"Tenth master, from what we can see, there is no valuable treasure around here at all." A strong man bowed to a rather big-bellied man that was in front of him, who he called as the tenth master.
Right next to the strong man was a servant who was clearly trembling as she kneeled before the man with a big belly as well.
"What about his background then?" The tenth master asked with a frown on his face.
"Here it is, tenth master." The strong man said as he extended a file to the man.
The big-bellied man frowned as he beckoned a servant next to him, who took the file from the strong man and gave it to him.
As the tenth master read the entire file, a frown graced his face.
"I thought he was a prodigy or was hiding a secret, but in the end, it was an utter disappointment." The tenth master said with disappointment laced in his tone.
"You can let him gamble as much as he wants."
"Should we change the mana stone just in case, master?" The strong man asked tentatively.
"You don't need to." The tenth master shook his head and swiped his hand.
The two, the servant girl and the strong man, left together with a relieved expression on their faces.
"Luckily, the tenth master didn't do anything to us." The servant girl smiled in a whisper and left.
Although the strong man's face was stern, his mouth was still slightly curved up as he too left to his own devices.
Aur returned again the next morning with an expressionless face and started to choose the mana stones again one by one.
"Hmm, there are only forty mana stones left that match Sebastian's description." Aur had a thoughtful expression on his face before he actually chose every single stone, forty magic stones.
"Cut these stones carefully." He casually said to the servant girl, and the girl started to scrape the stones one by one carefully with a nervous expression on her face.
....
"Young master, it looks like it is a dud again."
"Don't worry and continue." Aur said casually.
"Yes, young master." She nodded her head.
"It's already been ten mana stones already. Is Aur really squandering his money just like this?"
Aur's ears twitched as he looked around him. A crowd had already formed behind him, who were all looking at the purple stones with interest in their eyes.
Seeing this, the tenth master's expression seemed to brighten.
"Tell me, servant. How much did the young master buy all these mana stones for?" He looked at the servant girl.
"This..." The girl was rather confused, however, since it was her master's order, she told everything truthfully without any hesitation as she pointed at each of the stones and started to point at every stone and state their prices.
"These ones cost 80 low-grade mana crystals, and these ones..."
"Stop, stop," The tenth master said with a generous smile on his face. "Since I am feeling generous and there are still eleven of them left, let's sum it up to twelve middle-grade mana crystals, so let's give these brothers just about twenty-two middle-grade mana crystals."
The tenth master shook his head without any care and looked at Aur. "How about it?"
"No, thanks." Aur stated with a cold expression on his face.
"Eh." The tenth master was stumped to hear this. "Are you really not going to sell it? You will incur a loss if you do so, while selling it to me will at least make you recuperate a little of your losses and use those resources for your mana instead of wasting it here."
"You are right, but I don't want to. These gambling gives me a sense of addiction that makes me reel in pleasure. If I give it to you, it won't be fun. It isn't about winning or losing. I don't even care if I get any treasure or not. It's all about the chance of getting anything or not." Aur said with his face morphing into a crazy smile.
"Isn't it fun to get your entire cultivation resource on a chance so slim to even gain back the amount you lost? If I ever had the opportunity, I would even gamble my life away."
Aur laughed crazily like a true madman.
"This..." The tenth master couldn't form any coherent words to counter back at Aur, which made him quite reluctant as he glanced at the half-scraped stone one last time.
"Alright, if you say so."
He shook his head and left to the side, patiently waiting for the girl to scrape the stone open.
"You don't have to stop it, start it again." Aur said with a calm expression returning to him.
"Yes, yes, young lord."
Under the watchful stare of the tenth master, the stone was slowly scraped to reveal a dim light.
"This is..." The servant girl's eyes widened with astonishment.
"Be careful with it." Aur said calmly.
She nodded her head and started to scrape the other layer of stone as well to reveal a pitch-black rock that was shining in a dim golden light, contrasting each other. Her hand trembled while holding it.
The others who were casually looking at attention were also drawn by the golden light as they looked at it with a curious gaze.
"An Adamantite."