“Dear friends!” Suddenly Chris stood up, “I’m Chris Evans and our Evans family really likes this necklace. I hope everyone could respect it as we would like to bid nine and a half gold, thank you!”

It looked like it was a closed loop – aristocrats could still throw their weight around.

“On behalf of our Meyer family, we would like to thank everyone for taking part in today’s auction. Unfortunately we can’t disclose the winner, but, my condolences, it wasn’t the Evans family. Congratulations to the winner who made a bid of fifteen gold!” Nick theatrically bowed towards Chris.

Everyone’s eyes lit up. This might work!

“Of course, but before we change the bidding tradition in the capital, we can’t auction items which are easily recognizable.” Nick added, “But you do have a ton of them, correct?”

“True.” Mason agreed, “We solved the main problem, but the second is exactly that.”

“I don’t think so.” Nick shook his head, “Did the king give you deadline?”

“No.”

“I thought so. Our king is not stupid. He knows that in order to get the best price you might have to sell all of the wares in a prolonged period of time.”

“Good. Any suggestions on how should we approach this?” Mason looked around.

“First shake up the traditions here and, while you do that, send the lists of items to our friendly neighbors, noting base price as well as explain the rules of the auction.” Steven summarized everything in one sentence.

“Alright, then we would make the first auction already in five or ten days. But what should we sell that doesn’t stand out?” Mason scratched his head.

“I think that you shouldn’t sell anything.” Nick grinned, “You have all the items already. Pick fifteen or twenty of them that Meyer family needs, offer good price to the king and simply purchase. Then play a drama called “Aurora’s New Auction” and let aristocrats perform just like Chris showed us few minutes ago and at the end finish it with grand finale like I did. After such auction many will be angry, but without anyone to vent this anger at. In addition, it is not possible to find out who bought the items, because it is simply impossible for anyone to confess.”

“But … isn’t it cheating?” YunYun blushed at her fiance’s audacity. It was really improper for a family with good reputation to cheat others like this.

“Not at all. At the time Meyer family already has bought the items and can do with their property what they want. In addition they will even offer some free wine during the event. Not only the aristocrats don’t loose anything, they get free drinks and entertainment.” Nick’s grin grew wider.

“Only you can think of something so devious.” Kate sighed. But everyone had to agree – this idea was good.

“I could bet that after two auctions like this, the whole tradition will be broken, may be even after one.” Mason was looking at the piece of paper in his hand with a wide smile, “Thank you guys! Pizza today is on me!”

The bunch ate and drank a bit more and then dispersed.

Nick watched YunYun who was deep in thoughts. This event was completely new experience for her and they did brainstorm for a couple of hours.

“Confused?” He asked.

“A bit.” She nodded, “Didn’t you all just help Meyer family earn a ton of gold? And not from this auction but for many years to come as well?”

“Yup, we did well!” Nick felt good. Their ideas definitely will break the situation in capital.

“But everyone is from different families, so why they helped Mason that much? I understand you could help, but even if they are friends, it’s against their interests and even brings financial losses.”

“YunYun, you have misunderstood something. The main interest of the people who were gathered is not to earn much gold or influence, but to help their friend in a difficult situation. The stability between three aristocratic hegemons in the capital won’t be broken because of few tens or even hundreds thousands of gold. But that money can’t buy a real friendship.” Nick smiled at her, “This way we have been brainstorming on problems for years and at some point each of us had a situation they couldn’t solve alone. But together we always find a way out.”

“Didn’t you find the way out? The rest didn’t do anything!”

“Not true. You don’t remember, but you were the one who offered the first solution and a great one at that. Then, based on your idea, we managed to build everything else. Of course, if not you, someone else sooner or later also would have found a nuance that we could build around. In addition, don’t look down on those who didn’t bring up any flashy ideas. Even silly questions from Belia or Beata sometimes help us to find solutions in difficult situations. That’s the concept of ‘brainstorming’.”

“This was … very interesting.” YunYun smiled back.

“Of course! You can do a lot of fun stuff with friends!”

“Will you go to that auction?” YunYun asked.

“I wasn’t planning to. Do you want to see how it goes?”

She energetically nodded and they decided to take a look.

Ten days later around hundred and fifty people from the capital got invited to the ‘new’ auction. To YunYun’s great surprise events transpired exactly how Chris and Nick played them out and they had a lot of laughs watching the faces of few local heavyweights who desperately looked for the one who ‘didn’t show them enough respect’.

When his majesty heard about this event, he requested to be invited to the next auction as well. Twenty days later everyone greeted him with smiles on their faces, but those smiles got stomped just like the first time.

Seeing his arrogant subjects being played like that turned out to be quite amusing for the king. In the end he decided to use his influence to fill the country’s treasury more smoothly. These fat aristocrats sat on a ton of money that could be used for arming and feeding his soldiers! Thus he announced arrival of new era and that the old traditions had to change. He urged everyone to drop their acts during the auctions to save their reputation, because respected people acting like little angry kids was embarrassing not only for them, but for him as the king and the whole country as well. Then he explained that soon foreign guests will also start taking part in auctions and with it the last resistance was broken.

