Jing Shu sized up Xiao Liu again. She handled finances, yet she was a girl in her twenties who looked quiet and well-mannered. The way she immediately reached for her phone when someone yelled at her earlier said enough. She had her own spine.
"You've got potential." Jing Shu took a calm sip of coffee, then frowned a little. This was the Nestle that used to cost one yuan a packet. It tasted a bit harsh.
Compared to the top-tier beans her family brought back from America, this stuff didn't stand a chance. But getting coffee at all these days was already rare. Since things were already this ridiculous, she didn't feel like tormenting her taste buds. She pulled a milk pouch from her coat, squeezed the milk into the cup, and the flavor instantly turned rich and smooth.
Xiao Liu silently gave her a thumbs-up. Look at that. No wonder she was the factory director. She was awesome.
"Holy shit."
"Damn."
"That's classy."
"Hurry, someone get this queen a seat."
Jin Baba grumbled, "Lan Shao, what are you doing? Didn't you say I'd get to enjoy myself today?" Compared to her setup, his whole vibe collapsed. Look at her, sitting with a blanket on her chair, a tablecloth on her table, snacks on the side, legs crossed, and a bodyguard standing nearby.
Then look at him. The atmosphere was completely lopsided. Unacceptable. He already lost twice today.
Lan Shao nodded awkwardly. "I'll go arrange it now." This damned place didn't have anything to eat. The so-called Elite Society was so broke it couldn't afford underwear. Otherwise he wouldn't have tricked his college classmates into working as free labor.
Jin Baba kept muttering under his breath, annoyed, but the event finally started.
"Gentlemen, ladies, good afternoon. I'm today's host, Xiao Shuai. Since we're all familiar faces here, I won't waste time. Let's start right away." The host wore a big black padded coat, mud all over him, clearly not the picky type.
The organizers were simply too poor. The budget didn't exist.
Xiao Shuai tapped the mic. He had to move fast. He had no idea if the battery would last until he finished hosting. He sped up his speech. "Alright, I know what everyone's waiting for. Our first auction item today is something amazing and nearly extinct, the Jinhua sow. Bring her out!"
"Buy a sow today, get a boar for free. Trouble finding good breeding stock? Prices too high? Other people holding you hostage? Forget all that. We'll solve everything for you in one go.
Bring a sow and boar home, and next year you'll have piglets. The year after that, those piglets will have piglets. You'll have pigs running all over your place."
As he spoke excitedly, two servers huffed and puffed as they carried the pigs onstage. They were small and a bit thin, but clean.
It wasn't that no one wanted to fatten them up. If you had pigs, you obviously had feed. This was just the reality of the apocalypse. It was the same as the goose farm run by the Capital Food Regulation Bureau. The resources were there, but the apocalypse twisted everything. Jing Shu even suspected there was some unknown gas or element in the air damaging all living things.
The crowd erupted in shock. At this point, pigs weren't pigs. They were walking Ferraris and Maseratis. No, they were piles of gold that could grow more gold.
"Alright, the nearly extinct Jinhua sow is up for auction. We don't accept virtual currency or fake bids. Government staff are stationed here to check your assets. Fake bids will get your entire household confiscated, so think before you shout.
And one more thing. This Elite Society event is special. We only accept physical goods of equivalent value. Between items of equal value, we reserve the right to choose which one we want.
Starting bid: goods equal to ten thousand virtual coins."
When virtual coins couldn't buy anything anymore, that was when the nightmare truly began.
Someone quickly placed a bid. These pigs were too profitable. There was no way buying them would be a loss.
"Goods worth twenty thousand!"
"Goods worth twenty-five thousand in petroleum!"
"Oh, right, to save time and stop malicious price-raising or shouting matches, each person can bid a maximum of three times per item. Think carefully before you call your number. Every auction item has a traceable code. If your representative buys it and you resell it later, you'll pay a two percent handling fee." Xiao Shuai rolled his eyes as he recited the rules, dead inside. In his heart, he cursed the organizers. They were shameless. Money-hungry lunatics.
It was simple. They said it was to prevent price manipulation, but it was basically open bidding. Three calls maximum meant you didn't get to raise the price slowly like a normal auction. You had to go big.
The real meaning was: stop messing around and just shout your final price. If you bring someone else to bid for you, pay a fee and get on with it.
The hall went quiet for a few seconds. No one called anything. After several more seconds, someone finally shouted:
"Goods worth two hundred thousand!"
"Goods worth four hundred thousand!"
The hall stirred again. Prices that high crushed ninety-nine percent of the crowd's fantasies. Were they here to find deals? The item was great, sure, but still.
Jing Shu's classmates behind her burst into shrieks. What did hundreds of thousands in goods mean? These days, a whole house only cost a few thousand or ten thousand virtual coins. Their families weren't poor and each of them managed to squeeze into a single-unit blocked house, but that was it. Even the high-salary ones only earned a few hundred coins a month.
"Seven hundred thousand in goods!"
The shouts slowed down. It wasn't that people had no money. Many wealthy folks held tons of virtual coins from the government's forced exchange program. But it hurt to give up that many physical goods.
The bidding stalled. Xiao Shuai was about to call the final when Jin Baba yelled, "One million in goods!"
The whole venue exploded. One million in goods for a sow and boar? How many trucks would that take? Was it worth it? Not at all. Even if the pigs had piglets, and those piglets had piglets, it still wasn't worth it! Normal pigs weren't remotely this pricey.
Xiao Shuai shouted several rounds with no new bids, then announced, "One million in goods, sold! Please complete the transaction now. Professionals will verify everything. Everyone wait a moment. If it's fake, we'll redo the auction."
"Damn, Baba, you're insane."
"He really spent a million just like that. That's wild."
"I didn't hear wrong, right? He really bought two pigs for a million?"
Soon, the professionals arrived to verify the transaction. Two servers also came in with the pigs. They were Jin Baba and Lan Shao's college classmates, and they were wiggling their eyebrows excitedly.