It was ten o'clock. Li Guaizi couldn't stay awake any longer and fell asleep in his chair. Chen Ke sighed and stood up. Just as he was about to call Li Guaizi to go back together, Chen Zhuo appeared at the door.
Chen Ke walked over and said, "It's so late, I thought you weren't coming."
"Huh? It's raining outside? You didn't bring an umbrella?" Chen Zhuo's clothes were wet on his head and shoulders. Chen Ke handed him a towel. "It's so late and it's raining. You can come back tomorrow."
"But you said you wouldn't come to see me today, so just pretend you didn't say that!" Chen Zhuo said resentfully, which is why he acted like a lunatic, running over in the rain even though he was already asleep.
"I just said it offhand at the time, but it's still valid if you come tomorrow."
Chen Zhuo looked up at Chen Ke with a strange expression, "Then what are you doing here so late?"
Chen Ke: ""
"Come in."
"Hehe, but don't get too cocky and think I came all this way in the rain just for you. It'll be three months, so you'd better figure out how to convince my mom by then."
Chen Ke remained silent.
Chen Zhuo followed closely behind Chen Ke into the shop. "Is this your antique shop? You opened it after returning to Shanghai? Where did you get the money?"
After being asked three questions in a row, Chen Ke took a deep breath and said, "From now on, follow me and observe more and ask fewer questions."
Who is this person?
Li Guaizi, who was snoring loudly, seemed to be sleeping soundly, but he was actually very vigilant. As someone who had been through thick and thin in the outside world, he would have died countless times if he hadn't been alert. So, Li Guaizi woke up as soon as Chen Zhuojin spoke his first words.
But he pretended to have just woken up and rubbed his eyes, "Huh? Boss, your brother is here?"
Chen Ke: "Let me introduce you. This is my brother, Chen Zhuo, and this is the antique craftsman in the shop. You can call him Master Li."
"Hey, Chen Zhuo, hello, hello."
Chen Zhuo simply nodded slightly as a greeting, making the usually enthusiastic Li Guaizi seem a little embarrassed.
Li Guai Zi secretly curled his lip, thinking resentfully, "What's with the attitude? If you weren't Chen Ke's brother, I wouldn't even give you the time of day."
"So you want me to help you look after this antique shop?"
Before Chen Ke could speak, Li Guaizi got anxious. This shop was practically deserted, so why did it need two people to mind it? This guy was clearly trying to steal his job!
"No, no, boss, I can manage this shop all by myself, so there's no need for your brother to come too, is there?" Could it be that Chen Ke was afraid he would embezzle the money, so he asked his brother to supervise him? But looking at the business, even if he wanted to embezzle, there was no way he could do it.
Chen Ke knew what Li Guaizi was thinking, so he didn't explain further. "You two come with me for a moment."
Chen Ke led the two to the warehouse behind the shop. The reason Chen Ke bought this place was because of this very hidden warehouse. He thought that the volume of antiques he sold in the future should be quite large, and there had to be a source for it, otherwise it would be difficult to explain.
Li Guaizi and Chen Zhuo remained relatively calm when Chen Ke opened the warehouse door, but they were shocked the moment Chen Ke turned on the light.
"Hiss!" Li Guaizi gasped, "This, this is all..."
"Is this all fake?" Chen Zhuo quickly calmed down after a brief moment of surprise.
Li Guaizi's expression was even more surprised than before. "Fake?" He examined a Tang tri-colored horse closely for a long time. "It doesn't look like one." Li Guaizi's appraisal skills were not strong. He could only determine whether an antique was genuine by its origin. Those that came out of tombs were definitely genuine. Family heirlooms passed down through the family were half genuine and half fake. As for antiques from other sources, he relied entirely on guesswork.
Chen Ke was somewhat surprised that Chen Ke could guess it. He led the two inside and asked Chen Zhuo, "Where did you come to this conclusion?" Chen Zhuo was definitely a complete novice when it came to antiques, but he directly said that these were all fake, so he must have come to this conclusion from other sources.
"Ha, we're not some family that specializes in the antique business. Where did you get so many genuine antiques? Even if you went to rob tombs, you couldn't possibly rob tombs from every era, could you?"
Upon hearing about tomb raiding, Li Guaizi glanced at Chen Ke with a stiff expression, his eyes filled with a guilty conscience.
Chen Ke's expression didn't even change. Li Guaizi couldn't help but give Chen Ke a thumbs up in his heart. He was indeed a boss, so calm.
“You’re right, these are all fake antiques, but they are the most realistic fake antiques. Even the most skilled appraiser wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them.”
"So many, all fake?" Li Guaizi still couldn't believe it. In his opinion, stealing antiques was much easier than making "antiques," let alone making them so realistic that they were indistinguishable from the real thing.
“Yes, they’re all fake.” Chen Ke walked up to the mother-of-pearl inlaid rosewood five-stringed pipa, “including this Tang Dynasty heirloom five-stringed pipa.”
Neither Li Guaizi nor Chen Zhuo knew much about the five-stringed pipa, so they didn't know what Chen Ke meant by specifically mentioning it.
Chen Ke continued unhurriedly, "And the original is hanging on the wall of Daisuke Matsumoto's study in the Japanese quarter of the concession."
······
Chen Zhuo's brows suddenly furrowed.
Li Guaizi exclaimed in shock, "Are you out of your mind? Making a fake so close to the real thing! What if you get caught?"
The two thought that was enough to surprise them, but Chen Ke's next words made Li Guaizi collapse to the ground, and Chen Zhuo's expression also became serious.
After a long silence, Chen Zhuo's somewhat uncertain voice finally rang out, "You, you just said you were going to use this fake pipa to replace the Japanese man's real pipa?"
Chen Ke replied calmly, "Yes, is there a problem?"
Although Chen Zhuo was shocked, he shook his head and said, "I'm fine."
Li Guaizi, slumped on the ground, was almost in tears looking at the two brothers in front of him. "It's fine for you two brothers to be crazy together, but he... he has a problem! He's perfectly fine and doesn't want to die!"
"No, no, boss, you said this pipa is so realistic it's indistinguishable from the real thing, so let's just pretend it's real. Why do we have to be so foolish as to exchange it for the Japanese one?"
"Because I know it's fake, I can't take it seriously."
Chen Zhuo nodded. "Do you have a plan?"
Chen Ke: "I've got it."
Li Guaizi weakly raised his hand, "Me, was I not part of the plan?"
Chen Zhuo scoffed, "Coward!"
Li the Cripple:
Despite his limp, his spirit remained strong. How could a grown man allow a little kid to call him a coward?
Li Guaizi stood up abruptly. "If I'm not in the plan, then add me in. We must get back the cultural relics our country has taken from the Japanese!"
So Chen Ke began to explain his plan.
Two minutes later.
Chen Zhuo frowned: "Who made so many incredibly realistic fake antiques for you?"
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