The person from the Chinese side stared blankly at the fragments on the ground, his lips trembling non-stop. This national treasure was smashed by him in full view of everyone, which is an indisputable fact. This is a national treasure from the Western Zhou Dynasty, not last week's...
The representative of the Chinese side who accepted it was a certain deputy director of the Palace Museum. When he saw that the vase had been smashed, he slapped his thigh and pointed at the still-dazed attendant, saying: "How could you be so careless? This is a national treasure! There's only one such glazed pottery vase with this kind of lid that has been passed down, and now there isn't even one left!"
In the blink of an eye, the handover ceremony had turned into a complete mess. However, except for Sun Baozi and his group, as well as the clergy from San Marino, no one else seemed to have noticed the black air that had suddenly appeared earlier, nor did they know whether the people on stage who were in disarray had not noticed or simply couldn't see it.
The black air dissipated unnoticed into the air. Unlike in the cabin, where the python transformed into a black fog dispersed differently. After this mass of black air emerged, it surprisingly floated and transformed into the shape of a man. The misty figure glanced at the shattered pottery shards on the ground, then turned around and walked away.
This fog-like person took a step, and the fog dissipated by several tenths. After three or four steps, even Ximen Lian, who had the strongest Heavenly Eye ability in Sun Bi's team, couldn't see where the fog went.
The black air transformed into a human figure, and it disappeared into thin air in just a few breaths. The bishop of San Marino had just removed the cross from his neck and hadn't even finished reciting the scriptures when the mist had already vanished completely.
After the human-shaped mist dissipated, the people from the San Marino church gathered together, whispering and gesturing to each other. They bypassed the translator from China and even Ruhua was blocked from getting closer. However, none of them noticed that on Sun Bao's side, a young man was watching their lip movements, repeating the same words in his mouth, while Sun Pianzhang was listening with his ears perked up beside him.
Ximen Qing said after finishing speaking, looking at Sun Wukong: "Great Sage, what are they discussing? It doesn't seem like anything good."
Sun Baozi chuckled and shifted his gaze from the Bishop of San Marino to Xi Menlian's face, saying: "You think you can just run away after causing trouble? I'm not saying it, but is that really possible?"
Ximen was stunned for a moment, not understanding the meaning of Sun Baozi's words. Wasn't it the Chinese side that broke the vase just now? Who exactly caused this trouble? Before he could ask any questions, the San Marino church had already sent a representative to find Liu, the deputy director in charge of the handover ceremony. They expressed that the occurrence of such an event was also deeply regrettable for Archbishop Antonino. However, strictly speaking, the sealed ceramic vase with double ears had already been handed over to the Chinese side, so theoretically, this handover ceremony could be considered concluded. Although the result is extremely regrettable. It is believed that the Chinese side still has some follow-up matters to attend to, if there are no other issues, Archbishop Antonino and the clergy would like to take their leave first, return to rest, and depart tomorrow with the San Marino Prime Minister's delegation.
No matter how you look at it, this incident was caused by the carelessness of the Chinese personnel and has nothing to do with the San Marino church. After thanking Archbishop Antonelli for his concern, Deputy Director Liu immediately arranged for someone to send the San Marino clergy back to rest.
Just as Bishop Anthony was leading the crowd out, Sun Baozi suddenly shouted a sentence in Italian. As soon as the words came out, the old bishop and all the clergy stopped in their tracks, staring straight at Sun Baozi.
Deputy Director Liu didn't know what had happened, fortunately there was a clever translator next to him who repeated Sun Wukong's words in Chinese: "We can't just leave after cheating us with fake goods."
This Qianlong-marked ceramic double-eared vase had been examined by experts before the handover and had already been identified as a genuine piece. After the identification, it was kept by the Chinese side until it was returned to San Marino for the ceremony, so they didn't have any opportunity to swap or do anything else.
At this time, officials from San Marino had already come out to protest to Deputy Director Liu. Seeing that it was about to become a diplomatic incident, Deputy Director Liu directly confronted Sun: "I'm asking you, Sun, do you have any evidence for what you're saying? Do you know how passive our work will be if you speak so irresponsibly?"
Sun Baozi smiled at Deputy Director Liu without a care, and after he finished speaking, said: "Do you want evidence? Wait." As he spoke, he walked over to the location of the shattered fragments. He picked up the base of the broken ceramic vase from the ground, reached in and rummaged around, and after a moment, his eyebrows rose as he looked inside the fragments, and two words escaped his lips: "Found it"
After he spoke, everyone on the scene, including San Marino, gathered around. Sun saw the base fragments under the light and said: "Come and see what's inside." The Chinese personnel who had just smashed the vase immediately came over and looked at it with the light, and there were a few small words printed on the edge of the base with ink - Jingdezhen Products.
