Seal

After Zhou Wenping and Chu Chen clinked glasses, he asked, "Xiao Chen, are you free next week? I have a job involving clearing out a residence."

"For people in the antique business like us, how could we not be free? But who's the other party? Brother Zhou, when did you start working as a go-between?" Chu Chen asked, somewhat puzzled.

"Heh, the owner of that residence is actually my wife's second granduncle..."

"What second granduncle!"

Sister-in-law Zhou "cut" in, saying, "He's actually from our village. Back then, his family were landlords, and my grandfather even worked for them as a long-term laborer."

"Mommy, what's a long-term laborer?" Zhou Wen Hui asked curiously, pausing with a sweet near her mouth.

Zhou Wenping hurriedly explained, "A long-term laborer is someone who works all the time without getting paid. That's what a long-term laborer is."

"Oh, stop it. Who explains it like that? Aren't you afraid of teaching our daughter badly?" Sister-in-law Zhou said with an annoyed look.

"Ah, then Daddy does housework all day without getting paid. Daddy, you're a long-term laborer too!"

"Pfft!"

Zhou Wen Hui's words made everyone laugh. Zhou Wenping said awkwardly to her,

"You're just a child. Eat your food and don't talk nonsense."

Zhou Wen Hui immediately became unhappy. Pouting, she said, "Hmph, stinky Daddy, I'm not talking to you anymore."

"Ahem!" Zhou Wenping coughed awkwardly, shifting the conversation back. "As my wife said, that family used to be landlords, so they still had some things stored away. Those things weren't destroyed before, either. Something happened to his family this time, so he wants to find someone to take a look and exchange those ancestral items for some emergency money."

"Everyone in their village knows I'm in this line of business, so they called me this afternoon and asked me to help make the connection. But I don't know what good items his family actually has, so I wanted to ask your opinion."

When Chu Chen heard this, he readily agreed. "Sure, no problem. Of course we can't pass up an opportunity like this. Even if we don't find anything, we can still take a trip around Xijing. I've been in the antique trade for so many years, but I've never visited Xijing, this thousand-year-old capital. I should take this chance to have a good look around its antique market."

Seeing that Chu Chen had agreed, Zhou Wenping was delighted. He turned and asked Old Wu, "What do you say, Old Wu?"

Old Wu scratched his head and said apologetically, "Brothers, I'm sorry, but I have to go home with my wife next week. What a pity that I won't be able to make it."

"All right, then. Guodong, are you going?" Zhou Wenping asked Li Guodong.

Before Li Guodong could answer, Chu Chen said with a smile, "Exactly. Guodong, you have nothing to do during summer vacation. You can bring your girlfriend along, too. It'll strengthen your relationship, and it'll also give us a chance to meet her."

After hearing that, Old Wu joked, "Yo, Guodong, not bad! After being a monk for several years, you've finally returned to the secular world. How come you didn't bring her along to dinner today so we could meet her?"

Zhou Wenping picked up the liquor bottle. "Exactly. This won't do. Do you still consider us friends or not? No, you have to down three penalty cups."

Everyone began egging him on to drink. Li Guodong had no choice but to down three cups of penalty liquor.

Perhaps the liquor had really given the timid man courage. After three cups, Li Guodong's face was flushed, and he said thickly, "Fine, I'll go. I'll definitely bring her along. Otherwise, I'll take your family name."

Everyone cheered loudly. Chu Chen said with a smile, "Good! As the people of Bashu would say, you've finally shown some spirit. Just for that, I have to toast you, Brother Li."

After that, their cups clinked back and forth, and everyone had a wonderful time. The atmosphere was exceptionally lively.

********************************

The next day, Chu Chen woke up early as usual. Yesterday's meal had lasted more than three hours. With the lively atmosphere, their drinking contest had also been unusually intense. The four of them had finished eight 500-milliliter bottles of Maotai. By the end, apart from Chu Chen, who was still somewhat conscious thanks to his strong constitution, the others were all dead drunk.

Perhaps the liquor had been of good quality, or perhaps it was because he possessed a special ability. After getting up, Chu Chen didn't have a headache at all. Otherwise, the effects of a hangover would have been miserable.

Today, Chu Chen planned to stock up on some goods. After thinking it over these past two days, he still felt it would be better to run a street stall. The vendors had quite extensive information networks, and information was the most important thing in the antique trade. Besides, mixing around in the market would make it more convenient for him to encounter opportunities to find undervalued treasures.

As for stone gambling, to be honest, Chu Chen still hadn't decided exactly what to do. Going occasionally was fine, but if he gambled on stones all day and won most of the time, people might become suspicious.

Besides, the quality of the rough material in the capital wasn't as good as that in the south. Good steel had to be used on the blade. What Chu Chen wanted most now was to hitch a ride to the stone-gambling markets in southern Yunnan and see whether he could get to know a few informants.

He had often heard that good jadeite rough material was kept in the sellers' homes. Without an informant to lead the way, they wouldn't sell it to outsiders. If he already knew an informant, he wouldn't be stocking up today; he would have flown to southern Yunnan to gamble on stones long ago.

