"Huh… did you just say auction house, master?" Alex thought he heard her wrong.
"Yes. Auction house. You need to learn how to search for items in auctions as well as have the proper etiquette in there." Ma Rong repeated.
'Oh, so we are going to an auction after all. I wonder if it's the same auction house as the one I was going to. I should have checked if there were others.'
"Alright, master. Let's leave." He said as he started walking outside.
"Where are you going?" Ma Rong asked him.
"Uhh… to the auction house?" why would she ask him this?
Ma Rong chuckled a little and said, "get back here." She then proceeded to take out her boat-like artifact. "We aren't going to walk all the way there. It's too inefficient. We are going to fly there."
She jumped and got onto the boat. "Oh, right. Make sure to not use the Immortal Concealment technique today. It's not good to show other people that you can hide your cultivation from them." She also canceled her technique and her cultivation base started giving off the same strong aura as before.
Alex wasn't using his technique so he just nodded and told her he won't use it today. He got onto the boat without asking and settled himself on the back of the boat.
After seeing everything was ready, Ma Rong flew off. Ma Rong hadn't sped up or anything. She just flew at her normal flying speed that just made Alex feel a cool breeze on his face.
Still, they ended up reaching the auction house in less than 10 minutes. 'Not having to go up and down the mountains or walk jagged path really does help trim down your travel time a lot,' he thought. He couldn't wait for the time when his flying speed would be faster than his walking speed.
Ma Rong flew down in front of the auction house and jumped down. Alex followed behind her as well. He was happy to find out that this was the same auction house as he wanted to go to. Somehow fate had taken away his chance and gave it back to him.
"This is the Pink Cloud Auction house. This is their secondary branch, while their main branch is in the capital of the empire, Cardinal city. There are only these 2 branches. Today, they will sell quite a lot of things, so I brought you here to check it out."
Alex hadn't even come during the auction time so he was quite shocked at the number of people waiting outside. "Come," Ma Rong said as she walked towards something she seemed to have noticed.
"Greetings, City lord, lady," Ma Rong greeted a purple-robed couple that just flew down. These were Fu Wen and Mo An, the husband-wife pair that ruled the Scarlet City under the authority of the crimson empire.
"Ah, Sect leader, you are here early." Fu Wen said with a big smile. Mo An greeted from the side as well.
Fu Wen then saw Alex to her side. "Oh, isn't this our little friend from back then? Hello." He said with a smiling face.
"Greet the city lord," Ma Rong's voice sounded in his head.
"Greetings, City lord, lady," he used the same greetings as his master.
"Let's go inside," he said and started walking towards the door. Alex looked around and saw the many people still standing outside. There still sometime before the auction started, and seeing the many people standing outside, he wondered if he would even be allowed inside so early.
But, he seemed to be overthinking things. The people he was with were some of the VVIPs in the city. The auction house wasn't going to offend the City and one of the only 2 sects that was in the city, just because they arrived early.
He had just walked inside the door when he saw a girl walk up to his master— No, she was walking up to him. He looked at her face and realized who it was.
"Hello, sect leader Ma, little brother. It's good to see you here." Luo Mei had arrived in front of them.
"Hello, Lady Luo," Ma Rong greeted her.
"Hello, Daoist Luo," Alex greeted her as well.
Both Ma Rong and Luo Mei looked at him weirdly. Both of them suddenly started chuckling. Alex got weirded out as he couldn't understand why they were laughing.
"Why are you acting so distant towards her?" Ma Rong asked.
"Yeah, little brother. You should call me sister now that we have the same master." Luo Mei said as well.
Alex was a little surprised. Then he understood what was going on. "Oh, I didn't know that. In that case, I should call you senior sister."
Ma Rong looked towards Luo Mei and asked, "Lady Luo, are you here with your master?"
"Oh no. I'm here with my friends. Master should be arriving anytime soon by himself. I came early." She said.
"Oh, my friends seem to be restless, I will see you guys later." She left towards her friends somewhere deeper in the hall.
"Hmm… did she try to run away from us?" Ma Rong got a little taken aback.
"I don't think so, she probably saw her friends and went back." Alex simply said.
"Can't be. She didn't even turn around." Ma Rong said.
"Oh, did you forget master? She has a spiritual sense too. I told you I only learned about spiritual sense after she asked me to pick up a Spirit Cleansing Lily for her."
Ma Rong didn't remember much from that day. The whole day had gone by in a flash because of how unbelievable that day was.
She cleared her thoughts and started walking down the hall once more. "Come on, let's go. The auction should start anytime now." They finally reached the end of the hall where a lot of staff members, both high and low ranking of the auction house were standing there waiting to guide the newly arrived guests to their rooms.