...
Along the quiet, well-kept row of bookshops, one establishment stood out as a particularly jarring eyesore: a Goblin antiquarian bookshop that looked as though it had been cobbled together from rotting planks of wood.
The ancient Goblin proprietor, whose skin was so deeply creased it could have trapped a fly, shuffled about in a tattered cotton jacket leaking tufts of stuffing, hollering as he thrust one battered volume after another into the air — less like a bookseller, more like a peddler hawking miscellaneous goods.
The students, for their part, had long since stopped being surprised. They would pick out a book, wipe the grime off the cover, and read it as-is.
Most books in the shop cost only one or two credits; the slightly more valuable ones went for around ten.
Yet Dark had often heard it said that this Goblin antiquarian shop sold books at prices that were — in their own peculiar way — exceptionally steep.
Certain rare single-copy editions put up for auction had been known to fetch upwards of a hundred credits.
Clearly, this was a place only true bibliophiles — or students with credits to spare — would come to hunt for treasures.
Dark himself was not much of a book lover, which was why he had never set foot inside before.
But Angelia Hudson was a regular.
Especially recently, now that she had a means of earning credits, she had been coming even more frequently.
So running into her here was hardly a coincidence, when he thought about it.
Still, the two of them were not particularly close, so Dark made no move to start a conversation. He simply walked into the shop as one naturally would.
Unlike the clamor out front, the interior of the shop was reasonably quiet, faint traces of a woody scent drifting from every corner.
The shop assistant drooping listlessly behind the counter was not a Goblin at all, but a Long-Eared lady.
The Long-Eared folk were a Demi-human Species who, aside from their pair of long, fluffy ears that could hang all the way down to their shoulders, bore no other distinguishing non-human features.
When Dark walked in, the Long-Eared lady had folded her ears down beneath her chin, wrapping both sides of her face completely, and was lying sprawled across the counter — staring out at the street with the utterly dead-fish eyes of someone who had given up on life.
Whether it was from the noise or the cold, Dark couldn't tell.
It was his first time seeing a Long-Eared person in the flesh, so he couldn't help but look a moment longer — and then got glared at for his trouble.
"Seems like quite a short-tempered young lady," he thought to himself.
With that, he turned and made his way on his own toward the bookshelf marked with an "Art" placard, browsing through the titles at a leisurely pace.
Since he was here, he figured he might as well look for something useful.
Under the "Art" section, books related to painting made up the bulk of the shelves, but there was also a fair number on carving.
His main interest lay in carving — woodcarving, ideally.
After a few minutes, he spotted a thick volume on the bottom shelf whose title contained the words "wood carving," and crouched down to pull it out.
It took some effort to work it free. Then, as he stood up, he gave it a firm shake — and sent a great cloud of dust billowing into the air.
Clearly, this book had been sitting on that bottom shelf not for one or two years, but far longer.
Only after patting the dust off the cover did Dark look carefully at the title and read it aloud: "Vandi's Art of Wood Carving… Vandi… who's that?"
He blinked.
Van Gogh he'd heard of — the one who painted sunflowers.
But this Van-low…
"He was a performance artist during the war. So he could also carve, could he?"
A soft voice rose suddenly from just behind his ear.
Dark turned his head slightly, and found that Senior Angelia had come around from behind him to stand at his side. She asked, in a casually offhand tone, "You're interested in woodcarving?"
Dark smiled. "A little, yes. It's good to see you, Senior Hudson."
But Senior Angelia reached up and tugged at her overly long fringe, her expression unreadable as she said, "That's not what you were thinking when you first saw me, was it?"
Dark paused internally, but kept his manner perfectly natural. "Not at all — I simply didn't want to disturb you. Speaking of which, so Vandi was a performance artist rather than a carver?"
"Whether or not he was a carver, I can't say, but he was certainly a performance artist," Angelia nodded and said. "How else would you explain a madman who, on a battlefield still strewn with corpses after a slaughter, ran naked through it all, laughing?"
"That's…"
Dark looked down at Vandi's Art of Wood Carving and replied, "As a matter of fact, I've never even seen a battlefield."
Angelia cradled her own book and tilted her head sideways to peer at the one in his hands.
Dark obligingly flipped Vandi's Art of Wood Carving open.
The first page repeated the title and author, followed by a single line from the author himself.
