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Chapter 13

The phone in his pocket vibrated madly, its urgent ringtone enough to drive anyone up the wall. Fang Zhimiao, who was crouched on the roof recording the condition of the tiles, called out loudly, "Master, your phone's ringing."

Gu Jiuque, who had been dismantling the roof tiles piece by piece with Jade Celestial Pivot's help, instantly snapped back to his senses. He took out his phone and casually muted it, then looked at the restorers crouching on the roof. "Have you finished your records?"

The restorers all nodded in unison.

Gu Jiuque casually took several of their notes and looked them over, commenting offhandedly, "Who wrote this? You got the construction method for the tiled roof wrong..."

"This one got the texture of the tiles wrong..."

"Are you sure you measured these dimensions correctly?"

"Whose notes are these? Drawing the decorative roof beasts based on their styles was a good idea, but don't draw them next time. Just take pictures!"

The young restorers could not help trembling as they listened to Gu Jiuque's gentle-toned yet stern critiques. It felt as though they had suddenly returned to a pop quiz in college.

After reviewing everyone's records and correcting each mistake, Gu Jiuque led them on to the next step—numbering every single tile.

Cheng Yuan stroked the carved ridge tile beside her and asked dejectedly, "Master, are we really that dumb?"

When they had first heard that Old Master Gu had directly appointed Gu Jiuque to lead the surveying work at the Gu Family Ancestral Residence, they had been somewhat dissatisfied. They thought Old Master Gu was abusing his position for personal gain, using the opportunity to pave the way for his grandson.

But brutal reality soon taught them a lesson—

As graduate students in cultural relics studies, they not only lagged far behind Gu Jiuque in learning talent and speed, but their hands-on skills were worlds apart as well. They were clearly several years older than Gu Jiuque! Even if Gu Jiuque had begun learning restoration techniques in the womb, there was no way he could have become this omniscient and capable in barely over a decade, right?

Hearing the restorers' half-serious, half-joking wails, Gu Jiuque smiled mildly. "I merely encountered these things earlier than you did and practiced more often. They aren't especially difficult to learn. Once you've handled them a few more times and become proficient, you'll be fine."

Cheng Yuan sighed miserably. "This is so discouraging!"

Though Cheng Yuan claimed to be discouraged, she only became more determined after every setback. Once she finished lamenting, she immediately devoted herself fully to the work. She carefully numbered every tile, carefully drew a map marking their positions, then asked Gu Jiuque from a distance about the problems she encountered during the process.

Since she had the good fortune to work with a junior like Gu Jiuque, whose talent was terrifying, whose fundamentals were solid, and who was so ridiculously handsome, she had to seize the chance to ask what needed asking and learn what needed learning. There was no point wasting limited time agonizing over the gap in talent between people!

After all, as the saying went, comparisons only made people miserable! Not to mention that Master was kind enough to comfort them.

"Gu the Great! Are you really not looking for a girlfriend?" Cheng Yuan gazed at Gu Jiuque with pleading eyes. The more she looked, the more her heart fluttered!

"As expected of the genius restorer you two personally trained!" The supervising instructor, who had been watching coldly from the sidelines, finally spoke after seeing his proud young students thoroughly won over by an eighteen-year-old male college student. "Let's make a deal. The kid doesn't have anything to do over summer break, right? Is he interested in taking on some part-time work?"

Grandpa Gu and Grandma Gu looked over with great interest.

The instructor from the Cultural Heritage Administration kept flipping through the drawings and notes Gu Jiuque had made, practically unable to put them down. "These could be used as textbook examples!"

"With such solid fundamentals, it would be such a shame if he didn't join our bureau's ancient architecture team!"

"I remember Jiuque applied for the cultural relic restoration program at Jingzhou University too. He can come intern at our Cultural Heritage Administration while he's in college! We old fellows go way back—why let such a prize fall into someone else's hands?"

At the same time, old family friends who had rushed over to "watch the excitement" upon hearing that the Gu family home had burned down also noticed Gu Jiuque's extraordinary performance. Everyone was astonished by his learning talent and solid foundation. While constantly praising him as surpassing his predecessors before Grandpa Gu and Grandma Gu, they also kept tempting Gu Jiuque like wolves in grandmother's clothing luring a child with candy.

"Little Gu, do you want to pursue graduate studies? Are you interested in becoming my student?"

"Apply to be my graduate student, and you can join my lab as soon as the semester begins!"

"Apply to be my graduate student, and you can start working on projects with your senior brothers and sisters over the summer."

"Our institute has just taken on a project to restore a historic architectural complex in a certain city. Do you want to join it?"

"Don't just focus on Little Jiuque's talent and foundation in ancient architecture restoration. He's actually even better at painting and calligraphy restoration. This is a Willow-Branch Guanyin Portrait he restored for a client of Antique Appreciation Studio after the fire. He has only reached the stage of rejoining the brushstrokes, but just look at that craftsmanship, those strokes—they've absolutely inherited the Yue family's supreme mounting techniques!"

Seeing that everyone was only admiring her grandson's talent and solid fundamentals in ancient architecture restoration, Yue Jinmei finally could not sit still any longer. With an air of restrained pride, she led everyone into the mounting room and displayed the half-restored Willow-Branch Guanyin Portrait Gu Jiuque had been working on.

It had to be said that repeatedly restoring paintings ten thousand times with Jade Celestial Pivot's help had affected Gu Jiuque beyond measure. Every restoration step he performed after returning to reality was flawless beyond criticism. Even restoration experts with vast experience and exceptional eyesight could not find the slightest flaw when they examined the painting inch by inch through magnifying glasses.

"Perhaps only computer analysis can distinguish the different handwriting now!"

The well-traveled restoration experts clicked their tongues in amazement. Director Qin of Jingzhou City Museum was the first to lose his composure, smiling as he invited him, "It seems our Little Jiuque's talent and skill in painting and calligraphy restoration are even more rare. Are you interested in joining our museum's Institute of Painting, Calligraphy, and Document Restoration?"

"I dare guarantee you this: as long as you're willing to come, you'll have more ancient paintings, calligraphy, and books to restore than you could ever finish! And it's not limited to painting and calligraphy restoration. As long as your skills are up to par, it's not impossible to discuss restoring other categories of antiques as well!"