Chapter 126: A Misprinted Newspaper?

The music and singing were deafening, a sea of people everywhere.

The flow of people was like a tide, bustling, noisy, crowded, and chaotic.

Yet, it was permeated with a thick, worldly atmosphere of life.

Ye Anning followed Lin Sicheng, her gaze full of novelty and longing. The little Pangzi had his hands tucked into Lin Sicheng's trouser pockets, gripping the bottom of the pockets tightly, his two eyeballs rolling round and round, round and round.

Lanterns cast halos of light, paper-cutting stalls were set up on Eight Immortal tables, and the silver scissors flew between the old artisan's fingers.

Shreds of paper drifted down like snowflakes, and a chubby little girl lifted her tiger-head shoes, red light spilling all over the tips of her shoes.

The old man paused his scissors, the tips clicking lightly, and the eight-inch square "Hundred Birds Paying Homage to the Phoenix" suddenly came to life, the magpies accented with Gold Powder appearing vivid and realistic.

The little girl took it in her hands, beaming with joy.

Beside them was a sugar-painting stall, the sugar syrup bubbling in the pot, the smell of burnt sugar mixed with the scent of flowers, winding through the crowd with the hazy mist.

The old artisan had sugar stains on his cuffs, his withered fingers pinching a bamboo skewer to tap lightly on the cutting board, flames licking the copper ladle, pouring out amber-colored sugar threads.

His wrist suddenly flicked, the sugar threads whipping out a long arc of light, and with a wrap of the bamboo skewer, an auspicious pattern formed instantly. The excess syrup dripped down drop by drop, gradually spreading out. After a moment of setting, a bamboo knife cut through lightly, and the sugar sheet curled into a fish tail.

The little Pangzi stared with wide eyes, his lips licking incessantly, then he turned his head to look at Ye Anning.

Ye Anning pursed her lips and smiled: "Why look at me? I didn't bring my wallet!"

Wang Youjian squinted: "Then why didn't you let me bring mine?"

"Bring what? With so many people and it being so chaotic, you wouldn't even know if someone stole it!" Ye Anning laughed out loud: "But what are you afraid of? Your senior brother definitely brought his!"

It was fine not to bring it, as there were indeed too many people, but Lin Sicheng suspected Ye Anning had done it on purpose.

Just when they were leaving, the bag was clearly on top of her clothes; she had taken her coat and then hung the bag back up.

Without thinking too much, Lin Sicheng took out his wallet: "One mouse, one ox, make the stalls a bit smaller!"

"You got it!"

The old man replied, lifting the copper ladle, and the sugar threads were pulled into gold lines.

A few minutes later, the sister and brother were each licking a sugar painting, but after walking only a few steps, Ye Anning stopped again.

Using a noodle press that had been used for at least ten years, its entire body gleaming with oil, the old master pressed down hard, and with a "creak-creak" sound, the thin buckwheat noodles were slowly squeezed out.

Steam billowed in the soup pot, a bamboo-woven strainer was placed on top, and mutton sauce was poured over it, the fresh aroma hitting the nose.

Ye Anning kept swallowing her saliva, Wang Youjian didn't eat, and Lin Sicheng only ordered a small Bowl.

Continuing forward, jujube cakes, mirror cakes, oil cakes, Noodle Skin, cold jelly, baked buns... every time she saw a stall, Ye Anning couldn't move her legs, and regardless of whether it tasted good or not, she definitely had to taste a little.

The little Pangzi was the exact opposite; he didn't love to eat much, but every time he saw some rare trinket, he wanted to buy one.

Wave drums, iron rings, clay dogs, belly-band monkeys... in no time at all, he had filled half a tote bag.

Walking further, a three-stringed instrument rang out sharply. An old actor of the Qin opera appeared, flicking his white beard, his hoarse roar making the soup bowls of the mutton pita bread tremble slightly.

Ye Anning was stunned, watching while she ate.

On the other side, a sturdy man threw with force, and a vermilion central banner was tossed into mid-air. The banner canopy unfolded against the Wind, and the copper bells chimed.

The strong man did several somersaults in a row, and by the time he stood up, the banner had also fallen.

But perhaps the Wind was too strong, and the three-zhang-tall banner was blown quite a bit off course. Suddenly, the man's face was full of panic, suddenly moving forward, suddenly retreating, searching for the landing spot.

The banner brushed past his face, and just as it was about to hit the ground, a foot suddenly reached out, kicking the end of the pole with force.

The central banner shot upward and landed steadily on the man's forehead.