"There is no greater beauty than the human form. And so it is the human form we have given to our gods."
...
"Doesn't sound like something a madman who liked to run around naked would say."
Dark read the line and found it had a certain truth to it.
The form of a deity is not fixed — many gods can freely shift between multiple forms entirely.
Yet humans tend to imagine the gods they believe in as existing in an idealized, purely human shape.
The ultimate expression of that imagining was the very core of the Holy Church's faith: the "Saint."
Of course, without confirmation, Dark could not yet say whether that was merely imagination or something that truly existed.
After all, the gods had long since fallen.
In any case, while these thoughts turned in his mind, he idly flipped to the next page, glanced at the table of contents — which listed only chapter numbers — and kept turning.
Then he came to the first section of the first chapter: "The Softness of Beauty."
What the page depicted was a graceful human figure carved from pale white wood.
The entire sculpture was posed in a deeply arched, bow-like posture, every detail of the human form rendered with meticulous precision.
Dark's heart lurched. He hastily averted his gaze.
He wasn't embarrassed — he was worried about "[Lust +1]."
But once he looked away, he also realized this was not a private moment, and snapped the book shut with a slightly awkward feeling.
Then he glanced at Senior Angelia beside him.
Her long fringe fell over her forehead, giving her an understated look.
But to Dark's surprise, she showed none of the bashful reaction one might expect from a girl. If anything, she looked more intrigued than ever.
"So these are Vandi's works?"
Angelia blurted out.
"I never imagined a performance artist could have such masterful carving technique! Are you going to buy it? If you're not…"
Even as Dark felt taken aback, he answered on instinct, "I am."
"Oh?" Angelia looked genuinely disappointed. "Then once you've finished reading it, could I possibly borrow it? I'll pay you like a rental fee."
Dark went with it smoothly. "No need for payment — once I'm done."
Angelia immediately said, "Wonderful, thank you!"
...
Dark ultimately bought Vandi's Art of Wood Carving.
Not because Angelia was standing beside him, of course.
After thinking it through carefully, he had concluded that the book genuinely had something to offer him.
The types of "Armed" equipment varied widely, but the most common by far was full-body armor — and the foundation of crafting armor, particularly form-fitting soft armor, was naturally understanding the structure of the human body.
When learning something new, laying a solid foundation was the most important thing.
From the basics up to the advanced — you couldn't simply gaze at a lofty castle in the clouds and expect to build one.
He was starting from nearly zero, and would have to teach himself on top of that. Jumping straight to armor-crafting would make things far too difficult.
So — start with human figure carving.
Besides, Vandi's Art of Wood Carving wasn't solely about human figures. There were quite a few sections on Demi-human Species as well — beastmen, for instance.
If he could master the carving of beastman bodies, understanding the skeletal and muscular structure of animals would follow naturally.
All in all, the book turned out to be surprisingly comprehensive.
...
After purchasing Vandi's Art of Wood Carving, Dark did not linger long in the Goblin antiquarian shop.
He quickly said his goodbyes to Senior Angelia and continued scouring Traveler Street for materials.
By the time dusk was closing in, he summoned Gatomon from the dormitory, and with her help, hauled back an entire cartload of packages.
Room 201's door was like a great gaping mouth — things went in, and nothing came back out.
Dark unpacked everything, sorted the materials by category, then finally let out a long breath and headed into the bathroom to wash up.
Once he felt thoroughly refreshed, he flopped straight onto the bed and began flipping through Vandi's Art of Wood Carving.
He had instinctively shied away from it earlier, yes.
But in truth, at his current level of self-discipline, looking at these carvings — exquisite as they were, they were ultimately crafted imitations — was not going to cause him much trouble.
Dark Demon was not some wide-eyed, clueless boy.
...
He had barely started reading when Little Eevee and Sylveon crept stealthily into the blankets, one on each side, nuzzling their faces against his — which left him feeling rather put-upon.
Predictably, it wasn't long before both Magic Guide Spirits were captivated by the wood carving book and flatly refused to leave.
...
Time turned its page quickly.
Starting that Sunday, Dark officially embarked on his journey into woodcarving.
Beginning with the most basic things — identifying materials, familiarizing himself with his tools and learning how to use them — he gradually found himself sinking deeper and deeper into it.
Boys, it seemed, had a natural affinity for this kind of hands-on work.
