Alex looked around and didn't find Cai Ping anywhere in the hall at all. 'Is she somewhere else, busy preparing the auction?' he wondered.
A girl walked up to them and took them to a VIP room from where you could see the stage, but nobody else could see you.
There was an array of seats inside spread among the almost 10 by 10 meters big room. Alex sat on a random seat near the window at the front where the view was the best. Ma Rong sat where she could only see the stage.
The girl who came with them also stayed in the room but remained standing next to the door.
There was time to spare, so Alex decided to ask his master something. He made sure he wasn't loud enough for the girl to listen.
"Master, how do I speak into someone's head?"
Ma Rong wasn't expecting such a question in an environment like this. Still, she answered. "It's easy. Just send out your spiritual sense to someone's head and say things in your mind. They will be able to hear it in their head."
Alex heard it in his head and decided to try. He sent out his spiritual sense towards Ma Rong and asked, "Can you hear me?"
"Yes," an answer came to his head. He was happy learning it had worked. Now he didn't have to worry about communicating in secret if the need ever arises.
Time passed by as more and more people came and sat at the seats in the open down below.
"Oh, he's here too." Ma Rong seemed to be quite surprised by someone's arrival. Alex looked below the window but didn't recognize anyone. So he asked, "Who are you talking about master?"
"The man with the black hat, 5 rooms to our left. He is the sect leader of Honor sect from Rosewood city." Ma Rong said.
He tried to look who it was, but his spiritual sense couldn't reach so far away. 5 rooms were about 50 meters in total length, even when stretched to the maximum, he could only cover a radius of 30 meters with his spiritual sense. So, he couldn't see who his master was talking about.
"You can see that far master? What is your radius on your spiritual sense?" he couldn't help but ask.
"My radius? It's about 50 or so meters. I can do about 75 at best. I need to eat more spirit-enriching pills to be able to increase it more." She said.
'Wow, so far,' he was amazed at how far she could send out her spiritual sense. 'But what's a spirit-enriching pill? I don't remember any pill like that in the recipes I got from the library. Nor did the records have anything about them.'
"Do you have a recipe for that pill, master?" he asked.
"Yes, I do. It's a personal recipe my master handed down to me. I will give you the recipe when you have True Qi. Since it's a True pill, giving it to you now would be useless." She said.
Alex accepted the reasoning and sat back. He watched as the entire room filled up. There weren't a lot of people he recognized here if any. He saw some disciples from both of his sects, most of whom seemed to be a core disciples.
He sent out his spiritual sense to the 2 different rooms on either side of his room and realized he didn't know any of them either. The world was big, and he hadn't lived in it for long. So it was obvious that he wouldn't recognize them.
There was one thing that surprised him, however. There was a person in a room next to the room adjacent to his left. The thing that surprised him regarding this person was that he was fat, extremely fat.
It looked like he could barely walk, especially with all the jewelry he was wearing. There seemed to be 4 people next to him all fit and seemed to be very alert.
"Master, who is the fat guy 2 rooms over?" he asked through his spiritual sense.
Ma Rong checked the room and said, "That is Huo Zemin, he is the head of the Victorious Snow merchant group originating in our Scarlet city. They are the third richest merchant group in all of the Crimson Empire."
'Third richest? I wonder how many spirit stones he has.'
Alex moved his attentions elsewhere waiting for the auction to start. He looked at the talisman on the table. He had already scanned it and realized it was the list of items that would be auctioned off today.
He wanted to be completely in the unknown so didn't read it at all.
Finally, once everyone had arrived and the seats on the base were full, the lights in the room and the hall started to dim, while the lights on the stage started to shine brighter.
Everyone waited with bated breath as the curtain on the stage finally started to move and a woman walked from the inside.
"Good afternoon, everyone. I hope you are all settled and ready for the auction. Welcome to the bi-annual mega auction of the Pink Cloud auction house, presented to you by myself, Cai Ping." Cai Ping had finally appeared in a beautiful blue dress. She swiped her hands and a large desk along with a wooden hammer appeared out of nowhere.
"If you are all prepared. We will bring out the first item." She said, and a few people walked up with a square-shaped box with a cloth on top of it. They placed it on the desk and walked away.
Cai Ping walked ahead of the box with exaggerated theatrics in her motion and held a corner of the cloth.
"And for our first item of the day, we have…" She paused for a moment to increase the suspense and finally lifted the cloth to show a small uneven ball of yellow color with a bunch of white patches all over it.
"A Clouded Tiger Cub."