Chapter 1 The First Box
The first chest was opened, revealing a box full of porcelain.
This was no ordinary porcelain, but an entire box of Song Dynasty Ru ware.
Ru ware was already famous in the Song Dynasty, with the saying, "Among celadon, Ru ware is the best."
As the former imperial kiln porcelain, its craftsmanship was naturally impeccable, with an ancient and elegant style and beautiful forms.
But what was most captivating was its glaze color, described as "like the sky after rain, clouds breaking through," and "a thousand peaks of emerald waves arriving." It was bright yet not dazzling, called by the world "like jade, not jade, but superior to jade."
And this box of Ru ware before them was genuine, and a treasure.
Su Xiaotian took them out one by one and examined them. There were many varieties, including brush pots shaped like sunflower petals, lotus bowls, small square basins, and fish-ear censers, totaling ten items.
Looking at so many good things, Su Xiaotian felt a sense of her own limited knowledge.
Every time she took one out, Su Xiaotian was extremely careful, fearing she might chip it, which would be heartbreaking.
After all, there was a saying in the marketplace, "Even with a fortune, it's not worth a piece of Ru porcelain," which showed the preciousness of Ru ware.
Su Xiaotian could guarantee that any one of these items, if taken out, would be fought over fiercely.
After carefully closing the chest, Su Xiaotian opened the second one.
The second chest was filled with precious calligraphy and paintings, some of which were said to be lost, but unexpectedly, they were sealed here.
Su Xiaotian didn't have much time to examine them closely. She was just curious about who had stored so many treasures here without retrieving them.
With the first two chests as a prelude, Su Xiaotian was no longer surprised when she saw some ancient ornaments in the third chest.
These ornaments were made of gold, jade, and silver, but all were exquisitely crafted. Especially the gemstones inlaid in the gold ornaments, which were the finest of the finest.
Su Xiaotian closed it directly, not even considering the value of the items in this chest.
Su Xiaotian took a deep breath to calm her excited mood, then slowly opened the last chest.
Inside the chest was a lustrous jade dragon.
The luster was the natural radiance of the jade. The moment the chest was opened, Su Xiaotian felt her eyes were almost blinded.
According to the system, this jade dragon not only had a rare jade quality but was also a thousand-year-old treasure.
An antique of antique level.
She had truly struck it rich.
The chest indeed contained good treasures. If she could keep all of them, Su Xiaotian felt:
Her life as a salted fish could begin!
However, after the surprise, Su Xiaotian hesitated about how to deal with these items.
Although it was said that a horse cannot grow fat without night fodder, receiving unexpected wealth like this might not be a good thing.
She still needed to find a way to spend it.
"System, what do you think? Should I take all these good things back with me, or should I take them back?" Su Xiaotian rubbed her hands and seriously communicated with the system.
The system, true to its nature of taking everything, would naturally not let such good things slip away, and therefore resolutely demanded that Su Xiaotian take all the treasures back.
"The storage box was expanded not long ago, so fitting these small chests won't be a problem," the system urged repeatedly.
After much thought, Su Xiaotian decided to take these chests home.
The method of taking them home was simple: as the system suggested, hide them in the system's storage box.
The system's storage box was small. Even after several expansions, it couldn't hold too many things.
Su Xiaotian generally didn't put anything in it unless it was particularly valuable.
This time, Su Xiaotian had no choice but to put these chests in the storage box because she couldn't take them away without anyone noticing.
Of course, there was another important issue: she was afraid of accidentally breaking the treasures in the chests, and then where would she find justice?
Before Su Xiaotian left the cave, she communicated with the big tree outside and learned that Su Wu Rang and a few others had discovered her absence and were looking for her everywhere.
It was then that she realized that time had passed without her noticing.
Su Xiaotian emerged from the cave and had not taken two steps before she saw Su Wu Rang and Su Ci Liang looking for her in a panic.
"Xiaotian, didn't I tell you the mountain is dangerous and you shouldn't wander off?" Su Wu Rang said with a stern face.
Su Ci Liang quickly added, "Xiao Wu, she's fine. Don't blame little sister, what if you scare her?"
Su Wu Rang was speechless. He was doing this for Xiaotian's own good, yet he was made to look like the bad guy.
"Xiaotian, you need to be obedient. Your brother is also doing this for your own good!" Su Ci Liang gently comforted Su Xiaotian, looking incredibly doting.
At that moment, Su Wu Rang felt that he might have made a mistake by going south alone to attend military school.
Now, it felt like his sister was being snatched away.
Xiaotian was his biological sister!
"I just suddenly felt unwell," Su Xiaotian explained in a low voice.
Su Ci Liang and Su Wu Rang exchanged glances. It was just such a small matter.
It was no wonder she had to hide.
The two brothers tacitly remained silent and turned back to continue guarding the wild boar.
If you were to say someone was lucky, it was truly unstoppable. As Su Xiaotian went to join the others guarding the wild boar, a wild rabbit happened to pass by.
The group was very agile, and the two wild rabbits were quickly dealt with.
"These two rabbits are really plump," Chen Zi An said, holding the two rabbits with a beaming smile.
Su Xiaotian was also delighted. "We caught four wild rabbits earlier. Let's make spicy rabbit heads later."
Chen Zi An was taken aback. Having spent more time outdoors, he knew that spicy rabbit heads were a specialty of Sichuan Province. How did Xiaotian know about them?
However, this thought quickly passed. It wasn't strange for a well-read child to know such things.
He was just worried that they might not be able to make the authentic flavor and would spoil the good ingredients.
As they were talking, people from the team had already arrived on the mountain.
The Su brothers led the way, and they easily found them.
Under the leadership of Su Chang Jiu, a group of men successfully tied up the wild boars and brought them back to the team.
Because of the wild boars, no one paid attention to the two rabbits in Chen Zi An's hands.
Rabbit meat was tough, not as delicious as pork.
Chen Zi An wanted to help catch the wild boar, so the rabbits were smoothly handed over to Su Xiaotian.
Su Xiaotian, holding two plump rabbits, was only concerned about how to eat them, and didn't ponder the question of why they had to eat such cute bunnies.
By the time everyone reached the foot of the mountain, it was completely dark.
It was already the twenty-ninth of the twelfth lunar month, and tomorrow was New Year's Eve. The team leader immediately decided to slaughter the pigs overnight.
The team had many pigs to slaughter this year, and each person had already received seven to eight catties of meat, considered a prosperous year.
Unexpectedly, there were now several more plump wild boars to distribute, and everyone was extremely excited.
After all, who could complain about having too much meat?
Even if they couldn't eat it all, they could still preserve it in brine and eat it for more than half a year.