How can a retired savior be considered retired if his price drops to 40,000?

Chapter 403: The elevator takes twenty-three minutes to run, just enough to tell a story

What happened after that was pretty unremarkable. After all, once Akultona, Sigismund, and Arjuna were all in the team, any adventure story would lose all the exciting challenges in the battle phase and become a boring push all the way.

What's more, there is no fighting stage left on the road that Fujimaru Ritsuka needs to take next.

For obvious reasons, when Arjuna passed through this corridor, he did not hesitate to use heavy firepower in the no-man's land, literally "plowing" all the way, just to violently destroy all possible places for ambushes to hide. Unfortunately, he did not encounter any ambushes along the way, but this violent behavior was not meaningless, and in the process, he did destroy several trigger traps set on the road.

For similar but slightly different reasons, Sigismund also used all his skills during the elevator journey from top to bottom, using different methods from Arjuna to ensure safety as much as possible. After all, the experience that Fujimaru Ritsuka had suffered when requesting support through telepathy showed that the elevator itself had been used as a trap by the enemy as a whole, so safety issues had to be prevented.

The good news is that when it comes to issues like security and protection, most of the Sons of Dorne are professionals.

Considering that the elevator connecting the prison was limited in size for daily management safety reasons, Sigismund, who had no time to do earthwork, had to streamline the rescue team he brought as much as possible. Along with the elevator and the first Emperor Champion of the Black Templars, there were three other people, one was a defense master from the Rebukers, and the other two were from the Black Templars and the other from the Ultramarines. Judging from the markings on their power armor, both of them had experience serving in the Deathwatch. Considering the causes and consequences of the attack, it was natural for Sigismund to choose to borrow the wisdom of these cousins ​​who specialized in fighting aliens.

After receiving the news, they immediately found qualified people from different regiments, studied the route map, and checked for safety hazards during the journey, which inevitably took some time. It took Sigismund only 40 minutes to reach the target floor, which was already remarkable in efficiency, but it could not change the fact that the attack had basically been settled when they arrived.

In any case, this was a good thing for completing the mission. After exchanging information that was not very good, the entire team was able to move smoothly into the elevator that was just about to be disassembled for inspection, and smoothly drove the motor to make the entire elevator start to move upwards.

Amid the sound of the elevator running, Fujimaru Ritsuka looked around and felt that the current environment was roughly "safe". So she huddled herself next to Sigismund, breathed a sigh of relief, and began to comment on the previous series of events: "What a disaster, it should have been a happy thing, but it turned out to be such a mess."

It goes without saying what the "mess" was. Looking at the long dress she was wearing, with half of the hem torn off by herself and stained with someone's blood, you can tell that she must have had a very thrilling time during the previous period.

But obviously, this did not mean that the guards around her were incompetent in the previous conflict. Everyone had traces of battle, especially Santo, who took the most damage for the entire team by relying on the excellent protection of the Terminator armor.

The only person who was out of place in many ways was the clone on the edge of the team - he was indeed covered in dirt, but the extraordinary recovery ability of the replica of the original had completely healed the wounds on his body in just over ten minutes. In addition, the role he played in this matter, his own identity and status were very embarrassing. Therefore, when he was forced to be locked up with everyone else in an elevator that was not narrow (for the capacity of elevators in this era, it could accommodate seven or eight Astartes, two or three mortals, and a cloned Primarch at a time, so it was barely crowded), but it was definitely not a spacious space. Although the person involved did not show it on the surface, he probably felt embarrassed in his heart.

Therefore, Fujimaru Ritsuka started this conversation for the clones. She thought that chatting with others casually based on the current situation might help ease the awkwardness that would obviously continue to grow in silence. But she didn't expect that the first person to speak after scanning the people present was Akultona, who was still upset about the destroyed woodcut:

"Yeah." He sounded rather glum, "The gift you were going to give was ruined, too."

Fujimaru Ritsuka couldn't help laughing. "Why are you still obsessed with this? It's just a fake anyway. Besides, only the engraving was destroyed. Of course, the printed version is still preserved in Chaldea. After this, the remaining version has become a unique piece that cannot be reproduced. As a work of art, its value has actually increased."

This is indeed true, but Akurdona still felt that he could not convince himself to agree with this point of view from the perspective of an art manager, so he returned to the issue of trying to reconcile himself in a depressed mood. However, the clone who was expected to be visited by Fujimaru Ritsuka heard about this link for the first time and could not help but turn his eyes to him:
"Can I ask what you were going to give as a gift?"

"Of course, I was going to give it to you anyway."

