Chapter 389: The Qilin Bearing Everything (2)

Fatty complained, "Xiao Ge, I told you to wipe the window, not this. If I'd known you'd be so diligent, I would have let you do the floor earlier."

Poker-face shook his head, rubbed it, and sniffed. I noticed that the water he wiped off was green.

"Fading? No way." Fatty gasped. "Damn, your grandmother's, don't tell me it's a painted fake?"

My heart skipped a beat. Then we'd be in deep shit. From the cautious attitude of the waiters earlier, this item must be genuine, but there could be accidents. If it's fake, then the auction party itself committed fraud. If they insist the auction item was real and it turned fake in our hands, we'd never be able to clear ourselves even if we jumped into the Yellow River.

Just as I was about to look closely, Poker-face said it wasn't that and told us not to touch: "Poisonous." He showed us his hand; where he'd touched the liquid, a large patch of two-layered red spots had appeared and was spreading toward his palm.

I was startled. Fatty clapped his hands and said, "Ah, I get it. I've heard that Americans sometimes smear a chemical on antiques to prevent theft. If you touch it, you get an allergic reaction and pass out. Hey, then why was I fine just now?"

"You wrapped it in cloth; it might have blocked it. This stuff dissolves when it absorbs moisture."

The red rash on Poker-face's hand didn't spread further, and he showed no signs of fainting. He didn't seem to care much. Fatty wrapped the jade seal in a towel and went with him to rinse it downstairs.

After washing, the jade seal became extremely clear and translucent. We looked at it in the full sunlight in the courtyard, and many details that were unclear earlier immediately appeared. I found the carving of the seal was so intricate that it reached a divine level. Even if it weren't an antique, it would certainly be a masterpiece in art history.

I felt relieved, thinking "Good, good."

The entire knob of the jade seal could now be carefully observed. I found it was a shape of a qilin stepping on a ghost — a qilin with its head held high and chest out, stepping on a three-headed little ghost. The ghost's claws grasped the qilin's claws. But on closer inspection, you'd see that the qilin itself was formed by many little ghosts — incredibly ingenious carving. The overall shape didn't look like a qilin stepping on ghosts, but ghosts forming a qilin. And these ghosts all had scales, seeming like snakes coiled together.

Ghost-knob dragon-fish jade seal.

"Ghost knob" was true to its name, but where were the dragon-fish? All I saw were snake-like patterns. Changing the angle of the seal, we immediately discovered that the qilin shape turned into countless dragon-fish shapes. When looked at sideways, the intertwined shapes of those little ghosts all revealed the meaning of dragon-fish.

Awesome.

As someone with some knowledge of traditional Chinese craftsmanship, I immediately understood that this item's value was extremely dominant. In the antique market, appearance, creativity, craftsmanship, and provenance are all important. Often if one of these four factors is excellent, the value is considerable. Yet this piece reached the limit in almost every aspect. The price paid earlier, to be honest, was really not high. If we hadn't disrupted things, the final transaction price would probably have been astronomical.

Thinking about it gave me cold sweat. If I were the seller and someone snatched this item, I would never forgive that person. At the same time, I felt that we had escaped with such a powerful item so easily. It seemed their security measures were too childish.

The overall shape of the qilin felt very similar to the tattoo on Poker-face's body, but I knew they were different. That said, qilins are generally all like that.

Fatty drooled over it and said, "We need to count how many fish and how many ghosts. If the numbers are special, it'll be even more incredible." With that he started counting. After just a few counts, he went "Ah" and said, "Not good, there's a problem with its condition."

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"This ghost is missing a head." He pointed it out to me. I looked and indeed, on the very intricate carved lines, there was a sudden break. Because the carving was so complex, if you didn't count one by one, you wouldn't notice this detail.

Looking over the whole thing, there wasn't just one place — three spots had broken lines. But strangely, the breaks were very smooth, as if deliberately made. Fatty gestured and found that those three spots were exactly where three fingers would grip when using the seal, where the finger pads would be.

