Chapter 2445

The thin old man sneered: "If I drink, I'm your grandson, if I don't drink, you're my grandson, do you want to bet?"

The fat old man opened his mouth to agree, but suddenly felt something was wrong with a flash of inspiration, and immediately shook his head: "Don't bet!"

The thin old man looked at the fat old man with disdain: "Guan Wangcai, even if I call you grandpa, do you dare to answer?"

Old Cricket laughed out loud: "Ma Hong, you call him grandpa, see if he dares to answer!"

Guan Wangcai glared at Old Cricket fiercely: "You old immortal, don't stir up trouble on the side."

At this time, Old Zhou slowly walked out. Now, as long as he strolls around the house, he has already thrown away his crutches, that is, he walks a bit slowly, needing to move forward step by step. Moreover, walking a distance also requires a rest.

"Several old brothers, it's a bit hot outside, why not sit in the living room, there's air conditioning, it's cool. Dongzi won't be back until he gets off work, it'll be more than an hour."

"Thank you, Old Brother Zhou!" Ma Hong thanked with a smile: "There's no sun today, sitting outside for a while and chatting is quite good."

As he spoke, Ma Hong looked at the tricycle. This was his life, how could he let it leave his sight.

Guan Wangcai naturally had the same idea, but Ma Hong had already refused, so he didn't speak, just smiled slightly at Old Zhou.

As for Old Cricket, he wanted to go to the living room to blow the air conditioning. But the two old brothers didn't want to go, so he didn't say anything. Because trust needs time to build, and after they contact Zhou Andong twice more, trust will naturally be built.

Since people didn't want to, Old Zhou naturally wouldn't force it, so he had someone send a chair and sat at the door.

Old Zhou looked at the tables and chairs on the tricycle and asked Old Cricket: "What kind of material is that cart of furniture, I can smell the fragrance here."

Old Cricket laughed: "They are all Qinan agarwood!"

Old Zhou's eyes widened instantly, he hurriedly stood up and walked over there, his movements were a bit more agile than usual. He came to the tricycle, reached out to touch this and that, with a cautious look.

If it were a year ago, he definitely wouldn't know what Qinan agarwood was. For him, as long as it was wood, besides making furniture and beams, it was for burning fire. There were plenty on the mountain, and it was worthless at all.

But since knowing that Zhou Andong had collected a lot of antiques, he also began to pay attention to knowledge in this area. Although he couldn't identify the wood, he knew the value of Qinan agarwood.

Old Cricket, Ma Hong, and Guan Wangcai also walked over. Ma Hong reached out and stroked a tabletop, his eyes full of reluctance: "Old Brother Zhou, these are all good things, they are from the Ming Dynasty and early Qing Dynasty.

Back then, during that movement, how many good things were chopped up for firewood. I took a huge risk to hide these. If it weren't for the family waiting for money, I wouldn't have sold them."

"Every family has a scripture that is hard to recite!" Old Zhou said with emotion: "But don't worry, these things have reached my son's hands, and they can definitely be well preserved. Whenever you want to see them, you can come over at any time."

Ma Hong shook his head slightly, saying with some sentiment: "Since they are sold, I won't look at them again. Looking at them too much will only add trouble."

"That's not trouble, but heartache." Guan Wangcai said with a smile: "Looking at them too much, I'm afraid of getting heart disease."

Ma Hong said unpleasantly: "If I die of heart disease, your sister will be a widow."

Old Cricket's mouth twitched. Ma Hong is Guan Wangcai's own brother-in-law. Therefore, just now Guan Wangcai asked Ma Hong to call him grandpa, which was also a joke. If Ma Hong called, he really wouldn't dare to answer, otherwise his old sister could break his legs.

Moreover, Guan Wangcai could have today because Ma Hong brought him out, and his craftsmanship was also taught by Ma Hong. Don't look at Guan Wangcai's wealthy appearance, if it weren't for Ma Hong, this old guy would have starved to death long ago.

"Beep beep beep!"

A car horn came from the entrance of the Hutong. Several people looked up and saw Zhou Andong's car parked in front of the garage door, and then Zhou Andong pushed open the door and got out of the car.

"Why so many this time?" Zhou Andong was also very surprised.

"Chairman Zhou, come, come, come, let me introduce you." Old Cricket pointed to Ma Hong and Guan Wangcai with a smile on his face, and said to Zhou Andong who walked over: "His name is Ma Hong, this one is Guan Wangcai, they are both my old brothers for decades.

The things in their hands are all treasures. Usually, I want to see them, but they aren't willing. If it weren't for the family's urgent need for money recently, there's really no way, they absolutely wouldn't take these treasures out to sell."

Zhou Andong smiled and shook hands with Ma Hong and Guan Wangcai: "Old Ma, Old Guan, nice to meet you. Don't stand at the door, please come in, let's go in and chat slowly."

Zhou Andong turned to the security guard at the door and shouted: "Call a few people over and move everything on the car to the third courtyard."

