Chapter 65: Unfilial Disciple

The most authentic Qishan saorou noodles were served in a massive, head-sized bowl, the broth crowned with a translucent layer of vibrant red chili oil.

Red carrots, white diced tofu, yellow shredded egg crepe, green garlic chives, black wood ear mushroom strips, and pale yellow alkaline noodles... resembled multicolored pearls piled high upon a cord of yellow jade.

Steam billowed upward. The fragrance of vinegar combined with a sharp, pungent spice rushed into the nasal cavity, making an Adam's apple bob uncontrollably. With a gentle lift of chopsticks and a slurping sound, a good quarter of the noodles vanished from the bowl.

In three or four bites at most, nothing was left in the bowl but broth, and Lin Sicheng reached for a second bowl.

The uncle and nephew sat across from each other, absentmindedly stirring their noodles.

They were ravenous, but there was far too much to process: the two of them had been reeling from start to finish. Forget about chiming in; their thoughts had barely been able to keep up.

An elderly woman who spoke fluent antique-dealer jargon and whose face was stained with a rust-like patina?

Even her walking cane was inlaid with Shang dynasty jade, the kind of rare artifact one only sees in museums, casually being handed out like common currency?

Not to mention those dozen or so antiquities which, despite having been restored, still rightfully qualified as true masterpieces.

Even stranger was Lin Sicheng.

He spoke the secret slang even more fluently than the old woman, treated historical allusions and figures like family heirlooms, and could see right through museum-quality forgeries at a single glance?

He didn't even feel a flicker of temptation when a Shang dynasty jade worth millions was offered to him for free?

Even if he suspected a trap or worried about the illicit origin of the items, shouldn't he have struggled with himself a little bit internally?

Yet, looking back, Lin Sicheng hadn't hesitated for a single second...

What astonished Wang Qizhi the most was the small box the old woman finally produced: just how unimaginably rare must an object be if she was willing to use multi-million-dollar items as payment simply to have it restored by Lin Sicheng?

As soon as Lin Sicheng finished his second bowl, Wang Qizhi eagerly poked his chopsticks forward:

"What was inside that final box?"

Genuinely starving, Lin Sicheng picked up his third bowl and took a slurping bite of noodles: "A Chicken Cup!"

"What?"

"A Chicken Cup!"

The hand holding the chopsticks trembled, sending ripples across the surface of the broth as Wang Qizhi stared in utter stupefaction.

As everyone knew, there were barely a dozen Chicken Cups left in existence: ten in the Taipei Palace Museum, one in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in the US, one in the Sir Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art in the UK, and one in a Swiss museum.

That made thirteen in total, and private collections in the civilian world certainly numbered no more than five... Add them all up, and what was the grand total?

Yet now, two more had suddenly popped out of nowhere? Even if those two were broken...

He opened his mouth to say it was impossible, but the words stuck in his throat, unable to be spoken.

At the time, he had been standing too far away and against the light, so he hadn't seen very clearly. He only knew that the topmost ceramic piece in the box featured a bird.

However, Wang Qizhi had seen the other pieces clearly: a Lu Zigong jade carving, a handwritten letter by Li Dongyang, an imperial tribute inkstone bestowed by a Ming emperor... Especially that *Chengni* tribute inkstone, which was as authentic as authentic could get.

Therefore, if the contents of that box were not Chicken Cups, what kind of porcelain could possibly command a restoration fee running into the millions?

Following that line of thought, the old woman's claim of being a "descendant of the Imperial Household Department's Workshop staple-repair artisans" was likely true nine times out of ten.

If she weren't a staple-repair artisan, her hands and face wouldn't be stained with that peculiar rust-like corrosion—unless that old woman had excavated thousands of undisturbed tombs where the objects had never seen daylight or been exposed to oxygen.

If she weren't a staple-repair artisan, it would be impossible for her to mend ceramics, wood, bronze, and jade with equal mastery, and to such an exceptional standard.

If she weren't a staple-repair artisan, it would be impossible for her to smuggle Chicken Cups out of the imperial palace... even broken ones...

Yet why insist on having Lin Sicheng repair them?

After a brief moment of reflection, Wang Qizhi's eyes widened: "Can you mend them?"

Lin Sicheng shook his head: "Not yet, but I can learn."

Wang Qizhi let out a scoff: How on earth do you plan to learn?

Forget the Chicken Cup; forget *doucai* porcelain. Over eighty percent of Ming dynasty porcelain restoration techniques have been lost to history. Where is Lin Sicheng supposed to learn them?