Sigismund, who was completely unaware of this, was slow to react, and a question mark slowly rose above his head. Under the shadow of this question mark, he watched Fujimaru Ritsuka and the clone discuss several rounds about the Ukiyo-e style print work "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji". Needless to say, Fujimaru Ritsuka knew what the original version was, but the clone could also recall the name of the work because it inherited Fulgrim's memory. However, by the time the information was transmitted to the 30th millennium, too much had been lost, and Fulgrim himself had only seen the most famous and widely circulated video material of "The Great Wave off Kanagawa", so the clone could not say much.

"The original Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji was a collaboration between Hokusai and his daughter in his later years. I have never actually seen the original engraved version. The set of forgeries I wanted to give you was hand-carved by Hokusai's daughter, Miss Arong. In addition to the thirty-six views that were published and the ten views that were added later due to the enthusiastic response, Miss Arong added four views based on what she saw and heard, making a total of fifty copies." Fujimaru Ritsuka explained leisurely, "There is a story behind this. Do you want to hear it?"

The clone smiled. He had not experienced this, but with Fulgrim's memory, he understood this basic social etiquette without any obstacles. In the upper class, the behavior of displaying high-value-added artworks is often not just to show an aesthetic experience or to highlight the aesthetic taste of the person involved, but there must be more hidden meanings. He has the ability to easily understand these implicit meanings, and he also believes that he can do whatever it takes, so there is no reason for him to refuse.

But after nodding, he realized that this confidence did not come from his own successful experience with similar problems, but from Fulgrim's. This thought made him feel a fleeting haze.

Fujimaru Ritsuka seemed to be completely unaware of this, and just told her story to herself: "Nothing special happened at that time. The origin of the whole thing might be that the miso soup in the morning was a little salty. When Miss Rong was bored, she suddenly felt: Although my fame is mostly due to helping my father Hokusai to paint, but now my painting skills may not be worse than my father's! Artists sometimes suddenly get stuck in a dead end on such things. After having this idea, Miss Rong locked herself in the studio, wanting to create works on her own without being influenced by her father. "Her idea at the time was that if I could make my father's most famous work by myself and make it so realistic, it would mean that there was no difference between my father and me in terms of technique. So, she made all 46 versions of "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji" in one breath in a closed state, and found colored ink to print it out, occupied an entire corridor on the ship for her street painting exhibition, and squatted on the side to eavesdrop on the thoughts of everyone passing by.

"After all, Miss Arong also contributed to the original work, so this set of counterfeits is naturally made to be exactly the same as the original. Almost everyone who passes by is wondering why there is a Hokusai exhibition on the road. When the first few people passed by and said so, Miss Arong was quite happy. But as more people passed by and everyone muttered like this, Miss Arong became angry: This is obviously my work, why is everyone talking about my father?

"So, Miss Arong jumped out from the dark and started to rant, 'I clearly hid my signature in the dark lines, why didn't anyone see it! You all don't know what's good!' Then she took down the simple frames of the paintings one by one from the wall and threw them on the ground. Even though they knew they were fakes, everyone felt sorry for them and tried to persuade her, saying, 'After all, you worked hard to make them, why do you have to smash them like this?'

"Everyone mistook Miss Arong's forgery for the original, and even after knowing it was a forgery, they still expressed sadness that she might have damaged the work. This shows that everyone recognizes the artistic value of her forgery. Miss Arong's technique is indeed as good as Mr. Hokusai himself. This is exactly the same conclusion she had originally thought of, but she is not happy at all. Ask yourself, she wanted everyone to remember herself as a painter through this batch of paintings, but in the end everyone still only thought of Katsushika Hokusai - isn't this a complete failure?

"But there was nothing she could do: Miss Arong's nickname 'Katsushika Oei' could only exist as a shadow of Mr. Hokusai. If she wanted others to remember her, she could only work hard to create works that surpassed her father's and even shocked Hokusai himself. But how easy was that? She was Hokusai's daughter, and all the brushes, inkstones, paper, and inkstones she touched were from Hokusai. The techniques she learned as an assistant were also taught by Hokusai himself. No matter how hard she tried on this style, she was just imitating her father. Being on par with her father in terms of painting skills was already the limit, and wanting to surpass him was even more unrealistic. So should she change her style and start over? But without trying it herself, she had no way of knowing whether she could adapt to other styles, and there was also the risk of failure in the transformation and not even being able to do the job of Hokusai's assistant. Miss Arong had no idea what to do at this time.

"At this time, Hokusai himself, who heard the commotion, came over and scolded his daughter, saying, 'What are you doing behind closed doors, little girl? It turns out you are doing this kind of thing secretly when you are not working. You are not a child who is still learning to paint. What's the point of repeating the same things you have already painted once? If you want to paint in addition to work, use your own brush and inkstone to paint something new!'

