Chapter 434: The Disparity of the World

"Tier 8? Isn't that the same level as Jack of Clubs?" Jian Changsheng widened his eyes in shock. "Is Kid Brother that strong?"

"It's strange... where do so many Tier 8s come from in this world? What exactly is this Golden Society?"

"Kid Brother doesn't seem to have any malice toward the Twilight Society. He must have let us go after seeing the playing card... Could he also be a senior of our Twilight Society?"

"Impossible. Among the top brass of the Twilight Society, there is absolutely no such ugly child." Heart 9 answered with certainty.

Jian Changsheng fell into deep thought.

"This is a loss." Heart 9 said angrily. "We didn't find out any information about the Special Envoy, didn't get any gold, and were beaten up by a little brat... Damn it, it's really 'Iya-hahahaha'!!"

As Heart 9 spoke, he couldn't stop laughing wildly. He widened his eyes in shock, one hand covering his mouth tightly.

Jian Changsheng looked at him in shock, about to say something, when the next moment he couldn't help but laugh wildly too!

"IYA-HAHAHAHAHAHA!!"

*Slap*—

He gave himself a clean, decisive slap.

"What's going on?!" Jian Changsheng covered his face and asked in disbelief. "We..."

"Damn it, is this white ash playing tricks?"

Heart 9 also noticed the comical white ash on their noses. He sensed his body's condition and said with a dark face, "It seems we are controlled by that ugly child’s ability... The white ash must be the mark he left on us. What exactly does he want to do??"

"Didn't he say it? Let us protect the Special Envoy..."

"Isn't the Special Envoy Tier 8?! Why do we need to protect him? And we are from the Twilight Society, why should we listen to his orders?" Heart 9 was very unhappy and had no intention of cooperating with the Clown at all.

He snorted coldly, straightened his clothes, and walked straight toward the street. Jian Changsheng, seeing this, had no choice but to follow.

As soon as the two stepped onto the street, they were attracted by the commotion not far away.

On the other side of the street, dozens of cars kept stopping, and countless silver notes were packed into boxes, sent into the Red Dust Hotel in wave after wave. And these people sending money ran extremely fast, as if they were afraid of being slower than the others.

"How much money was sent in this round?"

"Time is too tight, and the banks aren't open at night. This round only has ten million..."

"Ten million?! Not enough! Go raise more money! If the bank isn't open, go find the president directly. Even if he's asleep, drag him out! There are special people in the government to handle the public relations."

"And those second-rate consortiums that have a good relationship with us, go borrow from them. You must scrape together another twenty million within half an hour!"

"Damn it, how can those loan sharks at the Beidou Consortium have such sufficient cash reserves?!"

"Hurry, hurry, hurry! Get moving!"

“……”

Even though it was late at night, the entrance to the Red Dust Hotel was still bright and noisy. This bustling scene of sending money left Jian Changsheng and Heart 9 stunned... They had never seen such a bizarre scene!

"What's going on? Were the directors of the five major consortiums kidnapped?" Jian Changsheng couldn't imagine what was happening inside and asked in disbelief.

"Hell... why is everything so evil today?"

Heart 9’s gaze landed on the Red Dust Hotel. After a brief hesitation, he waved his hand. "Let's go take a look."

The two bypassed the bustling main entrance of the hotel and, using the cover of night, passed through several layers of security set up by the consortiums around the hotel, arriving silently at a window on the edge of the hall to peek inside.

They saw a figure wearing a golden mask sitting in the center of the hall. Below were five consortium directors with sweat seeping from their foreheads, boxes upon boxes of silver notes placed beside them, piled almost to the ceiling.

"Item number ninety-eight, a golden headband. Please place your bids."

As the voice fell, the directors turned to look at the subordinates beside them. Beside almost every one of them was a trusted aide responsible for recording the auction situation—on one hand, to calculate how many items they had won, and on the other, to infer how many items the enemy camp had won. Some even drew charts of the transaction prices of the ninety-eight items so far, analyzing the best bidding range for this transaction...

This was no longer a small, casual auction during a banquet. Under Chen Ling’s pushing, it had become a gladiator arena for the five major consortiums!

"That's it?" Jian Changsheng asked suspiciously. "After all that, they're just auctioning gold? That gold isn't even big, just a little bit... at most worth a hundred thousand or so?"

Seeing such a big scene outside just now, Jian Changsheng had thought something big was happening inside. Now it seemed they were just auctioning off some small gold? It shouldn't be worth such solemnity for the five major consortiums.

Heart 9 was about to say something when Chen Ling slowly took out a sheet of paper inside the hall and spoke calmly:

"The highest bid for this auction, 1.7 million."

"How much?！！"

Jian Changsheng and Heart 9 widened their eyes at the same time, nearly thinking they had misheard.

"1.7 million?? To buy a golden headband?! Are they crazy?" Jian Changsheng felt his values collapsing.

Heart 9 also opened his mouth wide and slapped his thigh. "Damn, this is much faster than robbing people..."

"How did this Special Envoy do it? What kind of soul-bewitching soup did he feed the five major consortiums?"

Not long ago, Jian Changsheng and Heart 9 were still struggling over a bowl of fifteen-dollar beef noodles. Now, right in front of them, Chen Ling casually pulled out a piece of paper worth 1.7 million... At this moment, they suddenly realized what the disparity of the world meant.

They watched as the Special Envoy accumulated wealth in a storm-like manner in a way they couldn't understand. When the word "million" echoed in their ears again and again, they couldn't help but swallow their saliva...

Outside the dim window, two smears of the Clown’s white ash were evenly wiped on their dazed faces, inexplicably pathetic and comical.

When the 109th item was sold for 2 million, they seemed to have become completely numb. Chen Ling also announced at this time that there were only five items left.

As soon as these words were spoken, sharp light flashed in the eyes of the five consortium directors... They knew the time to decide who would win this "battle" had arrived.

And at this moment, Chen Ling’s gaze also became subtle. He was the only one on the scene who clearly knew the actual transaction volume of each consortium.

There were 114 items in total. Except for the 11 he used for self-hype, there were actually only 103 real items. Currently, the one with the most transactions was the Beidou Consortium with 29, followed by Paradise with 28, then Huadu with 25... As for Whale Shark and Dinglu, they only had 16 combined, basically giving up the competition.

Chen Ling’s gaze swept over Mu Chunsheng, Pang Shan, and Zong Wen in turn. Seeing their eyes, each harboring their own ulterior motives, he sneered inwardly.

"Then, the final auction... begins now."