NOLMBW: Chapter 53
Principal Stewart saw clear signs of wavering in Student Rong and spoke in a milder tone. “Once you arrive at the college, come to my office and see me. I’ll take you there.”
“Yes, thank you Principal.”
Rong Mingshi raised his paws in a promise. In the 3D image, Principal Stewart smiled with relief, reached out to pat the little leopard’s head and turned off the call.
Rong Mingshi naturally couldn’t carry all of the 10 high-grade energy stones with him. He only took out one transparent stone as white as jade while the others were taken away by the housekeeper. In addition, Rong Mingshi didn’t forget to bring the low-grade energy stones for the baby elephant and red dragonfly.
Depending on the class, he might be able to sneak around and see which one he could carve. The price for these low-grade energy stones was far worse than the high-grade energy stones but there was no difference in Rong Mingshi’s heart.
On the way to the college by suspension car, Rong Mingshi opened his computer to confirm the beast images provided by the 10 buyers. At this time, Rong Mingshi saw the message from a certain fox deputy commander. A huge military order…
Rong Mingshi, who already had the booking fee of 100 million star coins, considered his recent arrangements, used his paws to rub his ears and politely replied.
After waiting a day and a night, the deputy commander suddenly received an alert for a message from the store owner. His eyes slightly narrowed and his mouth unconsciously rose. No businessman would reject the large order that he mentioned.
Thus, the fox opened the message and prepared to have a thorough discussion with the store owner to talk about the arrangement of the high-grade orders. However, the moment he saw the message, the smile on the deputy commander’s face suddenly froze.
The owner’s reply was blunt: I’m sorry, I’m too busy lately to pick up the order.
The delivery time of the military order wasn’t mentioned at all…
The fox got a glimpse of the lazy businessman recognized by tens of millions of buyers.
The master class of the Imperial Capital’s Carver Academy was famous and there was almost no one in the empire who didn’t know about it. It was just that in recent years, due to the high salary of the Oran Carving Business, most masters devoted themselves to the high-grade orders of the Oran Carving Business after becoming certified as a carving master. Therefore, the scale of this master class was much smaller than before. However, all those who participated in the class had supreme perception and carving skills and regarded money as dung.
Principal Stewart brought Student Rong to the master class and introduced him to the masters one by one. At present, there were 18 people in the master class. These people occasionally took one or two high-grade energy stone orders when lacking money but most of the time, they used high-grade energy stones to do research.
As he spoke, Principal Stewart suddenly sighed, “Every one of them aren’t serious, otherwise your marshal wouldn’t have found me to carve the high-grade energy stone for him…”
Upon hearing this, the tail of the little leopard driving the seat suddenly became stiff. Was it too late to refuse to come to class? There was no one serious apart from the principal?
Principal Stewart seemed unaware that he was speaking to himself, “My carving skills might not be the best but I am the most reliable one.”
Principal Stewart didn’t like to admit that he was actually the worst among them. A long time ago, he was forced to run the school after losing a bet.
In the beginning, Marshal Black Dragon went to these old masters for his high-grade energy stone carving. They quickly agreed but they had the request that they must thoroughly study Marshal Black Dragon’s real beast shape, not the image, before carving it for him.
The black dragon only lasted for half a minute after showing his beast form. His dragon scales were pulled out by these old guys to study and no one would be able to bear it. In the end, the marshal gave up and handed it to the principal.
At this point, Principal Stewart suddenly stood up and said, “Here we are.”
Rong Mingshi raised his head. They were in front of a building that looked ordinary. It was a study room that could be seen anywhere in the college. Principal Stewart activated the license key and the door of the study room automatically opened.
One man and one leopard entered.
They entered and the situation was different from other study rooms. The space inside was very large. There were no desks and chairs, just various energy stones piled up everywhere. There were even some high-grade energy stones. There was a platform in the middle and the masters were gathered around it.
Principal Stewart approached and heard a series of bangs. The more than a dozen masters were all pushed away by some type of force and they took a few steps back. They stabilized their bodies and once again gathered around the platform. They exchanged opinions loudly with each other and didn’t see the people who entered.
