Villain? No, I'll catch up with the protagonist after passing the civil service exam.

"Hey fellow villager, don't be in such a hurry to leave."

Lu Jingyan's voice wasn't loud, but it was like an invisible rope that instantly entangled the feet of the "old farmer" who was about to make a quick getaway.

The "old farmer" stiffened, slowly turned his head, and forced a smile that looked more like a grimace: "Officer... Officer, you called me?"

"Who else should I call if not you?"

Lu Jingyan didn't look at him, his gaze still fixed on the broken bowl in Ye Tian's arms. "There's something wrong with your 'family heirloom,' we need to have a good talk about it."

Holding the bowl, Ye Tian looked at the policeman who had suddenly disrupted the situation, then at the "old farmer" who was so scared he was about to wet his pants, his mind a complete mess.

The system clearly stated that this was a Song Dynasty Ru ware piece, priceless! How did it become a stolen item of dubious origin in the mouth of this policeman?

"Officer, are you sure you're not mistaken?"

Ye Tian, ​​clinging to the last shred of his "protagonist" dignity, tried to argue, "I bought this bowl from this old man for five hundred yuan based on my own judgment. It was a willing buyer and a willing seller; it was a legal transaction!"

"legitimate?"

Lu Jingyan finally raised his head, his eyes, hidden behind his glasses, like two sharp scalpels, ready to dissect this clumsy act completely.

"Then why don't I, an 'outsider,' give you my opinion?"

As he spoke, he extended his hand.

Ye Tian instinctively wanted to protect the bowl in his arms, but under Lu Jingyan's unquestionable gaze, he still handed the bowl over as if possessed.

Lu Jingyan put on a pair of white gloves that he always carried with him and carefully took the bowl.

His movements were so professional that even the antique dealers around him were ashamed of themselves.

He didn't rush to look at it, but first placed the bowl in the sunlight, squinted, and carefully observed the luster on the glaze.

"The glaze is sky blue, but it has a superficial sheen and lacks the restrained luster that Song porcelain has accumulated over a thousand years. This is a typical characteristic of 'shortly unearthed and untouched'."

He turned the bowl over again and gently traced the rough marks left by the spurs on the bottom with his fingertips.

"The spur marks on Ru ware are as fine as sesame seeds, but yours are... bigger than soybeans. And judging from the reddish-brown color, the firing temperature was obviously too high, and the craftsmanship is more like that of folk kilns in the mid-to-late Ming Dynasty."

Finally, he gently rubbed his fingers against the notch on the rim of the bowl, picking up a pinch of almost invisible...yellowish-brown powder.

He placed the powder under his nose and sniffed it gently.

"The earthy smell carried a faint... rotten coffin smell."

Lu Jingyan put down his bowl, took off his gloves, looked at Ye Tian, ​​whose face had turned deathly pale, and gave the final, and most fatal, conclusion:

"This is not some Song Dynasty Ru ware."

"If I'm not mistaken, this should be a burial object from a folk kiln during the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, commonly known as a 'mingqi' (funerary object)."

"Although it does have some value, probably worth... fifty or sixty thousand. But its nature has completely changed."

"Funerary items?!"

The antique dealers around them instantly erupted in chaos, retreating as if avoiding a plague, their eyes filled with terror as they looked at the bowl in Ye Tian's arms.

Reselling funerary objects is a major taboo in the antique trade! It's also a red line under the law!

Holding the bowl, Ye Tian felt as if he were holding not a national treasure, but a time bomb that could explode at any moment, and his hands trembled like leaves.

In his mind, the system's voice was frantically alarming.

[Warning! Warning! Force majeure has occurred! A major misjudgment has occurred in the system database! Host, please immediately discard the target item and evacuate immediately!]

"Abandon? Too late."

Lu Jingyan seemed to hear the voice in his heart, and a cold smile curled at the corner of his lips.

"Hey kid, let me give you a little legal advice."

"Spending five hundred yuan to buy an item worth fifty or sixty thousand yuan is called 'finding a bargain' in the antique world; it's your good luck."

"but--"

Lu Jingyan's voice suddenly turned cold.

"Spending 500 yuan to buy a national cultural relic that was just dug out of a grave is called the crime of 'illegally acquiring and reselling cultural relics'."