A round of applause.

The little Pangzi didn't move, his eyes glowing.

Lin Sicheng didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

You think he wants to perform with the banner?

He wants to be that banner...

Moving forward again, a crisp "ding-dong" sound came. An old grandmother with white hair held a Chisel, carving four characters onto a silver Bracelet: May you have eternal joy and no misfortune.

Ye Anning stopped again, just staring at the Bracelet.

The little Pangzi also stopped, his eyes blinking.

Of course he wasn't buying it; he was just curious: no wonder Ye Anning didn't bring money, so she was waiting here?

Wonder if Senior Brother could figure it out?

Of course, Lin Sicheng wasn't stupid?

But just like buying oil cakes, buying pita bread, buying baked buns, Lin Sicheng's posture when paying was exceptionally natural.

After measuring the size and carving one, Ye Anning put it on, shaking her fair wrist, the bright silver interlocking Bracelet chiming "ding-dong, ding-dong."

Her eyes crinkled into two slits: "Lin Sicheng, does it look good?"

Lin Sicheng nodded: "It looks good!"

The little Pangzi also nodded, and just as he was about to say something, he got hit on the head.

Without even needing to guess, Ye Anning knew what he wanted to say, her smile hiding a few traces of threat: "Wang Youjian, I wasn't asking you!"

Wang Youjian glared: Ye Anning, you deserve to be single.

Ye Anning sneered: What do you know?

As long as you shut up and follow obediently, that is the best support...

Continuing forward, past the middle hall, the sound in their ears suddenly went quiet.

A large courtyard, the side room doors wide open.

The side rooms and the space under the eaves were filled with people, each person holding at least one object. Whether large or small, square or round, or in a box, or wrapped in cloth.

In the courtyard, sun umbrellas were set up, more than ten Experts lined up, and the old man was in a position close to the eaves.

This spot was considered the best; in the morning it could catch the sun, and at noon it could provide shade.

Looking closer, Hao Jun and Guan Xingmin were actually there too, as well as that Chairman Ding, all sitting together in the Experts' seats.

Children don't need to pay, so Lin Sicheng bought two express tickets.

A regular identification ticket is fifty, but you can only sit in the side room and wait. A mid-tier ticket is one hundred; you still have to wait, but you can sit under the eaves to watch.

Express is two hundred; you can get an identification immediately after entering, choose your Expert, and even watch after the identification is complete.

But there were still many people, and it was almost packed to capacity.

Ye Anning looked curious: "We have to buy tickets?"

Lin Sicheng nodded: "Originally, we didn't have to, but there were too many people on the first day. Just the day before yesterday, tourists got into several fights, even overturning stalls, and two people were even hospitalized. So we have to buy tickets to reduce the flow of people."

Only then did Ye Anning notice that the eaves were full of security guards, and there were also a few Police officers.

After entering, the three of them walked along the steps outside the eaves. Just halfway there, a few "Hey, hey, hey" sounds came over.

"Hey, hey... where are you going? Lin Sicheng, I'm talking to you..."

Hao Jun stood up and shouted loudly. Seeing Ye Anning, his gaze paused for a moment, then he waved vigorously, "Come, come, come, come to me first!"

Lin Sicheng smiled and walked over: "Senior Brother, I only have one ticket!"

"I'm truly impressed, why did you buy a ticket? You come here first..."

As he spoke, he said something to the Assistant at his side, and the Assistant got up and left.

Guan Xingmin and Hao Jun were sitting together, and they had all met before; Ye Anning, bringing Wang Youjian along, greeted them one by one.

Lin Sicheng cracked a joke: "Director Guan, the cases at the bureau are so busy, do you still have time to provide support?"

"It was decided long ago, there's no helping it; no matter how busy, I have to come!"

After just a few brief words, Hao Jun's assistant ran back, holding two guest passes in his hand.

Having already bought tickets, Lin Sicheng didn't intend to take them, but Hao Jun shoved them into his hand: "It's fine, you'll definitely have to sit with your grandfather for a while!"

Lin Sicheng glared at him, and Hao Jun laughed, "Hehehe."

After sitting for just a few minutes, Lin Sicheng and Ye Anning stood up.

Watching their retreating figures, Hao Jun looked thoughtful: "Lao Guan, what do you think?"

"Hard to say!" Guan Xingmin pondered for a moment, "But that girl has an upright aura on her face!"

Hao Jun let out a "Ha": "You might as well switch to fortune-telling, why be a Police officer?"

"You don't know a damn thing!"

