The auction moved with elegance after the opening remarks. Each item passed beneath the lights like a prize being sharpened for the room's appetite. The auctioneer never rushed, never wasted a syllable and never allowed the guests even a second to feel in control.
A jeweled compass went first, its case engraved with maps no one could verify and the bidding climbed almost immediately into the millions. A retired duke lifted his paddle only to be challenged by a woman in silk who did not blink once as she raised the price again and again until the compass had become too expensive to be called practical.
A set of brass prosthetic fingers, rumored to enhance dexterity for pianists and surgeons alike, sold for a sum that made several lesser nobles stiffen in their seats. A miniature locomotive engine, polished to mirror sheen and able to power a private carriage for hours, sparked a bidding war so vicious that even the auctioneer's voice seemed to sharpen. The room fed on the spectacle. Every time a hammer fell, someone smiled, someone sighed and someone else quietly recalculated the worth of their estate.
The rhythm only intensified as the evening went on. There were mechanical luxuries for the absurdly rich, relics for the dangerously curious and objects whose purpose was unclear enough to make their rarity feel even more seductive.
One item was a silver music case that could project voices from long distances, sold for fourteen million Isuone after a baron and a ship magnate nearly tore the room apart with their bids.
Another item was a glass vial containing what was described as "captured dawn," climbed past twenty-three million before disappearing into the hands of a masked collector seated high in the eastern balcony.
The hall reacted to every number with restrained frenzy. A bid of one million was no longer impressive. Five million was not enough to make heads turn. Ten million only meant the competition had become serious.
A mechanical servant appeared without sound, gliding forward on a narrow trolley wrapped in black fabric. It did not walk like a human servant nor did it clatter like the clockwork assistants used in lesser houses. Its movements were so smooth that it seemed less constructed than ordained.
It brought the trolley to the center before the stage and came to a perfect halt. The entire hall noticed. Even the people who had spent the whole evening pretending not to care leaned forward now.
"Honored patrons, the main highlight of this evening has arrived. This piece was personally brought here by the Painter of Origins. It is not a fake and not a work selected from existing display collections. The Painter herself chose to offer it to this house to see whether anyone present here is worthy of possessing it."
A collective breath passed through the hall. Even the wealthy who had already spent millions without flinching felt the impact of that revelation. A painting personally delivered by the Painter of Origins was an event of historical consequence. The work is titled Despair of the Deep."
The name alone sounded like a warning. With a careful motion, he pulled the black fabric away.
The hall vanished.
One instant the audience sat in a grand auction hall beneath chandeliers and the next they were submerged beneath an ocean that had no business being inside a building. The temperature dropped at once like the body had been dropped into fathomless water. The lights above were replaced by a dim, aquatic clarity that made every silhouette look suspended in a dream.
For a heartbeat, the most foolish among them panicked. A few cried out. One man lurched so hard in his seat that his opera glasses slipped from his nose That only made the others laugh, because the laughter was as much relief as mockery.
They were under the sea.
Aquatic creatures swam around them. Fish with long trailing fins moved past the audience's faces. A massive creature with fins like silk banners swam through the center aisle as though the seats were nothing more than coral shelves. Smaller schools of creatures flickered near the balconies.
They passed straight through the spectators as if the people were not there at all. Each contact sent delicate ripples through the watery world before the creature re-formed on the other side,
Some of the richest guests, those most accustomed to practical marvels, sat frozen in open astonishment. Others leaned back with nervous delight. Even the most jaded collectors were forced into silence. It was too beautiful to dismiss.
The underwater world rose away and suddenly they were at the ocean's surface beneath a violent storm. Rain crashed down in sheets thick enough to blur the horizon. Lightning flashed somewhere beyond the frame, illuminating swells of black water and foam. The droplets struck the guests' skin and clothing, but they did not wet them.
Instead, each bead of rain touched them like a cold kiss before lifting away again, drawn upward towards the heavy clouds overhead. The effect was uncanny and several women brought their gloved hands to their cheeks as though to confirm the sensation. The storm was ferocious, but it remained strangely poetic.
On a rock in the middle of the wild sea sat a mermaid with sorrow in her posture and a white violin tucked beneath her chin. The music did not merely echo through the scene. It seemed to shake the waves themselves. Her expression was distant and mournful. Her long hair was wet across the stone.
