A lucky cat fell from the sky.

Chapter 14 Ancient Bricks Used as Inkstones

Wu Cheng had never seen Jin Wanliang act so easily and dramatically.

It's estimated that the item it encountered this time was something even Jin Wanliang had rarely seen before, which is why it was so surprised.

Jin Wanliang has seen and tasted countless things, so if there's something he hasn't seen before, it must be a rare treasure.

Wu Cheng was also incredibly excited. Forcibly suppressing his excitement, he asked Jin Wanliang, "What exactly is this thing?"

Jin Wanliang was so excited that his tail wagged back and forth, and his cat eyes widened: "This thing is an ancient brick, but this ancient brick has a rather long history."

"Have you ever heard of Qin bricks and Han tiles? In our Jiuyuan Kingdom, there has always been a saying that Qin bricks refer to bricks from the Qin Dynasty and Han tiles refer to tiles from the Han Dynasty. In ancient times, people used bricks to make inkstones and tiles to make inkstones."

“Look at those beautiful tile inkstones on the shelves. They’re all made from roof tiles. These inkstones aren’t worth much in terms of the materials themselves, but the problem lies in the age of the bricks and the people who made them.”

"This inkstone has only simple fish and aquatic plant patterns on it, and the painting is very simple. But the origin of this brick is extraordinary. There was originally an ancient kingdom here in Longqiu City called Gumei Kingdom, and its history is even longer than that of the Zhou Dynasty."

"The royal tomb of this ancient kingdom of Gumei was built with these kinds of bricks. During the Song Dynasty, this royal tomb was discovered, the treasures inside were stolen, and the remaining tomb bricks flowed into the world and were collected by many literati to make brick inkstones."

"Very few of these bricks have survived to this day, and even fewer have been made into inkstones. Now look at this one; it has the character '章' (zhang) written on it. Do you know what that means?"

Jin Wanliang kept Wu Cheng in suspense, and Wu Cheng naturally had no idea, nor was he interested in knowing: "How much does this brick inkstone cost?"

Jin Wanliang was a little annoyed because Wu Cheng had interrupted his suspense, so he stretched out his claws and scratched Wu Cheng. This claw strike from the inside out made Wu Cheng stagger in pain.

He bumped his head into the shelf, causing several inkstones to fall and hit Wu Cheng on the head, raising a large bump.

The shop owner, who was half-asleep with his eyes closed, was suddenly awakened by Wu Cheng.

The shop owner was startled by what he saw and quickly came over to check the condition of the brick inkstones.

Seeing that several inkstones had been slightly damaged from being smashed on the ground, he became furious and grabbed Wu Cheng, demanding compensation.

Wu Chenglian protested his innocence, saying that he had been grabbed by Jin Wanliang, which caused such a big trouble. Now that he had been caught, he was being asked to compensate for the losses. What was he going to do?

He pointed to the bump on his head: "Boss, you have to be reasonable. Think about it, this bump on my head was caused by those bricks and inkstones you threw at me. I didn't even ask you to pay for my medical expenses, so why are you asking me to pay you?"

The boss glanced at Wu Cheng: "This is my territory. You came here and bumped into something, how can you blame me? Who knows if you're just plain stupid."

Wu Cheng got even angrier when he heard this, and insisted on pulling the boss to explain, and the two of them started arguing.

After arguing for a bit, Wu Cheng noticed that the inkstone that Jin Wanliang had been eyeing was also among them. A thought struck him, and he suddenly backed down: "Alright, we're both at fault. How about we each take a step back? I won't ask you to pay for the medical expenses, and you won't ask me to pay for the inkstone. Is that okay?"

The shopkeeper, however, insisted: "No, you have to buy all these inkstones."

Wu Cheng said with a long face, "I didn't bring that much money with me. How much money will it cost to replace these inkstones?"

"These inkstones together, I'll give you three thousand yuan," the shopkeeper said, trying to rip you off.

Wu Cheng was overjoyed, but he still pretended to be helpless: "Boss, you guys have to be honest, do you really think these bricks can fetch this much money?"

"What do you mean by 'bricks'? These are all brick inkstones, you know? Look them up online, these brick inkstones are all antiques."

Wu Cheng sighed and resigned himself to his fate. He took out three thousand yuan and bought all the brick inkstones. There were four or five brick inkstones, and they were quite heavy. The shop owner knew he couldn't be too ruthless, so he gave each brick inkstone a cardboard box and even gave him a bag with the shop's name printed on it to put all the cardboard boxes in.

Wu Cheng strode out of the store, his heart filled with joy.

Jin Wanliang put all the inkstones into the cat house and opened them one by one to look at them, praising them as he looked: "These brick inkstones are actually all from my aunt's tomb. The materials alone are enough to make Old Qian rich."

"Especially this inkstone with the character '章' (zhang) engraved on it. Look, the bottom of this inkstone is almost worn through. Do you know what that's called?"

“In ancient times, people talked about hard work, saying that an iron inkstone could be worn through. But in reality, how could an iron inkstone be worn through? To actually wear through a brick inkstone would be an extraordinary feat of hard work.”

"I've heard a story that there was a studious man in Longqiu City who, when he was poor, used bamboo leaves as paper, bricks as inkstones, and burned pine branches to make ink, so he could write continuously."

"Later, he finally became the top scholar in the imperial examination during the Song Dynasty. His name was Gu Bingzhang, and the character 'Zhang' in his name should be the same as the character 'Zhang' in Gu Bingzhang."

As Wu Cheng listened to Jin Wanliang recount the stories, he was quite impressed by Jin Wanliang's vast knowledge. It seemed that Jin Wanliang was not only a lucky cat, but also a professor cat.

He asked curiously, "Since it's Gu Bingzhang, why write 'Zhang' instead of 'Gu'?"

Jin Wanliang was not stumped by Wu Cheng's question. Instead, he picked up the inkstone and asked, "Take another look at this character '章' (zhang). Is there anything unusual about it?"

"It seems like this character is misspelled. How come this vertical stroke has completely pierced through the character 'sun'? Are you sure you're not mistaken? How could a top scholar misspell a character?"

"You don't know anything," Jin Wanliang said, annoyed by Wu Cheng. "The character '章' was deliberately written like this. It means 'literature reaching the heavens,' which shows that Gu Bingzhang has lofty ambitions. Kid, I advise you to read more books. You'll have to rely on knowledge to make money in the future."

Wu Cheng felt a little ashamed after what Jin Wanliang said.

He didn't really like reading, and in fact, this was a common problem among the people of Jiuyuan Kingdom. Everyone liked martial arts and didn't like reading.

The reason he attended a liberal arts school instead of a martial arts school was simply because his family was poor. The saying goes, "The poor study literature, the rich study martial arts." Unless a child with extraordinary talent, it was impossible for someone without money to attend a martial arts school.

He quickly changed the subject, saying, "This Gu Bingzhang's surname is Gu, could he be related to the Gu family in Longqiu City?"

Jin Wanliang rolled his eyes at Wu Cheng, dissatisfied: "What do you think, meow?"

Wu Cheng was taken aback, then overjoyed: "If that's really the case, wouldn't this inkstone easily win the Gu family's treasure competition?"