The Supreme God of Martial Arts novel Chapter 156

Having all the cultivators' undivided attention, the flirtatious auctioneer felt pleased. What had hooked the audience was obviously the Illusory Swordsmanship. But now as she smiled her sweet and seductive smile, the audience felt weak in the knees.

"As the name says, the Illusory Swordsmanship is almost too good to be true. It can release hundreds of Sword-lights if its owner has attained the Major Achievement Stage. In fact, the energy of each Sword-light is powerful enough to kill. This is what makes it a daunting weapon," she said as the introduction to the weapon. On hearing this, a wave of murmurs and gasps spread across the room.

"However," the auctioneer took a pause, "the Ganges Auction House has always been honest with its customers. We only deal in fair trade. Period. So, it is only obvious that we will tell you both the swordsmanship's merits and demerits. Especially the latter. Now, it has two shortcomings.

First, it consumes a lot of vital energy when used. This is very easy to understand. Its owner's vital energy would be the source of its Sword-lights, and we are talking about hundreds of Sword-lights here. So just imagine the amount it requires.

Second, its power could be too fragmented. It is true that the large amount of Sword-light it produces is very hard for your opponent to avoid, yet each of the lights might not be strong enough as the energy gets divided. It could be weaker than one focused attack in some circumstances," the auctioneer explained patiently.

"But then these are problems only for cultivators that have a weak cultivation base.

For those with a refined level of cultivation, who can absorb and unleash immense amount of high-quality vital energy, these weaknesses can easily become strengths.

In a word, this Illusory Swordsmanship is meant for the strong—the ones with a solid cultivation base and abundant vital energy.

So please think twice before you bid," she concluded. Austin was a bit surprised by the frankness and the detail in which the setbacks of the Swordsmanship were spelled out.

But then this was the very reason why the Ganges Auction House was so popular in the Violet Orchid Empire. It spoke of both, an item's merits and demerits. The House enabled the bidders to make a wise decision as they were fully informed. The bidders could then think of their needs and strike as fair a deal as possible.

So after the shortcomings of the Swordsmanship were articulated to the audience, many interested cultivators balked at the idea of bidding.

This was because most cultivators aimed at making as many breakthroughs and reaching a higher realm in the shortest time possible.

So for such cultivators, investing in medicinal pills or elixirs was big on their agenda. But as every coin has two sides, this kind of refinement wouldn't ensure a solid base in their cultivation and again, when it came to their vital energy, it would in all possibility be inferior and unrefined.

So after much mulling over, over half of the cultivators' enthusiasm to acquire the Illusory Swordsmanship wore off when its truth was bared to the audience.

But not Austin's. Austin was not to be deterred. He instead was all tense and excited to know how phenomenal the Illusory Swordsmanship was. 'Of course, its sapping immense vital energy to activate is a big drawback, but not for me. The vital energy stone in my elixir field can store enough vital energy to activate it in full throttle. The stone is my failsafe until I practice to harness the powers of the swordsmanship with proficiency, ' thought Austin to himself.

'In the worst case scenario, if my stone doesn't store the amount required, I'll just have to find a way to up my reserves in the stone somehow.'