Abstinence Pei, don't be too sweet when chasing your wife

Chapter 543 Recalling Old Images Amidst a Pile of Fragments

On the first morning after Du Fei left, the mist over Qinglongpo was so thick it resembled an impenetrable veil, obscuring even the distant old locust trees. Ling Jiu'er got up early and habitually walked to Du Fei's tent. She reached for the zipper before suddenly realizing it was empty—their cheerful voice would never again be heard: "Jiu'er, after I collect yesterday's scraps of forms, let's go organize the workbench together."

Her hand froze in mid-air. She stood there for a while, stunned, before letting out a soft sigh and turning to walk towards the organizing table not far away.

On the stage, the kiln tool fragments that Du Fei hadn't finished sorting were neatly arranged on a white foam board. Under each fragment was a small note with the location, date, and characteristics of the discovery written in neat handwriting.

On the topmost fragment of the paper, Du Fei's faint handwriting still remained.

"Jiu'er, the glaze on this fragment is very special. Remember to confirm the composition with Master Chen." A small smiley face was drawn at the end, as if afraid she would forget.

Ling Jiu'er picked up the smiling fragment, her fingertips gently tracing the fine crackle patterns on it, and memories suddenly surged forth.

On a misty morning, Du Fei held two fragments in his hand and patiently asked her for advice.

"Jiu'er, is the crackling on this glaze caused by the temperature dropping too quickly? Does the glaze shrink faster than the body, thus forming these patterns?"

That day, she even found a fragment of a modern replica for comparison, letting him touch it repeatedly to feel the difference. The sunlight slowly penetrated the thin mist, shining on his earnest profile, even the shadows cast by his eyelashes exuded gentleness.

As Ling Jiu'er thought about it, the corners of her mouth unconsciously turned up, but her eyes slowly reddened—she always thought that these days would last a long time, but she never expected that the separation would come so quickly.

"Jiu'er, what are you daydreaming about? It's time to go explore."

Gu Fanxing's voice came from behind her. She was carrying an exploration tool bag containing a small shovel, a soft brush, and a measuring tape.

"Today we went to the area near the mine pit north of the kiln site. Professor Wang sent a message yesterday saying that the soil layer there may contain fragments of daily utensils used by the kiln workers. If we can find them, we can have a clearer understanding of the production and living conditions of the 'Qingning Kiln' back then."

Ling Jiu'er quickly put the fragment back in its original place, gently pressed the paper strip underneath with her fingertips as if afraid it would be blown away by the wind, and then shook her head vigorously to drive away her thoughts.

"Here comes the star!"

Gu Fanxing felt a pang of heartache seeing her trying so hard to appear cheerful.

She walked over and picked up the light blue notebook on the table—the cover was already a little soft from being touched, the edges were slightly curled, and Du Fei's handwriting was written on the title page: "Jiu'er, don't panic when you encounter problems, write them down and find Fanxing to solve them together."

"Don't put too much pressure on yourself. You can ask me if you don't understand anything. Look how detailed Du Fei's notes are. He even marked out the problems you might encounter in advance, just so you wouldn't be anxious," Gu Fanxing reminded Jiu'er.

Ling Jiu'er nodded, carefully put the notebook into her backpack, zipped it up, as if protecting a precious treasure.

She followed Gu Fanxing toward the mine. The wild grass on the road was covered with cold dew, which quickly soaked her trouser legs, but she didn't care at all.

In the past, Du Fei would always walk ahead, using a small shovel to help her clear away the tall weeds. He would also make a small mark on the potholes to remind her, "There's a pothole here, be careful." He would even take her tool bag from her, afraid that she would get tired.

Without him by her side, she could only slow down and carefully watch the path beneath her feet. She felt empty inside, and even the sound of her footsteps on the fallen leaves felt particularly lonely.

After walking for about ten minutes, Pei Luonan suddenly stopped and pointed to a patch of darker-colored land next to the mine.

“Look, this layer of soil is a different color, it’s darker than the surrounding soil. It may contain organic residue or traces of kiln workers’ activities.”

The crowd immediately gathered around and saw that the soil there was much deeper than the surrounding yellow soil, and the edges of grayish-brown pottery shards could be vaguely seen protruding outwards, as if they were quietly greeting each other.

