Ch.6464. Bidders 69 and 74

At Hunters, today’s auction was called the “200 Auction.”

This meant an auction with an entrance fee of 2 million won.

– First time I’ve seen an auction with an entrance fee lol

ㄴ You just haven’t seen it before. All famous auctions have entrance fees.

ㄴ Yeah, if random people just come to check things out, those who actually want to bid can’t get in.

It’s not that auctions with entrance fees don’t exist.

VIP auctions have always operated on this concept.

Auctions where only department store VIPs can enter.

To attend, you need to become a department store VIP—isn’t that essentially an entrance fee?

While no one becomes a VIP just to enter an auction, so it’s debatable whether to call it an entrance fee, most auctions end up being attended only by those who can afford to buy, making it similar to an entrance fee.

As the market shifted to hunters, things changed from department store VIP auctions to allow more hunters to participate in bidding for good items. While hunter department store auctions still cater primarily to VIPs, distribution companies sometimes charge entrance fees when there are too many interested participants.

And the information shared on Hunters had some discrepancies.

– And it’s not a 200 entrance fee lol. From what I know, people are paying 10 million each to get in? There are 100 auction seats, and each seat was auctioned off, so 100 people are paying 10 million each to enter.

– Huh? How does that work? Wasn’t it sold at 2 million?

– Yeah, after scalping started, Gwangjin Distribution just recalled all the tickets and raised the price by auctioning them off lol. Even the entrance tickets were auctioned. The crazy thing is they all sold out.

– Wait, people are paying 10 million just to enter?

– What could be so amazing…

– It is amazing. Competition for an A+ grade armor is honestly fiercer than buying an S-grade weapon.

– Plus it was made by an A+ grade craftsman. Experts say the options are A+ grade but should be considered S-grade.

– BS lol. They’re just putting on a show to drive up the auction price.

ㄴ Item noob, go look at the item options. Two legendary-tier options. Just wearing it increases agility by 2 grades.

In reality, the auction entrance fee was set at 2 million won to filter out casual browsers, but due to excessive scalping and foreign hunters offering to pay more for seats, they directly raised the price and re-selected 100 attendees.

They figured it was better for Gwangjin Distribution to select reliable participants rather than have people enter through scalped tickets.

While 10 million won is certainly excessive, the A+ grade armor coming up for auction must be worth it compared to that entrance fee.

– They’re expecting at least 2 billion.

– Are you crazy lol? Go check the prices of previously sold A+ grade armor.

That’s why Hunters and many people, even hunters themselves, were extremely interested in this 200 Auction.

How much would it sell for?

Perhaps interest was heightened because there hadn’t been any sales of A+ grade armor or even defensive gear for several months.

And there was much discussion about the options too.

From “How is this only A+ grade? It should be at least S-grade” to rumors from the creator claiming it was rated A+ because the base leather used was A-, the item became a hot topic.

Whatever the case, the auction was clearly a success for Gwangjin Distribution even before it began.

All that remained was the actual auction.

With all this hype, if the item sold for a disappointing price, the excitement could quickly fizzle out.

That’s why the auction was livestreamed on YouTube.

The auction itself was conducted as a blind auction.

No one running the auction would know who bid how much or who the bidders were.

So even with the YouTube livestream, people wouldn’t know who bought what.

They would only see the final selling price.

The viewer count surpassed 100,000 as soon as the broadcast started.

It was already a famous topic, and even mainstream media had covered it, though not as headline news, drawing huge crowds.

YouTube was the only place to watch the auction in real-time.

Foreign viewers also flocked to the stream.

Hunters who couldn’t quite justify traveling all the way to Korea for the auction.

Just as Koreans get excited about good items appearing in foreign countries, foreigners were excited about this Korean item.

Of course, the main reason for all this attention was that the [Gray Wolf Leather Jacket] had ridiculously good options for its grade.

“We will now begin the auction.”

The auction featured ten items.

