Chapter 694: Another Round

The auction kept moving through one set of lots after another. For all the attention on the Betting Favorites, none of the others had actually placed a bid yet.

Grey was still the only one. But even he had stopped after taking the first 3 Legacy Items. He ignored several rounds of materials, finished mechs and blueprints while he waited for something that could actually help the people around him.

It was 3 more rounds before the golden Legacy markings finally showed up again.

Grey sat forward almost immediately.

A whip, a bow and another spear rose onto the platforms beneath Breejara. Before she’d even finished introducing the first one, Grey had already put automatic bids on all three.

His private bubble lit up once again, announcing exactly what he’d done to everyone watching. This time, though, nobody seemed interested in testing whether he understood the rules.

Grey wasn’t stupid enough to think showing what he wanted over and over was harmless. The easier it became to predict what he valued, the easier it would be for someone to drive the price up just to cost him money, or get in his way for the sake of it. That went double now that he’d proven he could actually claim these Legacies.

He was aware of it, but he still didn’t have much of a choice.

Luckily, that problem hadn’t arrived yet.

The other bidders slowly pulled out as the numbers climbed into the tens of thousands of Blue Credits, and none of the Betting Favorites stepped in to complicate things.

Grey kept waiting for someone to suddenly double one of the bids out of spite. But nope, all 3 countdowns hit zero without anything strange happening.

Breejara’s smile appeared across his display again.

"Our most enthusiastic collector has returned. Grey Temolt, kindly join us."

Grey stepped onto the teleportation platform and appeared beside her a moment later. The first thing he did was let his gaze drift down to her spider body.

He slowly shook his head and let out a disappointed sigh.

Breejara’s smile twitched.

Grey looked back up at her face. "Such a shame."

Several of her eyes narrowed before she visibly forced herself to keep hosting.

"You seem very interested in Legacy Items tonight, Grey Temolt. Surely all of these couldn’t possibly be intended for you. For your friends, perhaps?"

There was enough curiosity buried under the teasing that Grey understood right away what she was really asking.

His smile widened. "How’s Breejah doing?"

Breejara froze.

Grey blinked at her innocently. "Oh? Nothing to say?"

The silence lasted just long enough for the audience to notice it.

"You learn faster than she did. If you keep that up, maybe you won’t have to be six feet deep before you learn what you can and can’t say."

The reaction was instant.

Boos erupted throughout the auction hall, so loud that Grey could barely hear Breejara breathe. Judging by the anger spreading through the crowd, they liked their host quite a bit more than he’d expected.

They clearly didn’t know the history behind the exchange. However, they were smart enough to realize Grey had found a sore spot and deliberately jammed his thumb into it.

Grey didn’t care. The implication of her words would make trouble for him, and she knew it. She was lucky he couldn’t just smash her head in right now.

Axion-9 had just told him that Arc II heavily leaned on army building, and it was impossible that Breejara wouldn’t know something that was such common knowledge. She probably also already knew that the headliner item was a blueprint he’d created, so she’d know that compared to everyone else, simple blueprints were worthless to him since he could just pump one out with a thought.

This was obviously her way of targeting him, and he didn’t have the patience to play that.

He turned to the platforms.

Breejara recovered quickly enough that her voice came back with almost no trace of what had just happened.

"Our first Legacy is Widow’s Choice, a Dominion Class Branching whip left behind by the duelist Serai Vol, whose Frame allowed every movement of the weapon to split into multiple possible trajectories until the final strike was chosen. The wielder could begin one attack and force an opponent to defend against a dozen endings before deciding which one became real."

Grey looked at the next platform. A black bow rested there without any visible string.

"Next is Returner’s Arc, a rather unusual Recursive Legacy belonging to Faelen Orr, an archer whose arrows accumulated force through repeated cycles of the same attack. Every shot that returned to his Frame strengthened the pattern of the next, allowing a single technique to build upon itself until even minor attacks became increasingly difficult to survive."

The final platform held a narrow silver spear with several rings floating around its shaft.

"And finally, The Far Choir, a Resonant Legacy created by Iskala Vey, whose spear transmitted every impact through the space around her. A blocked thrust could continue vibrating through armor, terrain or other connected targets long after the spear itself had stopped moving."

Interesting enough. Still, it wasn’t for him.

Grey went to the whip first and adjusted his Neural Frame until the Branching patterns matched what the Legacy wanted. Then, he did the same for the Recursive bow and the Resonant spear.

Now that he understood what these Legacy Items were actually looking for, Soul Link made all 3 attempts almost embarrassingly easy. Before long, the audience was stuck watching him store away another complete set without the slightest resistance.

He returned to the private bubble and dumped all three onto the dining table.

Sabrina stood up first. She approached the weapons more carefully this time. She touched the bow, then the spear, before finally resting her fingers on the whip.

Nothing reacted to her.

After waiting a few seconds, she slowly pulled her hand back and shook her head. "No."

Grey watched her face for a moment but didn’t comment.

That was when he noticed Duke.

Duke had been standing near the table while the others tested the Legacies. Now, though, his lips were twitching strangely, and he was walking back to his seat with the feigned casualness of a man trying to sneak away from a crime scene.

Grey raised an eyebrow and then his gaze moved to the table, before it went back to Duke... then back to the table.

A grin slowly spread across his face.

Grey walked over and picked up Widow’s Choice.

"What’s this?"

Duke kept walking as though he hadn’t heard a thing.

Grey followed him. "Duke."

Nothing.

Grey circled around until he was standing right in front of him. "Buddy."

Duke stared past Grey’s shoulder.

"I don’t know what you’re talking about."

Grey’s grin widened. "Oh, you definitely know what I’m talking about."

"I actually don’t."

"That’s crazy, since this thing damn near started dancing when you walked past it."

Duke tried to step around him.

Grey stepped with him.

"Move."

"No."

"Grey."

"Duke."

"Don’t do this."

"Do what?"

Grey looked down at the whip in his hand with exaggerated confusion, then back up at Duke.

"I’m just trying to help my friend discover his destiny."

"My destiny doesn’t have a fucking whip in it."

"Maybe your destiny disagrees."

Duke tried to back away, but Grey caught his wrist and shoved the handle of Widow’s Choice into his palm.

The reaction was immediate.

The whip shook violently, and its segmented length snapped upward as branching patterns of light spread across the handle and crawled up Duke’s forearm.

Duke stared down at it in horror.

"FUCK!"

Everyone burst out laughing.

Duke tried to drop the weapon, but the whip curled around his wrist before he could.

"Which god did I piss off for this to happen to me? I refuse. Get me a badass sword."

Grey blinked innocently. "What was that someone said before?"

Duke’s face darkened.

Grey rubbed his chin as though he were struggling to remember. "Something, something, I don’t care what you have to do to make me powerful, something, something?"

"That wasn’t what I meant."

"Well, now your destiny’s been set."

Grey looked at the whip wrapped around Duke’s wrist and nodded approvingly.

"Lemme know if you want the full leather outfit too. I can make it happen so you can really live out your BDSM fantasies."

Duke’s face went dead.

Grey’s grin grew even wider. "Maybe some boots. Little mask."

"Grey."

"A collar could really tie the whole thing together."

"I’m going to kill you."

Grey clapped him on the shoulder. "See? You’re already getting into character."