Persona: Devil Summoner

The fact that Manager Liu could become a manager proved that he was not a slow person. The sudden change in his and his father's mood, the sudden change of Okumura Enterprises, and the exposure of its darkness to the society... and the fake "spitting blood show" all proved that after being reformed, Okumura Kuniwa began to join forces with the Phantom Thieves. This proved the "action" of the Phantom Thieves.

In addition, the torture records were clearly exposed on the Internet. Although he had only met Jiang Tianwei a few times, it was hard to forget a boy with this kind of temperament. So he recognized him at a glance. The leader of the Phantom Thieves was his fellow villager who lived next door to him...

Plus, he went to school one day and never came back. The police from next door came to investigate every now and then... Plus, the official announcement was that the leader of the Phantom Thieves committed suicide out of fear of punishment...

This boy probably will never have a chance to come back.

But how should I tell my dad?

He could see that his father doted on the kid next door like his grandson. It could be said that when he was busy with his career, he was his father's spiritual support. How cruel must one be to tell an old man that his beloved grandson had died...

I can only postpone it for a day...

Manager Liu originally hated this kind of procrastination. In his opinion, if there was anything to be done, it should be done quickly and decisively. But today, he finally understood what "unspeakable secrets" meant.

There was a knock at the door. Just as Master Liu was about to go, Manager Liu stopped him immediately: "[Your legs and feet are inconvenient, I'll go.]"

He took two big steps and reached the door. As soon as he opened the brand new security door that was out of tune with the overall style, he saw two young men standing at the door.

A man with soft blue hair, tall like a model, and looks very decent.

The boy next to him was standing casually with a slightly frivolous smile on his face. He was wearing an ordinary shirt and had a shoulder bag slung across his body. It was Jiang Tianwei.

"【You?!——(whispering) You are still alive?】"

Manager Liu recognized the boy opposite him. It was Jiang Tianwei, who he thought had died in prison. He was stunned and asked in a low voice. At the same time, he secretly glanced at the ground. He found that the boy's feet were firmly on the ground, and there was a shadow. He should not be a ghost.

Judging from the fact that he can bask in the sun and his body doesn't feel stiff, he is probably not a zombie.

"[Oh, you can't keep it secret anymore? Well, a lot of things happened anyway. I guess you're not very interested in our affairs, right? I actually came here with my friends to eat for free today...]"

As Jiang Tianwei spoke, he raised his nose and sniffed. Now all aspects of his physical qualities were far superior to those of ordinary people. His nose was almost as sensitive as a dog's, and he could immediately smell the olfactory violence of all the delicious foods in the room mixed in the air.

"【Indeed. Please come in. Both my father and I would like to thank you very much.】"

Manager Liu was a smart man, and he could tell in a few words that Jiang Tianwei was not someone he could dig deeper into. They could be friends, but he couldn't think of digging into his secrets.

Fortunately, as a middle-level manager, he is already familiar with this kind of thing.

The person next to Jiang Tianwei is, of course, Kitagawa Yusuke. Why did he bring Yusuke here to have a free meal? This is a rather long story about an artist.

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 680 Huh? What happened to my art?!

Kitagawa Yusuke's entry was submitted almost at the last minute, so it was exhibited like other works just a few days after it was handed in.

Art is a bit abstract to most people. Ordinary people know what art is, but if you ask them: "So, brother, do you want to buy a painting?" they will basically refuse.

For most people, buying a painting is just to decorate the room and make it look good. For them, as long as it looks good, it doesn't have to be a painting, nor does it have to be by a famous artist. You can find a furniture store and buy a decorative painting for a few thousand yen, so why spend millions or tens of millions to buy a painting?

As for a small number of pretentious people, they buy paintings to show off their financial resources and demonstrate their character.

So they don’t care whether the paintings they buy are good or not, nor do they care whether the artistic level is high or not, as long as they are expensive, they will just ask you if you have them? If not, then why don’t you hurry up and worship me!

There are very few people who truly love art.

