The Safe with No Key
An hour later, the curly-haired mage stepped up onto the platform. He took the lectern in both hands and spoke.
"Jabril. I'll be running today's auction."
Chris measured him against every mage he had dealt with so far. The man had the air of Seed Cultivation.
"Everyone who's coming seems to be here, so let's begin."
He offered no greeting worth the name and opened the sale at once.
The early lots put a strange look on Chris's face. The very goods he had sold off yesterday were already on the block. He didn't bid. He only watched. There was no reason to buy back today, and at a higher price, what he had let go cheap the day before.
Watching the pieces hammer down one after another left a bitter taste. Winning bids were settling at roughly twice what he had been paid. It soured him, but there was nothing to be done.
Stolen goods, sold at half price. For that, I came out all right.
He forced the consolation down and waited for the next lot.
Jabril smiled, white teeth showing. Something good was coming up.
"This lot is a defensive magic tool."
From the back row Chris could take in, at a glance, the way the mages straightened in their seats. That shift in posture told him the bidding would be fierce.
The price shot up, just as he'd expected. When the defensive piece hammered at ten top-grade mana stones, he understood why no such tool had turned up in the spatial pouches of the dead mages. They were too expensive to own. Think of a defensive magic tool as a spare life, and the price made sense.
The next item was another defensive piece, a crudely made necklace. Jabril insisted, spit flying, that its performance was extraordinary.
"It will stop a Seed Cultivation mage's attack up to three times. Even a lower Ring Binding strike, it ought to hold off to some degree."
Chris tilted his head. Some degree... and how much is some degree? From the looks around the room, it couldn't stop a blow outright.
"Bidding opens at ten top-grade mana stones."
Starting where the previous piece had closed meant this one was the better of the two.
Chris had always wanted a defensive magic tool. He raised his paddle and glanced around.
The auctioneer pointed at him.
"Ten. Do I hear eleven?"
Someone in the front row lifted a paddle.
"Eleven. Who'll give me twelve?"
Every time Jabril called the price higher, a paddle rose to meet it. Once the bid reached fifteen, they slowed sharply.
"Sixteen. Sixteen, anyone?"
The hall was quiet.
"I'll count to ten. If no one else bids, the mage in the front row takes it. One, two, three..."
Chris hesitated, then raised his paddle.
"The young mage in the back row bids sixteen. Any more?"
A fat mage in the front row stood and glared at him. He thrust a fist Chris's way, dropped back into his seat, and shouted.
"Seventeen!"
"Seventeen. Do I hear eighteen?"
Chris didn't snap the way the fat mage had. He only lifted his paddle in silence.
The fat man lurched up again, glaring, and yelled.
"I'll remember that mask!"
Chris stroked the mask and smiled.
"Then I'll just take it off."
The fat mage blew a rough snort and shouted.
"Twenty! Keep up, if you can."
Chris followed at once.
"Twenty-one."
The fat man ground his teeth and sat. Whether his stones had run out, or he had judged the piece worth no more than twenty-one, he didn't raise again.
Jabril's voice climbed, delighted.
"Twenty-one. Any more? If not, this gentleman takes the finest defensive magic tool of the day."
No paddle rose while he counted to ten. Thock, thock, thock. He rapped the block with his gavel and declared the sale.
"Sold, for twenty-one top-grade mana stones."
A mage in a black robe brought the piece over and showed it to Chris. Chris nodded, drew his spatial pouch from his robe, and took out a box holding fifteen top-grade mana stones along with the note the Header branch manager of the Black Hand Guild had given him. He picked four top-grade stones out of the box, then handed over the box and the note.
"Confirmed."
The black-robed mage took the payment and gave him the tool.
Chris hung it around his neck and pushed it down inside his clothes, out of sight. A necklace worth twenty-one top-grade mana stones settled something solid in his chest.
He counted what remained. With the stones taken from Franco added in, eleven top-grade stones were left. The thought that he could still win one more precious lot pleased him enough to draw a smile.
Next came an offensive magic tool. The moment Jabril lifted an Explosion Orb from the case, Chris's backside gave an involuntary twitch. Felix's games with Explosion Orbs had cost him dearly.
"This is no ordinary Explosion Orb. A mid-rank Ring Binder condensed lightning into it—a special orb. When it bursts, everything around it will be scorched to nothing."
The pitch seemed to carry a little exaggeration. The auctioneer hadn't even named an opening price before the fat man in the front row called one.
"Ten!"
The auctioneer smiled.
"Ten. Do I hear twelve?"
Confident in the goods, he jumped the call by twos. A gaunt mage in the second row raised his paddle.
"Twelve. Fourteen, anyone?"
The fat man had an unpleasant habit of growing irritated whenever someone else bid on a thing he wanted. He glared at the thin mage and spat the words.
"Sixteen!"
Chris disliked him enough to join in, even with no money to spend.
"Eighteen."
The auctioneer lit up.
"The gentleman who took the defensive tool bids eighteen. Do I hear twenty?"
A brief silence fell, and Chris's stomach clenched. If it hammered here, he would owe twenty top-grade mana stones, and he didn't have them.