Ling Jiu'er immediately took out the small shovel she carried with her, squatted down, and carefully dug away the surface soil.

Her movements were very gentle; she used a small shovel to carefully remove the soil. Her heart would race whenever her fingertips touched something hard, afraid of accidentally breaking a piece of debris.

As the soil was slowly removed, a piece of pottery with black fire marks was revealed. It was shaped like half a cylinder, and fine traces of hand-shaping could be seen on the surface, with wear marks on the edges.

Ling Jiu'er held her breath and gently brushed away the dirt from the pottery shard with a soft brush. Her eyes lit up immediately.

"This is... a saggar!"

Craftsman Chen, who had been standing nearby, suddenly exclaimed, his eyes filled with surprise.

"When firing porcelain in the Song Dynasty, the porcelain blanks would be placed in this kind of saggar for firing. This would prevent the kiln fire from directly hitting the porcelain blanks and also prevent kiln ash from falling on the glaze surface, making the glaze color more even."

My father used similar saggars when he made celadon, only a little smaller than this one. I had only seen descriptions of Song Dynasty saggars in literature before; I never imagined I could find actual fragments in Qinglongpo!

Ling Jiu'er excitedly continued to clear the surrounding soil and dug out several more fragments of a similar-shaped sagger.

She carefully pieced the fragments together and could roughly tell that the sagger was originally cylindrical, about thirty centimeters high and about twenty centimeters in diameter.

Just as she picked up a fragment with a more intact edge to examine the fire marks more closely, her fingertip suddenly touched a faint engraving. It was a small triangle, very lightly engraved, almost invisible without close inspection, located on the edge of the fragment, exactly in the same spot Du Fei had marked earlier.

Upon seeing this mark, Ling Jiu'er's heart skipped a beat.

This is Du Fei's "exclusive mark"!

When we were cleaning up the kiln tool fragments together last time, Du Fei said he was afraid that the fragments from different areas would get mixed up, so he lightly carved small triangles on the fragments he was responsible for. He even smiled and said to her, "That way, even if they get mixed up by accident, I can still recognize which ones I cleaned, and you can find them by looking at the marks if you forget."

She still remembers when Du Fei was marking the fragments, he was afraid of carving too deep and damaging the fragments. His finger was slightly scratched by the carving knife, and a little blood seeped out. He just wiped it with a tissue and continued to listen to her explain the classification method of the fragments, saying, "This little injury is nothing. The fragments are the most important thing."

Touching this familiar mark, Ling Jiu'er's nose suddenly stung, and her eyes instantly reddened.

"What's wrong? Did you find anything?"

Gu Fanxing noticed her unusual behavior and handed her a tissue.

Ling Jiu'er held up the fragment, her voice somewhat hoarse.

“Xingxing, look at this mark. Du Fei carved it. He told me last time that he would carve a small triangle on the fragments he cleaned up to make them easier to identify and to facilitate subsequent data analysis.”

We never expected that this fragment of the sagger was one he had cleaned up before. He had said at the time that there might be an important discovery in this area, and we actually found it.

Everyone crowded around to look, and sure enough, they saw the faint little triangular mark on the edge of the fragment.

Craftsman Chen sighed and gently touched the fragment: "That Du kid, he's so meticulous. Last time he helped me organize the glaze samples, he wrote the collection date, location, and composition prediction on each sample bag, even more clearly than I could remember it myself. Now I have to rely on the labels he wrote to find samples, otherwise I would have gotten all mixed up long ago."

Gu Fanxing patted Ling Jiu'er's shoulder and said gently, "Although he is gone, the traces he left behind are all his imprints on Qinglongpo."

He would be extremely happy if he knew that we used the fragments he marked to help us reconstruct the Song Dynasty porcelain-making process.

Ling Jiu'er couldn't help but smile at his words, nodded vigorously, and carefully placed the marked fragment into a separate sealed bag. She also drew a small triangle on the bag and wrote "Du Fei Mark - Fragment of a Sagger" next to it.

She thought that when Du Fei returned and saw this mark, he would know that she had done her job very diligently and had not disappointed him.