Please don't question multi-week players

Chapter 483. The Mysterious Collector (1)

News of Rose Auction House's upcoming mega-auction quickly spread throughout Haidu.

As Jiang Jianxin walked down the street, he could see all sorts of posters plastered on the street, and even the Rose Auction House had booked the rotating screen in the central square to show promotional images for the auction all day long.

On the scrolling screen, various vegetables stand alone in front of a black velvet background. The black background makes these usually simple ingredients look like rare treasures, and the extreme contrast exudes a suffocating aura of wealth.

In addition to extensive promotion on Haidu, the online rose auction house also invested heavily in promotional methods.

The forum now displays scrolling auction posters as soon as you click in, with a large close-up of a bright green cabbage next to a countdown timer.

The intertwining of the online world and real-world street scenes forcefully crammed news of this auction into everyone's field of vision.

Due to the special nature and grand scale of this auction, it attracted many wealthy individuals.

As the date approached, the skies over the city became more crowded than ever before.

Small private planes, rarely seen on ordinary days, hovered at low altitudes before landing on a makeshift helipad.

On the streets of the city center, there were guards every three steps and sentries every five steps, with tall bodyguards in black suits surrounding the wealthy and preventing ordinary people from prying into their lives.

In cafes and upscale restaurants, one could hear hushed, excited discussions everywhere.

"I heard that the starting bid for this 'Heart of Jade' cabbage is over ten million?"

"Of course, I brought enough chips this time, I'm determined to win."

"Hmph, Lao Li, you should save your budget. The few items I've got my eye on will cost at least three or five hundred million."

The air was thick with the mingled scents of champagne, expensive perfumes, and fervent desire; everyone awaited the start of the auction.

Unlike the proactive behavior of the wealthy in real life, ordinary people who had no chance to step into the auction hall flocked to related online discussions.

There was no astonishment at the exorbitant prices, nor a yearning for scarce resources; instead, the prevailing sentiment in the comments section was a poignant sense of nostalgia and melancholy.

Five years have passed since that apocalyptic rain that devoured civilization.

Industrial products from the old era were destroyed by war and rust, and everyday items that were once readily available have now become museum treasures.

For these survivors who crawled out of mountains of corpses and seas of blood, time seemed to have been split into two worlds.

When Jiang Jianxin swiped his phone screen, he discovered that several nostalgic terms with outdated filters had been squeezed into the bottom of the trending topics list, which was originally dominated by current affairs news.

A bounty hunter with blood on his hands recalled his high school days before the apocalypse, wearing thick glasses and buried in piles of books.

Back then, her old comrades-in-arms, who fought alongside her, weren't carrying knives and guns on their waists, but rather holding a certain brand of ballpoint pen in their fingertips.

So much time has passed, long enough for the apocalypse to arrive, for everything to be overturned, and for her personality to change drastically. Yet, she saw the same model of ballpoint pen from back then again in the daily necessities section of the auction.

She knew this wasn't hers. But how could it not be hers?

So this bounty hunter, despite emptying her coffers, also came to the Sea City, leaving a message on the forum:
“I know that’s not my pen; I lost mine a long time ago. But looking at it lying on the velvet, I feel like it must be mine—otherwise, where did that eighteen-year-old me, who hadn’t even finished the college entrance exam, go?”

Such stories are not isolated incidents. Under the announcement of this special auction, the comment section has become a huge online graveyard.

Some people, upon seeing an expensive can of luncheon meat, were reminded of their mothers who were always busy in the kitchen, and who, even in the final moments of food shortages during the apocalypse, would not open that can.

Someone stared blankly at a tin frog toy of the same model. It was a gift his father had bought for him on his seventh birthday after searching half the city. Now, his father had long since become a name on a tombstone.

The torrential rain brought by the apocalypse not only flooded the city, but also permeated the souls of the survivors for the rest of their lives.

That damp, cold, musty smell, along with every memory, gnaws at their hearts.

Jiang Jianxin saw the struggles and pain of the people on the forum. She could understand, but she couldn't fully empathize, after all, she didn't have parents who had accompanied her as she grew up.

Although her brother treated her very well, he could only appear occasionally, and most of the time it was just her and the empty house.

The arrival of the apocalypse actually allowed the two to reunite a little longer, which Jiang Jianxin felt was the luckiest thing about him.

As for immense power and supreme status, those treasures in the eyes of those who do not possess them are nothing but fleeting objects in the eyes of those who truly possess them.

For example, Rose Auction House did not disclose her identity at this auction, but only referred to her as a "mysterious collector".

Many people online are now searching for this "mysterious collector," curiously discussing whether he is a newly minted millionaire.

Jiang Jianxin simply smiled when he saw the heated discussion posts.

After making a series of investments with the financier, her personal assets have reached an immeasurable level, enough to create several accounts and give Haidu an extra wealthy family overnight.

The estimates of the mysterious collector's assets made by netizens on the forum are far too conservative.

As the date approached, the Rose Auction sent Jiang Jianxin an invitation to attend the event and thoughtfully provided her with wigs and masks.

Jiang Jianxin took a look. The wig was still red, and the mask also had a red face pattern, except that there was a rose symbol inside.

The auction house arranged a seat for her in the first row, where there were several other collectors.

Since the other party had made such thoughtful arrangements, Jiang Jianxin found it difficult to refuse their hospitality.

So on the day the auction began, she also put on a mask and set off at sunset.

　I'm experiencing writer's block, hence the late update. Don't wait for me after midnight; if I haven't updated by then, it usually means I'm experiencing writer's block.

　　(End of this chapter)