As the two muttered, Lin Sicheng and Ye Anning arrived under the eaves.

Lin Zhangqing's spot had the most people; the regular numbers were lined up past fifty, and two security guards were specifically maintaining order.

The security guard brought them over. Lin Zhangqing was currently examining an item, so the two didn't speak and stood there quietly.

After about three minutes, the collector stood up, and Lin Zhangqing raised his head. Just as he was about to say "Sit," he subconsciously paused in surprise.

A smile appeared on his face, and Lin Zhangqing flipped over the desk sign: Paused.

"Grandfather, this is Cousin Ye, my teacher's niece, and this is Youjian, my teacher's child... Teacher and his wife are away on a business trip, so we came out to look around!"

The siblings said in unison: "Hello, Grandfather!"

"Good... good!" Lin Zhangqing smiled, "Sit!"

Lin Sicheng shook his head and placed the tickets on the table: "We won't sit. Grandfather, you go ahead and get busy; we're going to the back hall to take a look!"

"That's fine, you go ahead and look around!"

The old man nodded and stood up.

Ye Anning and Wang Youjian politely said goodbye.

It was no more than three or five sentences in total, even shorter than the time spent with Hao Jun and Guan Xingmin.

With another soft smile, Ye Anning pursed her lips and followed behind Lin Sicheng.

The silver Bracelet on her wrist kept turning.

Watching the two's retreating figures, a glint appeared in Lin Zhangqing's eyes. After a brief pause, he waved his hand: "No more identifications, off work!"

The Assistant hurriedly packed up the items.

It was very quiet; no one spoke, and they just looked at the exhibits in silence.

Two silver rings bumped together from time to time, sounding exceptionally crisp.

Wang Youjian blinked his eyes, looking to the left, then looking to the right.

Lin Sicheng rubbed his head: "What do you want to eat tonight?"

The little Pangzi glanced at Ye Anning: "Senior Brother, it's not up to me!"

Ye Anning glared at him.

Lin Sicheng laughed again: "Don't worry, today it's definitely up to you. Let's look around first; there are quite a few stalls, and we'll go once we're done!"

Only then did Ye Anning realize they had finished walking through the exhibition hall in the back hall.

There were several exhibition halls with many tea sets and quite a few other Cultural Relics, but she had no impression of what exactly she had seen.

Looking further ahead, sure enough, there were many stalls.

This was the back half of Dongyue Temple, right against the base of the city wall, with only a wall separating it from Ring City Park.

The place was huge, and now it was all cordoned off, marked into squares, and equipped with square stools and sun umbrellas.

There were many tourists and quite a few stalls. Some had many items, roughly a hundred or eighty pieces, while others only had one or two pieces on display. But without exception, all of them had the new Identification Certificate issued by the organizer on display.

After walking around roughly, Lin Sicheng actually saw a familiar face.

It was that stall selling old books, the very owner from whom he had bought "Annals of the Yellow Emperor" back then. It was from his stall that he bought that internal reference material, which led to him meeting Wang Qizhi.

As soon as he saw this person, Lin Sicheng knew that those stalls with many items were all invited from Xiaodongmen by the Cultural Relics Center (the organizer) to attract tourists.

It was quite a coincidence.

Lin Sicheng walked straight over.

More than a month had passed, and the shopkeeper had long since forgotten him. Seeing a handsome man and a beautiful woman, dressed quite smartly, he hurriedly greeted them: "What would the two of you like to look at?"

"Just looking around!"

Lin Sicheng sat down.

Seeing that it was all newspapers and magazines, and all items from after the founding of the nation, Ye Anning did not sit, but stood to the side.

"Uncle quite likes these things!"

"Is that so?"

Lin Sicheng smiled.

No wonder that back then, with just a single glance, Professor Wang had recognized that internal reference material?

Thinking secretly to himself, he flipped through them casually.

Not to mention, it was much better than last time; at least the items were much older.

But there were not many with collection value, and even fewer that were rare.

After a rough look, Lin Sicheng prepared to change locations. Just as he was about to rise, he squinted his eyes again.

In the center of the street stall lay an old envelope, a bit larger than a standard envelope, looking more like a document bag.

It was quite thick inside, and what it contained should be a newspaper.

Looking at the cover again: the paper was yellowed, stamped with two black postmarks: one on the flap, one in the bottom right corner. In the middle was written a line of hard-pen calligraphy in the Mao Style: Please forward to Comrade □□阝.

The very middle should have been the name, but it might have been soaked in water, leaving only a radical for "ear".

