Meteor Fall Master in the 'Starry Abyss'
Chapter 646 - 259. Calamity is worried about you; it has brought you its favorite misfortune.

Chapter 646: 259. Calamity is worried about you; it has brought you its favorite misfortune.

By the time the auction was two-thirds through, the staff noticed something was off.

"Isn’t the frequency of overbidding unusually high today?"

"Yes, especially after the midpoint, the number of overbids significantly increased. If it happened once or twice, it would be fine, but with so many people determined to buy planets at any cost, it’s a bit strange."

"Could there be some problem?"

Out of concern, they quickly contacted the Planetary Resources Bureau and reported the matter to the official in charge.

"An increase in the frequency of overbidding?"

An official from Crystal Tower thought for a moment, then shook his head:

"What does it have to do with us? Getting more ammonium gold is a good thing."

The head of the auction was quite worried, "But after all, those attending the auction are either rich or noble. If they get displeased, could they turn their anger towards us...?"

"Would they even blame the Planetary Resources Bureau?" the official scoffed. "We’ve allowed these workshops to make a lot of money normally. Now, in our civilization’s time of need, having to sell state-owned resources, it’s their duty to contribute more money to help us through this crisis. There are many people who want to buy planets but don’t have the means!"

"So that’s how it is!" The auction staff suddenly understood.

In the eyes of the Planetary Resources Bureau, this move was to expand foreign reserves, to drain the workshops’ foreign reserves, to prevent them from escaping overseas even more effectively.

Planets and real estate are similar, both typical bundled assets. Once purchased, they require long-term management and maintenance. Purchasing a planet is like being a mortgage slave who has just made a down payment, needing to continuously make monthly payments. Thus, the civilization is least worried about them fleeing.

On the contrary, these workshop masters who bought planets, constrained by the difficulty of initial development, most became even more dependent on civilization. At most, later when they become wealthier, they might consider becoming independent. Even if it comes to that, it would take a long time, and the accumulated ammonium gold would at least be enough to weather the current hardships.

Li Aozi had precisely grasped this point.

"Your way of operating isn’t very clever."

Nikita pouted:

"For lots 016, 190, 122 up for auction, you keep making high bids. Aren’t you afraid they will subsequently block your purchase of Baizhu Star?"

"Of course I am not afraid, the premise of my bids is having sufficient reserve funds, otherwise it would be considered illegal and fraudulent."

Li Aozi interlaced his fingers, chuckling:

"Although I have always been a shill, I don’t just haphazardly escalate the bids—only for planets that you, Nikita, confirm as valuable do I continually raise the bid, and the number of times isn’t fixed. Each operation forces the other party to at least overbid by thirty percent of the actual value—after a few times like this, the opponent’s funds will probably run out."

"But by doing so, everyone knows that buyer number 077, which is you, is disrupting the order." Nikita was somewhat worried, "Not everyone is short of money. There are always a few who have plenty of reserves in ammonium gold. If they decide to band together to target you by then..."

"That won’t happen."

Li Aozi opened a directory, gazing at the planets that had been sold, his eyes slowly swirling with purple-red nebulae.

"Soon, they will be busier dealing with more pressing issues at hand."

Nikita was puzzled, but seeing Li Aozi’s confident demeanor, chose not to say more.

Li Aozi had no intention of revealing his hand.

[Sequence 77: Calamity]

After a five-year cooldown, Calamity returned to Li Aozi’s control. This arcane power had the ability to interfere with fate and amplify disasters, and it had never let Li Aozi down.

The most critical point:

Among the arcane powers he possessed, Calamity had the longest range and effect.

The range description of Calamity was any object within visual range, which was quite intriguing: what exactly does "visual range" include?

Looking up at the stars, downloading a picture online, video chatting with someone remotely, observing the microscopic world and particle surfaces...

All these things, aside from the differences in resolution, were actually within the "visual range."

However, Calamity was not a very precise arcane power. It was quick to activate for intuitive, rough targets, but for more finely detailed entities, Calamity struggled to capture them, and it needed to accumulate gradually before it could activate.

The targets Li Aozi used Calamity on were not specific people in a particular room number.

Simply put, he cursed the entire auction site, including himself. Everyone equally experienced misfortune.

This was not like the difficult situation he had faced against Canyue before; Canyue herself was a complete Sovereign Pathway, highly charismatic, and had strong resistance to arcane powers. It cost Li Aozi several mana bars, and Calamity kept accumulating the power of disaster until he finally managed to kill her.

Besides, this time his purpose was not to kill, but just to make a group of the internal Scholarly Faction Workshop Masters from the Crystal Tower bleed heavily — this was just a trivial revenge for their abandonment of three billion ordinary people on Baizhu Star, and for hindering Li Aozi’s normal auction activities.

Calamity did not directly affect Wealth Luck.

Actually, even Li Aozi himself only vaguely understood a bit about this arcane power.

The application process of Calamity involved continuously accumulating disasters until they burst out completely.

The definition of disaster was rather broad and could even be said to be abstract; it was hard for anyone to define it definitively at once.

On a smaller scale, disasters include choking while drinking water, being late due to traffic, being checked on by a boss, or an usually indifferent girlfriend suddenly deciding to check your phone... These could tentatively be considered disasters.

On a larger scale, such as the theft of a national exam paper, being killed by a meteorite on the way to school, or the bride suddenly mutating into a fire-spouting monster and swallowing you during a wedding ceremony.

When communicating with Dean Nastisha, Li Aozi discovered this:

The function of Calamity was to continually bring about disasters.

For instance, the first time, it might cause you to have a pollen allergy, but if you quickly wear a mask and stay away from flowers, then it might arrange for a bicycle to hit you next. However, if you are agile enough to dodge it, congratulations, the next step Calamity might take is to send a dump truck crashing towards you.

If it can’t kill you in one go, it will escalate the scale until it completely kills you.

When dealing with Canyue back then, Calamity continuously shook her this way.

Initially, Calamity tried many times, such as causing delays in Canyue’s Implant Gear, body malfunctions, and mental chaos, but her strong intuition let her survive even after accumulating many disasters.

Then, Calamity switched tactics: it planned to directly attract Balkmon, but perhaps because as a Kappa (10) rank powerhouse, Balkmon’s strength was too formidable, and the strong fate always managed to return to its course.

So Calamity started aiming lower, triggering many minor disasters to distract the attention of other powerhouses in different fortresses.

However, perhaps still limited by Li Aozi’s insufficient Charm, not strong enough to draw in very powerful individuals, it finally settled for less, and eventually zeroed in on Dean Nastisha.

Dean Nastisha of the Yita Phase (7), whether by beating Canyue or clearing Night Butterfly Federation reinforcements, was absolutely competent. But even so, Canyue’s raw strength was too strong, preventing Nastisha from being able to kill her personally, which led to a series of subsequent issues.