Ding. Your item has been auctioned successfully.

Ding. Your account has been credited with 120 gold.

"Nice. That's even a little more than I had expected."

Cheerfully whistling a tune, Eluraa made her way quickly to a trading goods store. There was a bald middle aged man sitting near the counter. He looked busy with a couple of customers.

After patiently waiting for a few minutes, it was finally her turn.

"h.e.l.lo. Nice to meet you. What is the cost of a level 1 beast core sir ?"

Looking at her ragged appearance and poor clothing, the bald man responded with a disdainful att.i.tude "Hmm. It costs 1 gold and 20 silvers."

Still smiling cheerfully, Eluraa enthusiastically started to place her order, "oh awesome! Can I have"

Abruptly cutting her off, the bald man rudely shouted at her, "Move over. Look at the queue forming behind you."

With veins popping on her forehead and bitting her lips, Eluraa again patiently asked, "Can I have 80 level 1 cores and 4 carving crystals ?"

For a moment, the bald man looked a little surprised. Muttering to himself, he went inside to grab the items. "Wow, even a weakling is dabbling in crafting goods... hai.. Kids these days.. So wasteful.."

Ignoring the rude salesman and finis.h.i.+ng her transaction, Eluraa skipped back to the guild base, still cheerful.

She had a challenge in front of her. She had strategised and planned everything out. Now all that is left is execution. For the first time, she had something to look forward to.

Hurrying a bit, Eluraa headed straight to the rune unit and started with her first carving crystal. It took her about 5 hours to finish the previous one. So she had a long night ahead of her.

But unlike others, she didn't have to focus her attention completely on the mana transfer process. So she opened her xenon screen and started going through the different herb names and their features simultaneously.

Time trickled by slowly....

Buzz.. buzz..

"Phew.. that was the third one. One more to go." Stretching her neck from side to side, Eluraa picked up another core and started with the last carving crystal.

Being at this for the whole night, Eluraa was feeling a bit tired and worn out. But to her surprise, when she was on her 74th core, she heard a much needed notification.

Ding. +1 Soul Strength

Cheering up a bit, she managed to power through and finish the fourth crystal as well.

"Yawn.. I can't believe there is actually still time to submit these today."

Sprinting to the auction house, Eluraa managed to catch the officer, just when he was about to close the deposits counter for the day. She quickly dropped off her freezing spell runes and breathed a sigh of relief.

For her, time was the biggest limiting factor now. She only had 4 more days left, but there was still a long way to go...

Feeling exhausted, she had a quick meal in the inn next to the auction house and fell asleep in the inn's resting area.

........

Leaning his back against the wall, s.h.i.+ Meng was sitting in his s.p.a.ce in the smithing workshop area. He decided to take a break today from his constant refining schedule.

Scanning the items on the auction list, he was trying to see if there were any suitable lower level armours. He did have some gold saved up for emergencies. But good equipments were really expensive.

"Hmmm.. Was it too stubborn of me to not accept dad's deposits.."

Shaking his head and ignoring that thought, he decided to step out for a nice meal before starting back up his ore refining process.

Still looking at the items being auctioned in his xenon, s.h.i.+ Meng ended up walking towards the auction house. Noticing a small commotion near the corner, he decided to go there and take a look.

Immediately his face changed and his expression darkened. There was a flash of anger in his sharp eyes.

He went straight into the small crowd and dragged Eluraa away from that area. He then turned back to take a good look at the 3 men who had been arguing with her.

The bigger rowdy looking guy was still shouting, "A formal challenge is a formal challenge my darling. Looking forward to our next 'close' combat encounter. Ke ke ke." He and his friends then started laughing hysterically.

s.h.i.+ Meng folded his fingers into a fist and gripped them tightly. Calming himself down first, he proceeded to check on Eluraa.

And she was worse off than him. She was literally shaking with anger.

"What happened ?"

Gritting her teeth Eluraa mumbled back, "I was just f.u.c.king sleeping in there by myself. Why would he start this nonsense all by himself ?!"

"Was that the guy who was hara.s.sing you the other day as well ?"

"mmhmm."

"Sorry. You can postpone a challenge for almost 3 months. Don't fret it. We will figure something out."

"mmhmm."

Both of them walked in silence for a while.

Luckily, breaking the tense atmosphere, Eluraa got her auction house notifications.

Ding. Your item has been auctioned successfully.

Ding. Your account has been credited with 135 gold.

Ding. Your item has been auctioned successfully.

Ding. Your account has been credited with 120 gold.

Ding. Your item has been auctioned successfully.

Ding. Your account has been credited with 130 gold.

Ding. Your item has been auctioned successfully.

Ding. Your account has been credited with 110 gold.

Since s.h.i.+ Meng had some items to purchase from the trade shop as well, they both ended up going together to the trade goods store.

Adding to Eluraa's misery, the same bald guy from the previous day was at the counter today as well. One look at Eluraa and he immediately recognised her.

Not wanting to deal with his shenanigans today, Eluraa immediately placed her order. "Please give me 300 level 1 beast cores and 100 carving crystals."

Looking astonished, the bald man started to nod his head understandingly and disappointedly. Much to Eluraa's dismay, he then decided to impart some of his wisdom to this spendthrift kid in front of him, "Hey brat. What have you been upto? Look at your eyes. All smokey and tired. Did your pill furnace explode ? Did you burn through all your cores from yesterday? What level are you even !? Listen to me. I am in a good mood today. At lower level focus on getting missions and reading materials. At higher levels these things will be a lot simpler."

Eluraa "....."

s.h.i.+ Meng "...."

Looking at their weird expressions, the bald man then muttered to himself and went inside to grab the items "Kids these days.. Hai.. So impatient.."

Hearing this, s.h.i.+ Meng couldn't control himself and burst into laughter. Looking at him giggling like a maniac, Eluraa also smiled helplessly. He then added mockingly, "Someday you should teach me how to attract these type of situations effortlessly." Eluraa rubbed her temples and smiled gently.