Misty Rain of the Old Times

Chapter 173 I Don’t Recognize You
With a goal in mind, Chen Xuan and Gao Jingming closed the door in their study and racked their brains to study different ways of writing the word "longevity".

Because Gao Jingming had just been enrolled for a few days, his elective courses had not yet been finalized, he did not have to attend classes in the afternoon, and he had not joined any clubs yet, so he spent the entire afternoon discussing this matter with Chen Xuan.

They used all they had learned over the years to write the word "longevity" in various ways, from small to large, from large to small, from thick to thin, and then from thin to thick again, sometimes neat, sometimes sloppy, from complicated to simple...

They were busy with this for the whole afternoon. The manuscripts were scattered everywhere in the study, almost filling every corner. For this reason, Geng Hong even ran to the small market outside the academy several times to buy paper and ink for them. He didn't know what they were busy with, so he didn't dare to disturb them or ask.

In the afternoon, Xiao Cai and the others prepared the meal, and the two of them stopped eating to relieve their swollen heads.

After that, we continued in the evening and kept busy until late at night.

In this way, after sorting out the manuscripts of the whole day and comparing and summarizing them, even if they wrote the word "longevity" in a flowery way, until they felt like vomiting, their wrists were swollen, and they could hardly recognize it, in the end there were only two or three hundred ways of writing that could be adopted to form the picture of longevity of pine and crane.

They both practiced martial arts and their writing speed was not slow. As long as it was the word "longevity", no matter whether it was round, flat, square or long, they would write it down as soon as they thought of it. Therefore, at the end of the day, the word "longevity" would be written tens of thousands of times on the pile of manuscripts!
However, there are only two or three hundred ways to adopt, and these are all the ways they can think of after racking their brains.

Holding the small stack of manuscripts that he finally approved, Gao Jingming carefully examined them, rubbed his brows and said, "Ah Xuan, this won't do. This is all we can think of. It's almost impossible to collect 1,800 different longevity characters."

After half a day, not to mention Gao Jingming, even Chen Xuan, who was at the innate realm, felt mentally exhausted. It was simply not something a human could do. If possible, he would rather fight with the black-robed man for three days and three nights.

"Young Master, this is just the beginning. It's certainly difficult, but precisely because of this difficulty, the final product is more eye-catching and most likely to stand out. And don't you think this is a very meaningful thing? What we do shouldn't just be about completing this birthday gift for His Majesty, but also about an in-depth summary of what we've learned and..."

When Chen Xuan said this, he was suddenly stunned. A flash of inspiration suddenly came to his mind, but he couldn't grasp it and stood there for a while.

"And what?" Gao Jingming asked subconsciously.

Chen Xuan frowned slightly and murmured, "And... and..."

He was stuck here, unable to answer the next question. The flash of inspiration in his mind disappeared, and suddenly he felt as if something extremely important had slipped away from his sight.

"What's wrong with you, Xuan? Are you tired? I am indeed very tired. I feel that if this happens a few more times, my hair will turn white. No wonder those learned gentlemen age quickly. It's too exhausting. Let's put this matter aside for now, empty our minds and relax, such as practicing martial arts to soothe our emotions." Gao Jingming was concerned about Chen Xuan at first, but as he spoke, he understood his current state and rubbed his eyebrows to comfort him.

Subconsciously looking at Gao Jingming, Chen Xuan said: "With this kind of experience accumulation, it will be easier for us to make breakthroughs in all aspects of ourselves in the future!"

Gao Jingming was stunned for a moment after hearing this, and immediately agreed with him and said, "A Xuan is right, but let's leave it at that for today. We'll continue tomorrow. This cannot be completed in one or two days."

He was immediately motivated, but he also knew how to balance work and rest.

Chen Xuan smiled. He knew that what he said was completely different from what Gao Jingming said, but so what? Everything in the world has the same destination, and everything is accumulated bit by bit.

This is true for learning and martial arts as well!
First learn what the predecessors have learned, summarize it on this basis, then understand it and make it your own, integrate it, and then innovate. Only by standing on the foundation of the predecessors can you walk your own path.

At this moment, Chen Xuan understood how much significance it meant to him to be busy with Gao Jingming for half a day. Maybe there was no actual gain at the moment, but there were already signs. It was like planting a seed. As long as he worked hard to cultivate and water it, one day it would take root and sprout and grow into a towering tree!
Smiling, Chen Xuan said, "Well, relax and take a rest first. Young Master has to go to school early tomorrow morning."

"Okay, what about these discarded manuscripts? They are useless and they take up space." Gao Jingming nodded and pointed to the piles of discarded manuscripts.

Chen Xuan said, "I'll handle it. Before the finished product comes out, it's better not to make it public, lest someone find out and plagiarize our ideas, which would be more trouble than good."

"That's true. I'll have to trouble A Xuan then." Gao Jingming also understood this.

Then Chen Xuan said, "Oh, Master, you have to go to class tomorrow morning, so I'll continue working on this matter. I'll try to collect 1,800 characters for the word 'longevity' as soon as possible to complete the 'pine crane longevity painting'."

