After Alex and the others took their seats, they spent another half an hour waiting for the other buyers to arrive and for the auction to start. At that time they had spent it looking at the guests that had arrived, at least those who had their faces out in the open as just like the three of them, most of the buyers had on masks. Of the people that had arrived here, Alex recognized two people without being told who they were.The first being Red Dragon, the man who now had the privilege of being called his step father, but in the end even that was just in name. And the second person happened to be the second prince, or some people would say, the tenth prince seeing as he was the tenth and final child of the current Emperor. Either way, the Auction hadn"t started yet, so Louis used the extra time he had on hand to explain to Alex what had led to the Aenz automobile industry backing out of their signed deal.
"The chief Qi engineers were actually prepared to honor their part of the deal, or at the very least that"s what I"ve found out, however the idea of backing out of the deal and putting the airship on auction was a move by the corporate sharks of the company. Since the engineers made the deal themselves, the leaders and investors declared it null and void. But the thing is the engineers can actually make such a deal, this was just a prototype after all, of course it"s the only one of it"s kind, but future collaboration between you and them would ensure that even better versions of the airship would be made.
However the corporate sharks decided to burn those bridges by selling it, but basically I found out that this move was as a result of a conflict between some of the board members and the chief engineers. This was basically board room politics as they took all of the designs and research spent on the airship over the past two years and handed it over to someone else. The deals they have with us is still valid, but they never thought we would find out about the auction as it was only spread amongst a select few.
If we do find out, we"ll find trouble with the engineers who made the deal with us, while the board members can have plausible deniability by saying they had no idea about the deal, putting all of the blame on the heads of the Qi engineers. If that can happen, they can use that method to make a new deal with us to make another airship using their designs and yours too, with the help you gave. It would be a win-win situation for them if they can get you on board, but if not…..
They can make lesser versions of the airship and still make a ton of money by banking on the popularity and sale of the first prototype. Either was they win, and we and the Engineers lose. But we found out about the Auction by sheer luck, they just didn"t count on the fact that you would be engaged to princess Victoria, and even if they counted on it, they"re weren"t prepared for it. So here we are about to rain down chaos and destruction on them, so have fun Master Alex."
Have Fun, Alex certainly intended to do so, he was just here for the Airship and for the people who thought it wise to get and double cross him. Alex had a low tolerance for betrayal and lies, especially when he"s already had a prior agreement with you. The death of his clan mates, the secrets that his dad kept from him, and bunch of other stuff had all joined in giving him such a predisposition to the act of lying, that"s why he gets to never lie, even when it"s required. The best he could do was tell you half truths or misdirect you, but lie, was something he would never do.
*Bang!*
There was a loud bang as a screen seemed to ride up at the other end of the hall, and just as it did so, tiny tablet like screens rose out of the ground in front of their seats. This auction was pretty much virtual, the larger screen would show the highest bid for the items on sale, and the highest bid would win if another one doesn"t replace it. This would keep the auction civilized, and also keep the ident.i.ties of the bidders a secret, they would only be able to bid by using the tablets in their hands.
"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this special automobile auction held by the Aenz automobile industry, my name is Ronald and I am your host. We would be putting on sale some of our limited airships, aircars, airbikes, airboards, and our first of it"s kind, and quite frankly the only airship capable of joint Mana and Qi controls. So stay tuned for the grand finale, we will be starting the auction with our limited edition Demon Stinger Airboards.
There"s only six of it"s kind in the entire world, and today we would be auctioning off the only one left in stock at Aenz automobile. We will be opening our starting bid at 1000 gold, please ladies and gentlemen, the floor is yours."
He had barely finished talking when the screen behind him out up with a bid of 10,000 gold. Alex raised an eyebrow at that, the price for the board had gone up by literally a thousand percent. Guess the people here were those that had the big bucks, besides the demon stinger Airboard was a collectors item, it just looked really cool seeing as the host did not even list out it"s specs, it"s obvious it wasn"t anything good.
