It was nearly dawn when Li Banfeng came back. The Phonograph complained, "My dear, why were you gone so long? You were only home for a few hours yesterday! How can an Eighth Layer Home Cultivator be like you? It’s only thanks to our Old Man being busy with the train station; otherwise, he would have had a fight with you."
Li Banfeng wiped the sweat from his body and said, "I couldn’t relax, so I took a turn around the territory. I’ll stay home today."
After sleeping until noon, Li Banfeng couldn’t stay put anymore. He just wanted to go out. Finding an excuse, he left the house again.
The Old Man was busy with the train station and really wasn’t in the mood to deal with Li Banfeng. Li Banfeng first went to look at the land they were clearing. Chu Er and Lao Niu were each leading their people, resting on the plot.
They had made an agreement: they would only fight in the afternoon and rest at other times. They wouldn’t launch surprise attacks on each other, and especially, they wouldn’t attack the other side’s injured soldiers.
Chu Er was terrifying when he went mad, but once rules were set, he followed them scrupulously. The fight was less than ten minutes away, and Lao Niu’s formation was still disorganized, yet Chu Er waited quietly with his men, showing no intention of launching a surprise attack.
Once the battle started, the two sides were still evenly matched. Li Banfeng didn’t stay long. He returned to his Portable Residence to get his painting supplies and went up the mountain again.
This time there was no thunder, so going up the mountain should be safe. The humidity in the mountains was even heavier than yesterday, and much of the drawing paper Li Banfeng brought had gotten damp.
After circling the mountain more than a dozen times, Li Banfeng finally found Fu Taiyue. His hand was covered by his sleeve, with only the tip of his brush visible. The sleeve itself was stained with a lot of ink.
The portrait from the day before was gone, probably completed. He had started a new piece.
This time, he was painting a middle-aged man of about forty, with brushes, ink, and an inkstone beside him, his eyes full of longing.
But Fu Taiyue still hadn’t painted the hands, so Li Banfeng still couldn’t discern the actions of the man in the painting.
Both the Clock Pendulum and Hong Ying had said that painting hands is a difficult skill, but with Fu Taiyue’s ability, he shouldn’t have problems with the basics.
"Old Master Fu, is there a reason why you never paint hands?"
Fu Taiyue was silent for a long time before he said, "Have you comprehended the Mental State of the Way of Painting?"
Li Banfeng didn’t rush to establish a connection but focused on learning painting techniques first.
He had Gloves bring him a desk, paper, brushes, and an inkstone, and he practiced as he learned.
By noon, Li Banfeng felt he had learned enough for the day. He had Gloves pack up the desk and left one hundred silver coins for Old Master Fu.
This was the going rate for lessons from renowned painters in Puluo State. It was only logical to pay for painting lessons; leveraging a situation didn’t always have to depend on smooth talking.
Li Banfeng placed two cans of food next to Fu Taiyue and went down the mountain alone.
Fu Taiyue stared at his artwork for several hours.
That evening, he took a porcelain cup, collected some dewdrops, and wanted to put them into his inkstone to grind ink, but he felt reluctant.
He brought the cup to his lips, his eyes filled with desire.
The man in the painting said to Fu Taiyue, "You can’t drink it, absolutely not."
Fu Taiyue opened his mouth and poured the water inside.
The man in the painting reminded him, "You can’t swallow it, spit it out quickly!"
Fu Taiyue held it in his mouth for a while, then spat it out.
He looked at the cans on the ground.
This time he really couldn’t resist anymore.
The man in the painting said again, "You can’t eat that, not even a bite. If you do, it’s all over."
Fu Taiyue said, "If I just wait to starve to death, isn’t that also ’over’?"
The man in the painting said, "Every day you survive is another day gained. Maybe you could still rush down the mountain?"
Fu Taiyue shook his head. "I can’t get down anymore. And even if I could, it would be useless!"
He tore open the tin of the can directly with his teeth, pouring all the meat and soup from inside into his mouth.
He chewed for a long time, but this time he couldn’t bear to spit it out.
He swallowed it down and then tore open another can with his teeth.
The man in the painting kept sighing but was powerless to stop him.
...
「That night, Li Banfeng woke up again in the middle of the night.」
The Phonograph yawned, "My dear, can’t you sleep again?"
"I still want to go out and take a look."
Hong Ying yawned, "If you keep this up, it’s going to turn into an obsession. We should discuss this with the Old Man one of these days. Let me out, and I’ll just kill that painter to put our minds at ease."
Even as Hong Ying spoke, Li Banfeng had already packed his things and left.
After Li Banfeng had been gone for a while, the Phonograph sensed something was amiss, "Ying Ying, I have something to ask you."
"What now?" Hong Ying said impatiently. "He’s done with his fuss, and now you’re starting yours. Are you going to let anyone sleep?"
"Why does my husband always want to run outside?"
"Has he got a lover outside? Would that make you angry?"
"Looking at him, do you think he’s about to advance?"
"Advance? Pfft," Hong Ying snorted. "He just reached the Eighth Layer. Do you think cultivation level is that easy to earn?"
"Cultivation level, easy to earn..." The Phonograph pondered for a long while, then suddenly said, "Maybe he really did earn a lot of cultivation level. Maybe that mountain isn’t just painted!"
Hong Ying didn’t understand, "If it’s not painted, where could it have come from?"
"Where indeed?" the Phonograph mused, but for a moment, she couldn’t figure it out either.
"Old Man," the Phonograph called out, "call back that madman first!"
There was no response from the Portable Residence.
Hong Ying said, "He’s been busy fixing the train station. He didn’t sleep at all last night and worked hard all day today. He’s sound asleep now; how could you possibly wake him?"
"Fixing the station, the big station... Sky Heart Stone! No wonder it’s such a coincidence!" the Phonograph exclaimed. "This is bad! Old Man, wake up! Get that madman back here!"
...
Li Banfeng went up the mountain. As he walked, he muttered to himself, "I have to find out his intentions, otherwise I won’t be able to sleep soundly!"