The Versatile Master Artist

Countdown 320 seconds,

”The Little Prince” exploded in front of his eyes, thousands of lines of text flowing like the zeros and ones on a hacker’s computer screen, sliding rapidly across the light screen in his mind.

Gu Weijing didn’t need to painstakingly read each letter and word.

Every sentence, every paragraph written by Saint-Exupéry echoed in his heart simultaneously.

In a moment,

the text broke free from the confines of paper,

they threaded and linked, cones of emotion overlapping, love and hate superimposed, as if a giant net was cast down overhead.

In the past, when he admired artworks using the Fine Level Calligraphy and Painting Identification Skill,

the system could always start with the smallest brushstrokes and ink dots and decompose them into the most essential elements on the light screen in his mind.

But now,

the light screen in Gu Weijing’s mind — was melting as the passionate words from the great writer fell into it.

It was no longer a movie-screen-like two-dimensional plane.

The light screen deconstructed and transformed... becoming a whole living three-dimensional space.

A majestic theater-like Temple of Thought appeared in Gu Weijing’s mind.

On the stage of this palace — contained the entire universe named ”The Little Prince.”

Countdown 306 seconds,

Gu Weijing’s thoughts began to shuttle through the universe woven by the giant web of text.

The Little Prince, King, Rose, fox, and Alcoholic.

Every character from the fairy tale, whose names had appeared, transformed into doll-like figures, impatiently jumping onto the stage of his Temple of Thought.

They clamored and they shouted.

A tidal wave of noise surged around Gu Weijing’s mind, like a thousand silver wind chimes swaying in the wind simultaneously.

All the fairy tale figures were already wound up,

performing their roles earnestly according to the author’s script of fate.

None of the stage plays he had ever seen could compare with the scene before his eyes at this moment.

Compared to that sincere performance of these laughing, cursing puppet figures, even the most profound director and the most devoted old actors could only be called a superficial imitation of the characters.

And Gu Weijing was the only spectator of this grand and passionate drama.

In one breath, he was standing on a tiny B612 asteroid only house-sized, watching the sunset forty-three times. The next second, he was conversing with a stern-faced unfamiliar King, and instantly, Gu Weijing found himself under a baobab tree, with a rosebud breaking through the soil at his feet...

The storyline of ”The Little Prince” seemed to be playing as a stage play at a thousand times speed.

Constantly changing magnificent scenery like a rotating giant kaleidoscope.

Countless streaming lights,

surfaced before Gu Weijing’s eyes.

In just over fifty thousand words, it contained boundless space, allowing him to roam and linger within.

In the real world,

this lively stage play lasted about three and a half minutes.

In just these three and a half minutes,

Gu Weijing felt more familiar with the entire plot of The Little Prince than all his previous knowledge combined.

The Skills were far from over.

Countdown 128 seconds,

The script’s last scene of the fairy tale ended. The curtain slowly fell, and the universe returned to tranquility after the brief bustle.

The twinkling fragments of light from stars disappeared.

No more charmingly cute orange-like small asteroids, no more blooming rose gardens, no more desert and starry night.

The play has ended and the audience has dispersed,

but the fairy tale characters in Saint-Exupéry’s writings didn’t disappear with the stage.

They stood still, covered by pale yellow translucent light masses, as if sealed in solidified amber.

The doll figures frozen, floating above Gu Weijing’s Temple of Thought, surrounded by a dark velvet-like abyss.

Gu Weijing had a feeling,

if the previous scene was meant to deepen his overall impression of the entire novel of ”The Little Prince.”

Then now the system was breaking down each fairy tale character into small units.

The characters imprisoned in these light masses were alive,

all expressions of emotions infused by Saint-Exupéry into every character in his creations.

A century after the French literary figure’s reconnaissance plane went missing, if it weren’t for the system’s help, there would be no second person in the world who could so truly touch the real world within this great writer’s heart.

It seemed as long as Gu Weijing willed it, poured his spirit into it,

he could, like cracking an egg, break the translucent shell that enveloped the fairy tale characters and hampered their movement.

Gu Weijing could release these lively and spirited souls,

release them under his pen.

”Huh, the look of these fairy tale characters...”

As Gu Weijing withdrew his spirit from the overwhelming drama, he had a moment to feel a bit surprised.

He discovered,

the appearance of the fairy tale characters extracted from ”The Little Prince” storybook by the Calligraphy and Painting Identification Skill in the Temple of Thought before him — was identical to the characters he had created in his Painting Knife Paintings.

Were they all characters he created?

”Even though the difference between the two isn’t huge, I thought they would be modeled after Saint-Exupéry’s original illustrations.”

Gu Weijing thought, ”Perhaps it is because it is constructed based on my own understanding of these characters as the source of inspiration?”

He focused intently on observing these little people in ”amber.”