Of course, there was nothing strange about this line of text; what Lin Sicheng found strange were the two stamps on the envelope:

A large circle enclosing a small circle, with "BJ" on top, "Seventeen (Branch) A" on the bottom, and the date in the middle: 1964…10…17.

It looked ordinary, like a stamp from some post office in Beijing, and a seventeenth branch office at that.

But only a very small number of people knew that the office where this stamp originated was inside the Forbidden City.

Internally, it was called the "Nanhai Post Office," while externally it only had code names: "Unit So-and-So," "Qi Temple Unit 10," or "So-and-So Troop."

External stamps were uniformly designated by "BJ·Number," and the most core category among them used "BJ·Seventeen" as its code.

Then, depending on the specific unit, they were distinguished by "A, B, C, D." Moreover, the earlier the character in the sequence, the higher the rank.

What if it was the character "A"?

The General Office of the Central Committee!

Lin Sicheng's spirit lifted: Who could the recipient be, the one whose name on the envelope was blurred, leaving only an "ear" radical?

And who could the sender be?

There were only four characters, and they were in the Shu Style; the recipient's name also only had an "ear" radical left. To be honest, Lin Sicheng really could not recognize it.

Of course, if it were the full name, even though very few people knew about "BJ·Seventeen (Branch) A," this envelope would never have ended up on a street stall.

Secretly suspicious, Lin Sicheng opened the envelope.

It was indeed a newspaper, but not a full edition; it was an extra. The headline was very eye-catching: Our Country's First Atomic Bomb Successfully Exploded.

If he remembered correctly, this should be the second extra of the People's Daily. But because it was a complimentary issue aimed at government agencies at the county level and above nationwide, the circulation was extremely large, and many copies survived.

From the perspective of curios, the value was not high.

Besides that, four characters were written in fountain pen at the top of the back: Unwavering determination, man can conquer nature.

This time it was in the Shu Style, clearly the handwriting of another person, with a neat structure and a spirited air.

But unfortunately, he still could not recognize it.

Lin Sicheng frowned: In that case, was the only value of this item the two stamps on the envelope?

It seemed like more?

He did not know if it was an illusion, but he always felt something was wrong, as if he were suffering from "darkness under the lamp," and something had been overlooked by him?

But it was not good to keep sitting here, holding this newspaper and reading it, otherwise, no matter how stupid the shopkeeper was, he would suspect there was something strange about this item.

And to be honest, these two stamps alone were enough. If he met a collector who liked them, like Professor Wang, he would pay fifty thousand for one without even a flicker of a frown.

Pondering secretly, Lin Sicheng raised the envelope: "Shopkeeper, how much for this envelope?"

"That newspaper is an extra, five hundred!"

Lin Sicheng laughed immediately: "I am very young, but you cannot treat me like a Japanese tourist to be slaughtered, and twice at that? Even if it is an extra, it is not worth five hundred..."

"Eh?"

Hearing the voice, the shopkeeper suddenly remembered: this young man had bought a magazine at his stall.

Back then, he had asked for three thousand, and in the end, he sold it for thirty...

He smiled: "Why didn't you say so earlier? Fifty!"

Lin Sicheng deftly took out the money.

The siblings looked at each other.

Not to mention whether the item was valuable or not, but this way of bargaining by Lin Sicheng was truly rarely seen.

After paying, he scanned the area roughly, and seeing there was nothing else eye-catching, Lin Sicheng stood up.

But he did not continue walking forward; instead, he walked back.

Wang Youjian was confused: "Senior brother, are we going to eat now?"

His dumplings from lunch had not even finished digesting, and he had been stuffed by Ye Anning with all sorts of strange, not-so-tasty things; he still felt bloated at this moment.

Lin Sicheng smiled: "It's still early for dinner... let's find a quiet place."

Ye Anning's eyes lit up: Had Lin Sicheng picked up another treasure?

Two adults and one child, the three walked to the base of the wall connecting to the rear hall of the Museum, and Lin Sicheng took out the newspaper again.

Ye Anning glanced at it: "Do you need a Magnifying Glass? I'll go ask Grandpa for one..."

"Sister Anning, not for now!"

Lin Sicheng shook his head and spread out the newspaper.

What was wrong?

From top to bottom, and then from bottom to top, he scrutinized it carefully twice. When he looked at the headline again, Lin Sicheng was suddenly stunned, letting out a "Ha."

What about the date?

Right under "People's Daily," where the specific date should have been, it was now completely blank?

Hahaha... Daily, daily, without a date, what kind of daily is it?