The Versatile Master Artist

”Why is that?”

Gu Weijing was also speculating on how Saint-Exupéry depicted the arrogant monarch of the lonely planet when he wrote ”The Little Prince.”

”Fatigue and solitude.”

Hearing Mr. Tree Sloth’s narration, this thought emerged in Gu Weijing’s mind.

People often say that ”The Little Prince” is a fairy tale about loneliness, and every character in it is quite lonely.

Gu Weijing had never understood exactly where the King’s loneliness lay, but now he somewhat gets it.

Encyclopedias say the King is hypocritical and arrogant, authoritarian, and conceited,

none of which is incorrect.

But when he faced the Little Prince wanting to leave, he was not angry because his authority was challenged, but simply because he failed to win over the Little Prince.

He was very lonely,

desiring a new companion so much.

Thus, the King would be angry to stop the Little Prince from leaving while cautiously promising him various titles, like a child who shares toys with others to have playmates.

In this fairy tale, the King indeed ruled over his realm, which was merely a tiny barren little star, the size of a palm.

His only life was sitting in his chair, watching the sun and moon rise and set, day after day, year after year.

The King was both the sole master of his wealth and the only slave to it.

Mr. Tree Sloth gave Gu Weijing time to think.

He didn’t ask questions anymore but continued reading.

[”Don’t go,” the King said loudly, proud to finally have a subject, ”you cannot leave, I, I can appoint you as a minister—”]

The voice of Mr. Tree Sloth reading a passage from ”The Little Prince” echoed in his ears.

Gu Weijing picked up his paintbrush again.

He used the tip of his brush to outline the features of a ruler sitting on a minuscule star like an orange floating in space on sketch paper.

The splendid throne, the slightly upturned angry mustache, the smug expression, and that small hint of cautious flattery and loneliness hidden in his eyes...

This time,

he cleared his mind of all the verbose expert literary interpretations of ”The Little Prince” from encyclopedias, fully immersing himself in Mr. Tree Sloth’s voice.

No longer troubled by a sense of detachment.

He seemed to fall into a fantasy state.

The ethereal and elusive fairy tale character formed a surreal shadow before Gu Weijing’s eyes.

Like a drifting gauze, finally caught in his hands.

”Ssh-ssh.”

The studio quieted down, only Mr. Tree Sloth’s reading and the sound of Gu Weijing’s brush tip scraping against paper were audible.

After just a few minutes,

the sketch was nearly complete.

He finished with a simple curve as the edge of the King’s robe on the sketch paper.

[Title: ”The King”—Little Prince]

[Sketching Technique: Level 4 Tier One (2103/5000)]

[Chinese Painting Techniques: Level 4 Tier One (903/5000)]

[Emotions: Heartfelt]

”Done!”

Gu Weijing looked at the sketch paper in his hand, clenched his fist, and muttered to himself.

...

Monday,

Gu Weijing walked through the corridors of the Fitz Building with his textbook in hand.

Today was the first day of the advanced class.

The original three-story art classroom was assigned to Mrs. Sakai and her talented class of students.

Students like Gu Weijing, who were not chosen by eminent artists, had to go to the common studio in the north teaching building.

The school’s old sketch teacher would be there to give a unified lesson.

”Hey, little thief, I’ve caught you.”

As he walked, he heard the sound of hard plastic wheels rubbing against the tiles on the floor behind him.

Gu Weijing turned his head to see a girl coming towards him on a skateboard down the corridor of the teaching building.

The girl deftly sidestepped next to him, and the skateboard under her feet sprang up as if with springs, caught mid-air by her.

Her dark long hair fell and rose, and the small metallic skulls on her earrings clashed, making a crisp ringing sound.

It was Koukou.

Little thief?

”Playing with a skateboard in the building will get conduct points deducted, won’t it?”

Gu Weijing looked at Koukou, puzzled.

”Humph, do you see any sign of a disciplinary committee member nearby?” Koukou rolled her eyes, holding the skateboard in her arms, she leaned forward, scrutinizing Gu Weijing from top to bottom.

”The Little Prince? I can’t see it, Gu Weijing, your tastes are quite whimsical! Such a strange version of the book...”

Koukou scrutinized the English title on the white cover of the book in Gu Weijing’s hand.

Gu Weijing turned the book over in his hand.

This strangely bound book was passed to him by that advisor called Daisen yesterday.

It seemed strange because it wasn’t an officially published work, looking like the product of a bootleg printing press, with nothing on its plain white cover except the title ”The Little Prince.”

Accurately speaking, it was a new translation of ”The Little Prince” by Mr. Hawke, the head of the English Literature Department at the University of Oxford, a white text internal version for the Scholastic Group.

His illustrations were meant for this book.

”The Little Prince” isn’t very long, the whole text is about three hundred thousand words or so, but Mr. Tree Sloth wasn’t a merciless manuscript reading machine.

Reading it all in one day for him was impossible.

They had set a time, connecting daily to read for about an hour and a half, while Gu Weijing also needed to frequently look through this fairy tale in his spare time.

Without claiming that reading a book a hundred times reveals its meaning,