"The bid has stalled at 12 thousand gold, do I see any 13 thousand gold? Anyone? 12 thousand going once, going twice…Sold!"
A single mission in the Orcon forest would raise enough money for Alex to but that Airboard, but it was useless to him since it really wasn"t that good a machine. Airboards, Aircars, and Airbikes weren"t completely just for transportation, hardly anyone trained demonic or magical beasts anymore to use as mounts. When there are machines that can move better, are more resilient, and if built well had more attacks and even had the possibility of growing and becoming a sentient artifact, not to mention the cost to maintain them as opposed to living being wasn"t that high.
The Automobile industry was in boom because of the existence of this air vehicles, And a proper battle vehicle was the wet dream of many young cultivators. There are still some old fashioned cultivators who prefer living mounts or have had mounts that have lived with them for years. But still this was the rage, with a proper vehicle someone in the mortal gate can kill a person in the earth gate, a.s.suming he or she is underestimated and they take advantage of every opportunity given to them. Bottom Line, Alex decided to get some as an addition to his airship.
"The next time item on display are a pair of Airboard, Airbikes, and Aircar. Triple Thunder G.o.ds: Zeus, Thor, and Sango! We"re auctioning them off as a set! The Airboard; Zeus! Named after the ancient Greek G.o.dking who was known for his ferocious anger and talent in battle has a minimum speed of 800km an hour and can go from ignition to top speed in 5.2 seconds! It has twin mini guns that fire concentrated bursts of lightning bolts with an intensity of no less than a billion joules! Amongst all the airboards in existence, he is the king!
The Airbike; Thor is just as mad and bloodthirsty as his brother Zeus! Even more so considering Thor was also the G.o.d of war, like his father Odin! A 1000km and hour and going from ignition to top speed in 3 seconds.
He"s capable of creating twenty meter concussive sound and thunder barriers that spreads from the Airbike itself to a radius of twenty meters in a second. It"s like thunder and lightening going off right in your face and lasts for at least 10 seconds, perfect for someone who likes to fight like a Calvary soldier. You could smash through enemies like a bowling ball through a room full of dominoes.
It"s equipped with the same mini guns, though they"re much bigger, to the point I would call them sub-machine guns firing concentrated lightning beams with an intensity of 3 million Joules! We"re talking the power of tribulation lightning! Amongst Airbikes in current existence, he stands at the peak alongside three others who"s name are not consequential to the auction.
But never the less I"ll call them out. The Raiga! The Hollow, and the Storm Fly. And as for our final entry in this set, the Sango is incomplete. Unfortunately we were never able to complete it as the parts it needed would be something similar to what our grand finale has. It would have been an Aircar capable of both Great feats of Qi and Mana as opposed to the others that run on a power core that would need to be changed regularly. However fear not!
Alexander Zhang Xiao Feng Alé of the Zhang clan and the Wudang sect, Childe Spirit Wind of the Heaven"s Empire and finance to the ninth princess Lu Victoria; is the only one capable of building parts that can utilize both Qi and Mana, a proper deal with him and you can complete the Sango.
He might even be inclined to help as the Sango is based on a G.o.d of Legend from the dark continent, the place he grew up in. Sango was a ferocious warrior, he was so strong and feared that it was said just be opening his mouth he could spit out thunder and fire. He never lost a fight and was even husband to a G.o.ddess of winds and storms! Truly worthy of appreciation.
Even uncompleted, the Sango has a top speed of Mach 3, enough to rival most Airship and capable of breaking the sound barrier. It takes it 3.73 seconds to get to top speed, and has the same concussive thunder field of the Thor, and has a Quad Omni directional battling guns that fire rapid burst of Black lightning! And a small cannon that fires a combined plasma bolt born from black lightning and black flames!
No one in the earth gate can withstand it"s power and it might leave a heaven gate severely injured if it"s completed. And with that said the starting bid would be 300 thousand gold, you can....."
(1 million gold!)
Every one was shocked by the increase, and no one more than Cross and Louis, because it was Alex who had made the bid.