As time passed, the atmosphere in the inner hall began to boil like a pot of slow-simmered old soup.
But contrary to the expectations of many onlookers, mixed within this boiling heat was a suffocating rationality and restraint.
"Three hundred ten."
Lin Feng bid. His voice was steady, showing no signs of losing his head.
Beside him, an old clan enshrined expert squinted, his inspection lamp pressed against a "Green-Grey Skin" raw stone, examining every crack on the shell.
"Three hundred twenty."
Not far away, Lin Ze played with his iron walnuts and followed with a faint bid.
Behind him stood an experienced clan steward, nodding slightly to him.
Though their words had been sharp before, their bidding was extremely cautious.
"Three hundred thirty." Lin Feng raised again, a flash of determination in his eyes.
"If this stone yields a Metal Path or durability-type Gu, it will merge perfectly with my 'Iron Bone' Primeval Essence and boost my physical defense."
"Even at a slight premium, it is a necessity for cultivation."
Hearing this, Lin Ze wanted to speak, but the steward behind him gently tugged his sleeve.
Lin Ze's eyes flickered.
He thought inwardly: "Mere defensive auxiliary material, and Metal Path at that. It doesn't match the Earth Path resources my Storage Lineage favors."
"Rather than fight him out of spite here, better to save my bullets for the Earth Path Gu later."
Thinking this through, the competitive urge in Lin Ze's eyes vanished instantly.
He shrugged and withdrew cleanly. "Since Cousin has a rigid need, it's yours."
No acting on impulse. No mindless throwing of money.
This was the norm under the elite education of large clans. They might be arrogant or greedy, but they were absolutely not stupid.
In games involving hundreds of Primeval Stones, interests and needs always held the upper hand.
Finally, Lin Feng took the stone for three hundred thirty.
Cut open on the spot. It was a Rank 1 Bronze Skin Gu. Market price roughly three hundred fifty.
A profit of twenty stones, and he filled a gap in his defense. Lin Feng nodded with satisfaction. This was an effective investment.
Such scenes played out constantly in the inner hall.
The young masters won and lost, but all within a "safe line." No huge losses, no huge gains. The scene was lively, but lacked the "explosive point" to make blood boil.
This was not the effect Jia Jinsheng wanted.
He was here to establish dominance, to prove his business ability. With this tepid trading volume, how could he go back and fight his outstanding brothers for the family inheritance?
"Men! Bring up that 'Crimson Blood Stone'!"
Jia Jinsheng snapped his folding fan shut, a trace of ruthlessness flashing in his eyes.
Soon, several strongmen huffed and puffed as they carried up a massive raw stone, the size of a millstone, colored entirely dark red.
The moment the stone landed, a faint smell of blood permeated the air. Even the surrounding temperature seemed to rise a few degrees.
"Everyone! This is old pit material transported from the battlefields of Northern Plains! Tight skin, color like blood—a sign of a big yield!"
Jia Jinsheng stood by the stone, doing his utmost to fan the flames of emotion. "Starting bid: three hundred Primeval Stones!"
"Good stuff!"
"That shell is definitely the real deal!"
The crowd instantly became restless. The appearance of this stone was too good; even laymen could see it was extraordinary.
"Three hundred fifty!"
"Four hundred!"
"Four hundred fifty!"
The price soared. Lin Feng and Lin Ze couldn't help but participate in a few rounds.
But when the price broke the five hundred barrier, their advisory teams acted again, shaking their heads to signal excessive risk.
Thus, even though they were envious, they could only rationally withdraw.
"Six hundred stones!"
Just then, a fleshy foreign merchant covered in gold and silver slammed the table and roared out this astronomical price.
Silence filled the hall. Six hundred. That was a massive sum.
"Good! This boss is generous!" Jia Jinsheng was overjoyed and brought the hammer down immediately.
The dissection master stepped forward. Knife light flashed.
As the stone skin peeled away layer by layer, a dense blood light shot into the sky.
"Profit! Huge profit!"
"It's a Rank 2 Blood Qi Gu! It's a top-tier Gu for healing and auxiliary cultivation!"
The crowd exploded. This Blood Qi Gu had a market price of at least eight hundred. If sold to someone in urgent need, one thousand wasn't rare.
The merchant laughed wildly as he hugged the Gu worm, his face flushed red.
And the rationality in the eyes of the surrounding people—whether young masters or lone cultivators—was instantly burned away by jealousy and greed.
This was rock gambling! This was getting rich overnight!
Waves of heat rolled over, sweeping through the entire inner hall.
Lin Mu, who had been hiding in the shadows watching coldly, also felt his mind become restless under this heatwave.
"Red Mud Gu is most sensitive to blood qi and earth qi... Since that Crimson Blood Stone yielded goods, it means my logic is correct."
Lin Mu touched his chest, feeling the faint restlessness coming from the Red Mud Gu.
"I have the Red Mud Gu's sensing. Though not X-ray vision, it's better than these blind guessers."
"I am one step away from Rank 1 Middle Stage. If I can make a profit from finding leaks, I can get more Primeval Stones, combine them with the Liquor Worm to refine essence, charge towards Rank 1 Peak, or even prepare for Rank 2..."
This urgency to "become stronger quickly" was like dry wood, instantly igniting the greed in his heart.
Although his funds could barely afford a few expensive stones, Lin Mu wasn't stupid—using this meager capital to touch high-priced goods was like filling an elephant's stomach with a toothpick. Futile.
It was better to focus on the budget raw stones in the inner hall priced between thirty and fifty stones. That was the safer choice.
After all, the entry threshold was there. The selection in the inner hall was worlds apart from the outer field.
The outer field was mostly petty play; the budget goods here, which made up seventy percent of the stock, actually had high cost-performance ratios.