"Have you heard of the 'matching pattern shirts' of old Beijing?" Fatty suddenly asked.

I shook my head. Fatty said, "The patterns on the jacket and vest are connected. When you wear the vest, the sleeves of the jacket show clouds, and the vest has a crescent moon. When you take off the vest, the jacket sleeves still have clouds, but the front of the jacket shows a full moon. This is called 'waxing and waning'."

I exclaimed, "What what? Why don't you just say it straight?" Fatty said, "Your Fatty Lord's meaning is that these three ghost heads are actually three rings. The person wearing the three rings grabs the seal, and the rings' positions exactly match the breaks. When you grip, the seal becomes complete. Ingenious, damn ingenious."

I grabbed it and thought to myself: clever as it is, it seems very similar to the ghost seal in my mind, but how can we prove whether it is or if there's a connection? I asked Poker-face, "You..." Then I thought, he must have forgotten everything, so asking would be useless.

Poker-face didn't seem particularly interested in this either, showing no special reaction. Fatty immediately fell in love with the item, almost wanting to swallow it into his stomach: "Damn, we've hit the jackpot this time. Wu Xie, if we want to sell this, who do you think could take it?"

I thought for a moment and suddenly felt a bad premonition: "This... it's really hard to say."

Just then, there were several honks outside, startling us. Fatty immediately wrapped the item back up and said, "Alright, the little girl is back. Stop pondering. We'll keep this thing; sooner or later someone will tell us. Let's put it away first."

He said this and brought it back inside. Fatty was very clever; he climbed up to the beam and stuffed it into a brick gap on the beam. Then he saw that it was indeed Huo Xiuxiu returning, followed by several people carrying large bags. They went upstairs and put down sleeping bags and the things she had mentioned. Fatty reacted quickly, immediately acting as if he had never seen the jade seal, and asked, "Where's the wine? Where's the wine?"

Huo Xiuxiu took out two unlabeled bottles of liquor: "The best er guo tou, I guarantee you've never tasted it."

"You're bragging. Can er guo tou have a 'best'?" Fatty said. But he saw that the people who came with her said goodbye and left. The little girl didn't leave; she took out a large takeout box from her bag: "Fried peanuts."

I watched those people leave and asked in surprise, "Aren't you going back?"

"If I go back, how miserable you'd be. Ancient house, three old men, er guo tou, just missing a rope. You'd drink and then hang yourselves together." she said.

"Add you as a female ghost, we'd have to hang ourselves even if we didn't want to." Fatty said.

I asked, "Does your grandmother know you're here? Don't let her come looking for you later."

"Brother Wu Xie, have you really forgotten or are you playing dumb? Don't you remember my temper?" The little girl blinked. "My grandmother doesn't know, but she won't look for me. I dared to fly alone at age eight, I know Changsha and Beijing well. She's fine with me running wild. And this time I came here to exchange secrets with you; of course I've made sure it's safe."

I really had no memory of her. It sounded strange, this girl was oddly mischievous. I didn't want to appear stupid by showing weakness, so I asked, "You really want to exchange? I thought you were joking. How? How can I believe what you say is true?"

"You can

"Test you? How is that a test?" I thought to myself, I don't even know what information you have.

Fatty then joked softly, "Tianzhen, this girl isn't trying to seduce you, is she?"

I poked him to stop his nonsense, and she said, "How about this: I'll tell you something, and after you hear it, you'll immediately know that I am qualified to exchange information with you."

I found it more and more interesting, so I nodded to see what trick she was playing.

She looked at me and said mysteriously, "When I was little, by a very chance opportunity, I saw a videotape. After watching it, I was very confused. I asked my grandmother, but she wouldn't say anything and even scolded me. Then I started investigating this matter on my own. After hearing what you said to my grandmother, I realized that the things we are investigating seem to be related. Saying this, you should believe me now, right?"

Fatty and I exchanged a glance, neither of us expressing an opinion, because when I narrated to the old woman, I had mentioned this matter—it could have been fabricated.

Seeing that we had no reaction, she sighed and murmured leisurely, "The fish is with me."