"Okay, I'll help out after class tomorrow morning. Besides, this is my job, and I'd be embarrassed to have you running around all the time, Xuan."

"Young master, you're too polite. It's my duty..." After Gao Jingming left the study, Chen Xuan sorted out the useful manuscripts and put them away. As for the discarded manuscripts, he silently blew out his innate true energy and turned them into powder. He then rolled them into a ball and burned them in the stove. They were useless and only took up space.

Chen Xuan did not just treat this matter as helping Gao Jingming complete the gift, but he really took it to heart and treated it as his own business.

What he needs is not how eye-catching the finished product is, nor to slap someone in the face, nor to get others' praise, but just the process.

As he said, organizing and summarizing what the predecessors have left behind is an in-depth understanding of what one has learned. Only by continuous accumulation can one make better progress in the future and even forge one's own path!
Persevere, accumulate little by little, no matter how slow it is, it is progress. As long as there is progress, one day you will reach the peak...

It's a bit helpless to say. There are too few people and few resources available. If one had a family background like Wei Ziyan, perhaps just a word would be needed, and countless people would be busy delivering everything needed. It would probably not take long to collect just 1,800 different longevity characters.

But on second thought, it might be more meaningful to do it myself.

The next morning, Gao Jingming went to class, while Chen Xuan continued to busy himself with collecting longevity characters. However, he no longer stayed at home to ponder over them, but instead looked around the huge Liuyu Academy.

The academy has a long history and has many authentic calligraphy works left by great predecessors scattered throughout the academy. Almost all the authentic calligraphy works left by famous people are engraved into inscriptions.

After half a day, Chen Xuan walked through almost every corner of the academy and learned more than a hundred different ways of writing the word "Shou" from the authentic works of countless predecessors.

Of course, there were not so many longevity characters written in those works, but Chen Xuan observed the writing styles of those characters and then changed the longevity characters according to those writing styles. In short, he gained a lot from it.

After Gao Jingming finished class at noon, the two had lunch and then went their separate ways. Using Gao Jingming's student credentials, they went straight into the academy's library.

The focus is to observe the writing of other countries, as well as various calligraphy collections, painting collections, and stone inscription rubbings collections, so as to get inspiration from them and continuously enrich the writing methods of the word "longevity".

During this half day, the two of them gained a lot. Inspired by others, they summarized and figured out two or three hundred different ways of writing the word "longevity". Together with the previous ones, there are already six or seven hundred ways.

But these six or seven hundred types are organized into a manuscript of only a dozen or so pages.

After that, their speed slowed down. After all, this kind of thing became more and more difficult as time went on. But they still gained something every day, ranging from hundreds to dozens or even a dozen.

In fact, many students in the entire school were also busy preparing gifts for the emperor's 70th birthday, but Chen Xuan and his classmates were too busy to pay much attention to it.

Until half a month later, the number of different ways of writing the word "Shou" compiled by Chen Xuan and his colleagues had exceeded 900, but it was difficult to make any further gains in the academy.

As a last resort, the two discussed it and decided that since Gao Jingming had to attend classes, he could only try to gain as much as possible at the academy, while Chen Xuan began to go to various bookstores in the small market outside the academy, hoping to be inspired by different books.

At the beginning, both of them felt very tired and mentally exhausted, and they became even more tired later, but they felt very fulfilled and were not so anxious anymore. Gao Jingming even stubbornly set a small goal for himself, which was to collect a thousand different ways of writing the word "longevity" before he could really start to complete the planned picture.

For this reason, he didn't even care about his original intention of presenting a gift to His Majesty. Perhaps he himself didn't realize that he was purely influenced by Chen Xuan and was making a breakthrough of himself.

It can be imagined that once the painting is completed, having read so many books and observed so many calligraphy works of predecessors, it will be a huge accumulation for itself, and all aspects will be taken to a higher level.

Even if it cannot be reflected temporarily, with the accumulation of strength, once the time comes, it will surely make rapid progress.

Because of this, Chen Xuan almost forgot himself and everything else. Every day when he opened his eyes and closed them, he saw the word "longevity". Later on, he seemed to not recognize the word, and even his martial arts training was a little behind. But the strange thing was that his cultivation level improved faster. The innate true qi was dormant in his body and circulated on its own, and it could open up several acupoints on its own every day!
Later, Chen Xuan found that he could not get any inspiration from the books, so he simply changed his thinking and began to wander around the academy with an empty mind, watching people, trees, mountains, rivers, stones, leaf textures, and clouds.

Not to mention, in this way, he actually imitated nature and created dozens of different ways of writing the word "Shou". Although they looked like ghost paintings, you could still tell that they were the word "Shou".

During the process, Chen Xuan was extremely clear in his heart that what he was doing was not to write out the word "longevity", but to achieve a breakthrough in some aspects of himself that he could not explain for the time being...

(End of this chapter)