Reborn As Super Heiress

Chapter 478: Chapter 474: Appraisal Contest

After breakfast, Huo Sining instantly felt reinvigorated by the food she had eaten.

No sooner had she put down her chopsticks than Ji Kun instructed, ”During the meeting just now, we mentioned our current task. They’ve identified a truckload of items above that need our verification.”

”Soon, you might be grouped together with other interns through a draw. If you come across a genuine piece, or something you’re uncertain about, bring it to me for further verification by the expert group.”

Of course, the so-called ”expert group” was overseen by several professors, and regarding the draw for grouping, Huo Sining was certain that it had been Ma Liwen’s idea, with the intention of testing the interns and undermining her and Ji Kun!

Of course, Ji Kun couldn’t state this too blatantly, so he could only remind, ”The specific arrangements will be decided after the draw. Don’t worry about anything else right now. Later, you just need to focus on examining the items assigned to you, and ignore everything else.”

Ji Kun was worried that Huo Sining would be nervous, which is why he comforted her with this equivocation. Despite understanding Huo Sining’s capabilities from the Baiyang Box incident, this was her first time participating in a formal appraisal competition. He was concerned that she might underperform or lose her equilibrium due to her competitive spirit. After some inner conflict, he ended up giving this rather ambiguous piece of advice.

Huo Sining certainly grasped the meaning behind Ji Kun’s words and nodded, ”I understand.”

In the appraisal grouping, Huo Sining wasn’t particularly lucky, drawing two teammates who were difficult companions: Li Xuanbing, with whom she did not get along, and Feng Yang, the disciple of Ma Liwen.

The draw results left Huo Sining somewhat frustrated; she could see the faint cunning sparkle in the eyes of those two, signaling that they wouldn’t be easy to handle.

”That Feng Yang is Ma Liwen’s teaching assistant, his prized student. Be careful with him later, don’t get too close,” Ji Kun discreetly explained to Huo Sining upon noticing her gaze fixed on Feng Yang, sharing his understanding of Ma Liwen after many years of working together.

However, while Ji Kun was focused on warning Huo Sining about Feng Yang, he was oblivious to the fact that Li Xuanbing was also at odds with Huo Sining.

Huo Sining couldn’t help but feel bitter amusement. She genuinely wondered if someone had tampered with the draw—how else could it be so coincidental? Despite her annoyance, she had no choice but to proceed, facing adversaries on all sides; she could only take it one step at a time.

Acutely aware of the hostility emanating from her two teammates, Huo Sining’s brow furrowed slightly.

While she wasn’t worried about the artifact appraisal itself, she feared her companions might play tricks to trip her up. This was truly difficult to guard against.

In total, twelve interns were divided into four groups. Once they were grouped, they headed to their respective appraisal rooms, where several rectangular desks were joined together to form a large table. In one corner of the room were three small square tables, obviously prepared for the professors.

Although Ma Liwen and Ji Kun did not get along, Huo Sining ended up in the same group with one of his students. Even though Ma Liwen was reluctant at heart, he still had to share a room with Ji Kun.

With this in mind, he felt extremely annoyed. His gaze landed on Huo Sining, and with a forced curve to his lips, he headed straight for the appraisal room.

”Don’t overthink it, just focus on doing what you need to do,” Ji Kun encouraged Huo Sining, worried she might be influenced by Ma Liwen.

Huo Sining nodded, not missing the slight scorn and underestimation in Ma Liwen’s eyes, but whatever he thought of her, she really didn’t care.

Ma Liwen had suffered defeats at her hands twice and was, so to speak, her vanquished foe. His opinions of her didn’t matter at all to Huo Sining.

True ability would be proven in battle. Ma Liwen’s disdainful look couldn’t affect her in the least.

The handicrafts that were detained were unloaded from the truck and delivered in batches to each of the temporarily prepared appraisal rooms. This first round of appraisals was just a broad screening. After these results came in, a second appraisal would be conducted in another secure room, where the military had even brought in a Carbon-14 Detector specifically for this purpose.

Once inside the appraisal room, Ma Liwen hurried to allocate the boxes that needed to be appraised to each person.

Having dealt with ancient paintings and enamel works on previous occasions, Ma Liwen believed he had some understanding of Huo Sining’s expertise. He thought that ancient paintings and porcelain might be her strong suit, so of course, he wouldn’t let things go her way. Instead, he assigned Huo Sining a box labeled with ”Jade artifacts.”

Ji Kun was furious inside, realizing that Ma Liwen was deliberately making things difficult, but he had already bragged earlier, claiming no student could compare to Huo Sining. So even though he knew Ma Liwen was picking a quarrel on purpose, Ji Kun couldn’t say much about it.

Huo Sining’s expression remained calm. Ma Liwen thought he had put Huo Sining at a disadvantage, but she wasn’t necessarily going to let him have his way.

As the saying goes: ”Buddhas fight for a single stick of incense, humans fight for a breath of air.” Who would have the last laugh remained unclear until the results came out.

Fortunately, even though they were grouped, there were so many items that Feng Yang and Li Xuanbing were initially too preoccupied to trouble Huo Sining. So she moved the box to one corner of the desk and began preliminary sorting.

Although these items would go back to the professors for a second round of screening after the interns’ initial sorting, the professors were eager to do so.

Even though the interns weren’t capable of handling everything on their own, the experience of appraisal could help them progress rapidly, which was crucial for their development.

Huo Sining opened the box that Ma Liwen had assigned to her, which was divided into three layers. The first layer contained jade jewelry, the second layer had jade pendants and Jade Bi among other accessories, and the third layer was for Jade Carving exhibits.

At first glance, the jade looked incredibly beautiful—at least to someone as inexperienced as Huo Sining, who couldn’t differentiate between the authentic and the fake.

However, this was not a bug; to Huo Sining, whether the jade was real or fake was not the point. She might not have been able to distinguish exactly what type of jade she held, but she could clearly tell whether the jade was an antique or not, thanks to the Heavenly Eye.

For today’s game, this was enough.

Huo Sining casually picked up a hairpin with her right hand and pretended to examine it with a high-powered magnifying glass. As her hand made contact, the Heavenly Eye activated, but the jade hairpin showed no trace of purple aura, nor did she see any other extraordinary sights.

Having identified this item as a fake, Huo Sining slightly pursed her lips and carefully set the jade hairpin aside.

She continued to look down from the hairpin, examining several jade ornaments in succession. Unfortunately, they were all of modern craftsmanship, without a hint of purple aura.

After just a few glances, Feng Yang couldn’t help but laugh secretly. Li Xuanbing, observing the same, couldn’t resist asking, ”What are you laughing at?”