He still held quite a few stones he hadn't sold to the Header branch manager, but every one of them was high-grade or mid-grade. Piled together, they weren't worth two top-grade stones. He couldn't pay.
His insides burned, but his face stayed calm. Show them how desperate he was, and they would sit out the bidding out of pure spite, just to watch him choke.
"Twenty, anyone? If no one joins before I finish the count, the special Explosion Orb goes to the gentleman in the back row as well."
The auctioneer let the moment hang, then began to count.
"One, two, three..."
Even as the numbers climbed toward ten, Chris kept an easy look on his face. He even licked his lips, as if pleased.
"Nine..."
At that instant the fat man raised his paddle.
"Twenty. Do I hear twenty-two?"
No one lifted a paddle.
The auctioneer pushed to the very end.
"Twenty-one?"
No response.
"The special Explosion Orb is sold to the great mage in the front row."
Delighted, he swung the gavel. Thock, thock, thock.
Next came magic tools useful for living and useless for fighting, things like a necklace that regulated body temperature. They had a demand of their own, and each one sold as soon as it appeared.
"We're nearing the end of the auction. Something interesting is coming last, so stay with us to the finish—and the next lot is potions."
Chris's interest sharpened. Stan's underling Felix had replenished his mana with potions, and that was why Chris had failed, in the end, to catch him.
The potions weren't sold one by one. They went in bundles of twenty, so the price ran high. Chris called a single top-grade mana stone, then gave up when the thin mage in the second row followed him. His attention had already turned to the final lot the auctioneer had promised with such confidence.
What'll it be?
If something he truly wanted appeared, and he lacked the stones to win it, the regret would burn. That worry kept him out of the bidding that followed.
After the potions came mana stones. Chris found it odd that a house trading in mana stones would put mana stones themselves on the block, but the explanation cleared it up. Every stone on offer was an attribute mana stone.
The mages gladly paid double for them. Among those, stones of special attributes—lightning, blood, darkness—sold even at four or five times the usual price.
Once that trade was done, the interesting item the auctioneer had touted finally appeared. He set a small safe, about the size of three fists, on the block.
"A magic safe."
Chris had never seen such a thing.
A magic safe? How is it different from any other safe?
"Judging by your faces, some of you don't know what a magic safe is. A Ring Binding mage draws a special metal from a meteorite, works it together with mana, and forges a safe that will never open unless you enter the mana pattern its maker set. The finest safe there is."
The fat mage sneered.
"So we can't open it either."
"You only have to match the mana pattern."
"If that were easy, your guild would have opened it. You're auctioning it because you can't. A safe with no key, a safe that won't open—it's worthless."
"I won't deny it. But this safe has value even if you never open it."
The auctioneer rolled his head from side to side and went on.
"Fiddle with the patterns this way and that, and your control of mana improves on its own."
"You can practice mana control without a magic safe."
"Of course you can. But that isn't any fun."
Chris asked.
"Do you know what's inside?"
"No. We don't."
He was genuinely curious about the contents.
"Can't it be broken open?"
"A high-rank Ring Binder could break it."
The thin mage scoffed.
"You mustn't break it."
"Why not?"
"Smash the safe, and two-thirds of whatever's inside will be ruined in the process."
"A third would still be left. Isn't that good enough?"
"If there's a high-rank Ring Binder in here, put your hand up."
No one did.
"This many mages in the room, and not one who can break a safe."
The auctioneer was determined to sell the thing somehow.
"Ask an elder of a magic tower."
"How many people in a tower have bound seven rings or more? Two, at the most. Some towers don't have even one. Of course they're hard to meet, and even if you do meet one, how do you ask him to open a safe? Fine. I'll concede that far and say you asked. You can't work a high-rank Ring Binder for free. You'd pay a tremendous price, and if what's inside is nothing special, or it breaks while the safe is smashed, you've just thrown the money away."
The fat man picked up the thread.
"Even if something comes out worth more than you spent, that's trouble too. The high-rank Ring Binder decides this one's his now—what are you going to say? Is there a mage here with the guts to answer, no, you can't have it?"
There wasn't a mage that bold in the room.
Listening to the fat man and the thin one, Chris understood.
Winning a magic safe at a high price is a gamble.
His interest went cold.
The auctioneer dug up another use.
"Give it to an elder as a gift. You'll be looked on kindly."
A few faces showed greed at that.
Chris nodded.
As a bribe, it would do.
"We'll start at two top-grade mana stones."
The opening price suggested the house expected little. They had teased a fine item at the end merely to unload the thing somehow.
Strangely, the fat man and the thin one—the same two who had been picking the safe apart—bid with enthusiasm.
Watching them step forward brought his cooled interest back to life. Chris sat up straight.
"Do I hear five?"
At the call, Chris raised his paddle.
"Five."
The fat man and the thin one glared at him together. Their eyes did the cursing. They had talked the price down, and now some nobody meant to walk off with it.
The fat man shouted.
"Seven!"
Then he turned the glare on the auctioneer.
"That's my last offer. Swing the gavel. Now."
The auctioneer had a spine. He ignored the fat man's veiled threat and lifted his voice.
"Do I hear eight?"
The thin mage called eight. From that moment the auction narrowed to a duel between him and Chris. The bid climbed to eleven.