Chapter 18: Old Mo (Part 1)

  Panjiayuan can be said to be the most popular second-hand market in the country. As for its overview, you can know it by searching online, but if you haven't been there in person, it's hard to understand the shock it brings to tourists. The whole garden covers an area of 485,000 square meters, with more than 4,000 business households, and is open every day from 9:00 am to 6:00 pm, offering a wide range of goods including antiques, handicrafts, collectibles, decorations, etc. On holidays, the number of visitors can reach as high as 100,000.

  At two thirty in the afternoon, it was just the busiest time for Panjiayuan in the second half of the day. Looking at the crowded crowd, Qu Wen couldn't help but sigh that humans are indeed the largest group-living animals, as long as there is a place and a name, they can gather together in groups.

  "This is not an antique market, it's just a vegetable market after work. There are more foreigners among the tourists, with white skin and black skin everywhere, and various foreign languages keep popping up from time to time, making you feel like you're in a foggy mountain. Don't say anything, maybe it's necessary for business, even the old men selling things on the street can exchange a few words with foreigners, while domestic tourists like Qu Wen are not so valued. Firstly, domestic tourists are more interested in watching the excitement, and secondly, their wallets are not as thick as others, to put it bluntly, it's still a matter of money."

  As a businessman, everyone knows that this type of customer is most likely to bring economic benefits. As long as foreign friends turn around in circles, they will inevitably buy some small trinkets to take back with them. Who knows, maybe they'll even encounter a clever salesperson and end up spending a lot more than expected. Even if it's just an old vase from their own home, they can claim it's a priceless antique, like Wu Zetian's legendary bathtub. They'll make a hefty profit off the sale, and even if the customer later discovers it's fake, no one will blame them for it. After all, in the antiques market, there's no such thing as "fake" - at most, something can be said to be "not genuine". If someone buys something that turns out to be wrong, they'll just chalk it up to bad luck and a lack of expertise, and definitely won't go around spreading rumors about being cheated.

  When buying things here, you have to be careful. Even if you are 70% sure it's genuine, you should still assume it's fake when making the purchase. This way, even if you make a mistake, you won't lose too much.

  As the crowd flowed, I strolled along the street stalls on both sides for a while, and suddenly heard a noisy sound. When I walked closer, it turned out that a foreign tourist was arguing with the stall owner.

  "You're not honest, this is not a Tongde copper stove, but you sold it to me for 8,000 yuan." The foreigner held a copper three-legged furnace the size of a face bowl, his face red with anger as he scolded the stall owner. Although he was speaking in English, Qu Wen could slightly understand.

  The stall owner's face was not pleasant, his eyebrows almost converged into one piece, and he replied in English: "This friend of yours, don't wrong me, I've always been honest in doing business. Look at the bottom of this stove, isn't it clearly printed with 'Xuan De' characters? How can you say it's not a Xuan De stove? The original price was 20,000 yuan, and I'm selling it to you for 8,000, which is already very cheap. It was a mutually agreed upon transaction at the time, so why are you asking me for a refund now?"

  After listening to the two, Qu Wen roughly knew what was going on. It turned out that this foreigner wanted to buy a stove made in the Xuande period of the Ming Dynasty, not a modern stove with the Xuande pattern printed on it. Although they both have the word "Xuande", the value is different by tens of thousands of miles.

  Xuande furnace, a copper incense burner designed and manufactured during the Xuande period of the Ming dynasty, is also known as "Xuan furnace". It was the first time in Chinese history that brass was used to cast copperware. The entire production process, including smelting copper and shaping, was completed under the personal supervision of Emperor Xuande. Its style is simple and elegant, with a crystal clear and warm color, making it one of the treasures of Ming dynasty craftsmanship.

  Due to the appearance of this batch of exquisite copper stoves, in the later period, stoves of the same style liked to be stamped with the words "Xuande", especially by the end of Qing and early Republic of China, it reached the peak of imitation. The price of the stoves produced during this period was basically between 800 and 6,000, while the authentic Xuande incense burner was sold at a minimum of 80,000 yuan at auction.

  This foreigner must be unfamiliar with China's collection rules, thinking that spending 8,000 yuan to buy a Xuande stove means it must be from the Xuande period of the Ming dynasty. He doesn't even know about later imitations. Moreover, the stove itself has a Xuande pattern, so even if it's not from the Xuande period, it still counts as a Xuande stove. The mistake is not on the vendor's side, but rather this foreigner who doesn't understand the rules and is greedy for small bargains.

  The two of them made a fuss for half a day, and it wasn't until the market management personnel arrived that the dispute was resolved. Fortunately, no major conflict ensued, but it did teach Qu Wen a lesson on the side.

  After finishing the lively scene, he came to a stall selling calligraphy and painting. Because of Jin Tingbiao's true trace, it sparked his interest, and with great interest, he carefully looked at it for half a day, almost every piece was not missed, and people who didn't know thought that an expert had come, so they looked so carefully. The owner let him watch without making a sound to disturb him.

