The access door was a pathetic meter wide. The hall on the other side could house mountain ranges. Such a contradiction was so insignificant by the standards that no one bothered to comment on it.
The Vantablack Auction House had been open for over a century, though barely twenty years had passed since the city's founding. That contradiction cemented part of its prestige. Truly important businesses always ended up occupying spaces where time had given up behaving.
The metropolitan amphitheater was packed to the brim.
From magnates. Demigods. Collectors. Mercenaries. To dirty politicians.
Among the attendees, one could distinguish an archduchess with a fortune that monopolized entire countries. A human industrialist who had bought three small wars to display them on a private estate. A demigod specialized in acquiring famous people and turning them into action figures. And even a creature without a stable form that attended solely out of a masochistic fetish oriented towards bidding.
All of them, hidden by ceremonial masks, would be future participants in the most grotesque social Darwinism to date.
The district war. A formality with much literalness.
The war that was about to begin.
The war that no one officially recognized.
The war whose prize changed depending on who you asked.
A wish.
A kingdom.
Divinity.
Your own personal dimension!
An opportunity to rewrite history.
Or simply an excuse for the most dangerous monsters on the planet to exterminate each other.
Aurelia Vantablack appeared on stage.
Across the stage, the woman paraded, bathed in golden light beams and cloaks made from the skin of exotic beasts. Aurelia smiled from ear to ear. Returning the cheers of the entire room.
"Welcome, hellouda, Bonjour, H̸̠͙̠̓́͐j̴̘͉͎̿́́f̸̝͔̫͊͝ù̴̙̺͓̔͊r̵̙̫̞͊̈́͝j̴͓͕̟͋̽e̴̫̠͕͆͛͠, Ni hao"
Her melodious voice intoxicated all five senses.
"Tonight we will not be auctioning relics, no sir"
She shook her head, finger raised.
"We will not be auctioning beasts"
She shook her head.
"We will not even be auctioning weapons"
Her bulging eyes darted across the stands.
"Tonight we will be auctioning your companions"
The silence was unanimous.
"And what a night awaits us! We bring forbidden specimens and at least two that constitute a flagrant violation of twenty-three international treaties!"
She tapped the floor once, twice, three times. Something seemed to click into place. An invisible gear completed its turn, and the memory surfaced.
"However, dear audience. First things first:"
>Name
>House
A poor devil or a high society citizen?
>Race
Human, demon, demigod, otherworlder, orboid.
>History