I'm a monster in Demon King's Castle

Under the cover of the robe and the shadowy slicing, a square section of the floor was instantly cut open, and Eggdrop fell through. Shadow was also quick and clean, sewing the floor back together along the edges of the cut, so the three demons fell into the crawlspace beneath the auction house floor without anyone noticing.

The target was directly beneath the auction stage—there was a passage at the bottom through which auctioned items were transported to the loading area, while items awaiting auction were stored in the vault.

Lee Read, sporting his "uninhibited, bony, trendy man" look, crawled out of the Shadow Space and began studying the auction house's layout using Shadow's living map.

There was only one route to the loading area and the vault: the outer corridor of the auction house. But for a skull, an egg, and a shadow, there were quite a few possible routes.

The three demons could pass through the floor crawlspace to beneath the auction stage and then choose which area to go to at the fork in the path; or Lee Read could transform into the town elder and swagger through the outer corridor.

Ultimately, Lee Read chose a more covert route—stealing the auction items unnoticed was obviously the most ideal.

The auction above continued, with most demons focused on it. Lee Read, however, had the "earth element affinity" of an octopus tentacle, making it not too difficult to pass through walls and earth. The challenge lay in how to get the auction items into the Shadow Space under the guard of the half-demons and armored warriors.

And the escape strategy.

"Let's go take a look first." After pondering for a moment in his mind, Lee Read had some ideas, but ultimately decided to see the situation first—after all, Death Small Town Deshler's defense force was concentrated here, and anything could happen underground.

So, with the swaying of the octopus tentacles, the three demons quickly approached beneath the auction stage. Then, when they were still about ten zhang away, Lee Read stopped.

Through the "Aberrant Eye's" vision, Lee Read could vaguely see that beneath the floor of the auction stage was a platform. The magic cannon had just been lowered, and the half-demons and armored warriors were working hard to move it out and send it to the loading area; at the same time, another half-demon, holding a chain, was pushing the third auction item, that demon merchant, onto the platform.

In the center of the room, there was also a beholder rotating its eyes, watching for any movement in the underground.

Next to the beholder were two strange things that looked like they were coordinating with the beholder to be responsible for the security of the auction items—the floor and wall crevices under the auction stage were covered with green sludge, which seemed to have a life of its own, constantly wriggling and enveloping the beholder's blood vessels, communicating something from time to time; half-sunken in the sludge, there was a butler-like fellow holding a wine glass, floating up and down in the sludge, like a tourist sunbathing in a swimming pool, arranging all the actions under the auction stage.

Lee Read's mind was blocked by the seal under the auction stage, and he couldn't use the Demon Illustrated Handbook to analyze them, so he couldn't directly determine their strength. But after a little observation, it was not difficult to find that neither the sludge nor the butler were on the same level as the half-demons and slaughterers seen in the Demon Market before. They should be top-tier combat forces in Deshler.

At least at the level of high-level demons, and there were two of them.

Just now, with the robe covering them, Lee Read's actions were not in danger of being discovered by the half-demons and armored warriors. Now that the scene below was bustling with activity, breaking through the earth would inevitably lead to discovery, and even getting closer would fall into the beholder's sight.

After that, the sludge and the butler would definitely move together, giving the invaders the most resolute blow.

"Kill them? Seems like we can't kill them." Shadow vaguely sensed that a contract was in effect, and killing any creature under the auction stage would attract the attention or alarm of Death Small Town.

With the beholder's true vision and perspective, plus the sludge monster and a butler, and the town's power to support them when necessary... the auction house was well-prepared.

"Robbing doesn't necessarily mean killing..." Lee Read transmitted the situation in the crawlspace to Shadow and Eggdrop while pondering how to act. "Can your Shadow Space hold them?"

"They might tear it apart." The current strength of the Shadow Space is limited. If the things stuffed inside constantly struggle, it would be equivalent to directly destroying the inside of Shadow's body.

