Chapter 10: Talent show
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“Bidding will begin at 100.000 UC!”

A large demon-looking guy with horns and stone-like skin raises a hologram with the number 200.000 on it.

“We have an offer from that Raalid in the back for 200.000 UC!”

A Raalid huh? I heard about that race in class… I don’t remember much about them though… Still, he looks scary.

The bidding continued for a while before finally stopping at 885.000 UC with the auctioneer announcing:

“885.000 going once… 885.000 going twice… Thrice… Sold! To that Raalid in the back.”

That demon-looking guy that was the first to bid eventually also ended up winning the auction and buying the ox-based Zoan.

I hope that guy doesn’t buy me too, he doesn’t really look all that friendly… Still, 885.000 UC seems like a lot…

Right as I was thinking that, the queen suddenly speaks up with a satisfied smile on her face:

“How nice, the first couple of slaves always get the highest bids…”

Fuck, I’m somewhere in the back, right behind Ares… I hope he won’t steal the spotlight from me… Nah, I should be okay, he said that he wasn’t very strong anyways…

Speaking of stealing the spotlight… What am I even supposed to do? The queen told us to show off, but I sure as hell can’t cleave straight through a piece of combat-armor like that Zoan did… For our school’s talent show, I did some magic tricks, sleight of hand and stuff. It was kind of nerdy and I wasn’t amazing at it or anything, but Alexie persuaded me to show of my skills… I even placed 3th… Only problem being, I don’t have any cards or doves with me!

*SIGH* Think Ryder, think…

I watched the performances of the other slaves in order to gain some inspiration. A lot of Zoan’s tried to show off their strength, but none got a higher bid than that first Ox-based Zoan. That was until a female servant Zoan suddenly dropped the robe she was wearing. The crowd went wild, and she got a bid of 1.150.000 UC…

I’m not sure if that was such a good idea, the highest bidder probably had an unsavory job for her in mind… But she undeniably received a high bid, so unsurprisingly, a couple of other Zoan girls adopted her strategy, even a male servant Zoan showed off his package on stage. Surprisingly, he received quite the sizable bid too, from a Crakkuin no less… Poor him.

Finally it was time for Ares, I’m excited to see what he has planned. Is he also going to drop his trousers? He is kind of handsome I guess, If he’s lucky, that Crakkuin from earlier will also bid for him hehe…

After they removed his cuffs, Ares grabbed two of the energy weapons and started tinkering with them… The crowd stared at him in confusion. I also wasn’t quite sure what he was trying to do here… After 9 minutes of disassembling and rearranging components from the two energy weapons, he stood up carrying one of them and stabbed the combat-armor wearing mannequin, to my surprise, he actually penetrated the armor and left a sizeable hole in the mannequin!

After that, the weapon he was holding exploded and charred his hand black, but Ares didn’t react at all. He simple spoke:

“I only have a strength level of around E-rank, I was able to penetrate this combat-armor because I overclocked the energy-weapon I was holding. Given more time and resources I could build even more powerful weapons that won’t explode after use.”

My attention was fixated on Ares, that was actually kind of impressive, but I get distracted when out of the corner of my eye, I could spot the queen sighing:

*SIGH* “He won’t sell for much now… Nobody wants a smart and crafty slave…”

I hadn’t thought of that, an intelligent slave does seem like a liability… Guess I better not draw any attention with my knowledge or something…

After Ares’ performance, the crowd goes silent, there’s no cheering or anything. The auctioneer starts the bidding at 300.000 UC, but there doesn’t seem much interest. He’s eventually sold for 400.000 UC to a fierce looking man with semi-long, red hair accompanied by a goatee and a scar under his eye. Looks like the man who bought Ares is a Sapien… I hope he didn’t just buy Ares to vent his anger at the Lunarians…

Wait, am I actually worried about that bastard?!

*SIGH* Let’s just focus on my performance, I couldn’t help Ares even if I wanted right now…

I get shoved on stage by one of the Chogid. Right as he was about to take off my cuffs, I stop him.

“Don’t, I need these cuffs for my performance.”

The chogid looked confused, but granted my request and walked of stage.

I turn to the queen and ask her:

“My honorable queen, how much strength would one need to exert in order to get out of these cuffs?”

The queen looks perplexed by my sudden question:

“Euum well, these are the cheapest cuffs we could find on the market, but they should still prove difficult to remove for anybody with a strength level below C.”

I can’t help but smile a little:

“Perfect!”

Luckily my hands were tied in front of me instead of behind my back, that will make things a bit easier for me to see during my performance…

During Ares’ performance I came up with an idea, it’ll hurt, but at least It’ll get the crowd going… Hopefully.

I flex every muscle in my body and start grunting. Blood starts to poor from my hands and after a sudden flash, I break free from my bindings.

The crowd is stunned, of course they would be, I just demonstrated that even those heavy electromagnetic cuffs couldn’t bind me.

I picked up the two large chunks of metal that fell off my wrists and threw them into the crowd to celebrate my feat of strength.

Throwing those cuffs actually took more strength than I used during my entire performance... I hope the crowd didn’t notice that I didn’t actually break free on my own…

I simply activated the plasma cutter that I had hidden under the skin of the fat, bottom part of my thumb. The plasma cutter cut through my skin as if it was butter and then continued to cut through the cuffs that were blocking it’s way.

That was also the reason why I threw my cuffs into the crowd, if the queen or one of the Chogids would inspect them, they would probably discover the foul play. Let’s hope the crowd will be too enthusiastic to notice.

Just as I hoped, after a couple of seconds of silence, the crowd suddenly erupts in a frenzy.

“He’s on the same level as that ox Zoan!!”

“Is he really just a Sapien?”

The auctioneer tries to make the most out of this hysteria:

“Alright you lot, let’s start the bidding!”

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