Far away in the storm-shrouded distance, a ship appeared and began sinking. Its sailors shouted and fell into the depths. The audience could see them clearly despite the violence of the rain and the churn of the water. They could even see carnivorous fish below tearing into the fallen sailors with merciless hunger. Blood spread through the waves and dissolved into crimson haze.
A hush moved through the hall again, darker this time.
One sailor, thrown free by the wreck, landed on the mermaid's rock and gasped as if he had been granted a miracle. The mermaid stopped playing. Her head lifted. Her eyes found him. The sailor's expression changed first to confusion, then wonder, then to the helpless, foolish awe of a man who had already lost the moment he believed he had been saved.
The mermaid extended a hand and the sailor reached for it. The gesture was almost romantic and that was what made the crowd lean in all the more. The sailor took her hand. She embraced him and he blushed, captivated by her body.
Then she bit his neck.
The sailor convulsed. His strength vanished as though it had been cut out of him. His limbs fell slack. His body went limp in her arms. The mermaid drew back slowly and dropped the body. She took up her white violin again and played while the dead sailor remained in front of her like an offering.
The painting faded.
The ocean, the storm, the mermaid, the sinking ship, the blood in the waves, the dead sailor, all of it dissolved into the black cloth and the stage beneath it. For several seconds no one in the hall spoke. No one coughed. No one dared to break the stillness. The audience had been shaken too deeply for immediate reaction. Some guests stared straight ahead as though their minds had not yet returned. Others looked at one another with a kind of stricken admiration, as if they had just witnessed an execution performed by divine art.
At last, the auctioneer spoke.
"As you have just seen, this is the first painting the Painter of Origins chose to release through this auction house. Every painting created by her bears an origin and that origin determines the nature of the tale it reveals. She informed our owners that the story within each work changes according to the one who wields it. If the wielder possesses a good heart, the tale may end in goodness. If the wielder is evil, the tale will lead them to ruin. If the wielder is neither wholly good nor wholly evil, the ending may become a mixture of both, as you have just witnessed."
A murmur broke out then because the explanation did not soothe anyone. It deepened the mystery. A painting that adapted its ending to the nature of its owner was very mysterious.
"This piece belongs to a horror origin. Regardless of who takes it, horror will remain its destination. Yet the form that horror takes may differ depending on the soul that claims it. You have before you one of the earliest works ever made by the Painter of Origins and tonight, it begins here."
He lifted the hammer.
"The starting bid is twenty million Isuone."
Hands rose at once. Paddles snapped upward. Voices cut across each other in measured bursts of controlled greed. Twenty-one million. Twenty-two. Twenty-five. The numbers climbed instantly as though the room had been waiting all evening for this moment and now refused to pretend otherwise.
One man called out a bid so high that several guests turned to stare at him, only for a woman three seats away to answer with something even larger and colder. The auctioneer's voice remained smooth as the escalation began.
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The bidding did not end with a graceful slowdown. Bids surged until the final number struck the room like a blow.
Four hundred million Isuone.
At that point, even the most reckless collectors had gone silent. The hammer came down and the man who had won the painting was not young. He was middle-aged,
The auctioneer lowered his hammer and then turned toward the man with a formal gesture.
"The winning patron is requested to come forward."
A murmur passed through the hall as the man rose from his seat. His coat was tailored in dark green velvet lined with brass-thread embroidery. The movement of the fabric made him look heavier than he was. He descended the aisle under the watchful gaze of every guest present, each of them trying and failing to hide how badly they wanted to know who had just become the owner of a painting born from the Painter of Origins herself.
When he reached the stage, a woman appeared without announcement. She wore an opaque veil that concealed her features completely and beneath it the shape of her face remained impossible to read. Her dress was tight and white. White gloves covered her hands and every step she took left behind a glowing purple footprint that lingered for a heartbeat before fading into nothing.
The guests recognized her almost immediately, though most of them had only heard of her in rumor. She was the tour guide of Muse's Artworks, one of the Painter of Origins' subordinates. No one knew her name.
She stopped in front of the man and inclined her head just enough to acknowledge him. When she spoke, her voice was so ethereal the same way a siren's song is beautiful,
"Is this painting for yourself Sir, or for another?"
The man swallowed once, then answered with the blunt honesty of someone who understood that lies were cheap in a room like this.
