise the bar pretty high. "Two thousand!"

"And another twist! The Worm owner raising the bid up to two thousand gold! Does anyone want to match them?" She pressed the crowd further as she pointed at them and pressured them more.

One woman then bid. "Twenty-one!"

And the presented pointed towards them, "We have twenty-one hundred, does anyone else want to go higher? Does the mysterious individual wish to raise the bid even more?"

"Twenty-five." I called out as by now the crowd had hushed, leaving only those actually bidding for the item and raising the price to two thousand five hundred.

"Twenty-five hundred, do I hear twenty-six? Twenty-six from anyone in the crowd?"

"Twenty-six!"

"Twenty-seven fifty!"

Hearing all of these people slowly raising the bids annoyed me, so I raised it a lot more.

"Five thousand." I announced in an aggressive tone, indicating that I would keep going until everyone else stopped bidding.

Silence descended upon the crowd for a few seconds before the presenter started shouting again.

"And our mysterious individual raises the total bid up to five thousand! She clearly has deep pockets, so if anyone else dares to go against her, you’ll have to contend with her for it as she clearly seems to want this."

"That in mind, does anyone else want to bid for it?"

She waited to hear something else from the crowd before she started to close off the auction.

"Going once for FIVE thousand gold! Going twice. Last chance people..." She gave a silent and dramatic pause.

"SOLD! To the mysterious individual responsible for this auction happening in the first place. Congratulation on winning... Whatever the hell this thing is!"

She clearly had no idea what exactly this thing was but kept her cheery and upbeat attitude as she moved on to the next item.

It was then that I realised that the maid had yet to return. I waited for a while but she never came back.

I poked my head out the back of the booth to see where she was but couldn’t see her.

It shouldn’t take that long to get some snacks, right? I shrugged and thought that maybe she went to go back into the city to get them or they were made fresh on demand or something.

Regardless, I sat back down went back to waiting for the next item to be auctioned off and more.

_

_

_

Some time later, as I was half asleep, my ears twitched. I raised my head and listened in and found that the auction was still going on, and it was only half way between the item I just bought and the scale.

Which made me question, why was my hearing triggered? And just as I was about to ignore it, I heard someone entering the booth.

I looked over my shoulder and saw that it was the Gorgon maid that was serving me.

I leaned back into my hand and sighed, "Finally. What took you so long?" I asked in a slightly annoyed tone, my brows furrowing slightly.

The maid didn’t respond as she just came over, and put the item that I had bought on the table.

My head snapped back in shock as I stared at the rock, then the maid, then back at the rock, then back at the maid. I repeated this action a few times before I noticed that the white and black frilly maid uniform was stained.

"What happened?" I asked slightly with some concern evident in my voice as I got up from my chaise.

The Gorgon lowered her head and gripped the hem of her uniform, her arms and lips trembling as I could see the glistening of some tears forming in her eyes.

I pressed my question again, this time in a more commanding tone. "What. Happened?"

She started sobbing as her lips quivered as she opened them to speak.

"Th-The other maids..."

"What about the other maids?"

"Th-They... They... They, they..."

"Stop stuttering, out with it!"

"They kept on bullying me! Saying that I would never be good enough and, and that I shouldn’t be here, and that I’m a disgrace to them all! And, and they kept on interrupting and messing up your request! And then, and then they threw this rock at me! Claiming that you bought it and that I should give it to you! But I was carrying the tray of snacks you requested finally after the chefs served literally everyone else that came to them!"

I was annoyed. No, I was beyond pissed.

Who did these wenches think they were? I’ll admit that I didn’t care much about the Gorgon, but I could feel her anguish.

Before my... Gap in my memories, Anywhere I went in the desert, I was ridiculed for being an orphan, no matter what I did or said to anyone. Which is why I wanted to come to this city in the first place.

So I knew what it was like to feel alone. To be ostracised by society.

And I wasn’t sure why I was feeling this urge to get back at the bitches that tormented this maid, which again, I don’t particularly feel much for. I just sympathise for her, which is probably why I want to help.

But there’s this burning feeling within me to bring down this righteous fury upon them. It’s as if my blood won’t stand for this transgression that they’ve made against me by inconveniencing my existence. And that’s what seems to be fuelling this desire.

Normally, I wouldn’t be feeling this feeling within me as powerfully as I am, but something was just calling to me to do something about this.

So, I ordered the Gorgon to bring all of the maids to me.

She was confused at first, but left to go and get them after some more insistence from me.

And now, I waited alone in my booth. Leaving me to contemplate this anger and why I feel it so intensely.

Search the lightnovelworld.cc website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.