The main item, [Gray Wolf Leather Jacket], was scheduled as the fourth auction.

You might think it should be last, but they placed it earlier since some people might not bid on other items if they were only there for the jacket.

From Dad’s perspective, while the jacket was important, the other items were also featured products.

The first item was a set of Pure Ginseng Mushrooms.

This was just a nutritional supplement, child’s play for the caliber of people attending.

But after hearing the description and seeing the information, bidders bought all ten sets of 20 Pure Ginseng Mushrooms at 10 million won each, totaling 200 million won per set.

The competition was quite fierce.

I heard there were more Pure Ginseng Mushrooms in stock, and now that these sold at auction for this price, the rest could be sold using this as the benchmark.

It’s almost double the profit.

While it might be pocket change for the people sitting here, Dad’s face must be beaming even without seeing it.

The second and third items were ones Dad had eagerly procured, but they weren’t popular.

That was expected.

Would hunters who came for the Gray Wolf Jacket be interested in C+ and B- grade items?

Still, since they paid the entrance fee, some placed bids just to get something, but the items sold for very cheap prices.

Considering the profit from the mushrooms, these items just seemed to fill space.

And then came the highly anticipated [Gray Wolf Leather Jacket].

YouTube’s chat froze as it exceeded 4.5 million live viewers, overwhelmed by the flood of messages.

How much would it go for?

– 1 billion?

– 2 billion?

– I’m thinking around 4 billion.

Most estimates were within reasonable ranges.

Both hunters and ordinary people understand market prices.

Even though these auction transactions are private, information always leaks out somewhere.

Typically, A to A+ grade armor sells for up to 5 billion won at the high end, depending on material and options, for items with stat bonuses.

Coincidentally, that record was also for an item with a +2 grade stat bonus option.

Though the difference is that this item has a maximum limit of A+.

Experts estimated it might reach 7 billion with the premium.

But those expert opinions were shattered within three minutes of the auction starting.

“We have 10 billion.”

– ?

– What?

– What’s with bidder #69? lol

The early bidding was, as always, a game of chicken.

The starting bid of 500 million was the seller’s way of saying “bid as you see fit,” and since no one thought it would sell near that price, bids increased by 500 million increments.

500 million. 1 billion. 1.5 billion. 2 billion.

Around 4 billion, suddenly bidder #69 placed a bid of 10 billion.

The auction froze for a moment.

Did they press the wrong button?

It wasn’t just adding an extra zero, as the next bid should have been 2.5 or 3 billion.

And if it had been a mistake, they would have said something to the organizers, but the auctioneer said nothing.

The auction continued.

“Any bids above 10 billion?”

Bidder #69’s move was sharp, but it wasn’t the decisive blow.

“We have 11 billion.”

From 10 billion, bids increased in 1 billion increments.

This was at the auctioneer’s discretion, but not their choice.

“12 billion.”

“13 billion. 13 billion.”

– What’s with bidder #74? lol

– What are these two doing?

With bidders #69 and #74 raising by 1 billion each time, other participants couldn’t even squeeze in with 500 million increments.

They might have been watching, but the competition between these two soon surpassed 20 billion.

“20 billion. From here, we’ll accept bids in 1 billion increments.”

It took 3 minutes to reach 10 billion after the auction started.

Then less than 5 minutes for another 10 billion to be added.

They were already bidding in 1 billion increments, but the auctioneer had initially said 500 million increments.

21 billion. 22 billion.

These people didn’t know moderation.

– ? How far is this going?

– Is it really worth this much?

– Wow… they’re so rich…

Even YouTube viewers were now watching in stunned silence.

23 billion. 24 billion.

With 100 bidders present, bidders #69 and #74 were putting on a show of their own competition.

Then a new competitor wedged in between them.

“30 billion!”

– What?

– WHAT?!!!!

– This is a prank, right? Please tell me this isn’t a live auction but a variety show.