"It's fake, it's a counterfeit!" Knowing that what he had just smashed was not a national treasure, the guy almost cried out. He took the base fragments and ran to his leader, the deputy curator, pointing at the marks on top and said: "It's from Jingdezhen, not from Western Zhou."
At this time, people kept coming over to check the marks on the base, and then they all looked at the San Marino side. At this point, almost everyone was convinced that the sealed ceramic vase with two ears was a fake, but no one thought about why there would be such fresh marks inside the sealed vase.
"Is there anything else to say?" Sun Wengzi smiled at the bishop, showing his teeth, and then said a few more sentences in Italian. The translator whispered in Liu's ear: "Sun Shoulong is saying that this jar killed your Gino, do you think smashing it would leave no evidence?"
Regarding the situation inside the cabin, Deputy Director Liu had heard some rumors. Although he didn't know what exactly happened, he also heard that a monk named Gino had something happen to him before getting off the plane, which caused a big commotion among the San Marino personnel. The official explanation from San Marino was that Monk Gino's old illness had relapsed, but after taking special medicine, his condition was effectively controlled. This time, he also accompanied Archbishop Anthony to attend the handover ceremony.
But now it seems that this matter is not as simple as San Marino officials said.
Bishop Anthony took a deep breath and said a few words in Italian to Sun Baozi. Sun Baozi nodded with a smile, then turned to Deputy Director Liu and said: "Old Liu, Bishop Anthony says there's been some misunderstanding here, he wants to meet with us privately so as not to let this misunderstanding deepen."
Vice Minister Liu had nothing else to say, so he dismissed the Chinese entourage. He then arranged for Archbishop Anthony and his group, along with Sun Bozi and a few others, to move to a nearby rest room. As they were about to enter, people from both sides wanted to bring Hugo into their own camp, but Sun Bozi was quick-witted and said: "Director Hugo, don't be polite, come on in!" Hugo glanced at Archbishop Anthony, who was staring at him, then looked down awkwardly and followed Sun Bozi into the rest room.
At this time, Deputy Director Liu actually took the initiative to ask for a recusal. Sun Baozi also admired him a bit for this, indeed an old diplomat, knowing what not to listen to and what to avoid.
After the host and guests were seated, Sun Baozi directly said to Archbishop Anthony: "You don't need to waste time asking, I'll tell you the truth, the jar is real, both inside and out. But as for Gino's grudge against this jar, won't you say something about it?" Sun Baozi spoke in Chinese so that Simon and the others could understand.
Anthony and the others were collectively silent for a while, then under the bishop's instructions, Big Beard who had a good relationship with Hugo at the airport explained the situation from start to finish.
After Sun Wenzhi's translation, the course of events is as follows: When San Marino officials decided to visit China, the church did prepare a Chinese artifact from the Eight-Nation Alliance period as a gift to return to the Chinese side, but it was not this sealed ceramic vase with two ears. However, just one week before boarding the plane, Brother Gino, who was in charge of keeping the items, accidentally discovered that there was something wrong with this sealed ceramic vase while sorting out the items. He faintly heard a sound of something moving inside the vase.
When Brother Gino was sorting out the church's collection, he also came into contact with this sealed ceramic double-eared pot. At that time, he didn't notice that there was something inside. Hearing what sounded like running water inside, Brother Gino immediately thought of ancient wine jars. What else could this sealed ceramic double-eared pot in front of him be used for except to hold wine?
Brother Gino was fond of shutting himself in to take a few sips, and imagining that inside there might be some fine wine aged for thousands of years, his heart began to itch. This earthenware jar had been in his care for several years, and even if it suffered slight damage, no one would know. Thinking this way, he found an awl and drilled a small hole in an inconspicuous spot, intending to pour out the fine wine inside.
Gino chose a spot right at the edge of the bottom of the jar, after all, it was several thousand years old pottery, and the quality and density were not going anywhere. He didn't exert too much effort, and in less than half an hour, he had drilled a small hole at the edge of the bottom of the pot. Gino put his nose up to it, wanting to take a sniff of the fine wine inside, but as soon as he took a breath in, everything went black before his eyes, and he didn't know anything until he came to on an airplane parked at a Chinese airport.