Lin Mu hesitated no longer. He squeezed to the "Budget Zone" shelves in the corner where prices ranged from 30 to 50 stones.
He quietly activated the Red Mud Gu, his fingertips sliding over the stone skins one by one.
Soon, he sensed a trace of faint "death qi" on a dusty grey stone, somewhat similar to the fossil of the Red Mud Gu earlier.
"A chance!"
Lin Mu rejoiced internally and bought it without hesitation for thirty stones.
Immediately after, he sensed a mass of dense, accumulated "earth qi" in another stone, as if heavy soil was hidden inside.
"Earth Path Gu worm!"
Lin Mu struck again. Twenty stones.
Finally, he chose a stone to which the Red Mud Gu reacted most strongly, even transmitting a trace of desire. Thirty stones.
Total: eighty Primeval Stones. One-third of his entire net worth.
Holding the three stones, Lin Mu didn't choose to dissect them publicly.
Instead, he requested a secret room. He needed to keep a low profile, and he needed to verify the Red Mud Gu's ability.
Inside the secret room, lights blazed.
Lin Mu took a deep breath, took out his rusty dagger, and cut into the first stone.
Stone skin peeled off.
When the dagger pried open the last bit of rubble, half a crumbling centipede shell stuck to the blade. It turned to powder at a touch.
Lin Mu's fingertip stiffened instantly. The ecstasy froze at the corner of his mouth. Even the Primeval Essence in his aperture fell into disorder for half a beat.
"Waste material..."
The "death qi" sensed by the Red Mud Gu was indeed left by a Gu worm. But that Gu worm had died thoroughly eight hundred years ago.
Refusing to believe in evil, he cut open the second one.
Crack.
The moment the stone skin split, a stench of rotting mud assaulted his face. Black, rotten sludge flowed down the cracks. Where was any Earth Path Gu worm?
Lin Mu took a deep breath. His knuckles gripped the dagger until they turned white. Even the roots of his ears flushed red.
Fifty Primeval Stones.
That was enough to buy ten catties of top-grade Green-Striped Rice for cultivation, or exchange for a common support Gu in the black market.
Just like that, it turned into two piles of trash.
"There is still the last one..."
Lin Mu's hand began to tremble slightly. This was the one the Red Mud Gu reacted to most strongly.
"It must yield something!"
Gritting his teeth, he cut down.
Ding!
A crisp sound. The stone skin cracked, revealing a smear of grey-brown inside.
A spherical Gu worm, the size of a fingernail and shaped like a stone pellet, rolled out.
Alive!
Lin Mu's heart skipped a beat. He hurriedly picked it up to look, but his heart immediately sank to rock bottom.
Rank 1 Stone Bullet Gu.
This was an extremely ordinary consumable attack Gu.
It could fire a triple stone bullet burst, with power comparable to a Rank 2 Gu Master's full strength. But it would disintegrate after a single activation.
Market price was extremely low.
About... eighty-five Primeval Stones.
Lin Mu looked at the inconspicuous Stone Bullet Gu in his hand, fingers rubbing its hard, rough shell.
He felt only coldness in his palm. His breathing tasted bitter.
Worked for half the day. Lived in fear. Invested eighty stones of principal.
Output: Eighty-five stones.
Net profit: Five stones.
And that wasn't the end.
Lin Mu sensed his aperture.
Because of three consecutive high-intensity sensing attempts, the Red Mud Gu had become listless. The dark red luster on its surface had faded a few degrees.
It was clearly overdrawn.
To make it recover, he had to feed it fresh beast blood and mineral slag immediately. This was another hidden cost.
If he counted the wear and tear, energy, and the risk borne... this was fundamentally a losing business!
The so-called "picking up leaks" appeared so pale and powerless before cruel probability.
Outside the secret room, frenzied cheers could still be heard faintly from the outer field. It seemed someone else had cut a profit.
But to Lin Mu, that sound was incredibly piercing, like countless slaps to his face.
He slumped in the chair, clutching that cheap Stone Bullet Gu tightly.
"Fang Yuan stopped after earning five hundred stones because he knew that apart from that MudSkin Toad, the other stones were unknowns."
"He relied on absolute intelligence brought by rebirth. He was 'cheating'."
"And me? I deluded myself into thinking I could challenge the stone appraisal methods accumulated by the Jia Clan for centuries with a half-baked Red Mud Gu?"
The Red Mud Gu was merely an aid. It could sense blood qi and earth qi, but it couldn't distinguish between a live worm and a corpse, nor between spiritual soil and rotten mud.
"I got carried away."
Lin Mu closed his eyes, letting out a self-mocking sigh.
Since transmigrating, a series of successes had given him an illusion—that he was the protagonist, that the opportunities of this world should belong to him.
But reality gave him a harsh slap.
The waters of rock gambling were too deep. Without absolute "original work foresight" as intelligence, so-called picking up leaks was essentially giving away money.
Huu...
Lin Mu stood up. He stored the Stone Bullet Gu in his aperture.
A wisp of pale green Primeval Essence condensed at his fingertip, grinding the waste slag into fine powder and blowing it into the ventilation duct, leaving not a trace of dissection.
His eyes became clear again, even calmer than ever before.
"A lesson for five Primeval Stones. Very cheap."
Lin Mu pushed open the door of the secret room and strode out.
Passing the center of the inner hall, he happened to see two Gu Masters bidding on a pitch-black "Black Iron Stone." Their faces were flushed, veins bulging on their necks. Only naked greed remained in their eyes.
Lin Mu didn't stop his steps. He didn't even lift his eyelids.
The fanaticism that had once made his heart itch now seemed incredibly absurd in his eyes.
The night wind blew, carrying a trace of chill, yet making Lin Mu feel incredibly real.