Lu Qi forcefully pushed open the door, and the dust flew into Xu Qingqing's face. He completely lost the vitality he usually had when Xu Qingqing came.
Xu Qingqing and Lu Chuanbai exchanged a look, and both saw the ominous premonition in each other's eyes. Xu Qingqing looked around at the messy environment in the store and spoke softly.
"Lu Qi?"
There was no response in the store. The bad premonition in Xu Qingqing's heart grew stronger. She led Lu Chuanbai into the studio.
There was no one at the workstations in the studio. They should have already gone home on holiday to prepare for the Chinese New Year.
"It's strange. If Lu Qi had gone home for the New Year, he should have tidied up the store. How could it be in such a mess?"
Xu Qingqing thought that Lu Qi must have encountered something bad.
Lu Chuanbai also nodded in agreement. Based on his understanding of Lu Qi.
Although Lu Qi seemed carefree, he was actually very meticulous and would arrange everything in great detail. He wouldn't leave the store in this state.
Xu Qingqing took out her phone and called Lu Qi. The next second, the phone rang in the empty store.
Xu Qingqing looked in the direction of the sound and found Lu Qi's phone in the corner of the sofa.
"Why is Lu Qi's phone here?"
Xu Qingqing was slightly stunned and stepped forward to pick up his phone.
Just as Xu Qingqing was about to hang up the phone, the door of the store was pushed open with a loud noise.
Lu Qi, with his hair as messy as a chicken coop, a haggard face, and a dull look in his eyes, forcefully pushed open the door and rushed in.
Completely different from his usual immaculate appearance and dressing, he looked like he had been wandering for several days.
"Lu Qi, how did you become like this?"
Xu Qingqing stared at Lu Qi in surprise, shocked by his current decadence.
Lu Qi didn't expect there to be someone else in the store. He was startled by Xu Qingqing's voice. When he looked up and saw that it was Xu Qingqing, he was completely stunned.
"Qingqing... Qingqing, you're finally back!"
After saying that, Lu Qi threw himself in front of Xu Qingqing. If it weren't for Lu Chuanbai stopping him in time, he might have hugged Xu Qingqing into his arms.
Lu Qi's expression changed from dull to full of excitement. There were even crystal tears in his eyes.
Xu Qingqing was startled by Lu Qi like this and stammered with concern.
"Lu Qi, what's wrong with you? What on earth happened?"
Lu Qi shamefully raised his hand to wipe away the tears. His voice was filled with self - blame and guilt. He sighed dejectedly.
"It's a long story. You two sit down first. I'll pour you some water."
Saying that, Lu Qi went to get the disposable paper cups for entertaining guests. As a result, he found that the bag of disposable paper cups had fallen from the water dispenser and been flattened by someone.
It would be a bit impolite to use the flattened paper cups to serve Xu Qingqing and Lu Chuanbai water. Lu Qi turned back and showed an embarrassed smile to Xu Qingqing.
"How about I go out and buy you some milk tea?"
"No need. Just tell us what happened quickly."
Xu Qingqing waved her hand and pushed Lu Chuanbai to the sofa to sit down.
Lu Chuanbai stared at the sofa covered with a thin layer of dust and fell into deep thought. Seeing Lu Qi staring at him all the time, he finally had to sit down.
The first thing he would do after leaving was to change his pants.
Lu Qi, who had made a lot of useless efforts, sat down awkwardly opposite Xu Qingqing. He felt a bit embarrassed about what he was going to say next.
Lu Qi rubbed his hands on his thighs for a long time. Finally, he decided to speak: "The store has become like this because I misjudged the situation."
"What exactly happened?" Xu Qingqing couldn't help but ask again when she saw Lu Qi's spirit fall into decadence again.
Lu Qi smiled bitterly and told them what had happened to him after Xu Qingqing left.
On the night when Xu Qingqing left, a shabby - dressed migrant worker came to Lu Qi's store with a sack to sell something.
The migrant worker claimed that a lot of cultural relics had been unearthed at the construction site where they were working. After the cultural relics were unearthed, most of them were taken away by their boss after being identified as Qing - dynasty vases by an appraiser.
The migrant worker secretly hid a vase in the middle of the night and wanted to sell it to Lu Qi to earn some extra money.
Lu Qi originally thought it was just an ordinary vase. There had been precedents before.
Migrant workers often thought the vases they dug out were national treasures, but after Lu Qi's appraisal, he knew they were just ordinary imitation ancient vases.
With the idea of giving it a try, Lu Qi asked the migrant worker to take out the vase. But the moment he saw the vase, he was instantly stunned.
Because the shape and appearance of this vase seemed to be the characteristic of a once - lost relic he had seen in an ancient book.
The vase was completely black. Although it was made of ceramic, it gave people a metallic luster. The golden patterns on it outlined the patterns of various animals.
"This..."
Lu Qi's eyes were firmly attracted by the vase and he couldn't move them away.
Seeing that Lu Qi didn't say a word for a long time, the migrant worker became a bit anxious and continued to ask.
"Boss, is this vase really from the Qing dynasty?"
Overjoyed, Lu Qi wanted to look through the ancient books he had read before and asked the migrant worker to wait for a while.
Then he quickly turned around and ran to the office to find the relevant records about Hualan City.
Some of the cultural relics from Hualan City had been unearthed by archaeologists and made into picture albums.
Lu Qi saw that the vase in the picture album was almost exactly the same as the one the migrant worker had brought, in terms of material, color, and even the patterns on it.
Moreover, he had just carefully appraised the manufacturing method of the vase the migrant worker had brought.
The ancient book recorded that the people in Hualan City were the first to use stone tools. The vases they used were chiseled out of a whole huge cobblestone manually bit by bit.
After generations of use, the edges and corners of the vases had been worn smooth and round, with a bit of metallic luster.
The vase the migrant worker had brought was also made in this way, which was enough to prove that it was a genuine one.
When he realized this, Lu Qi was almost overjoyed. Before, he always saw Xu Qingqing finding treasures everywhere, so he was very envious of Xu Qingqing's luck.
At that time, Lu Qi was still thinking that maybe he had borrowed Xu Qingqing's good luck to receive such a precious cultural relic.
Now, thinking about it, Lu Qi wished he could slap himself twice.
At this point, Lu Qi was a bit reluctant to recall.
Xu Qingqing guessed the general situation and asked softly: "Did you find out that the vase was fake after you bought it?"
Lu Qi, whose thoughts had been guessed, nodded silently. His face was as bitter as a bitter gourd and he continued.
Lu Qi suppressed his excitement and returned to the front desk to tell the migrant worker that he wanted to buy the antique. Seeing the simple - dressed migrant worker with the weather - beaten wrinkles on his face.
Lu Qi felt a moment of compassion and told the worker the real history of the vase.
The worker shook his head and didn't want to believe it when he heard Lu Qi say that the vase was from Hualan City. He insisted that the vase was from the Qing dynasty.
The reason was that the result of the appraisal by the appraiser invited by the boss was that it was from the Qing dynasty.