old Phoenix City was a wonder of the Lower Realms. Suspended in the skies by nine golden phoenix relics and protected by formation arrays older than most sects, it had never been conquered, never submitted. It stood as a sovereign beacon of pride, freedom, and controlled neutrality.
Until today.
Banners unfurled from the edges of the floating city, marked with a symbol no one had dared to display openly—the Heaven Auctioneer's sigil. A black hammer wrapped in violet karma threads. It was not announced with ceremony.
It simply appeared.
And the city... did not object.
Because Li Xuan was already there.
Seated in the highest tower, overlooking the skies and the phoenix relics, Li Xuan drank from a cup of flame wine and watched as the auction grounds were constructed at terrifying speed. Tens of thousands of elites and servants under his command worked in silent synchronization.
The Seven Generals managed security.
The Forty-Nine Elites coordinated the invitees.
But the most terrifying thing of all was this:
Not a single phoenix dared to resist.
The Phoenix Matriarch, Lady Huang Yanyi, sat across from Li Xuan in her divine robe, her breath faintly trembling. She was a peak Ascendant, said to have lived for 20,000 years, and had once scorned the heavens themselves.
Now, she dared not speak without permission.
"You know why I've come," Li Xuan said flatly.
She nodded slowly, not meeting his gaze. "You intend to auction... fate."
"Yes."
The word landed like a hammer.
Yanyi hesitated. "Do you not fear that tampering with such laws will bring ruin even upon you?"
Li Xuan turned his violet eyes toward her, and in that single glance, her soul was weighed.
"I am the karmic scale now," he replied. "Let the heavens tremble if they disagree."
The Auction of Destinies began at dusk.
More than ten thousand sects sent representatives. Even hidden families and rogue cultivators long thought extinct sent proxies or soul threads to observe. The stage was not set for wealth or treasure this time.
Each bidder was to stake a piece of their future.
Life spans. Bloodlines. Legacy arts. Entire generations.
And in exchange?
They could bid for karma-bound alterations to fate:
Erase the death of a sect heir fated to die in five years.
Reverse the destruction of a branch family ruined in battle.
Bind an enemy clan to bad karma for ten cycles.
Enhance a child's talent beyond natural limits.
Impossible things.
Things no cultivator had the right to demand.
But here... they were sold under Li Xuan's gavel.
When the auction opened, silence gripped the realm.
Li Xuan stood before the crowd. He wore no crown, bore no weapon. Yet all knelt—not out of ritual, but instinct.
"I will not repeat the rules," he said. "Those who betray karma after tonight shall be erased from its record. Even if the heavens intervene... they will not remember you existed."
He snapped his fingers.
A flame appeared.
The Karmic Flame—an eternal light that burned truth from lies. Every transaction made within it would be irrevocable.
"Let the first bid begin."
A trembling old cultivator stood. "I bid the soul of my second son, and the next three generations of my family's loyalty... to resurrect my slain wife."
A karmic thread glowed above his head, confirming his truth.
Li Xuan nodded. "Accepted."
The flame flared. Somewhere, across the realms, a buried woman opened her eyes in her grave.
A thousand gasps rang out.
Next, a cold beauty in white armor stood. "I bid my virgin soul and my sect's sacred inheritance... to ensure my tribe's bloodline awakens phoenix affinity for the next ten generations."
"Accepted."
The Karmic Flame howled.
Even Li Xuan's Generals stirred with unease.
This was not an auction.
This was divine arbitration.
Only one dared interrupt it.
Lady Huang Yanyi, the Phoenix Matriarch, stood at last.
"I offer Ninefold Phoenix City itself. And... my fate."
Murmurs exploded across the hall.
"For what?" Li Xuan asked, amused.
Her voice was firm. "Let my clan survive the coming purge. Let my phoenix daughters be spared."
Li Xuan's gaze darkened.
He lifted his hand.
The karmic threads shifted.
What he saw was clear:
In the near future, the karmic balance would demand a massacre. Someone would try to kill the phoenix line to sever their celestial link. It was destiny.
And she wanted him to protect them.
"A bold ask," he murmured. "And your offering is enough."
He waved his hand.
A pact formed in flame.
Huang Yanyi's name burned on it, and her soul flickered. A part of her was sacrificed—not her strength, but her line of fate. She would never rise beyond what she was.
It was done.
By the end of the auction, the very realm shivered with power. Futures had been rewritten. Legacies shattered or restored. Some sects paid too much. Others dared not bid at all and were cursed by their inaction.
But through it all, one truth became clear:
Li Xuan was no longer a player of the game.
He was the gamekeeper.
And in the deepest chamber of the Ninefold Phoenix Auction Tower, a new artifact began to form—an obsidian wheel of fate, rotating slowly, absorbing every karmic transaction.
It was the Karmic Auction Record.
Only Li Xuan could read it.
Only he could rewrite it.
And soon, even the heavens would have to bid for a piece of fate.
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