Chapter 40: The Storage Vault
Naturally, since Jing Shizhen was running a business, he couldn't simply turn customers away.
Besides, Zhao Zhengshan could be considered a major client. Although he didn't hold a position in his family's company, it would be quite easy for him to come up with tens of millions of yuan.
"All right, Uncle Jing. Today, I'll let you take this cut out of me!"
Zhao Zhengshan joked with a laugh. In truth, he rarely bought antiques from Jingxin Hall.
For one thing, the antiques at Jingxin Hall were genuinely expensive. For another, Zhao Zhengshan preferred searching for bargains at antique markets. Of course, the chances of getting fooled were actually greater than the chances of finding a genuine bargain.
However, he couldn't save money when it came to buying a birthday gift for his father. One of the reasons Zhao Zhengshan had brought his daughter to school this time was because he had already planned to buy a good item from Jingxin Hall.
"Then let's go."
Jing Shizhen beckoned to Zhao Zhengshan before turning around and heading toward the inner room.
"Uncle Jing... c-can I come along and broaden my horizons?"
Su Xiaofan's timid voice suddenly sounded.
The storage vault at Jingxin Hall wasn't a place that ordinary people could see. Even the last time they had been in Luochuan with Zheng Dagang, Su Xiaofan and the others hadn't been able to enter the inner room where the safes were kept.
"You want to go in too?"
Jing Shizhen turned around and thought for a moment.
"All right. But you'll have to buy something too. Let me see whether you can find another bargain here at my place."
"Uncle Jing, I'm poor."
Su Xiaofan put on a miserable expression.
"I'm not like Uncle Zhao. You can't hold me to the same standard as him."
"Poor my ass! You made more than ten million yuan right here today, and you still dare to say you're poor?"
Hearing Su Xiaofan's words, Jing Shizhen immediately became annoyed.
"I'll give you a discount. You don't have to buy something worth ten million, but you must buy something from the storage vault!"
These days, even many people who ran very large businesses might not be able to produce more than ten million yuan in cash. Yet this kid, Su Xiaofan, had that much money sitting in his bank account and was still complaining about being poor in front of him.
"Huh, that's true. I'm actually rich now."
Su Xiaofan scratched his head.
The main problem was that the money had come far too quickly, and it had all been transferred through the bank. His mind hadn't had enough time to adjust.
Besides, the antiques in Jingxin Hall's storage vault couldn't all possibly be worth tens of millions. There had to be cheaper pieces as well. With his current financial situation, spending a few hundred thousand yuan on something wasn't a big deal.
"All right, Uncle Jing. I'll buy one too!"
Thinking about the more than ten million yuan sitting in his account, Su Xiaofan suddenly felt much more confident.
"Old Liu, keep an eye on things outside."
Jing Shizhen called out to Manager Liu before leading Su Xiaofan and Zhao Zhengshan into the inner room.
Su Xiaofan had originally thought that the inner room was simply a room with a safe inside.
But after entering, he discovered that it was actually a corridor. After passing through the corridor, there was a small courtyard, with several more rooms surrounding it.
Jing Shizhen pushed open the door of one of the rooms and pressed something somewhere.
Suddenly, the wall directly opposite the room slid apart to both sides, revealing an elevator door.
"The storage vault is underground. It was converted from the original basement."
Jing Shizhen pressed the elevator button.
Su Xiaofan discovered that the elevator required fingerprint identification. Jing Shizhen also seemed to scan his iris before the elevator could be activated.
Now Su Xiaofan understood why Jing Shizhen had been reluctant to bring them to the storage vault.
This place was simply too secretive. Bringing one more person inside meant one more person would know Jingxin Hall's secrets.
For Jing Shizhen to bring both of them here was already a great show of respect toward Zhao Zhengshan and Su Xiaofan. It was also a sign that he trusted the two of them.
After taking the elevator underground, they encountered another large door resembling the entrance to a bank vault.
Su Xiaofan and Zhao Zhengshan didn't step forward. They tactfully turned around and waited until Jing Shizhen called them before turning back and walking over.
"Fewer than five outsiders have ever been here."
Jing Shizhen said, "Your father, Zhengshan, counts as one of them. He came into the storage vault once more than twenty years ago."
"Uncle Jing, you already had a shop here more than twenty years ago?"
Su Xiaofan was stunned.
Fingerprint and iris recognition—did they already have technology like this back then?
"I bought this property more than twenty years ago. The storefront in front was renovated later, but this storage vault has always been here."
Jing Shizhen briefly explained it to the two of them.
"Originally, there wasn't an elevator in the storage vault. We had to take the stairs down. The elevator was installed only in the past few years."
After entering the storage vault, Su Xiaofan and Zhao Zhengshan discovered that the underground space was enormous.
The first room alone was more than thirty square meters, and it was filled with antique display shelves. Various objects were placed on every shelf.
"My storage vault is divided into three main rooms. This one contains porcelain. The room on the right has paintings and calligraphy, and the other one contains miscellaneous antiques. Which one of you wants to look first?"
Different antiques required different storage conditions. For example, paintings and calligraphy and porcelain required different temperatures and humidity levels.
Therefore, Jingxin Hall's underground vault had been divided into different areas.
According to Jing Shizhen, renovating this basement alone had cost more than ten million yuan, with some of the constant-temperature equipment costing hundreds of thousands of yuan.
"I'll look at the paintings and calligraphy. Uncle Jing, do you have anything suitable as a birthday gift?"
Zhao Zhengshan had already decided before coming here that he wanted to buy a painting or calligraphy piece as a birthday present for his father.
"What a coincidence. A while ago, I acquired an old master's 'Ten Thousand Blessings Coming to Court'. Would you like to take a look?"
Jing Shizhen smiled when he heard this.
