"Is everything ready?"

Standing right before the main gate of the entire area, I threw one last look behind to see Venna nodding her head with a resigned look at her face. I guess asking this question over and over again didn't lead to the small staff that we employed, suddenly finding something that required to be taken care of.

While I could run around the entire place myself to check everything this one last time, I decided that with how little others would know about this investment, I had to do my very best to promote it to the best of my ability. Instead of sitting in the VIP lounge and watching the occurring events from a comfortable chair, I stood at the very frontline, waiting for the big clock that decorated the building to ring the bell, indicating that the time to open our gates finally came.

At this moment, the kitchens were already full of intricate food, while the cooks continued to work on the desserts. Since I couldn't compete with Bakari House in terms of popularity or scale, I had to move my focus somewhere else.

Whenever I was reading about the auctions in cultivation novels, I couldn't help but wonder about one thing. Auction houses were places where insane amounts of money and rare goods exchanged hands. How come only the most important guests could enjoy the luxury then? Looking at the only auction that I took part in so far, tending to the basic needs of every customer would cost way less than even the cheapest product they offered!

"Five minutes!"

Someone shouted from behind me. God damn it. I thought that the anticipation and workload before the event would kill me, but it couldn't even begin to compare to the stress that I was feeling now! I guess that's the reality of doing your own business…

To be fair, I didn't need to worry about the success of the auction at all. Despite the auction starting only an hour after the grand opening, I already saw the crowd that gathered in front of the gates a while ago. And that was only a common part of the people!

Big players like Natural's - represented obviously by Neterian who was surprisingly accompanied by Nadia - or the great elder of Heavenly Sect, were already comfortably sitting in their VIP lounges, with designated servants making sure that everything was accessible for them in abundance. While they all had to enter the premises through the back gate - the same one that just a half an hour earlier a group of whores used to get inside - that was the only way in which we could make them avoid the trouble of waiting in the dense crowd currently pilling up in front of the gate!

"One minute!"

With someone starting to continuously shout the remaining seconds that were left for us to open the gate, I could fear a sudden bout of softness and warmth enveloping my arm.

"Everything will be okay."

Gracing me with a sweet smile, Eve rested her head on my shoulder. Despite the fact that every single one of the people gathered behind the gate, Eve, me and Venna included, had to take a quick shower in the basement to wash off the sweat from overworking ourselves in the last moments before the opening, she still somehow managed to look like an worldwide popular movie star, wearing a long, sky-blue dress that exposed her delicate shoulders and arms. Looking at her, I couldn't help but wonder whether someone else from earth already visited this place, giving birth to such a design!

"Open the gates!"

With the loud shout announcing the start of the exam, the guards on both sides of the gate pulled on the thick, metal chains, bound to the both wings of the entrance. While I expected a moderate crowd of people to attend my auction, when the gate finally got opened, I couldn't believe my eyes.

The entire street was filled with people!

With a sudden thought darkening my mind, I analyzed something in my mind, before turning my head slightly to Venna.

"Not everyone will fit."

While it was a huge success to gather so much attention, if we failed to accommodate for such a big crowd, it would keep haunting this business in the future! How can an enterprise be successful if its very owner and creator didn't have enough faith in it to adapt it to reality?

"Don't worry about it. It's always like that. I would love if even a single one of them out of ten would come here with the intention to buy! While I didn't tell you about it, I already prepared a small trick that will sew out the useless spectators."

With a small, devious smile plastered on her face, she looked to her side. As if this gesture was a secret signal, three people that stood at the very front of the crowd suddenly ran to the side and pulled out signs with 'privileged entry' written on them!

But what the hell was this supposed to mean? It wasn't like there was any additional entrance for people to go inside except for the back gate that leads directly to the VIP lodges!

"To enter, you need to verify yourself! You will be denied entry otherwise!"

Suddenly, the guards that opened the gate just a moment ago, moved to block the path of the crowd and shouted. This was something that I already knew about. Considering how Katenaris and Draconic Sabre sect announced that they won't take part in the whole event at all, it was obvious that they would send enough spies to get information about everything that would happen. While we could only dream about preventing every single one of them from slipping through - after all, we didn't know their identities at all - the process of checking the identification tokens would slow the entire crowd down!

So that's what she meant by this trick!

Looking to the side, I saw several people already talking with the attendants that ran to the side before, showing them something that I was unable to see, before passing through them and going straight for the entrance while avoiding all the identification process!

"How does it even work?"

Only after more than five of them received acknowledgement and went inside, I realised that they were only pretending to show something to the bouncers!

"It's all about the wits. Every real gambler will do their very best to enter the auction, even if they will risk losing the face. That was the foundation of this trick. Right now, those who frequent the auctions know about this scheme and are using it to guarantee their seats beforehand! But let's move back to the building. There is no point standing here anymore."

She was right with this. We already showed our faces and welcomed the people. While it was hard to see through the entire crowd, all the way back in the planning phase for the investment, Venna enforced her idea to make the main entrance slightly elevated compared to the road outside.

While I didn't understand it back then, seeing how every visitor could see my face even if they stood at the very end of the queue, the ingenuity of this design dawned on me. Why waste hours upon hours of greeting the guests, if we could slightly accent the fact that we came out to greet them and just move away right after the grand opening?