This kind of observation was focused solely on that square base. Under silent scrutiny, the general shape of the base was seen clearly by Brian Carter. If you only looked at the pattern on the base, it was incomplete—like a complete picture that had been torn apart; no matter which piece you held, it would never be whole.

An incomplete pattern?

Brian Carter immediately felt a wave of disappointment. Even if this base had been around for some years, it must still be a fragment. No wonder someone had used new porcelain to patch it together into a complete plate.

Fragments, even if they are genuine antiques, are of very limited value.

However, Brian Carter didn’t put the plate down right away. Instead, he examined it carefully again. The entire plate had strong coloring, vivid hues, and stable tones...

All these features made his heart suddenly skip a beat—this should be blue-and-white porcelain.

Moreover, the whole base was light in body, with delicate patterns, a glaze free of orange peel texture, and carried a distinct trace of Yuan dynasty style, with extremely fine craftsmanship. Blue-and-white porcelain, with Yuan dynasty influence—most likely Ming dynasty blue-and-white.

In the early Ming period, domestic porcelain was still heavily influenced by Yuan styles, since the Ming had only just seized the realm from the Yuan. It wasn’t until the Xuande era that blue-and-white porcelain completely shed the Yuan influence and developed its own style and charm.

“Ming blue-and-white, with traces of Yuan style—this should be early Ming blue-and-white. That counts as an antique, a genuine Ming blue-and-white. Unfortunately, it’s a fragment; otherwise, it would have some real value.”

His expression calm, Brian Carter’s mind was racing with thoughts, and he was almost certain this was Ming blue-and-white.

A fragment? So what if it’s a fragment? Fragments only fetch low prices in the hands of modern collectors, but don’t forget, he was here looking for antiques to find 【文气】 for the Yellow Leather Book to absorb.

Do fragments not contain 【文气】? He really wasn’t sure about that. If fragments did contain 【文气】, then buying this Ming blue-and-white piece could make for a good experiment.

Blue-and-white porcelain—after all, it’s blue-and-white porcelain.

The name of blue-and-white porcelain may not be thunderously familiar to everyone, but its reputation is certainly formidable.

On July 12, 2005, a “Guigu Descends the Mountain” Yuan dynasty blue-and-white jar was auctioned in London, selling for 230 million RMB—enough to buy two tons of gold at the international price that day.

And that jar was only 27.5 centimeters tall, with a belly diameter of 33 centimeters, weighing about 20 jin.

In terms of volume, this Yuan blue-and-white is the most expensive porcelain in the world, and the highest price ever achieved by a single piece of art was set by this Yuan blue-and-white.

Even if this base wasn’t from the era when the Yuan dynasty ruled all under heaven, Ming blue-and-white is still a very important period in porcelain history. Just recently, at the 2011 Sotheby’s Hong Kong autumn auction, a Ming Yongle “ruyi drooping-shoulder branch flower and fruit pattern” meiping vase sold for 168 million Hong Kong dollars, setting a new world record for Ming dynasty porcelain at auction.

Of course, not every Ming porcelain piece can fetch such a price—those are the rarest of the rare—but overall, many genuine Ming blue-and-white pieces still have considerable value. Since they have value, then when this base was whole, it must have contained 【文气】. The reason it’s so valuable is precisely because it embodies a rich cultural and artistic heritage, right? If it had it when whole, it might not be entirely lost in its fragmented state.

Time slipped by again during this observation. When Brian Carter checked his phone, he realized nearly ten minutes had passed, and the time limit for the 【觅文符】 was quickly running out.

“Forget it, I’ll buy this fragment first and study it carefully at home.”

Just as Brian Carter was about to make the purchase, his expression suddenly changed. He picked up the porcelain plate again for a closer look, suddenly realizing he had overlooked something. It was possible that the Ming blue-and-white on this base wasn’t a fragment at all, but a complete piece of Ming blue-and-white.

Chapter 008: The Number One Pagoda Under Heaven

Brian Carter’s biggest oversight was that, after discovering the plate was a fake pieced together from old and new porcelain, he only focused on examining the base and ignored the overall structure.

When he suddenly remembered the overall shape of the plate, he realized it seemed to be Yongle porcelain.

Ming Yongle porcelain: the inner wall and base junction of plates and bowls have a red line encircling them, and the center of the vessel is concave inside and convex outside, forming a sunken base.

The red line on this porcelain plate was hidden right at the junction of the old and new pieces, cleverly masking a faint, shallow seam.

There are many ways to piece porcelain together. The simplest uses garlic juice: if you break a porcelain bowl and piece it back together, smearing garlic juice on the cracks can make it stick, even better than most glues, and as long as it’s not soaked in water, it won’t easily break again.

But the patching on this porcelain wasn’t done with garlic juice, because the cracks were barely visible—even to the naked eye, they were hard to spot. If he hadn’t already known it was joined, even if David Carter examined it closely, he might not have noticed. But at this moment, he didn’t need to discover it—before even picking it up, he had already seen through it with his x-ray vision.

Still, the forger’s use of the red line to hide the seam was an art in itself—truly hard to detect.

Looking at the whole piece again, Brian Carter felt more and more that the entire plate’s shape belonged to Yongle porcelain.