"Try again!" the voice of the Deer flowed into Alex at once.
Alex looked up in confusion. "What?" he couldn't help but ask. Had he failed again? With such an incredible painting?
'Hell no!' Alex thought. This was one of the best paintings he had made. Not counting the art, the aura alone would be enough to put it into conversation for placing this painting into the Hall of Fame.
And he had failed with this? He didn't believe it deserved to fail.
"What's wrong with this one?" he asked loudly in frustration. He knew he wasn't going to get an answer but he needed to vent. He needed to find a way to get his frustration with the situation ou—
"Not good enough," the Deer responded, stunning Alex into silence for a moment. "It's an improvement on the first one, but it is still not good enough."
"Why not?" Alex asked. "If you want me to put more aura into it, I'm not sure I can do that. I already used the best Dao I could, so there's not much I can do. Might as well send me out at this point."
"I am here to judge your painting, not your knowledge of Dao. Make one." The deer didn't say anything anymore, leaving Alex to contemplate on the situation.
Alex had to sit down to contemplate what he had to do. Even the painting he made with one of his deepest and saddest memories didn't work. Why? He asked himself.
The answer had already been given to him by the deer. This was a test of painting skills, not of Dao. Putting his knowledge of Dao into the painting wouldn't help him here, not like it had helped him with the second test. If he wanted to place an aura in there, it couldn't be from a dao, but something else.
Something that one could feel through a painting.
Emotions.
He had put aside his emotion for the last painting, focusing his Intent only on the Dao. While that had brought out a painting that could be used to help others learn the mysteries of the Dao, when he really thought about it, it had failed as a painting.
It had some emotion, but nothing spectacular. He had felt so many things while making that, and yet… he had chosen to hide it, so it didn't affect his painting. That had been a stupid choice.
'Do I redraw it then?' he wondered. But his heart didn't want to. He doubted he could bring out the same emotion he had just now. He needed a different source for his emotions that he wanted to paint about.
Should he go with a memory? Or something entirely new but filled with the emotion he felt.
He couldn't decide.
He sat on the floor, trying to come up with ideas. It had only been an hour since the third test had begun, so he had ample time to come up with something.
'Something with emotion… something that comes from deep within me… something I care about.' What did he care about? His parents, his daughter, Pearl, Whisker, his family, his master, his friends, and many others.
He cared about the reason why he was sent here. He cared about why Bai Jingshen chose him. He cared about the immortal realm and the immortals there.
He cared about his cultivation journey. He cared about breaking through.
He cared about…
He realized what he cared about right now. He realized what to draw.
But he didn't move. He sat there, preparing for as long as he could. This was something he couldn't just draw. He had to prepare himself. He had to be ready for what he was going to draw.
He spent the entire day calming himself, calming his heart before he finally began.
When he did, his heart was empty. Completely vacant with nothing there but a single emotion.
Grief.
And he painted that grief.
Alex was hardly aware of what he was painting. He didn't care. He didn't care about the colors, about the art, about the canvas. He didn't even care about the painting
He only cared about taking out what he felt and placing it somewhere. Painting just happened to be the thing that allowed him to do this.
At this moment, his emotion was what was the most important to him. His grief. His feeling of loss. The painting was the outlet.
And he let the emotions flow.
He marked with a black paint here and a green one here. He added a bit of pink on the left side, and some yellow on the right. A bit of white on the eyes with a hint of blue.
He painted what he remembered. It had been a while since he had seen her, but he knew what she looked like. He remembered the young girl that he played with as a child, the only one he cared about, the one that was his sister.
He drew Hannah.
He had tried to let go of the hope of finding Hannah for some time. That was what was stopping him from breaking through for nearly a year now. He knew he needed to give up on the hope, but it was difficult. It was not something he could just let go of.
He couldn't bear the thought of disappointing his aunt, by bringing back the news that he couldn't find her daughter after she had recently received the knowledge of her husband's death.
But Alex couldn't do that anymore. He would have to disappoint her. He would have to come to terms with the fact that finding Hannah was a lost cause.
He needed to understand in his heart of hearts that Hannah was long gone.
So, whatever hope he might have had, he let it flow with his grief and sadness, as he painted them onto the canvas where the young girl's face was now becoming more and more real.
The deer looked in surprise, feeling the aura that came from Alex's painting even before he was finished. It continued keeping its senses on him, carefully sensing through things to see what was going on.
Through just the pages, it could also feel the sense of loss and grief. It could feel the sadness.
It had been a while since the deer had felt emotion this strong being painted into a canvas. The last time… when had the last time been?
A memory of a young man floated in the deer's mind. The deer remembered the painting. A woman and her son sat close to each other, painting something vivid on a canvas. That had been the only painting in a few centuries to have successfully moved it.
And it seemed there was another now.
'Incredible,' it thought and moved on to helping other participants, giving them some hints here and there as it had to Alex the day before.
Alex felt his heart empty up completely, and the final stroke of his brush gave him the cathartic release he had been hoping for such a long time.
He dropped his brush and could only stare at the painting in front of him. The image had been a cacophony of colors, mixed together in an unseemly way. However, somehow, there seemed to be a symphony between them that created an overall picture of a young girl with a bright smile on her face.
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