Chapter 616: The Strange Stele

It was now the last day of the auction. Aside from that second-tier divine technique, all the items that Ye Feng and his group had entrusted to the auction were sold off.
The peak-grade spiritual treasure in the form of a ship from the first day was sold to the master and disciple in VIP Room No. 8 for a staggering 300 million, far exceeding Old Chen’s estimate. As for the corpses of those interstellar-level monsters, they had all been auctioned as well, with the total amount coming in roughly in line with Old Chen’s prediction—over 400 million.
After deducting the fees, Ye Feng still had a net profit of 710 million. If converted into sixth-tier domain value, that would be over 700 billion, far exceeding his current 250 billion. Ye Feng knew that after this auction, by converting all those star crystals into domain value, he would surely receive considerable rewards.
Over the course of twelve days, Ye Feng did not participate in any bids at all. VIP Room No. 12 was the only room that didn’t press the bidding button from start to finish. This drew the attention of other VIP rooms.
There were only two possibilities for someone occupying a VIP room but not bidding: either the owner was focused on accumulating wealth for a single item and dismissed bidding on others, or they were submitting a highly valuable item that hadn’t been auctioned yet. Thus, there was always someone inside VIP Room No. 12.
It was possible to tell whether a VIP room was occupied, as the room number staying lit indicated someone was inside. If there was no one from the start, then VIP Room No. 12 would be replaced by No. 13, with subsequent numbers shifting forward in order.
Ye Feng hadn’t expected to attract attention for this reason.
However, thanks to Luo Yan’s abilities, he discovered that several VIP rooms were trying to guess his identity.
In VIP Room No. 1, the old man waved his hand, driving everyone else out of the room before turning to the old butler. “Uncle Luo, if I’m not mistaken, VIP Room No. 12 hasn’t made a single bid from the first day to now, has it?”
“My lord, you’re not wrong!” the old butler nodded in agreement.
“Do you think it’s possible that the person in that room is the seller of that second-tier divine technique?” the old man made a surprising guess.
“It’s possible. He might just be determined to acquire that second-tier divine technique and unwilling to spend money on other items,” the old butler replied, not agreeing with his guess.

“If he doesn’t make a bid by the end of the auction?” the old man pressed.
“Then that’s quite likely,” the old butler was taken aback before nodding in agreement.
“Otherwise, what if the two of us team up to snatch it from him?” the old man seemed eager.
“Master, if the person in VIP Room 12 is indeed the seller of a second-tier divine technique, do you think he’s selling it because he’s short of money, or because he believes it’s useless?” the old butler asked with a smile.
“That’s a second-tier divine technique! If it were me, I wouldn’t sell it even if I were starving—I’d definitely practice it on my own…” As soon as the old man said this, he froze. “Uncle Luo, are you saying…”
“A person who can so openly sell a second-tier divine technique is definitely not an ordinary person!” the old butler continued. “In this world, second-tier divine techniques can only be obtained from those super-secret realms or extreme perilous places—they’re not something you can just find on the street.”
“That’s true. But I reckon the competition this time will be fierce. I estimate this divine technique is worth at least hundreds of billions,” the old man frowned slightly. “That’s a hefty expense for our Nan Gong family.”
“Then has Master considered that mastering one more second-tier divine technique could increase our chances in the struggle for the spiritual veins against the Bei Ming family?” The old butler once again saw through the situation.
“We’ve been fighting the Bei Ming family for years, with a 50-50 split in wins and losses. If we had one more second-tier divine technique, conservatively speaking, our chances of winning would be at least 60%.” The old man’s eyes lit up.
“Moreover, if VIP Room 12 is indeed the seller of that second-tier divine technique, we could ask the auction house if he has any other ones. We could buy them at the same price or exchange them for something else. If he does have them, we can proceed with further transactions. If not, we can still place orders with him. Since he can obtain one, he might also have a way to get a second, third…” The old butler seemed excited, envisioning the future of the Nan Gong family.
Ye Feng narrowed his eyes slightly. That old butler really knew how to plan. But since he had learned about this, it would be unfair not to take advantage of it. Moreover, Ye Feng thought about whether he should approach the Bei Ming family as well and sell them a few second-tier divine techniques… As long as the Bei Ming family knew the Nan Gong family had acquired second-tier divine techniques, they would surely try to get their own as well.
Inside VIP Room 13, demonic energy swirled.