  Qu Yun has been staying in the pawnshop for over 20 days. What he learned is not even a hair on the skin of the antique business. He looked so carefully, just secretly releasing his spiritual awareness to detect if there was any spiritual energy on these calligraphy and paintings. Unfortunately, after searching around, none of the calligraphy and paintings on the stall showed any signs of spiritual energy. In other words, most of these paintings are basically modern products or not old enough.

  After reading the letter, Qu Wen slightly shook his head, and he couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. It's not just this stall, there are hardly any good goods on the whole road, occasionally discovering some spiritual energy, but it's also extremely rare, completely incomparable to Jin Tingbiao's true work and the jade board in his hand.

  "Hey little brother, I still have some other old stuff here, want to take a look?"

  Just as Qu Wen was about to turn around and leave, the stall owner hastily called him back. People like this who are so serious about finding something are all potential customers.

  "What is it?"

  It's still a long time before Guo Qiang said dinner time, Qu Wen didn't rush either, and went back to the stall.

  The stall owner smiled and took out a few black lacquered items from behind the stall: "Just these few pieces of old ink, I don't know if you're interested, little brother?"

  "Old ink!" Qu Wen was shocked, he had used ink before, but old ink he had never seen, nor did he know how much it was worth.

  These few pieces of old ink, black and shiny like lacquer, fine and pure without impurities, with a faint scent of ink, look really good at first glance. Qu Wen picked up one of them in a pretentious manner, taking the opportunity to release his spiritual awareness to detect whether there was any spiritual energy condensed on the ink.

  The spiritual aura emitted by Quwen is like air, colorless and odorless. When the spiritual aura passes through, it only brings a slight wave of air, making people unaware.

  These several pieces of old ink also didn't bring him any surprise, the gold and silver thread on the inkstone were carved with great skill, the work was done with great care, the quality was not bad, but unfortunately they were all modern or near-modern things, without a hint of spiritual energy existing.

  If it were someone else, they might have bought it, but Qu Wen had worked at the pawnshop for a while and heard Fan Yongcheng say that eight or nine out of ten antiques were fakes. Even if you're an expert, it's rare to find something genuine in your lifetime. The more beautiful and ancient something looks, the more careful you should be. Plus, these inkstones didn't have any spiritual energy, so Qu Wen didn't take them seriously.

  When putting back a few ink blocks, I inadvertently saw that the owner of the stall had another black ink in the small paper box where he put the ink. It was far different from the several pieces on display, with no gold decoration and no exquisite carvings. At first glance, it looked like a piece of charcoal.

  However, this black ink attracted Qu Wen's attention. With a sweep of his spiritual awareness, he could sense that there was a faint gathering of spiritual energy above him, tightly wrapped around his body and lingering without dispersing.

  "Boss, isn't there another piece of ink over there? Bring it out and let me take a look."

  "Is this the one?" The stall owner took out a black ink from the box and handed it to Qu Wen. He thought: This business is not going to work, even the previous few good inks were not chosen, how could he sell this inferior black ink?

  However, the stall owner didn't intend to let go of any opportunity, and while handing the ink to Qu Wen, he casually came up with a story: "Although the quality of this ink is not as good, it's authentic old ink. You see the Hu character on top, don't you? This is actually something from Hu Kaiwen. If it weren't for the missing corner, I would have taken it to an auction. The reason I didn't bring it out is that the value of this ink is too high, and I'm afraid of damaging it again."

  Go ahead and fabricate as much as you want.

  Qu Wen doesn't understand the market value of the old ink, and secondly, he isn't very familiar with Hu Kaiwen, only knowing that he's a famous ink maker. If it were to be auctioned off, it would be absolutely impossible, otherwise it wouldn't have been simply wrapped in oil paper and placed at the bottom of the box.

  "This ink may not be genuine, if it were Hu Kaiwen's brand, there should be a full name, but this block only has the word 'Hu', I'm afraid it may not be made by Hu Kaiwen, maybe even Hu Hansan could have made it." Qu Wen smiled faintly, you can pretend and so can I, when everyone is unsure of what's real, it all depends on who has the stronger aura, since we're putting on a show, let's do it thoroughly.

  Actually, this inkstone was collected by the stall owner from someone else. The old ink is indeed old, and it looks like an antique from its packaging, but there's no real money on it, only a single character "Hu". At first, the stall owner thought it was Hu Kaiwen's work, but after collecting it, he found out it didn't look like his style. He secretly thought he had been cheated, wasting hundreds of dollars on a useless inkstone, and almost smashed it to pieces. The missing small corner on top was actually chipped off in anger.

  Seeing Qu Wen's words reveal the problem, the boss doesn't think there's anything wrong with it, and only slightly lowers his voice: "If you're sincere about it, I'll give you this number." He says, stretching out two fingers.

  "Two hundred." Qu Wen originally didn't understand it anyway, so there's no need to pretend to understand.