"Miss Arong then realized that the reason why people would mistake her work for Mr. Hokusai's was not because she hid her monogram in the details too well, but because she painted Mr. Hokusai's Mount Fuji. If she wanted others to remember her, she had to paint her own Mount Fuji. After figuring this out, Miss Arong returned to her studio and created the last four prints in this set of works based on her own thoughts and ideas. Originally, I thought we would work together to print the paintings on the engravings one by one, while slowly telling this story. When I get to this point, no matter where they are printed, I will turn out the last four engravings to show you how much difference the difference in perspective and expression can make in the finished product with the same painting technique. But unfortunately, the current situation is like this, I can only do a non-physical performance without any evidence, and you can only imagine the specific content of the paintings."

After finishing the story, Fujimaru Ritsuka shrank back with satisfaction and began to examine the expressions of all his listeners. Most of the Space Marines did not care about this question, which was normal. Only Akurdona was thinking hard, and Sigismund seemed confused by a detail in the story, but neither of them spoke based on it. Arjuna and Asclepius looked up at the sky and down at the ground, obviously refusing to express their opinions. Only the clone frowned slightly, with a slight dissatisfaction with the implication of the story, and pointed out: "But when and where did this story happen, how do you know?"

"It can happen at any time and anywhere." Fujimaru Ritsuka deliberately did not give a direct answer. "If you think the birth and death dates of the characters are unreasonable, then whether it is Akuldona, Captain Santo or Sigismund, their existence at this time and place is also 'irrational'."

The clone laughed. This story overlapped too much with his current situation, and he couldn't help but think: "So, is this story you told true?"

"Is it important?" Fujimaru Ritsuka slyly avoided the question again. "What's important is not whether the story is true, not the engraving itself, and not even whether you can recognize four of the paintings as Ms. Rong's original works when you see the finished paintings. What's important is that Ms. Rong finally found her own brush and inkstone and can paint Mount Fuji as she sees it."

The clone wanted to say something, but changed his mind and gave up. Ritsuka Fujimaru's way of speaking, "extending a fable and pointing out the core of the problem with a pointed wit," reminded him of Chagatai Khan. He wanted to talk about this, but the words "You remind me of a brother of mine" were about to come out of his mouth, but he swallowed them back in a hurry. He didn't think that "finding his own pen and ink" was as simple as the story said, nor did he think that he, as a clone of the original, could be brothers with the real original. The noise of the dead that always appeared in his mind from time to time began to sneer again, and he -

"Oh, I suddenly remembered that I haven't asked for your name yet." Fujimaru Ritsuka's voice interrupted the clone's chaotic thoughts. "My name is Fujimaru Ritsuka. I think you must have seen this name on the visiting card. But I don't know your name yet. It seems that the Ultramarines didn't write it for you."

Then it is indeed not the Ultramarines’ fault, the clone couldn’t help but smile bitterly. But Maxius was unhappy because of this sentence, and couldn’t help but remind him: “Sir, in fact—”

"--Alas, 'Clone of Fulgrim' is not a name." Fujimaru Ritsuka sounded a little unhappy. "It is just an identity that the person concerned has no choice of, just like Miss Arong is the daughter of Katsushika Hokusai. In formal written occasions, Miss Arong would write her nickname 'Katsushika Ouwei'. What I want to know is a 'name' like this."

In the first instant, this question annoyed the clone greatly. He had no name of his own, and the only purpose of Fabius Bile, who created him, was to make him "another Fulgrim", and everyone else he had met and still meets also thought so because of his own memories, appearance, characteristics and abilities. No one had any expectations of him beyond the former Fulgrim, and they were even wary of him because of Fulgrim's own corruption. There is no doubt that the clone is the shadow of the real Fulgrim, and even though the real one is dead, the shadow he casts still falls on the clone, and it is not dead yet. No one thought that he had the ability to leave the paradigm set for him by his predecessors with their own lives, and naturally no one remembered that he should have a name of his own -

Then he realized that everything that Fujimaru Ritsuka said during this conversation was connected. It really didn't matter whether the story she told was true or not. What mattered was that Rong finally found his pen and ink. Of course, this was not an easy task. Even if the clone's thinking and intelligence had the specifications of the original, it was impossible to figure everything out in an instant. But just like Rong, as Hokusai's assistant, also had her own nickname "Yingwei", which was the prerequisite for others to distinguish her from Hokusai, he could also start by giving himself a "nickname".

The clone exhaled slowly, a long breath, as if he was exhaling all the air in his three lungs.

"Ms. Fujimaru, I am really surprised by the high level of communication you have mastered." After a period of silence, the original clone who had figured out everything smiled appropriately again: "There is a saying in Ancient Terra: It is impolite not to return the favor. I did not have a formal enough name before, but since you asked, I will tell you:
"My name is Pegasus."

The clone responded.

(End of this chapter)