A young woman around 25 years old spotted Abium's arrival and asked politely.
"Do you need something, sir?"
Abium nodded as he observed her unique black gown-like dress and spoke.
"I want to auction something." He paused as he noticed the confused look on her face and added calmly.
"It's a valuable item. I can't show it in the open."
"Oh? Wait a minute, sir. I'll bring you to our appraiser." Saying so, the receptionist woman said a few words to the nearby person and walked out of the counter.
Then, she gave him a polite bow and spoke.
"Please follow me, sir."
She then turned around and started walking towards the right side hallway.
Abium followed that person for about a few minutes before arriving at a small room.
But before Abium could walk in, he suddenly saw a middle-aged man standing a few feet away from that room, chatting with a young woman. He wore a small black hood covering half of his face and looked more like a rogue assassin. He appears to be around 40-years-old, tall, and wore a unique purplish gem-embedded ring on his left-hand finger.
As he took a closer look at the middle-aged man, Abium felt a strange familiarity and stopped his footsteps.
Even though the hood covered half of his face, Abium knew he had met him before.
'But where have I seen him?' He couldn't help but show a puzzled look on his face.
He tried to rack his brain but couldn't figure out who he was.
'Do you know him?' Azolla asked while sending a minute amount of spiritual wave in that direction.
'Yes. But I couldn't remember when-'
Azolla interrupted him all of a sudden.
'He is a second-tier necromancer! Kid, if you knew of such a powerful person, why not ask him to bid that fairy for you?'
Abium almost fell when he heard those words.
'Necromancer? Why did he come here?' He was startled and furrowed his brows.
The receptionist noticed him stopping his footsteps, turned around in a hurry, and asked in confusion.
"Did something happen, sir? Do you need any help?"
Abium shook his head and spoke.
"Wait a minute. I need to confirm something."
As he spoke, he took out an old book from his space ring and started flipping through the pages to appear more mysterious.
At that moment, Azolla noticed the discomfort in his heart and asked.
'Who is he?'
'He must be one of the 'Order of the Dead' members. Thankfully, I am in the heart of the kingdom. Otherwise, he might slaughter everyone and take whatever he wants. These guys are a bunch of lunatics.' He spoke in a grave tone.
'Don't talk nonsense, kid. Who told you that necromancers are bad people? Although they would capture mortals and do experiments sometimes, they aren't that evil. They won't slaughter everyone. They will do these things only when they see something precious. It has something to do with that curse of the Death God.'
'Ugh, isn't that evil? I don't think you understand these Order of the Dead members, Azolla. It's not the Ancient Era. In truth, these guys would slaughter a whole city without batting an eye and wouldn't hesitate to capture all the souls for their studies. They are pure evil.'
Azolla became silent for a moment and then spoke.
'You might be right, kid. Ah, I forgot to remind you of one thing. Nether crystals are very precious to necromancers. You can utilize this opportunity and earn more money.'
'Precious?' Abium raised his eyebrows in surprise and asked further.
'How precious is it? Can you tell me its exact value?'
'Although I don't know its exact value, it could help a second-tier necromancer to build a spell model in his mind. Due to the scarcity of nether elements in our plane, there are no nature-born undead beasts appearing anywhere. So, these nether crystals are pretty rare even during the ancient era. If you sell this crystal now, it would draw all the necromancers' attention.' Azolla said calmly.
Abium fell silent as he heard those words and started to ponder deeply.
'If what Azolla said was true, then it would become huge chaos if I decided to put it up for auction. But that will be a good thing. This nether crystal might expose the existence of necromancers to the academic mages.'
Abium instantly made up his mind, closed the book before storing it inside his ring, and entered the appraisal room.
The one who received Abium was a young man who looked a bit over twenty. He was wearing a black gown and was in the middle of appraising a small azure stone on the table.
After seeing Abium coming through the front door, he nodded at him and spoke while pointing his finger at the nearby wooden chair.
"Please take a seat."
Meanwhile, Abium didn't say anything and sat before the young appraiser.
Just as he was about to explain why he had come, that young man waved his hand and impatiently said.
