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Chapter 324: Dark Demon's Road to Art
In the neat and quiet street lined up with bookshops, the goblin's antique bookshop, which looked as though it was put together from a few planks of decayed wood, appeared extremely out of place.
The old goblin—whose wrinkles were deep enough to trap a fly—was wearing a worn-out padded jacket with its stuffing exposed, grabbing an equally worn-out book as he loudly called out for customers. Rather than selling books, it looked more like he was selling groceries.
Yet the students were unfazed by this. Once they've picked out the books, they simply made do and read them after wiping off the dirt on the cover.
Most of the books sold in bookshops could be bought for a mere one or two credits, and even the more expensive ones cost only ten or so credits.
But Dark often heard people say that the books in the goblin's antique bookshop were particularly expensive.
Some books, which had only one copy and were sold in auctions, could even fetch over a hundred credits.Evidently, this was a bookshop where only those who really loved books or had more than enough credits to spare would come to visit.
Dark wasn't actually that passionate about books, so he had never patronised it before.
But Angelia Hudson was a regular customer of the goblin's antique bookshop.
Ever since a channel to obtain credits recently emerged, she began visiting it even more frequently.
Therefore, it couldn't really be called a coincidence that Dark came across her in this place.
However, the two didn't actually have that close of a relationship, so Dark didn't take the initiative to strike up a conversation with her and simply walked into the bookshop.
Different from the bustle at the entrance, the inside of the bookshop was considerably quiet, permeated with a faint woody fragrance.
The clerk at the counter with droopy ears wasn't a goblin, but a woman of the long-eared race.
The demi-human-type who had no other different traits aside from a pair of furry long ears that could hang down to their shoulders were referred to as the long-eared race.
When Dark walked into the shop, the long-eared lady was pulling her ears and tucking them under her chin, completely covering the sides of her face, staring outside with a pair of dull and lifeless eyes as she leaned on the counter.
He didn't know whether she did it because it was too noisy, or too cold.
It was the first time Dark saw a long-eared person in the flesh, so he couldn't help taking another look, but then... he was glared at!
"Seems like she's a young lady with a temper."
Thinking so, he walked to the bookshelf with the [Art] sign on his own and casually browsed through it.
Since he already came, he wanted to look for some useful books.
Books about painting took up more than half of the [Art] section, but there were also some that were about carving.
Books on carving, especially wood carving, were precisely what he was looking for.
A few minutes later, he found a thick book containing "wood carving" in its title at the bottom of the bookshelf, so he knelt down and took it out for a look.
He exerted some strength to pull out the book and vigorously shook it as he got up, causing a large cloud of dust to puff out.
It was evident that this book had laid untouched at the bottom of the bookshelf for quite a few years.
After dusting off the cover of the book, Dark carefully looked at the title and read it out, "《Van Dee(梵迪)'s Art of Wood Carving》... Who is Van Dee?"
Dark couldn't help blinking his eyes.
He knew about Van Gogh, the painter who drew sunflowers.
But Van Dee…
"He's a performance artist during the time of war. I didn't know he could also do carving."
A gentle voice suddenly came from behind his ears.
Dark did a slight turn of his head and saw Senior Sister Angelia approaching him from behind as she asked seemingly casually, "Are you interested in wood carving?"
Dark smiled and answered, "A little. It's a pleasure to meet you, Senior Hudson."
But Senior Sister Angelia moved to tug on her overly long bangs and said with an unreadable expression, "I don't think that's how you feel when you saw me just now."
Despite being inwardly taken aback, Dark managed to keep his expression natural. "No such thing, I just didn't want to disturb you just now. Speaking of which, is Van Dee actually a performance artist instead of a carver?"
"I don't know if he's a carver or not, but he's indeed a performance artist," Angelia nodded and said, "Otherwise, have you ever seen a lunatic who ran around naked while laughing madly on a battlefield littered with corpses in the aftermath of battle?"
"This…"
Dark looked down at 《Van Dee's Art of Wood Carving》 and answered, "Actually, I've never even seen a battlefield before."
Angelia held up the book in her hand and peered at the book he was holding.
Dark took the chance to open 《Van Dee's Art of Wood Carving》.
The first page was a reiteration of the title, author, as well as a quote from the author.
"There is nothing more beautiful than the human body. Thus, we use the form of humans to portray our gods."
……
"It doesn't seem like something a lunatic who likes to run naked would say."
Dark read the line of words and thought that it made sense.
The form of gods was indefinite. Many gods could even switch freely between multiple forms.
However, human beings often conjured a purely human form for the gods they believed in.
The epitome of such imaginations was the core belief of the holy church—"Saint"!
But of course, since he had yet to confirm it, Dark couldn't judge whether it was merely an imagination or something that truly existed.
After all, the gods had long since fallen.
While he was thinking about it, he turned to the next page, glanced at the table of contents that marked only the chapter numbers, and continued to flip the page.
Then, he saw the first part of the first chapter—《The Beauty of Softness》.
Depicted in the book was a delicate human body carved out of a type of white wood. The carving displayed the body leaning back to form a ☊ shape, and every detail of the body was clearly visible.
Startled, Dark hurriedly looked away.
It wasn't that he was shy, but he was worried that his [Lust] would increase.
But after looking away, he realised that he wasn't alone, so he closed 《Van Dee's Art of Wood Carving》 with some embarrassment.
Then, he glanced at Senior Sister Angelia beside him.
Her long bangs covered up her forehead, making her seem rather low-key.
But to Dark's surprise, instead of reacting shyly like most girls would, she looked even more interested.
"Is this Van Dee's work?" Angelia remarked, "I really didn't expect a performance artist to have such good carving skills! Do you want this book? If you don't..."
In the midst of his surprise, Dark subconsciously blurted, "I want it."
"Is that so?" Angelia found it quite regrettable. "Then can you lend it to me after you finish reading? I'll pay you the rental fee."
Dark said to her, "There's no need for that, just wait until I finish reading it."
Angelia immediately replied, "Alright, thank you!"
……
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