Dungeon Raider System

Tyche gifted the newcomers with her usual business smile despite assuming they didn't have the means to buy a single item. For humans to show unannounced and uninvited in their domain was a rare occurrence as not just anyone knew about her dealings. Most humans that ever showed up investigated for years just to know about the auction and had to endure a lot just to find it, only to be left in absolute despair when they realized they could not afford a single item, let alone the one that motivated them to get there in the first place.

After all, humans used only modern currency, but to even participate in the auction they had to use ancient coins. This meant that humans were the equivalent to beggars with nothing to offer but their own tears, and they were particularly delicious to the goddess of fortune Tyche. This was precisely what she was counting on when she extended the conversion chart to the two male humans that casually walked in.

"Bollocks! This is bollocks!" Jon's outrage was followed by disbelief.

"Is this for real? The conversion rate even for Florins, Marks, denarius and even groats is insane!"

'Writhe in despair you filthy mongrels.' Tyche inwardly thought as she had a hard time keeping herself from making an ugly face. She could already taste their despair and almost drooled in anticipation. As the goddess of fortune, the human emotions that derived from material possessions were akin to a delicacy set on the table. Despair for being poor, greed for becoming rich and even the desire to possess the auctioned artifacts, she benefited from all those emotions.

That is why she decided to connect her domain with the museum rather than a bank. Banks possessed the most amount of money and although people who worked there started their careers filled with dark thoughts that tempted them to steal the money and live a lavish life, that all stopped after a couple years and they saw money like a product rather than an object of desire. But that was not the case for the museum where thousands of people visited and gasped at the sight of golden statues, rich antiques and expensive jewelry that made them crave for what they didn't have.

There was also a reason why Tyche never allowed any modern minted coin. The exchange rates were unreasonable on purpose. That way she could fill her vaults with easy money and keep it sealed until it became obsolete and only then she would introduce it into her list.

"Is there a problem?"

"Of course there is a problem, this is daylight robbery!" Jon exclaimed.

"If it was only the exchange rates that would be one thing, but credits aren't even listed." Uriel said in a thin voice.

"The rules are set that way and I'm afraid there's nothing I can do." Tyche remained polite, yet she was starting to get impatient as the emotions she wanted to squeeze out of the humans did not appear. Instead, they were angry and disappointed respectively.

"And it just happened that you're the one who set the rules." Jon muttered under his breath, but Uriel remained calm and asked for clarification about the process and time to decide if they wanted to participate.

The auction process was much similar to any regular auction, but there were a couple differences. Attendants could bid for an item and wait anything from a couple years to a few centuries for the price to be accepted by the auctioneer. That option was soon discarded by Uriel since he didn't have a month to spare, let alone a century.

"Since I am also a fair goddess, I allow being with short lifespans to bid 50% extra from the top bid and buy the artifacts on the spot."

"So we're charged extra just because we don't live long lives." Jon let out a sigh thinking on how unfair the world of immortal beings was, steeling his resolve once more to become one of the gods as Dana insisted.

Tyche left after explaining the lowly mortals how the auction worked and both Jon and Uriel discussed the matter briefly and reached an agreement. Jon would go out and ask the Mapple corp. employees under him to bring him any old coin they could find while Uriel entered the auction to determine if the items in there were the ones they were looking for.

A god's axis mundi would keep them tethered to the physical realm and without it, they would be forced to return to the mystical realm and they would leave their vessels behind depending on the time and affinity they had with them.

This explained why Dana was returned with her body to her dungeon while Aphrodite abandoned the nun's body after being exorcised. That is because an exorcism temporarily cuts the connection between the axis mundi and the god, causing the same effect as if the axis mundi was tampered with.

Uriel walked inside the next room and found it filled to the brim not with people but beings. They also weren't gods, but mere envoys as even with eternity ahead of them, they didn't want to waste their time in something as menial as participating in an auction. Most gods were also too lazy to attend in person and some even forgot they were bidding for certain items, though even in the rare case where a god wanted to come in person they still needed to ask for permission in advance.

It was precisely as Uriel thought, for a god to enter another god's domain was impossible unless invited, but to weak creatures like humans infiltrating was easy depending on their rank. What didn't even cross Uriel's mind was that among the creatures that served the gods were some that were evidently cryptids.

The sight of some demihuman creatures along with monstrosities of all kind left Uriel paralyzed on the spot. He knew some by Luna's constant rants about tales or whenever she theorized what crytpids could be present, but it was only at that moment that he realized that cryptids too served Dana in her dungeon.

They gathered gold and valuables and deposited them as offerings to the goddess of death, but at the time he didn't think much of it and the implications were only starting to sink in. His entire perspective on the world that shifted and many thoughts crossed his mind in a flash. His apparent shock and odd behavior drew too much attention from the cryptids as an uneven number of eyes stared at him giving off the feeling that he was nothing but a snack equivalent to a coffee break to them.

Uriel was about to draw his sword from his trait, but was soon stopped not by force but by a rather soft hug.

"I didn't expect to see you here!" Medusa said after breaking the hug.

"You... shouldn't you be in America?" Asked Uriel dumbfounded. Instead of replying, the cryptid shapeshifted into a past version of Uriel immediately which immediately informed him who he was dealing with.

"Shapeshifter." Uriel declared.

"Yep," Uriel nodded, then shifted into Nika before continuing with an apologetic tone. "when I saw you enter I thought I knew you from somewhere, but I have trouble remembering things when I'm not in character."

"What's going on here? Why are there so many..."

"Cryptids? Isn't that kind of racist on your part?" The shapeshifter asked in an offended tone which mimicked not only how Nika usually carried herself, but also her world view.

"I can't believe I'm going to say this, but is it possible for you to shift back into me?"

"Sure thing, boss," The shapeshifter said in Nika's voice before shifting into Uriel. "man this is confusing."

"You're telling me." Uriel laughed.

"What do you want to know and why should I help you?" The shapeshifter's version of Uriel cut to the chase immediately.

"I knew I was kind of a jerk, but is this really what I looked like?" Uriel mused as he now was an entirely different person. Though it wasn't just because of recovering his heart from Water warlock, what actually made a difference was the growth he underwent. Only that fact was something both Uriel and Water warlock ignored.

"Yes, but don't forget that you also stabbed me once so don't expect me to be all friendly with you."

"Uh... you just hugged me." Uriel glared at the other Uriel.

"Yeah, this is awkward," The shapeshifter said as if it wasn't her own fault that things became like that. "anyway, you need to sit and shut up or else you will be kicked out, or worse..."

"What does or worse mean?"

"Whenever I'm not hunting or at father's, I spend some time here to bid for some relics father desires."

"What does 'or worse mean'? I'm serious!" Uriel whined.

"Just tell me what is it you want to buy and I'll help you find it. Well, maybe you don't need my help... it's pretty much like online shopping. Use the crystal ball to browse the items, but make sure to only bid into things you can afford... or else..." The shapeshifter's tone in Uriel's voice was ominous, but what made it worse was to hear it coming out with his own voice. But the absolute worst was that no matter how much Uriel insisted, the cryptid did not answer.