Chapter 359 - 359: One Hundred Boxes of Gold! Tributes from Japan! A Pile of Tricolor Tang Pottery! (3)
Luo Feng took the book and examined it for a while. His excitement quickly turned into disappointment. “It seems that this is not the original copy, is it?”
It made sense. How could the original copy possibly be here? After all, as long as there was no war, the Emperor would have possession of the originals, right?
Of course, the value of the Yongle Encyclopedia lay not in whether it was an original or a copy, but in the information it contained. Even so, an original would be preferable.
Even if it was not the original, the content was the same. Just like purchasing a novel written by the author or reading a pirated copy, the content would be identical.
“It seems to be a transcription from the Jiajing era, perhaps a private copy made by scholars from the Hanlin Academy!”
In history, the Yongle Encyclopedia had been copied by several scholars. As such, Luo Feng believed that no matter who the tomb owner was, having copied the Yongle Encyclopedia and preserving some documents was a commendable deed and was a significant contribution to future generations.
Luo Feng opened all the boxes, totaling more than a hundred. Each box contained 25 volumes of the Yongle Encyclopedia, adding up to 2, 500 volumes.
It was evident that the tomb owner had not finished copying the encyclopedia. After all, copying it was a monumental task. Even Emperor Yongle had many people working on it.
Could the tomb owner have been more formidable than Emperor Yongle? Of course not, as such failing to finish the transcription seemed quite reasonable.
“Let’s move on, Master Gu. Let’s see what’s ahead!” Luo Feng called out to Gu Santong.
“Alright, alright, very well!” Gu Santong was thrilled at that moment.
Gu Santong was still very curious about the identity of the tomb owner. The tomb owner’s status was undoubtedly not lower than that of Yuan Zai, and most likely, they were a high-ranking corrupt official.
Otherwise, how could there be so many valuable items in the tomb? Just the gold and silver alone would have been enough to buy many slaves and fertile lands in ancient times.
However, such behavior was typical in the context of ancient times — if one did not become a corrupt official, they would essentially be going against everyone else.
Soon, they entered the next chamber. Inside, they saw rows of long tables. No, not tables – display cases for weapons.
On the cases, there were various swords and knives, dozens in total, as well as some armor. Altogether, there were likely over a hundred pieces.
“Wow, this entire room is filled with forbidden items!” Luo Feng was well aware that while it was acceptable to create weapons like swords and knives, armor was likely prohibited in any dynasty.
In other words, the most powerful weapons were those you could not privately create. For example, while you could forge swords in modern times, firearms were strictly regulated by the state.
In ancient times, armor was undoubtedly a powerful piece of equipment.
“A Tang blade? Could this have been taken from Yuan Zai’s tomb as well?” Gu Santong spotted a blade and asked.
“Haha, it probably was. Poor Yuan Zai, even in death, he cannot rest in peace!” Luo Feng laughed.
“Seven Stars Sword? Peony Sword?” Luo Feng saw the names on the swords and realized that they were merely the names given by their owners.
“Master Gu, come and have a look. This should be a sword from Japan, right?” Luo Feng looked at the sword’s shape with intrigue, as ancient Chinese swords did not resemble it.
This sword had a strong Japanese style. Luo Feng’s gaze swept over every inch of the blade, and on the hilt, he saw five Japanese characters engraved: “My?h?
Renge Ky??”
Luo Feng’s heart jolted.
My?h? Muramasa?
The Demon Blade Muramasa?