Therefore, this art exhibition came up with this model, holding a painting competition to improve the public's aesthetic taste, impart the true meaning of art to the general public, and make Japan an elegant and beautiful country - this is of course a lie!

In fact, it is because of Madarame’s confession that it is very difficult to survive in the art world now.

Many people have a sense of justice, but their sense of justice is often excessive for various reasons, which is what people often call "overcorrection".

If you overcorrect, it is easy to cause false accusations and wrongful convictions. As a result, because of Madarame, the art world has set off a trend of catching fakes and plagiarism. Ordinary people are either indifferent or watching the show. Artworks nowadays are a bit like rats.

Therefore, in order to reshape the image - and of course to improve people's artistic aesthetics so that they can buy more paintings and make more money - in short, it is for this reason that this competition came into being.

First, collect the works of talented painters from all walks of life, and then exhibit them together. In this way, there will be scores and comments from the public judges, which seems open, fair and just, and you can also collect some sponsorship fees, thus killing two birds with one stone.

This is also a good sign for the art world. After all, the image of the "older generation" artists has been damaged, but on the other hand, the image of the "newly debuted" artists has not been damaged, right?

In this art competition venue which is not really that artistic, Kitagawa Yusuke stands in front of his paintings with his hands on his chest, looking quite confident.

He had already scanned the other works in the venue at a very fast speed, which filled him with confidence.

Sometimes it's just like that as an artist, you have to be very proud of your work and firmly believe that no one can compare to you.

Jiang Tianwei dressed up in disguise today and came along to see it.

In fact, with Jiang Tianwei's influence, as long as he reveals himself as a phantom thief here, Yusuke's painting will be regarded as a masterpiece favored by "phantom thieves" and instantly win the first place. However, this is too disrespectful to Yusuke's work.

This simple and warm figure painting attracted a large number of viewers to stop and watch, appreciating the various details in it.

As mentioned before, Yusuke's entry this time was based on Master Liu. This Chinese old man, who did not speak his language, made him understand what warmth and love are. He wanted to pass this wonderful emotion to everyone who saw his work, so he tried his best to depict Master Liu's appearance.

Except that the overall composition is a bit like a restaurant advertisement, there are no shortcomings. The image of the kind old man holding the delicious wontons is also very novel - especially the wontons. When many Japanese mention Chinese cuisine, they think of Kung Pao Chicken, Chinese Ramen, and dumplings (actually Chinese pot stickers).

Such a popular and appetizing painting naturally attracted widespread attention.

Especially the title of this painting.

According to the description, most people might think that the title of this painting is "Father" or "A Bowl of Wonton Noodles" or something like that...

But Yusuke named this painting "Hope".

That makes a lot of sense.

So everyone speculated why this painting is called Hope. Some people thought that it was similar to the post-war reflective literature in Japan, that this is a very poor old man who can only eat this bowl of rice to survive. But even so, he can defeat the cruel reality and strive to make progress - just like Hemingway's famous work "The Old Man and the Sea".

Some people also think that this represents inheritance, that the grandfather hands his delicious food to the child, symbolizing that the fire of hope is passed down from generation to generation.

Others believe that the old man is a chef who is prepared to use delicious food to bring hope and vitality to diners, just like in "Midnight Diner".

There is a saying that once a work is created, it no longer belongs to the original author and can be interpreted in any way. Although this statement is too extreme and biased, the general idea is correct. After all, if it really has nothing to do with the original author's ideas, some people say that "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" shows the restoration of fascism, wants to destroy the earth, summon the Dragon Ball to destroy the Milky Way, and finally realize the double success of the Sunflower Manual in the field of stinky tofu. Isn't that pure nonsense? Who taught you to interpret the Romance of the Three Kingdoms in this way?

Yusuke also enjoys the feeling of having his work read by thousands of people.

After all, isn't this a masterpiece like the Venus de Milo or Mona Lisa's smile, which gives people endless room for thinking, imagination and reflection?