Mason, with assistance of his friends, managed to solve the problem his father couldn’t and earned quite a bit of respect in the family. His friends got a warm ‘thank you’ and another round of pizza, but they didn’t expect more and were happy for his achievement.

During the winter YunYun experienced quite a few ‘culture shocks’, but she loved the time spent in Aurora and boarded “Queen Elizabeth” a bit reluctantly.

A grand procession was organized by her new friends from the Sun kingdom and it was almost as big as the crowd that sent off the rest of the passengers combined. Even king himself came over for a short moment to wish her a pleasant voyage.

While YunYun was thankful and happy, she and Nick were a bit upset for not being able to keep a low profile. They were planning to polish their Qi manipulation skills in ship’s galley again, but now no one would allow it since it was not suitable for her status.

YunYun was looking at the crowd on the pier with her short hair fluttering in the wind. During the winter her coal black hair grew a little bit more and now was ‘perfect’ according to Nick and she loved it like that as well. Even though long hair stretching over her waist was beautiful, it was extremely inconvenient during the practice and especially during the actual combat. Nick found her new hair style very adorable and pretty, thus skeptical opinions from ‘flowers of Aurora’ were not even considered.

It was a warm spring day and both of them wore jeans and snake’s skin shoes. The rest of the snake’s skin ‘equipment’ was neatly stored in their spacial treasures. At the beginning YunYun tried to experience Nick’s style fully and for a half day wore t-shirt, but it was too extreme for her royal upbringing and way too ‘perverted’. Thus Nick suggested for her to try out a long white shirt that covered her bottom and accentuate the waist with a snake’s skin belt.

As a result she immediately fell in love with this style and got complimented by her ‘expert’ friends as well. Her black hair, belt and footwear gave an effective contrast to the snow white shirt and looked even better. But despite Kate’s continuous begging, she refused to get out of the jeans claiming that it was the most convenient clothing for training and combat. In the end she agreed to at least consider other colors than the blue Nick for some reason always chose.

Nick, of course, didn’t care about all of that – he liked her hair and that was it. The rest was YunYun’s own choice and he, at this moment, didn’t even notice what she wore. He was more interested in how to train during the next month if he was not allowed to cook. Anything that involved alchemy was a no-no on the ship because of the potential accidents, therefore only the option of physical practice remained.

On the second day after setting the sail, both of them finally found a solution – they climbed on top of the foremast and played hand clapping games while balancing on the yard the whole day long. It might seem silly, but in fact was incredibly difficult. Even a gigantic ship that was “Queen Elizabeth”, was swaying in the waves and the ship’s front had the most movement with the top of the foremast moving the most. Thus balancing on the relatively thin yard high above the water level for a long time was extremely taxing.

The hand clapping games regular children were playing to amuse themselves proved to be even more challenging endeavor. The rule was for them to maximize their hand speed while still maintaining the balance. It was up to the point where captain, being a Qi master, couldn’t even see their hands. He, of course, didn’t care too much about the two crazy youths and soon the rest of the crew stopped paying attention to these weirdos as well.

After leaving Ravi, the weather worsened and sea became quite unruly. Nick and YunYun rejoiced at the ‘increased difficulty’ as the ‘regular’ had become too easy for them. They were still all smiles when it started to rain, but when a real storm hit, after a bigger wave both of them fell down from the slippery yard and, because the ship was tilted at that moment, ‘luckily’ landed in the water. The crew was already in panic – there was no way to rescue people who fell overboard in such storm, but got shocked to their bones when the two climbed back in on their own, all wet, but while laughing loudly.

Despite the fact that the two maniacs survived, captain forbade them from going out on the deck during the storm and it took a lot of persuasion and a signed waiver, that removed all responsibility from the crew and the captain in case of their demise, for captain to allow them go up on the foremast again. Still, they were only allowed to ‘play’ there in case there were no storms.

Luckily the weather was mostly beautiful and not dangerous at all and the two continued their weird practices for the rest of the trip.

Contrary to the other passengers and the crew, they had no problem with the freshwater and during the whole trip could drink the herbal mixture they brewed back in Aurora. Their food was of different quality as well and mostly consisted of dried fruits and nuts mixed in honey. Already during their escape from the Nestri continent, YunYun got educated on the principles of proper nutrition and on this subject she currently was the second most knowledgeable person in the world. Of course, Nick stacked up quite a few pizzas from the “Sunshine” as well, but they already decided to eat them sparingly. And, in addition, YunYun really wanted to let her sister and mother taste this amazing food.

While practicing on the foremast, obviously they were the people who noticed the Eastern continent first. Everyone on the ship besides them were elated when the hard and tedious voyage was over, or rather they would be finally able to take few days of break. Duo didn’t have that sentiment, although YunYun started to get a bit anxious after arrival. She had been away from home for over a year and now came back with a fiance. She was blushing at the thought of her mother meeting Nick, but the clueless bastard never even mentioned that.