Restoring cultural relics: Starting with the crying Tang Dynasty figurines

Su Yuan nodded. He knew Zhong Ming was right. Han Zhengming and Sun Guoliang knew the jade ring was in his possession, but they couldn't openly take it from him.

This time, we can't let them know what he's looking for.

The wooden board was then put back in its original position using copper nails.

Su Yuan left the warehouse, locked the door, walked to the window at the end of the corridor, took out his phone, and called his mother.

"Mom, I'm going back tomorrow."

"Tomorrow? Didn't you say you were going to the provincial capital next Monday?"

"The seminar has been postponed. I'll go back to see you and Dad beforehand, and then go directly from my hometown to the provincial capital."

His father's voice came from the other end of the phone: "Okay."

Su Yuan: "Mm."

After hanging up the phone, Su Yuan stood by the window, watching Sun Guoliang's car for a while.

Su Yuan returned to his office, placed the bronze mirror on the table, took the cloth bag out of his pocket, found the small jade piece, and put the three items together.

"Mr. Zhong, do you know what this lock looks like?"

"Never seen it before..."

Zhong Ming floated over and said, "Your great-grandfather only told me that he hid something, but he didn't tell me what it looked like."

Su Yuan held the key in his hand and examined the two teeth carefully.

The teeth are shaped like two overlapping curves, one above the other, intersecting each other. This is something that cannot be produced by a machine!

It was filed by hand, and every line bears the marks of the file.

Su Yuan muttered, "These locks and keys were all made by my great-grandfather himself."

Miao Deyu remarked from behind, "The curve of these teeth looks simple, but it took a lot of work to file them back then!"

Su Yuan smiled, rewrapped the key, note, and jade piece, and put them into the toolbox.

Leaning back in my chair and closing my eyes, I pieced together the clues in my mind, one by one.

My great-grandfather hid the lock inside the stone lion in the ancestral grave. The ancestral grave was on the hill behind our old home. He had been there a few times and remembered that there were two stone lions there, one on the left and one on the right, squatting in front of the grave.

But which lion's belly was it locked inside? The note didn't say.

Su Yuan reopened the cloth bag and read the note again.

"Locked inside the ancestral tomb, inside the belly of the stone lion."

There was only this one sentence on the front, without mentioning the left or right sides. I took out the paper again and carefully looked at it all, and I actually found something!

There is a small black dot on the bottom of the back, which looks like writing, but it is not clear what it is.

Su Yuan had to use a magnifying glass to see clearly that it was a character "左" (left) written with the tip of a calligraphy brush.

Zhong Ming smiled and said, "Your great-grandfather did a very thorough job."

Su Yuan nodded and stood up, putting everything into the toolbox. He would take it all back to his hometown tomorrow!

The thing inside the lock is very likely the key to waking A-Wu up completely. She sent a message to Zhang Weiyi and the others on her phone that she needed to go home, and then looked around the warehouse.

As he walked out of the company gate, the late summer breeze refreshed him considerably. He nodded to Liu Jun and headed towards his dormitory.

Su Yuan touched the mirror in his pocket and thought to himself:

"It'll be soon, Awu, just wait a little longer...it'll be soon..."

Because I had to get up early the next day, I went to bed very early that night. The area outside the dormitory was very noisy that night, filled with inhuman chatter:

"Master Su is going back to his hometown."

"Yes, it seems quite important!"

"Keep your voice down, don't disturb Master Su..."

"Okay, okay, let's wait. Our problem isn't serious, no rush to fix it..."

The next morning at 6:30, Su Yuan was woken up by his alarm clock.

After washing up and packing his things, he felt there was still some information he had overlooked. He decided to think about it later, and left with his backpack and toolbox.

I arrived at the bus station at 7:10 and bought a ticket for the earliest bus back to my hometown.

The bus, carrying a dozen or so passengers, swayed and bumped its way onto the highway. Su Yuan found an empty seat at the back and sat down.

As he gazed intently into the bronze mirror, the sound of a bell tolling came from within:

Does your mother know about your great-grandfather?

Su Yuan covered his face with the bronze mirror and thought for a moment, then said in a very low voice, "He probably knows something, but he's never told me. Maybe he doesn't want me to get involved."

"Did your father say anything to your mother before he went insane?"

"I was too young to know back then."

Su Yuan recalled, "I remember that a few days before my dad disappeared, he seemed to lock himself in his room and write something, but I don't remember very clearly."

Zhong Ming turned to look at Old Ancestor Su behind him and remained silent for a moment:

"You'd better ask your mother if she's kept it."

Su Yuan nodded, put the bronze mirror back in his pocket, and, leaning on his toolbox and backpack, gazed out the window. The scenery outside the car window changed from city to farmland, hills…

Five or six hours later, the bus stopped at a bus station in a small town.

Su Yuan got off the car carrying his toolbox and bag, and took a deep breath.

The air back home is so different from the city; it smells more of earth and firewood. He hasn't been back for over half a year!

When I came back this time, I felt that time had slowed down.

There was still some distance between the station and his home, so Su Yuan flagged down a three-wheeled motorcycle. After a bumpy ride of more than ten minutes, it stopped in front of a two-story building.

The building was an old-style red brick house with a layer of whitewash on the exterior walls. Su Yuan pushed open the courtyard gate and called out:

"mom…"

A woman wearing an apron and with flour still on her hands came out of the house; it was his mother, Liu Xiuyun.

"Yuan'er's back? Come in quickly, Mom will make you some noodles."

Su Yuan helped Liu Xiuyun into the house, put her backpack on the sofa, and looked around the room.

The room was simply furnished but very clean. A plate of apples and oranges sat on the octagonal table, several old magazines were stacked on the coffee table, and the television was on.

Where's my dad?

"In the inner room, I was just talking about you."

Liu Xiuyun wiped her hands and pointed towards the corridor: "Go check on him, the noodles will be cooked soon."

Su Yuan walked down the corridor and pushed open the door to the innermost room.

The room was poorly lit, and the curtains were only half-drawn. His father, Su Fu, sat on the edge of the bed, wearing an old jacket and holding a wooden comb in his hand.

She was combing her hair, stroke by stroke, over the porcelain cat on the bedside table!

The porcelain cat was bought by Su Fu from the market when Su Yuan was very young. It was a cheap item that cost only a few yuan, and the glaze was chipped off in several places.

Su Fu's nerves have been a bit erratic lately; sometimes he's in a daze, and sometimes he's lucid.

"dad."

Su Yuan walked over and squatted down beside the bed. Su Fu looked at Su Yuan's face, paused for two seconds, and then gave him a slightly strange smile:

"Yuan'er is back. Look, the cat's fur is all messed up. Let me comb it."

"Okay, you can comb it."

Su Yuan grasped his hand and asked, "Dad, how have you been feeling lately?"

"I'm doing well, eating and sleeping well, don't worry about me, Yuan'er..."

After Su Fu finished speaking, he continued combing the porcelain cat, muttering to himself:

"I had a dream that day, I dreamt of your great-grandfather, and he told me to tell you that the things are in the back mountain, don't forget to go get them."

Su Yuan's heart skipped a beat, and he squatted down again to ask:

"Dad, besides saying the things were in the back mountain, what else did Great-Grandpa say?"

Su Fu turned her head, looking at him with a confused expression: "Who...who said that?"

"What you just said, Dad, is what Great-Grandpa told you in a dream..."

Su Yuan asked anxiously!