Principal Stewart patted Student Rong’s seat and didn’t go to these masters. Instead, he headed to the other side with the little leopard. Principal Stewart spoke as he walked, “Don’t worry about them. I will take you to see these people’s works.”
Rong Mingshi nodded and followed the principal all the way to the semi-open display hall. There was a large number of carvings displayed in the exhibition hall with various techniques. Some were exquisite and complex, some were rough and simple. These works only had the carved beast structure and no background, so these stones had the energy spillover.
The spilled energy of these works was significantly different from the ones carved by Rong Mingshi. These works all had a special charm that made them more than just carvings. Like Rong Mingshi, these works had 100% of the energy enabled but Rong Mingshi felt there was a clear gap between his works and these ones on display.
Rong Mingshi frowned and unconsciously grabbed his tail. The feeling was so illusory that he couldn’t catch it.
Principal Stewart glanced at the little leopard, picked up one of the works and passed it to Student Rong. The little leopard loosened the thick tail in his mouth, paws grabbed the carving handed over by Principal Stewart.
Principal Stewart said, “The activation of the energy stone and the carving of the shape are two parallel lines. They aren’t subordinate to each other.”
Rong Mingshi suddenly looked up at Principal Stewart. Principal Stewart raised his eyebrows. “Do you think that I haven’t seen your work before?”
Rong Mingshi pouted. He didn’t mean that. It was that Principal Stewart’s words broke the fog.
Rong Mingshi looked down at the carving held in his paws. It was a running antelope. The details weren’t fine compared to his carvings but the antelope gave him a feeling of pulsing life. Even the overflowing energy had the breath of life.
The little leopard was in a trance and his clear eyes flashed. For a long time, none of his works had his perception fully integrated. It was all craftsmanship-driven perception. It was his ingenuity and carving skill that dominated everything and the perception power was subordinate.
In other words, he always thought about how to make the work look similar to the beast form and never looked at the power that the energy stone should have. His works were dazzling and in his subconscious, he always denied the role of the energy stone as ‘medicine’ for treating mania! The carvers of the beastmen empire not only carved energy stones to show the beast shape. The carvers also performed the sacred duty… a doctor’s heart.
The little leopard respectfully put the carving back and solemnly stared at Principal Stewart. “Thank you, Principal!”
Then Rong Mingshi drove the seat and carefully observed all of the carvings in the exhibition hall. In this state, Rong Mingshi arrived at the end of the exhibition hall and pulled out the energy stone for the red dragonfly.
Rong Mingshi started the carving knife of the leopard paw tools and moved it from bottom up. His outline of the shape wasn’t slow and at the same time, his perception travelled along his carving knife into the stone and into the stone’s veins to activate the power of the stone.
The bottom contained a large lotus leaves. The lotus leaves were planted at the pavilion with lotus flowers blooming on top. There were the pink delicate petals while the inside was a bright yellow. A red dragonfly landed on the lotus. It had a slender and delicate red body, dexterous feet and colourful complex eyes.
The most important thing was the thin and light wings. Rong Mingshi’s knife got rid of the redundant parts smoothly. Every time the knife fell, the force in the energy stone was drawn to each line of the wings.
Throughout the entire carving process, regardless of whether it was the easy to carve lotus leaf or the difficult wings, Rong Mingshi always controlled his knife and his consciousness. Once the work was completed, Rong Mingshi put away the knife and looked down at the carving.
From start to finish, Principal Stewart watched Student Rong and was stunned. He had guided Student Rong to some extent but he never thought that Student Rong’s insight was so high. Student Rong’s work was half the size of a fist but it was fine and vivid.
Under the widely stretched out lotus leaf, the still water seemed deep. Meanwhile, the dragonfly on the lotus flower seemed like it would fly away on the light and thin wings while the blooming lotus flower seemed to give off a fragrance.
This lotus leaf and flower was self-contained and was like a small world. It was simply a huge change compared to the emperor penguin carved by Student Rong just a few days ago!