When the Trader and Guan Zhenyan moved on to the next ship on display, they caught a bit of motion in the corner of their eye, but when they looked back everything was still. They turned away again and Guan Zhenyan used his Spirit Sense to ‘see’ the morbidly obese ‘statue’ turning its eyes and head slightly towards them. After reaching the third ship, they turned to look at it, bringing the fat man back into their peripheral vision. Just before they turned the huge statue puffed up its chest, trying to make itself look valiant.

Sage was currently sharing Guan Zhenyan’s senses so he observed this whole display, but they overlooked it for now. The next ship was beautiful, though not quite as cohesive or overly expensive as the first one. Like all the works in this room it also had very high performance, but it wasn’t absurdly so like the first ship. It was long and slender, a lacquered black wooden ship that was over a hundred yards long but in the shape of an elegant gondola with both the prow and stern rising up into a smooth crescent shape. Near the center of the immense gondola in place of what would normally be a covered seating area was instead a gothic castle. The castle was somewhat miniature as it was only 20 yards long and wide. The juxtaposition between the giant gondola and tiny castle made for a memorable sight, quite fitting for this Hall of Eccentricities.

After checking the sign, the real reason it was in this hall became apparent as it was not powered by a giant Spirit Crystal. Instead, it ran upon sacrifices. Qi, Souls, and Blood were all things that the ship could feed upon to power its functions. If that were all, there were certainly plenty of terrible people out there that wouldn’t hesitate to spend the lives of others for their own benefit. The problem was that it also took from the owner as well. Worst yet, the aura that it would release while in motion was extremely obvious and ominous. Perhaps if it was more inconspicuous or didn’t feed upon the owner it would be more desirable. The combination of weird look, obvious evil, and self harm landed it here in this hall despite its otherwise high performance. There was actually a very popular line of Flying Tools from a dark organization that could similarly receive sacrifices to improve its performance. The difference was that it didn’t require the owner to also take a hit and it was normally powered by a Spirit Crystal. The sacrifices were purely optional rather than mandatory. The two extra drawbacks were not worth the higher performance.

Moving on, the fourth ship was straight out of a fairy tale. It was made of a shimmering gossamer material that seemed equal parts crystal and silk. The blue-white sparkled with pinpricks of silver light. Even without being activated it was surrounded with a gentle haze of golden light, blurring the light like a dreamland mirage. This Flying Tool was in the shape of a swan with a crystal palace upon its back. Purely on artistic merit it was above the expensive flagship at the entrance, even if it was made of a single material rather than a mountain of the most expensive ones.

As they approached closer, the haze around it grew thicker, hiding it from view. The Jade Talisman board also explained the reason for this one to be here and it was similar to the second ship in that it was also an Artifact. The living spirit of this one wasn’t trying to show off, instead it did the opposite, hiding from those it didn’t deem fit. In particular, this Flying Ship only wanted the youngest and fairest maidens as an owner. Only a kind and gentle young lady, lovely as a fairy, was allowed to be its owner. Nobody would be able to acquire so many millions of Spirit Stones to purchase it while still being so young, and anyone with such a doting and powerful parent was likely to end up being a little spoiled monster. Fulfilling both conditions at once had landed the Flying Ship here in the Hall of Eccentricities.

After these first four ships, the others in the Hall of Eccentricities followed a similar pattern. Each of the ships were either too extravagantly expensive, too unpleasant to look at, required a weird and unusual power source, or could only be owned by a very specific type of person. They were all valuable and high performance Flying Ships, but they each had a quirk that had landed them into this obscure hall. This immense shop, Palace in the Sky, was too prideful of its reputation as the end all and be all of Flying Ships that it would buy and sell any Flying Tool for a fair price. They were compelled by their honor to buy and sell these quirky ships for a price commensurate with their performance, materials, and construction quality.

Who am I kidding, it’s far more likely arrogance and wanting to not lose face. An honorable business is an oxymoron.

Guan Zhenyan did a full tour of the room checking every one of the Jade Talismans to see if any of them happened to match up with him, but they were all equally weird and unusual. That’s when he sent a voice transmission to Sage.

“I’ll let you keep the Realm Heart for another century past its maturation. That should be enough to pay for the ship. I’m sure you’ve got enough stuff in your World Core to pay for it, just do a big trade and we’ll be out of here in a jiffy.”

This question was not unexpected. Of course, Guan Zhenyan would only want the most powerful and extravagant of Flying Ships.

“It’s my money, so it's my choice. We’re buying the second one.”

Guan Zhenyan turned towards the giant statue that was just as wide as it was tall. The folds were simply too many to count and the detail so high that looking a little too closely revealed stretch marks and sweat drops.

“There’s no way I’m going to ride on the back of that thing.”

“Just trust me. There’s a secret to that one and it will fit our needs the best. Worst case scenario I’ll put it in a big coffin and build a manor on top of it.”

The man thought it over for a moment before agreeing to the deal. He cared only about his own comfort and not being seen and that deal should suffice. Since he had a target now, he brought out his negotiating skills and the poor Trader was buried under a litany of things that were wrong with the ‘Flying Ship’. Then after highlighting the limits of it, he put out a price that was half of what was listed on the Jade Talisman. The Trader was flabbergasted and took a few percentage points off the total instead. They went back and forth before the Trader got upset and finally gave his bottom line.

“I can only take one tenth off, anymore and I have to pay for it myself!”

“Then make it two tenths off, you’ll get our ships, you don’t need any extra commission.”

The only problem was that the amounts they were arguing over was in the millions of Spirit Stones so the Trader wasn’t going to give all that up without a fight. In the meantime, Sage had the people of the Inner World collecting and then cataloging the most valuable things they could trade away without devastating the Inner World or drawing too much attention. Thankfully, Sage had run into this issue in the past which was why he had gone out of his way to acquire the methods to grow Spirit Pearls. A portion of the seas of the Inner World had turned into fields used to raise the giant pearls and convert many of the Natural Treasures of the Inner World into Spirit Pearls. They lost some of their value along the way, but they could convert the output of the planet into a form of currency. Instead of having millions of pounds of plants and minerals for trade, he would just have a pile of money. They were thousand dollar bills, a bit odd to have, but they were far less unusual than having immense amounts of lower level goods.

After this purchase, the windfall from Jinxi Po, who was actually the Jinxi Ancestor, was finally exhausted. In addition, after the disaster that befell the Inner World, the reserve of Spirit Stones that Sage had been saving up over a decade in the Depths was exhausted. After suffering from a worldwide disaster, the Inner World had been recovering for a few decades already. The Lang Clan and Purple Mist Sect had used this as an opportunity to set a better foundation for the future, constructing new major cities in more optimal locations, basing them around specific resources tied to the now altered geography and topology of the world.

The deal was finally concluded and the Trader made a few hundred thousand Spirit Stones along with the three Flying Tools. Sage paid more than forty million Spirit Stones worth of Spirit Pearls, Spirit Stones and other miscellaneous materials.