In truth, the most important issue was that he had no money. If he had money, he could go directly to the public auctions for large-scale transactions. Chu Chen believed that with his special ability, he would definitely make a fortune by then. If he was lucky, earning over a hundred million wouldn't be difficult.

Thinking of this, Chu Chen hesitated. Should he go gamble on stones or stock up on goods? After considering it, he decided to give up the temptation of stone gambling. After all, any disturbance in the stone-gambling market could spread far too easily. If he won today and then won again tomorrow, some people with ulterior motives would inevitably take notice.

After all was said and done, Chu Chen's reputation was simply too small. If he were famous, no one would find it strange if he often won. That was also why he wanted to go stone gambling in southern Yunnan. The volume of rough material there was huge, so winning wouldn't be surprising. Even if he won several times, people would only praise his good judgment, and his reputation would rise accordingly.

The place where Chu Chen went to stock up was the Capital Antique City, just one wall away from Panjiayuan. Uncle Wu had introduced him to this channel as well.

The Capital Antique City could be considered the largest antique and art trading center in Asia at present. It had taken shape around the same time as Panjiayuan, and both were long-established antique markets in the capital.

Although it wasn't the weekend, Chu Chen still saw crowds surging through the place, making it extremely lively. However, the shop he was headed for was somewhat out of the way, so he didn't have to squeeze through the crowds like everyone else. In such hot weather, being pressed in among a crowd really wasn't pleasant.

When he was almost at the shop, an old man suddenly flung open the door of an antique store and stormed out, grumbling angrily, "What nonsense! It's clearly an item passed down from my ancestors, yet they insisted it was a modern imitation. If you can't recognize antiques, why open an antique shop?"

The situation was probably that the old man had brought an antique to sell, but the appraiser hadn't thought highly of it and had even said something unpleasant, leading to the dispute. At first, Chu Chen paid it no attention. Such things happened all the time in the antique trade. Although antique shop appraisers sometimes made mistakes, most of the time, the items customers brought in simply weren't genuine.

However, when Chu Chen caught sight of the item in the old man's hand from the corner of his eye, he felt that something was off. He hurriedly called out, "Sir, please wait."

"What do you want? What business do you have?"

The old man stopped. His tone was somewhat stiff as he tightened his grip on the item and watched Chu Chen warily.

With a broad smile, Chu Chen said, "Sir, I mean no harm. I just wanted to ask whether you're planning to sell the item in your hand. If possible, could I take a closer look?"

The old man regarded Chu Chen suspiciously. "You want to buy it? If you do, let's make one thing clear first: this item isn't cheap."

Chu Chen nodded. "All right. As long as it's a good item, we can discuss the price."

The old man had come specifically to sell the item. Seeing that Chu Chen seemed easy to deal with, he walked to the side of the road and handed it over.

The old man might not have been involved in the antique trade and didn't know that antiques shouldn't be handled directly. Seeing this, Chu Chen frowned, but he could only carefully accept the item and begin examining it.

It was a roughly six-centimeter-tall seal made of green jade. There was a black mass on top, which looked rather ugly at first glance.

However, the moment the item touched his hand, Chu Chen felt delighted. Even without using his special ability, he knew that it was indeed an antique. Perhaps it was precisely because of the black mass that the people in the antique shop had misjudged it.

That black mass had a special name in the antique trade: "oil lifting." It had been extremely popular from the Song dynasty through the Ming and Qing dynasties. Specifically, it involved using certain heat-processing methods to work black substances, such as ebony sawdust, into jade, giving it an antique flavor. It was also called "black lifting."

This method was also frequently used in modern counterfeiting. However, ancient techniques had certain limitations. Because their processing methods were not advanced enough, the jade would develop cracks. After the ancients handled it for a long time, sweat seeped into the cracks and produced yellow staining. The contrast between the yellow and black staining was extremely obvious.

From this point alone, it was clear that the seal was an old item. Chu Chen also couldn't understand why the shop owner hadn't noticed such an obvious feature. Was the man simply not skilled enough, or had he made his judgment after only a cursory glance?

Chu Chen then began carefully examining the seal's features. The first thing he noticed was that the black staining caused by the oil lifting had spread downward from the top, giving it an air of solemn majesty.

The seal material was square and regular, with a fine, lustrous, pure texture. A dragon finial had been carved into the black-stained section at the top. Its body coiled around, its head centered, and its bearing majestic in every direction. Each dragon scale was clearly defined, its features finely detailed, and its craftsmanship exquisite—a perfect combination of jade and ingenious workmanship.

Judging from the carving of the dragon finial, it should have been made in the style of Ming dynasty artisans. Looking at the dragon's carving through a magnifying glass, he could see many lines. These were traces left by polishing with a water lathe and diamond sand in ancient times, matching the characteristics of the Ming dynasty.

Based on these points, it could basically be determined that this was a Ming dynasty green-jade seal with an ancient dragon finial and oil lifting. After using his special ability, Chu Chen confirmed the conclusion as well.