The Yamazaki Gallery. This was the premier art gallery for sculptures, and of course, each of the largest cities in the Aerthos continent had its own Yamazaki Gallery branch. The raw space in this gallery was extremely large, and most of the people who came in were those of culture and breeding. Therefore, ostentatious magical rings were often scorned and derided as lacking class inside the Yamazaki Gallery, for art and refinement were valued above all else here. They charged a gold coin to each person who entered Yamazaki Gallery.
In the gallery, a clean and gentle ding-dong floated in and lightened the mood. Then, many of those who passed the gateway were noble men and noble ladies, beautiful young girls—all well-dressed, and ordinary people in front of the gallery became almost unconsciously well-behaved. By the time Renji and his bros, along with Cass and the three guardsmen, finally made their way to the Yamazaki Gallery, any person with a keen eye would recognize the Keito Institute garb they all donned. The sighting of the Blue-eyed Stormraven perched on Cass' shoulders made people become more courteous and polite naturally.
"Uncle Cass, come in with us. The other three can wait outside," Yori instructed. Renji, his three bros and Cass entered the gallery.
In the main hall of the Yamazaki Gallery stood a large, man-shaped sculpture—the grandmaster sculptor, Yamazaki himself. The whole gallery was exceptionally quiet. Everybody, regardless of status, spoke in hushed tones not to disturb anybody else. Yori, Ryūji, Giichi, and Renji would look at one stone sculpture after another, exclaiming that indeed these sculptures were incomparably beautiful.
"The exhibits at the Yamazaki Gallery are divided into three halls: the main hall, the experts' hall, and the masters' hall. This is the main hall where some sculptures by various sculptors are put together and displayed for a month. After a month, the highest bid takes the sculpture. Ordinary sculptures such as that are generally a few gold coins, especially good ones value toward a few dozen of coins," Yori explained laughing. "The hall of experts is different. Inside, it is divided into individual rooms, and inside these rooms, each sculpture has its own room. Generally, an 'expert' refers to someone with sculpting ability acknowledged by all, and most expert sculptures are worth about a thousand gold coins."
"As for the masters' hall, well, it's even more amazing. Inside the innermost sanctum of the gallery, there are very, very few master sculptures. The price of the sculptures is frighteningly high. "Each of them is valued in tens of thousands of gold, and some masterpieces, which first made their sculptors famous, are hundreds of thousands of gold pieces," Yori continued. Renji was speechless. Any masterpiece by a master sculptor was tens of thousands of gold coins. For a master sculptor, money meant little.
"It's quite hard to do a masterpiece for a master sculptor. He doesn't want to commit mistakes," Yori sighed. "A masterpiece must be able to be venerated through the ages, and it takes a combination of talent, skill, and perhaps a spark of genius."
"Works in the main hall, only slightly pleasing to one's eye. Shall we proceed?" Yori nudged them further in. With the silence of the gallery and light music in the air, Renji felt like he was swimming in a sea of culture. Suddenly, at this moment, Kaiya Tanaka flew out from the Celestial Dragon Ring and began to appraise the art nearby.
"Terrible, terrible. How can people have the face to bring out artwork of this quality to show others?" Kaiya Tanaka said unhappily.
"Grandpa Kaiya," Renji looked at Kaiya Tanaka, "this is just the main hall. There's an experts' hall up ahead and a masters' hall."
"Yamazaki Gallery?" Kaiya Tanaka began but fell into silence. "Grandpa Kaiya, Grandpa Kaiya?" Renji called in his mind several times but seeing Kaiya Tanaka was still lost in his thoughts. Renji then followed after Yori, Ryūji and Giichi to the experts' hall. Indeed, this hall is very different, every artist had their information recorded and accurately noted on their respective displays.
Renji and others started to enter display rooms. While he didn't know much about sculpture, clearly the works of the experts were different from those on the main hall, according to Renji's feeling. They seemed to carry some kind of ineffable grace and culture. Having enjoyed the sculpture, Renji enjoyed Kaiya Tanaka's voice in his head again.
"Not bad. These, at the very least, can be acknowledged as accomplished," Kaiya Tanaka sighed in praise. "However, compared with Yamazaki's works, there's still quite a way to go." Renji speechlessly looked around. "Kaiya Tanaka, how could such people be put in the same category as Grandmaster Yamazaki?" Renji shook his head helplessly and laughed. Yamazaki was the number one sculptor ever since the Aerthos Continent came into being.
Kaiya Tanaka scrunched up his face, dragging his beard uneasily. "Well? You think Yamazaki was born a grandmaster? He, too, at first was an ordinary sculptor, though went up and became a true grandmaster."
Renji was gobsmacked. There was some reason in the words of the Grandpa Kaiya. After going around the experts' hall, Renji and the rest went to the innermost masters' hall.
"Everyone, remember, while in the masters' hall, don't touch anything. If you break anything, it would be a disaster," reminded Yori. They entered the master's hall, and an absolute silence greeted them. The hall was huge, but there were very few sculptures. There existed only a small number of masters, and each master had only four or five pieces of art shown. There were only twenty or thirty works in this entire hall.
There were not many, but every statue gave an impression of soul as if alive. "Oh not bad, not bad. I did not expect in five thousand years, stone sculptures could reach such a high level," gasped Kaiya Tanaka in disbelief. "If they become slightly better then they would be touching Yamazaki." The silent Renji and others were entranced, their spirits ascending.
As night was closing in, outside the front gate of the Keito Institute, Renji and the rest alighted from the carriage. "Second bro, third bro, the two of you… I had been planning for us to have a good time tonight in Solara Kingdom City, but you… ugh, you guys are so thin-skinned. I started having fun in those places when I was six years old," Yori grumbled unhappily.
"Right on, right on," Ryūji interjected from the side. Giichi and Renji exchanged a glance, and both laughed bitterly. "Quick! Open the gate!" That was a furious, urgent shout. Renji and all the rest turned their heads to have a look. They saw a curly-haired youth carrying another bloody youth with him. At his side was a pretty girl. The bloody youth's face was ashen white, his left arm broken with white bones sticking out, and his chest covered with claw marks.
"Some of the trainees from this session going to the Mountain of Magical Monsters were wounded. Which group is this? We have been at Keito Institute for less than a year and have seen so many high-level students injured outside," Yori said casually. Well, the Mountain of Magical Monsters was east of the Sacred Alliance, quite a near one hundred kilometers to the Keito Institute. Generally, those in good physical shape could jog from the mountain range to the Keito Institute in about half a day.
"I've always found the Keito Institute and this place with magical beasts very interesting. Over time, I have seen flying beasts, running beasts, and defection beasts. In fact, most people with magical beast companions here are magus instructors or high-level students," Giichi admired.
Just then, as the four bros reached the main gate, a familiar voice called out, "Renji." Turning his head in surprise, Renji lit up with joy. "Uncle Draven.