Chapter 90

90 You Aren’t The Artist

Although they were in a mental haste to know what had happened with the painting, they couldn’t rush other people on the team and could only wait that they finished their painting soon enough!

Since Rong Yue has said she was done, Wang Lei and Elder Wang were not worried since they both knew what she was capable of. However, for the mothers and the other two brothers, they were worried out of their mind.

As for Rong Yue, she was casually testing out everything that had been placed on their table carefully without any hint that she was affected by the whispers in the hall.

Thankfully, the other five also understood that this was a party and were done with their work in thirty more minutes which meant that they had used double the time that Rong Yue had used.

“Let every work be split up and rearranged, we would then decide who the winner is,” Pang Ye said as soon as he saw the masters standing up.

Since they had decided not to set a theme or question at the last minute, Wang Shu was sure that every painting there had been seen by each of their masters before. Other than him who had no idea what Rong Yue had drawn.

Regardless, it would eliminate cheating in the voting as each master would only know what work belonged to his student and not the others.

After the works had been properly separated and rearranged, the masters were asked to step down and then the works were turned for everyone in the hall to see.

“Has the Grand Elder seen one that he would like to keep the most?” The president of the association and also Ning Li’s master asked as soon as he was down in the center of the hall.

.....

“Hmmm, I’m sure he does, however, he has said that his way of giving back to the youngster would be to let everyone appreciate their skill also.” Pang Ye said, speaking for his grandfather.

“Okay, if that is it, we would proceed with scoring the work and hope that no matter which one comes on top, it doesn’t affect the Grand elder’s decision.” After saying that, the man in his late sixties bowed slightly and then turned back so that he could look at the work.

Since they were now arranged side by side, it was easy to keep them all in one’s sight.

“Master Pei, since you are the president, we would let you go first.” Bai Fu said with a scheming smile in his eyes.

Master Pei was the president while master Long was the vice president, as for master Wang, he was the third person after them in skills, since he had always been in a struggle with Bai Fu who closely followed him, the both of them hardly ever saw eye to eye.

More importantly, since there was Bai Lu in the his family who was now his direct student, Bai Fu had always used that against Wang Shu.

In a gathering like this, he certainly didn’t want his student to lose to Wang Shu’s student.

“If you say so,” Pei Wu said with a nod and then stepped forward.

His eyes moved over the paintings in one clean sweep before pausing at the painting in the fourth position.

Master Pei Wu’s eyes lit up as he moved forward and crouched low in front of the painting. Since all eyes were on him, they also moved to looking at the painting.

For people that were knowledgeable about painting, they all leaned forward in their seat as they found themselves being sucked into the painting.

“That painting looks really beautiful,” Wang Bo said with a sigh.

“Seems like Bai Lu has perfected her oil painting to another level again,” someone in the audience and a lot of other people nodded in agreement.

None of them noticed that the girl in question who was maintaining a poker and impossible to read face had clenched her fists under the table.

“It will be hard to compete with this one, but if Rong Yue gets the second position, it would still be good for grandfather,” Wang An said with a resigned sigh.

“You can’t be too certain yet, as a man, it’s inappropriate to count your eggs before the chicken hatches,” Wang Lei used that opportunity to school them while Rong Yue didn’t take her focus away from her food.

“Is she always eating?” Mo Fan who already knew what Rong Yue had drawn asked curiously as he glanced over at her.

“You are staring at her even more than me, Mo Fan, is your Mo family getting too comfortable?” Qin Yichen asked him with sharp and piercing glare that had Mo Fan feel like he had just been thrown into the wind.

“You can’t be this calculating!” He argued as he forced himself to look away from Rong Yue, other than the fact that her appearance made most people’s eyes go to her every now and then, Mo Fan just felt he needed to keep looking to know exactly why she was able to get the man beside him interested.

However, he also understood that for a man like Qin Yichen, being territorial would definitely be a baggage and so he tucked his curiosity about her away as he watched the show.

“This painting is very unique and moving,” Master Pei said as touched the paper gently, his gentleness was almost as if he was touching a child and was scared he would hurt the child.

“Although she’s only twenty two, her painting has indeed grown that it seems even I, her master is shocked by her speed,” Bai Fu, who had imagined that it was his nephew said excitedly.

Although he knew her skill level, he was confident in her abilities to grow. Also, he knew that his niece was the type to rise up to challenges, with the whispers in the hall, he had already taken it to heart that she was the artist behind the work.

Master Pei nodded in agreement and then looked over the other paintings carefully too.

Although he didn’t say a word, it was clear to see which work was his favorite.

“The first work for me is this, the oil paints are well mixed and the artist was able to maintain a strong firm on their brush while still making fast and deliberate stroke, the control of the brush is already very good for this age.

Finally, the message passed across through the painting is sharp and yet can be seen from different angles, I’m afraid that perhaps, this level of skill was something even I didn’t have ten years ago.” Master Pei said and then pointed out two more works to get the top three he chose.

The vice president and Master Wang Shu had the same choice and Bai Fu smirked in confidence.

Since he was the fourth ranked, it was his turn to pick and everyone could already guess his choice.

“While sometimes it might seem like some people are skilled on the surface, true and deeply rooted talented would always shine through. Like Elder Pei has said, a skill like this is something even us didn’t possess in our youths and that alone is enough to say that, the artist would go far in the painting world and perhaps, even internationally.” He declared heartily and all the uniform nods had him feeling even more pride.

He picked two paintings and then looked at one more oil painting that was in the middle.

“Although this is also oil painting, the gap is startling and it is advisable that instead of trying to pick a path that someone else has taken and conquered, an artist must take his own path and then tune it to become theirs,” Bai Fu said cockily while shooting a glance at Wang Shu and then stepped back to let the other two vote.

He had said those because amongst all their students, only Bai Lu, his own student, loved to use oil painting, if there was some other oil painting there, then it could only mean that the new girl who was Wang Shu student had done it.

The other two votes were also in sync with the previous four, proving that the painting by ‘Bai Lu’ was the best among the six.

President Pei presented the results to the hall and then asked the standing housekeepers to turn the easel so he could show the high table their results.

“Hmmm, the first is also a unique one for me, I have also picked it as my favourite, although young, this little girl has so much in front of her and one can only imagine what peak she would get to,” he said with a light shining in his eyes.

He appreciated talent and this right here was the best he had seen in a while.

“I’ll award this girl because of her talent and because her painting had helped me to resolve a certain matter that had been on my mind for a while now, if there’s anything you want, you can tell your master Wang Shu and I’ll do my best to give you appropriately... other than that, I’ll...” before he could complete his words, Bai Fu interrupted.

“I’m afraid you are mistaken sir, the painting was done by Bai Lu, my niece and student,” he argued as he looked at his niece to stand up, Bai Lu, however, looked away, unwilling to save her uncle and master.

“Then old age must be getting a hold of me, earlier, the girl over there stood up from the easel with this painting, am I right?” Grand Elder Pang said as he looked at his son and grandson.

“Grandfather is right, the young miss over there was the one that did this painting,” Pang Ye confirmed sealing the final blow and Bai Fu looked at his niece in shock.

“Bai Lu! Is the painting not yours?” He asked about to lose his mind from embarrassment.

“Master, I never said it was mine,” Bai Lu said as her face flushed in embarrassment.

Not only had he gone to the heavens to praise the work, he had even insulted her work, making her embarrassed further.

“So the artist of that work earlier is this new girl?”