Although he didn't like this example, didn't it look like Sayuri was modified by Madarame? Because the child was blacked out, everyone speculated what Sayuri's eyes were looking at.

"…Are you the author of this painting?"

A white-haired old man suddenly came over and started talking.

Jiang Tianwei looked at Yusuke's face. This man's smile really looked like the smile of an author seeing that his work was very popular.

"Yes, it is I, old man."

“It’s amazing that he has such skills at such a young age.”

"Thank you for the compliment."

"but……"

The old man changed the subject, and Jiang Tianwei's heart skipped a beat. This is a common point in all languages ​​in the world: when someone is talking to you, if they say "but", it means that a reversal is coming. Chinese teachers will tell you that the content after "but" is the key point.

"But - you are too superficial. The 'hope' you portrayed is really... heh, empty. Your skills are indeed outstanding, and I guess you were chosen because of your skills, right? But it's still too shallow. You are still too young."

The old man scolded Yusuke so harshly that he was stunned, as if cold water was poured over his head and he was holding ice in his arms. When he came to his senses, the old gentleman had already left.

Yusuke was left staring angrily, muttering, "How could my painting be empty! I clearly showed the old man's kindness perfectly!" Then he pushed through the crowd, came to the front of the painting, and looked deeply into the old man's eyes across the canvas.

half an hour...

"Indeed... it's too, too empty... I, I'm not [expressing] or [conveying] hope, I, I'm just [depicting] hope in a specific way... Indeed, it's too superficial... Then, then what about my excitement and excitement before..."

Yusuke lay on the ground in frustration, his eyes blank, completely ignoring the people pointing and talking behind him. At this moment, he was trapped in a vortex of panic and couldn't extricate himself.

(End of this chapter)

Chapter 681 You Lack Love (Fog)

Sometimes, there are some things that only professionals can discover.

Take music for example. When ordinary people evaluate music, they only judge it by whether it sounds good or not. But people who really understand music will listen to the expression, the emotions, and some things that are difficult to explain and only insiders can understand.

For example, when ordinary people evaluate paintings, they usually say whether it looks like the real thing or not. A deeper level of evaluation would be whether it looks good or not. As for the inner brushstrokes, blank spaces, and even more inner emotional expressions and collisions of thoughts, that is something at a higher level.

This is probably why some people on the Internet say that the Four Great Classics are outdated, and that online novels such as XXXX and YYYY should be regarded as the new Four Great Classics, because the old Four Great Classics are not "cool"! The protagonist is not even a time traveler, what kind of novel is this? ? ?

Yusuke himself is an artist with artistic aesthetics and artistic pursuits, so he cannot tolerate his works being evaluated so randomly.

However, as an artist, what makes him even more uncomfortable than the criticism from others is that when he calms down and takes a closer look, he finds that what the other person said is true!

People who don’t paint may not know this, but painters... no, or people who engage in artistic creation, often have times when they get “excited”.

That is, when they are creating artworks, they will suddenly fall into a kind of frenzy, with inspiration flowing and writing with inspiration. After completing the work in this frenzy, they will feel that their work is good in every way, the best, and the best in the world.

However, when he calmed down after a week or two and looked back at his artwork, some things that he could not see when he was blinded by enthusiasm began to emerge.

Yusuke was the same, because he was too pressed for time, he immediately exhibited his work after finishing it, and as a result, he had no time to calmly examine himself. The old gentleman poured a bucket of cold water on him.

"No. This painting needs to be improved."

This is what Yusuke said in the family restaurant across the street. He was fuming, with his mouth full of fried rice, like a squirrel hiding pine nuts.

Naturally, this meal was treated to by Jiang Tianwei.

It is said that hungry people tend to get angry easily. Just now, Yusuke was in the art gallery and was so angry that he almost took down the painting and left. Jiang Tianwei had to stop him. He was afraid that this kid would do something out of line and be expelled from the art world. So in order to ease Yusuke's anger, he took Yusuke to eat across the street.

