Spy game? Stop guessing, I really am an undercover agent!

Chapter 77 Personal Customization
Shanghai, French Concession, MixC Residence.

This is an old-fashioned antique shop, covering an area of ​​160 square meters, with two and a half rooms in the front and back. The shop is not spacious, but it is unusually deep.
Under the high roof beams, light slanted in through the wooden lattice windows facing the street, casting dappled shadows on the smooth, mirror-like ground paved with blue bricks.

The soul of the shop is the display shelves that stand on three sides of the wall.

This frame is made of rosewood and padauk wood joined together.
It must be said that the craftsmanship of the artisan who made this furniture is truly exceptional, perfectly combining the patterns and shapes of the two types of wood.

The enormous shelf gleamed with a warm and substantial luster in the dim light, with the openwork scroll patterns faintly visible along the edges of the thick lattice panels.

The shelves are arranged in a staggered pattern, with varying sizes, like a meticulously woven grid, steadily supporting a thousand years of time.
Of course, the shop owner also has a good understanding of how to display antiques. From top to bottom, he arranged celadon ware, jade ornaments, and landscape paintings.
Each object rests quietly in its own place, radiating its own story.
Directly opposite the entrance is a chest-high counter, also made of heavy hardwood.

The counter was inlaid with imported flat glass, which was considered a luxury at the time, and the edges were wrapped with shiny brass strips.

Inside the glass case are exquisitely designed and priceless treasures.

A mutton-fat white jade pendant, a Tianhuang stone seal, and a pair of small doucai cups with a glaze as blue as the sky after rain.
Many exquisite accessories, under limited light transmission, refract a subtle yet alluring shimmer.

Inside the counter, ebony abacuses, brass balances, and weights were on display, with several shop assistants busily moving about.
The side of the antique shop is a side hall, where an eight-immortal table and two exquisitely carved armchairs are placed. This is the place for receiving guests and discussing business. At this moment, the shop owner is sitting leisurely in the armchairs drinking tea, while playing with a string of beads that is hard to tell whether it is agate or jade.

The sound of leather shoes approached from afar, and a man dressed in a Western-style suit and wearing a gray-white hat walked briskly into Wanxiangju carrying a black cloth bag.

"Uncle, what brings you here?" A man of similar age from behind the counter quickly came to greet him.

"Where's my older brother?" Feng Jian's expression was somewhat strange, and his tone was very anxious.

"Oh, Father is having tea in the side room. I'll take you there."

"No need, you go ahead with your work, I'll go by myself."

"Big Brother." In the side hall, Feng Jian respectfully greeted Li Lang, who was drinking tea.

"Second brother, why aren't you at the Tongji office at this time? What are you doing here?"

"Don't think you can be careless just because you got lucky a little. Your older brother spent a lot of money to get you this job."

"If you ask where that shipment went, the answer is simply: no comment."

“Every industry has its own rules. We don’t ask where the goods come from when we receive them, so don’t worry about how I handle them.”

Feng Jian ignored Li Lang's lecture, took out the things Chen Yang had given him from the black bag, and handed them to Li Lang, saying, "Brother, please take a look."

Li Lang glanced at it, but didn't even touch it, and said indifferently, "It's fake. There are plenty of stalls selling them on the old street. Buy one and get two free for one silver dollar."

"Hey, second brother, you've worked at Wanxiangju before. You can't even fool a three-year-old with this kind of stuff. You're showing it to me? You must be out of your mind."

Feng Jian said with a worried look, "I know this thing is wrong, but the officer insists it's worth 30,000 and even asked you to write a note for it."

Before I could say anything, he said that I would understand what was going on once I saw the things.

Li Lang, who had been drinking tea, suddenly narrowed his eyes, his right hand jerked, and the tea spilled all over the floor.
"Second brother, what did you say? Your superior told you to bring this over?"

Feng Jian nodded and said, "That's right, the officer asked me to bring it."

Li Lang suddenly stood up and said seriously, "Tell me every detail of your conversation with your superior, without missing a single word."

Feng Jian was startled by Li Lang's expression, but still obeyed and recounted his conversation with Chen Yang. "Good, good, good," Li Lang burst into laughter after hearing Feng Jian's words, saying "good" three times in a row.

"Brother, what's wrong?" Feng Jian asked, somewhat puzzled.
Li Lang ignored him, turned and went behind the counter, took out a piece of paper with the name of Wanxiangju printed on it, picked up a brush and quickly wrote a note.

Then he instructed his busy son, "Baozai, go and get a fine brocade box."

"Okay." Li Dabao replied and quickly took out a gift box from behind the counter, which was specially used to store valuable antiques.

Li Lang picked up the gift box and then used professional tools to clean the wine vessel from top to bottom.

I have to say, it actually looks quite convincing when done this way.

But Li Dabao frowned: "Dad, this is a fake that costs three for one yuan."

"If you do that, you'll ruin the reputation of Wanxiangju."

"You don't know anything," Li Lang cursed, carefully wrapping the gift box. He then asked his son, "How much money is left in the account?"

Li Dabao quickly put down his work, took out the ledger and flipped to the back: "Dad, there are still more than 10,000 silver dollars in working capital in the shop."

"I received some things last month, and all the money is tied up in them."

Li Lang frowned: "Not enough, far from it. Baozai, go and contact Manager Zhou and Manager Pan, and ask them to come to the store."

"What Dad meant was that they could take anything in the store at cost price if they wanted it, but there was only one condition: I only wanted cash."

"Go find Mr. Qian from Fuyutang again and tell him that I am willing to sell the courtyard he had his eye on before. The starting price is 38,000. You can pay in US dollars, but I don't accept Chinese currency."

This whole situation left Li Dabao completely bewildered: "Dad, what's going on with our family? All these things add up to at least tens of thousands of silver dollars."

"You've sold everything; what a mess our family has gotten ourselves into."

"Could it be that my second uncle caused this trouble again?"

"What do you mean your second uncle caused this trouble? He's bringing wealth to our family." Li Lang scolded, then picked up the abacus on the table and started typing away haphazardly. Finally, he frowned as he looked at the numbers on the abacus and muttered to himself, "167,000, hmm, still not enough. We need to make at least 200,000."

Seeing Li Lang talking to himself, Li Dabao thought he was possessed.

What kind of curse did my second uncle cast on his father to cause their family to lose all their wealth?
This company is probably going to go out of business.
Shanghai, City Hall, Office of the Director of the Economic Department.

Feng Jian pushed open the office door and placed the packaged brocade box on the table.

The next second, he took out a small bag and placed the contents in front of Chen Yang one by one before respectfully saying, "Sir, my elder brother said that if we're going to put on an act, we have to go all the way."

"Your item is in such poor condition that it won't stand up to scrutiny if it's investigated."

“My elder brother specially prepared these for you. All the items are made by Jia Sizhen. Ordinary people can’t tell the difference.”

"If you have any other needs, we can also provide personalized services."

(End of this chapter)