The feeling of creating something with your own hands was addictive in a way that was hard to resist.
And under his deliberate indulgence, [Greed] was steadily ticking upward.
And yet, nothing comes easily.
By the end of that entire day.
The only thing he had to show for himself was a few extra pieces of rubbish scattered around the dormitory.
Then, that evening, something suddenly occurred to him, and he summoned Meowth!
What followed was a rude awakening: Meowth, an absolute latecomer to the craft, proceeded to demonstrate on the spot exactly what "Technician" truly meant.
A mere half hour later, Meowth had deftly mastered every carving tool, and then — under the watching eyes of Dark and the rest of the Magic Guide Spirits — carved out a gloriously chubby bighead carp, looking every bit alive.
"Meow…"
With the task complete, Meowth clamped the bighead carp between its teeth, thrust out its little hips with insufferable smugness, and struck a pose.
In this round.
Dark Demon suffered a crushing defeat.
...
"Perhaps… this is what a true genius looks like."
[Envy +1]
Drifting slowly across his field of vision was a [Major Sin] he hadn't seen in quite a while — Envy.
Dark suddenly found he had missed it, and without thinking, reached out to touch it.
His hand closed on nothing, of course.
Afterward, he watched Meowth strutting around with the bighead carp in its mouth, showing off to anyone who would look — and a faint spark of inspiration flickered through his mind.
It lit up for just an instant before going dark again, like something scratching at his heart, close enough to reach but impossible to grasp.
"What on earth was I just thinking?"
Dark sat down on the spot and racked his brain.
But sometimes, the harder you try to remember, the more it slips away.
He fretted over it the entire night, and still couldn't recapture that one fleeting spark.
...
A new week opened its curtain to the sound of Professor Silf's voice lecturing in class.
The last traces of Valentine's Day had completely faded away.
The students refocused their attention on their studies.
Dark, too, found his way back to his usual rhythm.
He scaled back the time he spent on woodcarving to just three hours each evening.
Unlike before, whenever he returned to the dormitory each day, he would summon Meowth and have DemiDevimon and Gatomon — the two most proficient readers among his spirits — take turns teaching it.
And during each night's three-hour "woodcarving session," he studied carving alongside it.
Even though everything Meowth learned about woodcarving had to pass through Dark first before reaching it, Meowth could always absorb it with remarkable speed — and invariably left its owner in the dust far behind.
It had been a long time since Dark had felt this way.
In the realm of woodcarving, Meowth was the hare, and he was the tortoise in that old race.
Only through persevering effort could the tortoise hope to reach the same finish line as the hare.
But sometimes, having a silhouette up ahead to chase after was, in itself, a stroke of good fortune.
He could clearly feel that his learning efficiency was notably higher than it had been that first Sunday.
By the end of the week.
He was already able to carve a reasonably shaped human figure from a piece of softwood.
It was still far from "refined," but it had a complete, coherent structure.
His technical fluency continued to accumulate.
He was finally starting to look like someone who was actually "doing woodcarving" rather than just hacking at wood.
During that week, Meowth's chin tilted a little higher with each passing day — but Dark paid it no mind.
...
The last Sunday of February.
Two days left before the month was over.
Seven-thirty in the evening.
Dark gazed at the wooden figure he had carved with his own hands sitting on the desk, then slowly closed Vandi's Art of Wood Carving and let out a breath.
"One week — from nothing to something. My progress has actually been quite fast. As long as I don't compare myself to Meowth."
He allowed himself a small smile, then set Vandi's Art of Wood Carving aside in the corner and pulled out another woodcarving-related book: Elf Craftsmanship — Wood Carving!
"There's still a great deal of content in Vandi's Art of Wood Carving about more detailed human figure carving — there are even techniques for softening materials to simulate specific parts of the body. But those techniques are beyond what I need right now."
"Now that I've got a handle on basic human figure carving, I can finally start adding 'Armed' pieces on the outside of the body. I'll begin with the simplest thing: a dress."
"In that regard, Elf Craftsmanship — Wood Carving should be able to give me a great deal more help."
Dark flipped Elf Craftsmanship — Wood Carving to the page he needed, then picked up his carving knife, held it up against the wooden figure, made a few tentative passes, turned it over in his mind for a moment — and finally got to work.
"Let's start by carving a little skirt!"
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