"Then we can knock them unconscious, or cripple them, we only put the goods in..." Lee Read spoke of his idea—if they went under the auction stage, they would definitely be discovered by the beholder immediately, followed by Deshler's power suppressing them in some way. So the three demons' time to act was very limited, they had to be quick, accurate, and ruthless, retreating immediately after one strike.

Instantly paralyze the opponent's defense force, expand the shadow to hold all the auction items, and then retreat.

That was Lee Read's plan.

The most difficult part was of course the first point—without the Demon Illustrated Handbook prompting weaknesses, how to deal with the sludge and the butler... that would require some skill.

"Are you ready?" Fortunately, Lee Read didn't plan to rob the demon merchant. The living things in the Shadow Space... only needed to consider Fire Cinder Valley Prophet, so there wouldn't be any mistakes easily.

"Let's do it." Shadow had long been eager to try, thinking that this was the Demon Market she had been looking forward to.

[Come on, honey-like beautiful memories...]

...

The auction of the third item was still in progress, the beholder diligently rotating its eyeballs, observing the changes in the soil layer, while the sludge and butler were very relaxed, not feeling that any ignorant demons dared to cause trouble in the Demon Market.

Then, the beholder saw a skeleton, pushing aside layers of soil, swimming like, "swimming" over from between the floor's crawlspaces.

When the sludge received the news, there was still a trace of uncertainty, and it surged toward where the beholder's eyes were looking, on guard.

After that, all the demons under the auction stage saw... a skeleton drilled out of the soil—the skeleton looked exactly like Godrick in the auction house, except it was missing the gold chain around its neck and had a few more tentacles on its back.

The moment the skeleton entered, the sludge surged over, enveloping it with a hiss in a burst of corrosion, and before being completely sealed by the green mud, the skeleton only made one move.

It flipped open a card in its skull.

The card of "Attention."

In an instant, all the eyes under the stage were attracted to the skeleton, followed by the shadow occupying the entire space, just like the jackal family encountered, the entire space seemed to be frozen, falling into stillness.

Almost at the same time, the beholder saw a bone sword emerge from its eye, blocking its vision and blinding it; while the butler suffered a heavy blow to the back of his head, and his eyeballs were smashed out of their sockets.

As for the sludge... it was heavily suppressed by the surging lava, unable to move.

The seal of the auction house was also activated at the same time, and countless souls of Deshler poured in, vowing to defend the order of the Demon Market; but these souls, when they were about to enter the stage, suddenly encountered the obstruction of more wronged souls, entangled together and fell into chaos, and then were pulled into the Necromantic Realm.

Dirge of the Dead.

Next, the sludge began to harden, swallowing the lava in reverse, seeing the light of day again; the butler jerkily broke free from the shackles of the shadow, reaching his hand into his chest.

But the sludge and the butler couldn't move their eyes away, staring fixedly at the skull, seeing it chuckle, but unable to see that the auction items in the adjacent vault and loading area... had all disappeared at this moment.

The shadow began to shrink, retracting from the ground back into the wall crevices, like a magical hand returning fully loaded—the half-demons and armored warriors in the vault and loading area were the first to discover the fact that the auction items had disappeared, and in a panic, they touched the walls.

At the same time, the skeleton that was frozen outside the wall by the sludge crumbled, and then was swallowed by the lava, leaving not even a bone residue.

Only a hole was left in the wall, with traces of the skeleton swimming at the entrance; as for the auction items and the robbers, they were no longer there, everything was like a nightmare.

"No one can leave..." The butler put his eyeballs back into their sockets, took out an ordinary dagger from his chest, and walked step by step toward the lift.

And the demon merchant Bane, who had just been bought by Aberde, opened his toad-like mouth, not understanding what bizarre events had taken place below in this back-and-forth.

The auction house alarm sounded loudly, and the mist in the town square also suddenly dissipated at this moment, gathering around the auction house, completely sealing it off.