Xiu Luo’s eyes darted around. “Zhuge Xiu, do you think the person in VIP Room 12 might be the seller of that second-tier divine technique?”
“It’s possible. That VIP Room 12 has never participated in a single auction so far,” Zhuge Xiu replied with respect. His mood had improved a lot these days because he had seen what happened before the auction began. Though he wasn’t there, he had watched the secretly filmed footage. Seeing Xiu Luo kneeling and admitting his mistake filled him with secret joy.
Although Xiu Luo had been extremely irritable those days, he didn’t do anything to Zhuge Xiu because, in his view, Zhuge Xiu had already become one of his most trusted subordinates. He vented his anger on others before settling down.
“I don’t have that much money to buy that divine technique. As for a second-tier one, I don’t care either. I’ve already mastered two second-tier divine techniques and still haven’t fully internalized them. When I need one, I can just ask my dad for it. Let those people fight among themselves. Once my cultivation satisfies my dad, he’ll even grant me a third-tier divine technique,” Xiu Luo said proudly. “But whether the person in VIP Room 12 is the seller or not, I don’t mind killing and stealing directly. If they can enter a VIP room, they must have quite a few valuable things.”
“As you say, my lord!” Zhuge Xiu replied with a perfunctory smile.
Ye Feng naturally saw this as well. “It’s that guy from that day. Is his so-called ‘dad’ real or fake? Someone who can casually produce second- and third-tier divine techniques must be from an intermediate main plane, right?”
“He’s probably real. He indeed has mastered two second-tier divine techniques,” Luo Yan nodded. He had fought against Xiu Luo that day and knew best—although it was a complete suppression, he could still detect something from Xiu Luo’s resistance.
“By the way, I still haven’t checked the loot you stole that day,” Ye Feng said as he took out all the storage rings and used his soul power to examine them one by one.
“Damn, this guy really has a vast foundation—over three billion star crystals…” Ye Feng couldn’t help but exclaim when he inspected Xiu Luo’s first ring. “There are also three lower-grade void crystal cores…”
“Void crystal cores? Those are items that only appear in intermediate main planes. It seems his dad is indeed from an intermediate main plane,” Long Tian became even more convinced of this guy’s identity.
“There are many pseudo-void-level beast crystal cores, plus eight true-void-level beast crystal cores…” Ye Feng never expected such a rich harvest, and this was just one storage ring.

After examining the ring, Ye Feng infused his soul power into another ring. “Uh, no wonder he has two rings—this top-tier storage spirit treasure ring is already packed to the brim.”
“There must be even more valuable items in this ring, right?” Long Tian couldn’t help but lean in.
“A bottle of Ru Xu Dan, three pieces in total… materials for creating a fire attribute clone… one Zhi Yang fruit… a plant that has reached the Ru Xu level…” Ye Feng’s voice suddenly paused. “This is… a sword art divine technique!!! There are such amazing things here. Good thing he can’t cultivate until he reaches the Zhen Xu level; that’s a relief for me!”
“The master is really lucky!” Luo Yan was also stunned. He naturally knew how precious such divine techniques were.
“There’s also a strange stone tablet. I don’t know what it is, and I can’t make out the inscriptions no matter how hard I try,” Ye Feng said, frowning slightly.
“Take it out and take a look!” Long Tian immediately became interested.
Ye Feng took out the stone tablet. It seemed to be made of ordinary bluestone, over three meters tall and about one meter wide, with strange inscriptions carved on it. It seemed to be obscured by a thin layer of mist, making it hard to see clearly.
As soon as the stone tablet was taken out, Luo Yan suddenly noticed that the restrictions in the entire VIP room seemed to be weakening, on the verge of collapsing.
“Put it back quickly!” Luo Yan ordered immediately.
Ye Feng and the others also sensed the anomaly and promptly returned the stone tablet to the Liu Luan Hall.
“This isn’t an ordinary object. We need to find time to study it thoroughly,” Ye Feng said, looking at the restrictions that had returned to their original state. He was quite shocked. After all, even soul-probing techniques at the Pseudo-Zhen Xu level could block these restrictions, yet they started to collapse the moment the stone tablet appeared—this was simply unbelievable.
The powerful individuals in the other VIP rooms also noticed the anomaly, as it wasn’t just the restrictions in Ye Feng’s room that were affected; all eighteen VIP halls in the auction venue were experiencing the same issue.
“What’s going on?” In VIP Room No. 1, an old man looked at the butler. “Just now, the restrictions seemed to be attacked and started collapsing. Such restrictions must be extremely difficult for even Zhen Xu-level experts to break, right?”
The powerful figures in the other VIP rooms also changed expressions in alarm.
“Huh? What attacked the restrictions I set up back then?” Suddenly, a mirror made of ice and snow appeared in front of a young man. Inside the mirror was the auction venue of Longquan City. “It’s Longquan City in the lower world. I happen to have a clone left there; I can go check it out.”

After a long while, in the extremely cold regions of the star realm, a white-haired man with the same appearance as the young man before slowly opened his eyes. “I understand now. I’ll go take a look!”
The figure of the white-haired young man vanished in an instant.