According to my country's Law on the Protection of Cultural Relics, all cultural relics remaining underground, in inland waters, and in territorial waters belong to the state. They may not be bought or sold between private individuals.

He pointed to the "old farmer" next to him who was almost collapsed on the ground.

"By buying this bowl from this suspected tomb raider, you are committing the crime of receiving stolen goods. He was a tomb raider, and you were a receiver of stolen goods; you two are accomplices."

"Now, the suspect has been caught red-handed."

Lu Jingyan looked at Ye Tian, ​​his eyes showing no sympathy whatsoever.

"Do you still think this is a legal transaction?"

"No...no...I don't know, officer!"

Ye Tian completely broke down.

He knelt on the ground with a thud, dropping the bowl he was holding, and cried out with a mournful face, "I'm just a student! I don't know anything! It was him! He lied to me! He said it was his family heirloom!"

He sold the "old farmer" without hesitation.

"Oh? Is that so?"

Lu Jingyan looked at the "old farmer" who was already preparing to slip away, his voice not loud, but every word was like thunder.

"Hey fellow villager, don't be in such a hurry to leave."

"There's something wrong with your 'family heirloom,' aren't you going to stay and explain?"

Seeing this, the "old farmer" knew he couldn't escape. A fierce glint flashed in his eyes, and he suddenly pulled out a rusty dagger from his pocket. He turned and rushed into the crowd, trying to take a hostage!

However, he hadn't even taken two steps.

A dark figure appeared behind him like a ghost.

Zhao Tiezhu (who had been waiting on the perimeter for some time) had already crept over. He didn't even bother with any grappling techniques, and simply used a crude "chokehold" to lift the skinny "old farmer" up like a chicken.

"Behave yourself, officer!"

The dagger clattered to the ground.

A potential bloodshed was thus averted with a swift and easy resolution.

Ye Tian knelt on the ground, watching this professional yet violent scene, trembling with fear, even forgetting to cry.

He finally realized how ridiculous and powerless his so-called "god-level treasure appraisal system" was in the face of the real state apparatus.

Get up.

Lu Jingyan walked up to him and looked down at him.

"Don't kneel, it looks unlucky."

"Considering that you are a college student and this is your first offense, we may be able to negotiate a lenient treatment."

He paused, then pulled the cold silver bracelet from behind his waist.

"However, while the death penalty may be spared, punishment is inevitable."

"You're definitely going to the police station this time."

As Ye Tian watched the handcuffs slowly approach, his vision blurred. He felt his "protagonist" life, which had just begun, was about to...

It has lost its wings.

Just as Lu Jingyan was about to handcuff him and end this farce...

The "old farmer" whose throat was being held by Zhao Tiezhu suddenly began to struggle wildly, letting out a series of unintelligible roars.

"Let me go! You bunch of mortals! How dare you touch my people, the 'Tomb Raiders'?!"

As he shouted, he pulled a handful of dark powder from his pocket and threw it violently at Zhao Tiezhu's face!

"Be careful! It's corpse poison powder!" The system in Ye Tian's mind issued a final warning.

Zhao Tiezhu subconsciously closed his eyes and turned his head to the side.

However, the powder was not poisonous.

"boom--!"

A loud bang.

The black powder suddenly exploded in mid-air, forming a huge fireball that instantly engulfed Zhao Tiezhu and the "old farmer"!

"Iron Pillar!"

Lu Jingyan's pupils contracted sharply, and he instinctively lunged forward.

However, it was too late.

The flames died down.

All that remained on the ground was a charred mark.

Zhao Tiezhu lay on the ground, his fate unknown.

And that thin, small "old farmer," along with Ye Tian, ​​the "protagonist of the treasure appraisal" kneeling on the ground, actually...

Vanished into thin air!

Lu Jingyan looked at the empty ground and then at the chaotic crowd in the distance. His face instantly darkened to the point of being dripping with water.

"A talisman? An illusion?"

He slowly straightened up, clenched his fists, and his knuckles cracked.

"interesting."

"It seems that the 'protagonist' in this provincial capital is indeed much more troublesome than those good-for-nothings in Jinghai."

"but……"

He took out a walkie-talkie, his voice as cold as ice.

"run?"

"Where can you run to in this city?"