In fact, when Zhao Zhengshan had mentioned wanting to buy a birthday gift for his father, Jing Shizhen had immediately thought of this painting.
"Isn't 'Ten Thousand Blessings Coming to Court' a work by Chen Mei from the Qing Dynasty? How could it be by the old master Zhang Daqian?"
Zhao Zhengshan was stunned.
He had profound knowledge of paintings and calligraphy. The moment Jing Shizhen mentioned the name of the painting, he immediately sensed that something was unusual.
Moreover, 'Ten Thousand Blessings Coming to Court' was extremely famous. It was a birthday painting that Chen Mei, a court painter of the Qing Dynasty, had created for the emperor.
"Have you forgotten what the old master Daqian was best at?"
Jing Shizhen's face was full of amusement, as if he had thought of something interesting.
"Ah, I almost forgot. This is a good one!"
Zhao Zhengshan's eyes lit up.
"Uncle Jing, hurry up and take me to see it. If it's suitable, I'll take this one."
If outsiders had heard the conversation between Jing Shizhen and Zhao Zhengshan, they probably wouldn't have understood a word of it.
But Su Xiaofan understood.
When the old master Zhang Daqian was young, he particularly enjoyed copying famous paintings and calligraphy. After making copies, he would sometimes sell them as genuine works.
At that time, Zhang Daqian wasn't very famous, and selling copies of famous artists' works naturally brought in more money than selling his own paintings. As a result, quite a number of his copies circulated on the market for a long period.
Later, after Zhang Daqian himself became famous, his practice of copying famous works instead became an interesting story.
And rather than decreasing in value, his copies actually became even more expensive. They became highly sought-after on the market.
Take this copy of 'Ten Thousand Blessings Coming to Court', for example. The price Jing Shizhen quoted later would probably exceed the value of Chen Mei's original work.
Following the two men, Su Xiaofan also entered the room where the paintings and calligraphy were stored.
This room was considerably drier than the one outside. Clearly, special air treatment had been installed to preserve the paintings.
"Xiaofan, aren't you going to look around by yourself?"
Jing Shizhen glanced back at Su Xiaofan.
"I'll stay with Uncle Zhao for now. I'll look around after he's finished buying something."
Su Xiaofan answered.
Some miscellaneous antiques were very small, and he didn't want anything to happen later that might be difficult to explain.
"You're overthinking it."
Jing Shizhen was an experienced old fox. How could he fail to see what Su Xiaofan was thinking?
He pointed upward and said, "There are more than thirty cameras covering the three rooms. There's absolutely no blind spot. Even a fly wouldn't be able to hide."
"That's true."
Su Xiaofan couldn't help laughing.
After spending so much time setting up stalls in antique markets, he had become accustomed to constantly worrying about someone walking off with his things. He had simply forgotten where he was now.
But since he was already inside, Su Xiaofan didn't leave. He also wanted to see an authentic work by the famous Zhang Daqian.
The painting wasn't hanging on the wall. Instead, it had been rolled up for storage.
Jing Shizhen took out the scroll and slowly spread it across a table in the room.
"The original work is currently kept at the New Palace Museum. But there are still three copies by Zhang Daqian on the market. This is one of them."
After spreading out the painting, Jing Shizhen stepped aside and let Zhao Zhengshan examine it.
Su Xiaofan also moved closer and looked for a while.
However, he didn't know much about paintings and calligraphy. All he could see were the calligraphy and various seals on the painting. Those should all have been forged by Zhang Daqian himself.
Su Xiaofan could only marvel.
Zhang Daqian had reached such an extraordinary level in the art of imitation that one of his fake paintings could actually be worth more than the genuine original.
"Uncle Jing, I'll take this painting. Name your price."
After more than ten minutes, Zhao Zhengshan finally lifted his eyes from the painting.
"Zhengshan, you know that as long as a Zhang Daqian painting goes to auction, it basically sells for more than a hundred million yuan."
Jing Shizhen thought for a moment.
"There are three copies of this painting on the market, so I'll give you a lower price. Eighty million yuan. How does that sound?"
"Eighty million?"
Su Xiaofan couldn't help shouting from the side.
He knew that Zhang Daqian's paintings were extremely valuable, but this number still exceeded his understanding.
"Xiaofan, eighty million isn't actually expensive. Among Zhang Daqian's imitation works, this is considered a fine piece."
Zhao Zhengshan hesitated for a moment before saying, "Uncle Jing, I'll take it. But you'll have to give me a few days to arrange the money. I don't have enough cash on hand right now."
Zhao Zhengshan didn't work for his family's company. Although the dividends he had received over the years were far more than eighty million yuan, much of his money had been invested elsewhere, so he didn't have that much cash available.
"No problem. You can take the painting first and transfer the money within a month."
Jing Shizhen was naturally very accommodating toward a high-quality client like Zhao Zhengshan.
He immediately rolled up the painting and placed it inside a wooden box that gave off the fragrance of sandalwood.
"Uncle Zhao, you just bought it for eighty million?"
Su Xiaofan was completely dumbfounded.
He had just felt quite wealthy himself, but he had watched a transaction worth nearly one hundred million yuan get completed in just a few sentences. It gave him an almost unreal feeling.
"Paintings and calligraphy preserve their value, and they have a lot of room to appreciate. They're also a form of investment. Why can't I buy one?"
Zhao Zhengshan gave Su Xiaofan a few words of advice.
In his view, suddenly having more than ten million yuan in assets wasn't necessarily a good thing for Su Xiaofan. It would be better to invest some of it in antiques.
"I don't have your kind of courage."
Su Xiaofan shook his head with a bitter smile.
"Paintings can't be eaten or used to pay the bills. Isn't it better to have more than ten million yuan in cash sitting safely in my bank account?"
(End of Chapter)
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