"Yes!" The security guard saluted, turned and entered the courtyard, and called more than a dozen people. They started moving the things on the tricycle into the courtyard. Since they were antiques, they moved them cautiously, fearing a mistake.

Soon, the third courtyard was filled with all kinds of tables, chairs, and stools, as well as wooden boxes that were tightly sealed and of different sizes, about seventy or eighty of them. And the wood of the wooden boxes looked very new, and they should have been newly made.

Zhou Andong helped Old Zhou sit on a carved high-backed agarwood chair, and then said to the security guard: "Open all the wooden boxes."

"Yes!" The security guard answered, went to the tool room to get tools, and pried open the wooden boxes one by one.

Zhou Andong's eyes became brighter as he watched. Guan Wangcai picked up a jade pot and stroked it like stroking a woman's smooth skin, his eyes full of reluctance.

"Chairman Zhou, the Chinese intertwined thin-tire jade pot, as far as I know, there are only three complete ones without any flaws. One is in the British Royal Museum, one is in the Wanwan Museum, and the remaining one is this one in my hand. Of course, whether there are any undiscovered ones in the folk, this is hard to say."

Then, Guan Wangcai carefully took out an object from the wooden box, but it was wrapped in bright yellow cotton cloth, layer by layer. It took Guan Wangcai a long time to open it, revealing the true face of the object, which was actually a phoenix crown.

"This is a kingfisher phoenix crown, only a first-rank noble lady can wear it. However, who wore this kingfisher phoenix crown is already impossible to examine."

Zhou Andong carefully held the phoenix crown in front of him, gently touched the feathers on the phoenix crown with his fingertips, feeling the soft and delicate touch, and couldn't help but feel a sense of amazement in his heart.

"These feathers are really beautiful, I thought they were fake."

Guan Wangcai said with a smile: "Since ancient times, traditional kingfisher is an indispensable and unique raw material in the kingfisher craft. The reason for saying this is because only the feathers of the kingfisher can present that unique luster and rich layering of colors."

Zhou Andong couldn't put it down, observing the phoenix crown carefully. Guan Wangcai looked at him and said: "It can be said that the essence of the kingfisher craft lies in the word 'kingfisher'. If there were no real kingfisher feathers, then the kingfisher phoenix crown produced would lose its original charm and value, and would belong to counterfeit and shoddy goods."

It's just that it's regrettable that this craft is too extravagant, wasteful, and extremely cruel.

During the Song Dynasty, members of the royal family believed that this production method not only had no aesthetic value, but could even be said to be a surface vanity that was not worth pursuing at all. Therefore, a ban was issued to prohibit the production of kingfisher phoenix crowns.

However, time passed, and during the Yuan Dynasty, this ban was lifted. But during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, it was lifted and banned many times. In 1958, the first generation of inheritors of the kingfisher craft welcomed a difficult task, which was to repair the kingfisher phoenix crown unearthed from Dingling.

The two phoenix crowns unearthed at that time had their soft kingfisher parts severely damaged. It is estimated that to repair these two phoenix crowns, each would require two hundred soft kingfishers.

What's more demanding is that according to the color selection standard, only five to six out of every hundred kingfishers can be selected as high-quality, and the rest will be ruthlessly eliminated. This means the elimination rate is as high as 95%. Such a high proportion of elimination undoubtedly makes it extremely difficult to obtain enough high-quality soft kingfishers.

To repair these two phoenix crowns, it actually requires four hundred kingfishers as a base, which means the total number of kingfishers actually screened is likely to be close to ten thousand. Such a huge number is really staggering.

It is precisely because of this that after those two kingfisher phoenix crowns were repaired that year, the state issued a strict order to strictly prohibit the use of kingfishers to repair phoenix crowns again. Since then, if any kingfisher phoenix crowns are unearthed, only substitutes can be found for repair.

Zhou Andong looked at them one by one, Guan Wangcai explained on the side, the characteristics and historical background of each cultural relic. The expression on his face looked very calm, but his heart was bleeding.

And Zhou Andong was exactly the opposite of Guan Wangcai, his heart was already excited. This time the quantity sent was large, and each piece could be called a national treasure.

Zhou Andong finished looking at the bottles and jars, and then walked towards the Qinan agarwood furniture. He picked up a stool and threw it into the pool. With a 'splash', the stool didn't float, but sank slowly.

"Chairman Zhou!" This time it was Ma Hong who spoke: "These tables, chairs, and stools are all Qinan agarwood, with high density, and sink as soon as they enter the water."

Zhou Andong came to the side of the pool, just about to lie down and fish out the stool, a security guard jumped into the pool with a 'splash', picked up the stool and handed it to Zhou Andong: "Chairman!"

"Thank you!" Zhou Andong thanked with a smile and reached out to take the stool. He didn't understand this, but he knew that the price of agarwood was comparable to gold. And Qinan agarwood is the aristocrat among agarwood, extremely rare, so the price is calculated by the gram.

"This is really good stuff."