However, seeing this handsome guy eating and drinking recklessly while damaging his image with a frown on his face, Jiang Tianwei knew that it would not be so easy for him to reconcile with him.

"Well, as a complete layman, I think your painting is great."

Jiang Tianwei wanted to comfort him first, but he didn't expect Yusuke to say, "So you are the layman!"

Jiang Tianwei sighed inwardly and cursed: (Do you know how to chat? Why don’t you give others face at all?)

"What exactly do I lack? Skills? Passion? Or..."

The more Yusuke talked, the more his brows furrowed. He was so distressed that he could only temporarily ease his mood by eating fried rice in big mouthfuls - you are just hungry, right?!

"Well, I don't understand art, but I always feel that you, Yusuke, are particularly anxious..."

"Anxious... Yes, you used a very good word, anxious."

Yusuke said this, and stood up with a snap. He leaned over the table and grabbed Jiang Tianwei's hands with both hands.

The other people in the family restaurant heard the sound and looked over instinctively, and what they saw was a scene that looked like a love scene, or a scene where LoveLive was recruiting people...

"Sit down first, sit down first, don't do anything, I'm telling you, I have a girlfriend."

"? I know."

Yusuke looked at him in confusion, not understanding why he suddenly started emphasizing that he had a girlfriend - you're not going to lend me your girlfriend as a model, why are you saying this?

"...Hey...I've actually been in a bottleneck period recently."

Yusuke calmly talked about the topic of bottleneck.

Jiang Tianwei guessed this.

It is better to say that almost all artists have to go through this repeated tormenting process. First, "eyes are higher than hands", then "hands are higher than eyes", and then "eyes are higher than hands" repeatedly. Artistic aesthetics and artistic creation ability are like two people involuted, always trying to surpass each other.

These two situations will create two completely different "bottleneck periods".

Jiang Tianwei didn't know which type Yusuke was, but it was obvious that Yusuke needed a listener, so even if the other party didn't respond, he slowly began to express himself.

"I have a clue myself. Probably, it started from the palace, when I realized the ugliness of Madarame. I found that the art world I believed in was full of the smell of money, dirty desires and disgusting hypocrisy. I couldn't help but start to reflect, can I, who is corrupted by dirty desires, also draw true beauty? Or rather, does true beauty really exist!?"

Yusuke put his head in his hands and laid on the table - until the extra steak was served - then he raised his head.

Jiang Tianwei shrugged: "Well, we Chinese have an old saying, which goes, 'Out of the mud, untainted; out of the clear water, untainted.'"

"...Please translate for me."

"Oh, sorry, I forgot you don't understand Chinese. That is, lotus root, you know? When it grows up, it becomes a lotus flower, you've heard of it, right? You've seen a lotus flower, right? These two sentences are talking about this plant, which grows from mud but is very beautiful."

Chinese literati especially like to use natural phenomena and creatures to make metaphors. The earliest one is Qu Yuan, who wrote "Three Verses and One Fragrant Grass", and later there are Tao Yuanming who loves chrysanthemums and Zhou Dunyi who loves lotus. There are countless literati who like to refer to themselves as "Three Friends of Winter" and "Four Gentlemen of Flowers"...

Although Yusuke is not Chinese, as an artist, he can understand some of this kind of emotional sustenance.

"Oh, I know. I've seen Chinese paintings, and the scenery in them is really beautiful."

Yusuke nodded. Although he had never actually seen a lotus—after all, it was not easy to move it into the studio—he had at least seen pictures and works of other artists.

"And, as for the question of whether beauty exists or not - the real beauty is love!"

Jiang Tianwei originally wanted to comfort him, but unfortunately, he himself was not an artist and did not understand art, so he could only imitate the famous lines from the popular RPG works he had played and say them out loud.

Yusuke was obviously shocked: "True beauty is love? No, I know love is a beautiful emotion, but even without love, there are still many things that people find beautiful, right? For example, the lotus you just mentioned."

(How should I know? I’m not an artist…)