Ur was in a panic.
It hit him that he was walking straight down the road to his doom and picking up speed.
How on earth could he have forgotten the name of the city where Devil's Fang was based?
Now, standing just a few hundred meters from the Devil's Fang guildhall, he wanted nothing more than to slap himself across the face.
At this distance, if the Angel's Wing guild clashed with Devil's Fang, there was no way he wouldn't be involved in the crossfire. And when mages fought, their battlefield was never small.
"No, I have to find Jericho before the people from Angel's Wing get here. If I can't find him, I need to get out of here fast."
With that decision made, Ur moved immediately.
The news of the coming battle between Devil's Fang and Angel's Wing hadn't yet leaked, so the citizens of Moya City went about their lives as usual.
According to information he'd wrung out of a shopkeeper back in Starfish City, Moya was hosting a large underground auction today.
If he guessed right, Jericho would almost certainly try to unload his stolen treasure there. At these auctions, no one ever asked where the goods came from—only what they were worth. If Jericho wanted the best price possible, he wouldn't miss this opportunity.
Despite the underground label, the auction's venue was anything but hidden. It was held in the tallest, most luxurious building in the entire city.
Entry required an invitation.
Ur didn't have one, but that was a minor problem.
After half an hour of loitering outside the building, he successfully acquired an invitation from a wealthy woman.
Why a woman?
Well, obviously.
Male tycoons with a taste for "men on men" were rare. Even if Ur had wanted to seduce one, the logistical difficulties made it a hopeless plan.
Wait.
Did he just reveal something about himself?
Forget it. Best not to dwell on such details.
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Once he had the invitation, getting inside was easy.
The nice thing about underground auctions was that the invitations never carried any real personal information.
When Ur stepped inside, the hall was packed. Using the number on his invitation, he found his seat quickly, near the back, in an unremarkable corner.
The woman he knocked out for the ticket had been chosen with care—she was no one important.
Plenty of people here dressed like him, so spotting Jericho by appearance alone was out of the question. But Ur wasn't worried. If Jericho were here, he'd have to show himself eventually. All Ur had to do was keep his eyes on the items on stage.
It wasn't long before an elderly auctioneer, impeccably dressed, took the stage. After the usual opening remarks, the first item was showcased.
Once the bidding began, Ur closed his eyes and leaned back, quietly resting.
Why wasn't he watching?
Because he couldn't afford anything anyway.
Still, no matter how hard he tried to tune it out, hearing bids in the range of a few million and tens of millions made his poor man's heart ache with every number called.
The same routine continued for about twenty minutes, until the auctioneer spoke the words
Heart of Lanyang.
Ur's eyes snapped open.
The Heart of Lanyang was a blue-white crystalline gemstone and the very treasure Jericho had stolen.
If the gem was here, then Jericho had to be somewhere in the building.
The piece was clearly to the crowd's taste. Barely had the bidding started before the price began to climb, and within minutes it had soared into the tens of millions.
Ur didn't particularly care about who won it; his job didn't include recovering the Heart of Lanyang. Which, frankly, made sense. Ur was being paid only a few tens of thousands of J. Converted to his previous life's currency, it was only a few thousand RMB.
You couldn't expect someone to recover a gem worth tens of millions for that kind of money.
The truth was, this job had been flawed from the start. Ur didn't know whether the wealthy employer had made a mistake, or simply hadn't expected Jericho to auction the gem so quickly.
Either way, not Ur's problem.
The Heart of Lanyang sold for 36.5 million J.
As soon as the auctioneer called the final bid, Ur was prepared to head backstage. If his guess was right, Jericho would be there to complete the transaction with the buyer.
But before he could stand...
Boom!
A deafening explosion roared above them, and the entire auction hall began to shake violently.