“Don’t, big brother, I just set up my stall not long ago, and I haven’t made a single sale today.” Nancy Stewart looked at the expressionless middle-aged man, and couldn’t help but shiver inside. He could smell it—these people in front of him all carried that lingering earthy scent. During the last transaction, Nancy Stewart had already roughly guessed this man’s identity.

“Xiaofan, brothers, what’s going on here?” David Carter, standing nearby, sensed something was off. He had originally thought these people were interested in something on Nancy Stewart’s stall, but as soon as Nancy Stewart started talking with the middle-aged man, he immediately understood that these people were up to no good.

Nancy Stewart had been running a stall in the antique market for almost two years, and David Carter had always treated him like a little brother. Now that trouble had come, he naturally wouldn’t back down. He immediately stepped forward, blocking Nancy Stewart with his body, and said, “Brothers, let’s talk this out. Xiaofan is still young. If he’s offended you in any way, I, Gangzi, will apologize on his behalf.”

“It’s nothing much, really. There’s just another deal I want to make with him.” The middle-aged man in the lead shook his head and said, “Last time I bought an item from him. He said it was from the Western Zhou dynasty, and I paid eight thousand yuan for it. Who knew I’d end up with something from last week? Don’t you think he owes me an explanation?”

“Oh, so that’s what this is about.”

Hearing the middle-aged man’s words, David Carter breathed a sigh of relief. “Look, brother, you seem to know your stuff. Bronze ware is a prohibited cultural relic for trade. If he dared to display it at his stall, he’d be hauled off to the station in less than ten minutes. How could he possibly have a genuine Western Zhou artifact? That’s a national treasure! If you ask me, it’s a case of willing buyer and willing seller—you can’t blame Xiaofan for this.”

As he spoke, David Carter couldn’t help but smile. What kind of place is the antique market? It’s a den of tall tales. Any random stall owner could claim that a broken spittoon on their table was once used by Emperor Qianlong himself. The way Nancy Stewart introduced the items at his stall was perfectly normal.

Especially for temporary stalls like those run by Nancy Stewart and himself—once an item leaves their hands, they take no responsibility. No receipts, no guarantees. Since the stuff sold at these stalls is cheap, buyers are just in it for fun and basically know the items are fake. That’s why, in over ten years of running a stall, David Carter had never seen anyone come back with complaints. It was the shops inside the antique mall that occasionally had disputes.

And even if trouble did arise, David Carter wasn’t afraid. Despite the fierce looks on these men’s faces, David Carter was a local fixture—he’d been hanging around this antique market since he was in split pants. If these guys wanted to get rough, all David Carter had to do was shout, and he could call over half the stall owners in the market. These four or five men really weren’t much to worry about.

“My item wasn’t bought at a stall.” The middle-aged man waved his hand at David Carter and said, “Brother, he knows what happened. I just want to talk to him. Don’t worry, this is your turf—I won’t cause any trouble here.”

“Hm? What’s going on?” David Carter turned to look at Nancy Stewart. “Did you pass off a crafted imitation as an antique? That’s not how you folks do things.”

David Carter had known Nancy Stewart for several years and basically understood his background. He knew Nancy Stewart came from that famous bronze ware village in Luochuan City, and the biggest, most important rule in the bronze ware village was that you couldn’t sell their crafted bronze pieces as genuine antiques, and you had to tell customers they were reproductions.

Anyone who broke this rule would face the wrath of the old man who founded the bronze ware village. At best, you’d be kicked out of the village; at worst, you’d be sent straight to the police station. As the saying goes, money moves the heart. Over the decades, plenty of people had been tempted, but the old man personally handed every one of them over to the authorities. The harshest sentence was fifteen years. Since then, no one dared break the rule again.

In the antiques business, when you buy something at a stall, the seller can say whatever they want—it’s up to the buyer’s own judgment. And no one would dare display a real bronze artifact at a stall. Both buyers and sellers know the items are fake. But if Nancy Stewart was selling things privately, David Carter couldn’t guarantee he hadn’t broken the rule. After all, in Luochuan City, cultural relic smuggling was all too common, and with Nancy Stewart’s skills, it was hard for the average person to tell real from fake.

“I didn’t break the rule.” Hearing David Carter’s words, Nancy Stewart got a bit anxious and quickly said, “Big brother, didn’t I tell you at the time? I couldn’t be sure about that item—it might have been a reproduction. You insisted on buying it, so how can you come back now and blame me?”

“But the receipt you gave me says Western Zhou.” The middle-aged man glared as he spoke, pulling a receipt from his pocket. He was feeling a bit awkward himself—after more than twenty years in the business, he hadn’t expected to be tripped up by a young kid.