"You can leave me the material you want to sell and leave. I will appraise it and then sell it at a reasonable price. You can come and get your money once the auction is over."
Abium felt a bit uncomfortable with this and thought about how to explain it. Although he didn't know the value of these two crystals, he could guess these crystals were precious materials. Seeing Abium pondering, that young appraiser could only nod annoyingly.
"I still have important work waiting for me. So, I can give you two minutes."
Abium smiled lightly, tapped his spatial ring, and took two elemental crystals from it. One was a whitish blue crystal, while the other was a greyish crystal with black shades. Both appeared in hexagonal shapes and gave off strange elemental energies.
Without waiting for the appraiser to ask any more questions, Abium extended his right hand and put them on the wooden table.
At first, the young appraiser gave a puzzled look. But as he took a deep look at those crystals, his expression grew serious.
'Ice elemental crystal? But how should a commoner have elemental crystals?' He quickly noticed a difference in Abium's facial structure and soon widened his eyes.
"Elf?" He instantly stood up from his seat and decided to ask his chief.
Without saying a word, he took a step forward and ran out of the room to inform the higher-ups, leaving Abium alone in the room.
Two minutes later, the wooden door to the appraisal room opened from the other side, and soon a silver-haired woman came through it while panting heavily.
She was quickly over sixty, wore a wrinkled, red gown, and held a strange wooden staff in her hand.
She also wore eyeglasses and had a pale face, monolid blue eyes, and thin eyebrows.
She hurriedly approached Abium and asked.
"You brought two unique crystals?"
"You are…?" Abium stopped as he looked at the older woman, feeling puzzled. In his mind, there was no memory of that person at all.
The silver-haired woman looked at Abium for a second and smiled warmly.
"Welcome, Mr. Elven Mage. Let me introduce myself; I am Tabitha, Orchid Auction House's Chief Appraiser."
'Chief Appraiser?' Abium hurriedly stood up from his seat and gave her a slight bow.
"Greetings, Ma'am. I'm Abium. I am just an apprentice mage." Abium said with a polite smile.
On the other hand, his mind started to gather information about this person.
He had heard of Orchid Auction House's Chief Appraiser quite a few times.
'Tabitha, an Ice-elemental Mage… She is a close friend of Mage Zivior.'
Moreover, she was a Second-Tier Mage!
But like the Orchid Auction House, she had always been low-key.
While he was in muse, Tabitha moved towards the front seat, sat comfortably on the desk chair, and spoke.
"Even if you are just an Apprentice Mage, you are not far from becoming an Official Mage. Your spirit power has already reached its peak. Our Orchid Auction House wishes to cooperate with a young mage like you," she said, looking at the table and frowning.
At that moment, she saw no elemental crystal on the table and got confused a little.
She quickly adjusted to her professional look and spoke.
"If you are planning on auctioning any elemental crystals, you are at the right place, mister."
'Be careful, lad. She looks like a real deal.'
'I know.'
Abium knew that any elemental crystal would sell in this auction for very high prices and wasn't worried about her scamming him.
His worry was about something else.
'What will the necromancers do if they saw this nether crystal appeared in this auction?'
As she saw him thinking deeply, Tabitha adjusted her eyeglasses, looked into his eyes, and asked.
"Mage Abium, I wonder if you have heard about the grand auction event that occurs every three months."
A smile appeared on Abium's face.
"I have, My Lady," Abium paused and replied calmly.
"I came here specifically for this event."
'So, he is not a naive elf.' Tabitha's blue eyes glinted.
"Mage Abium, if you are okay with it, can we put these two mysterious crystals up for bidding? Unlike before, this time we only had very few materials for bidding. So, those two elemental crystals would fetch a high price." Tabitha said, noticing his intention.
But Abium wasn't done yet. He was planning on auctioning the crystals from the very start, but he also needed something else from the Orchid Auction House.
"I'd love to sell it, but I need some white gold coins, Lady. There is something I want to bid on in the Orchid auction, so it would be more helpful if I received some money in advance." Abium decided to explain his reasoning honestly. Although Helena might have successfully retrieved the fallen Baron's treasure, he didn't want to take any risk.