If such knowledge could be acquired, the old woman would have learned it herself instead of having to beg Lin Sicheng.

Wang Qizhi glanced down at the wooden crate at his feet, completely baffled: "Yet the old woman seemed entirely convinced that you would definitely be able to learn it?"

Lin Sicheng let out a silent inward sigh: Because I actually already know how.

He might never have repaired a Chicken Cup before, but he had mended plenty of *doucai* wares; it was merely a matter of practicing a few more times...

Lin Sicheng remained silent for a long while: "She must have caught the scent of my cobalt-blue lacquer!"

Having said that, Lin Sicheng put down his chopsticks and pointed to a blue speck on the nail of his right hand, "Professor Wang, this is staple-repair cyan lacquer. I mixed it on a whim the other day when I was doing some blue-touch-up work, and once it gets on you, it's impossible to wash off..."

Wang Qizhi nodded: "I know, and then?"

Those two fish had been glued on by Wang Qizhi's own hands, and at the time, Feng Lin had even reminded him that Lin Sicheng had warned them the lacquer couldn't be washed off once it touched the skin...

Lin Sicheng pondered for a moment: "Genuine staple-repair cyan lacquer refers to the specialized adhesive lacquer used by the Ming dynasty imperial kilns exclusively for restoring blue-and-white porcelain. It was later passed down to the Qing dynasty, where it was specifically used to mend legacy Ming blue-and-white wares...

Because the glaze formulas are similar and both require cobalt ore, the Imperial Workshop modified it and later applied it to cloisonné enamel as well... But the exact formula was lost during the Republican era..."

Pausing slightly, Lin Sicheng emphasized his next words: "Professor Wang, I'm not lying to you. This isn't actual staple-repair cyan lacquer; it's just something I concocted on my own by fumbling around based on historical literature... But for some reason, the old woman convinced herself: this is the genuine staple-repair cyan lacquer..."

"Inferring from that, she figured that since I know how to mix staple-repair cyan lacquer, I must certainly know how to mend Ming blue-and-white porcelain; and since I can mend Ming blue-and-white, I must certainly know how to mend *doucai* (*doucai* porcelain is painted over a blue-and-white underglaze); and since I can mend *doucai*, I must certainly know how to mend a Chicken Cup..."

Spreading his hands, Lin Sicheng sighed: "That's why I refused that inkstone, but the old woman refused to believe me and stubbornly forced a whole crate of porcelain shards on me, telling me to practice on them first..."

Lin Sicheng spoke fast, urgently, and at great length. At first, Wang Qizhi was still turning gears in his head to follow. But upon hearing the final sentence, his hand involuntarily twitched, and his chopsticks dropped straight into the noodle bowl.

The corners of his mouth twitched uncontrollably as he nearly cursed out loud: Lin Sicheng, are you out of your mind?

I'm your teacher, and you're trying to fool me like this?

That speck was so tiny, no bigger than a grain of millet. It had been days, and I hadn't even noticed it.

Yet the old woman recognized it with a single glance—just how terrifyingly sharp were her eyes?

Could anything possibly slip past her discernment?

Even just moments ago, Wang Qizhi had still been thinking that if those really were Chicken Cups in the box, how could the old woman have handed them over so carelessly?

Thinking about it now: Carelessly my foot!

The saying "the older the wiser" was embodied to absolute perfection in that old woman:

Why did the old woman shove her walking cane toward Lin Sicheng?

To test his eye for antiques.

Why use Shang dynasty jade to tempt Lin Sicheng?

To test his moral character.

The underworld jargon, the sleeve-concealed transactions, the dozen-plus restored items, and the three supreme treasures that followed were all part of a probing dance.

She was testing Lin Sicheng's background, and at the same time, testing his capability and even his character.

Therefore, in just over an hour, how many schemes did that old woman run, and how many methods did she employ?

Not until she was thoroughly convinced, having at least a ninety percent certainty, did she finally produce the Chicken Cups.

Wang Qizhi clenched his teeth:

So, the old woman truly was a descendant of the Imperial Household Department's staple-repair artisans.

So, inside that small box, those genuinely were Chicken Cups.

So, that spot on Lin Sicheng's fingernail really was staple-repair cyan lacquer.

So, from beginning to end, this unfilial disciple who hadn't spoken a single truthful sentence really did know how to repair Chicken Cups...