"For my daughter."
"Is your daughter present in this auction room?"
"She is."
"Then I shall require her presence."
The daughter was brought forward moments later. She was teenage girl with the same proud spine as her father but none of his practiced hardness. She stepped onto the stage and stood near her father, glancing between him and the veiled woman. Everyone in the hall watched her. No one spoke. The auctioneer remained still at the side of the stage, allowing the exchange to unfold.
The veiled woman addressed them both.
"There are three rules attached to any painting created by the Painter of Origins. You will follow them without exception."
Everyone went silent and listened.
"First, the painting must not be used more than three times in a single day unless the Painter of Origins allows it. If it is used for times or higher, the user will be pulled into the painting and continue to exist there as a living character inside it. That outcome is not symbolic but literal. Do not test it."
The girl's eyes widened but she nodded.
"Second, no one except the designated owner may take the painting. No one else may remove it, claim it or interfere with it without permission. Only a mechanical lifeform accepted by the Painter of Origins can do so. Any person who attempts to seize it without consent will die by the painting's own force. Even with consent, if the one holding it harbors evil intent toward the work, the same end will follow. The painting does not negotiate with malice."
A wave of unease swept through the audience. Some of them had expected a warning. None of them had expected something that sounded so final.
"Third, under no circumstances shall anyone speak to the characters inside the painting. This is a living painting. The characters within it are alive. They cannot leave the canvas but they must also remain unaware of the fourth wall. If that boundary breaks, the region itself will be affected by the painting's power. The consequences will not remain limited to this object."
That got the room's full attention. Even the richest and most skeptical guests were now listening like students before a judge. The woman let the silence hold for a moment before continuing.
"For that reason, the painting may be displayed at parties, galas and private events as decoration. It may be admired, studied and enjoyed within those limits. However, the rules remain absolute. The third rule applies only to you, young Miss. You are the only one who can use it. Therefore, you alone must never converse with the figures within it."
The girl nodded again, this time more firmly.
"I understand."
The veiled woman extended her white-gloved hand.
"Then stretch out your hand."
The girl obeyed. From somewhere within the folds of her dress, the woman produced a pen. She wrote a signature on the girl's hand. The ink vanished into her skin almost at once, leaving no mark behind. Then she held out the pen itself.
"Take this. Write your name on the painting in any corner you choose and it will become yours."
The girl accepted the pen with both hands as though she knew she was touching something sacred. Then she turned toward the canvas with visible caution. The entire hall held its breath. The auctioneer did not speak. The father did not move. The guests stared in silence while the girl approached the painting and chose the bottom right corner. With a steady hand, she wrote her signature there.
The instant the final stroke was complete, the signature glowed.
Light spread from the corner in a soft pulse and the entire content of the painting shifted beneath it. The world inside the canvas rearranged itself, responding to the girl's nature, her intent and whatever heart she carried into ownership. The veiled woman tilted her head, then spoke.
"You have a good heart. The painting has changed accordingly."
The girl looked at the canvas as though it had just begun breathing under her touch.
"Then enjoy it, young miss."
A moment later, she vanished.
She simply ceased to be there, leaving only the faint purple trace of her footsteps to mark where she had stood. The hall remained frozen for a beat longer, stunned by the weight of what they had just witnessed. Then the whispers began, spreading in threads of disbelief across the tiers and balconies. Every person in the room had heard the rules.
The auctioneer stepped forward once the murmur had settled enough for him to speak. His mask caught the light as he turned to face the audience. His voice echoed to every corner of the hall.
"Oh, forgot to mention something. Every painting created by the Painter of Origins possesses its own mechanical lifeform to preserve and support it. Do not attempt theft through mechanical proxies, devices, constructs or automatons. Such efforts will end in ash. Anyone who tries to steal one of these works will die before the attempt is completed."
He let the warning sink in before continuing.
"The painting will be delivered safely to the buyer's mansion under secure escort. No further handling is permitted unless it is done according to the conditions already stated."
The father, now no longer merely a bidder but the custodian of something far stranger than wealth, placed a hand over his daughter's shoulder. She looked down at the glowing signature and then back at the canvas. Around them, the hall slowly resumed its breath but the mood had changed permanently.
The Painter of Origins was a very powerful woman.