Raphael calmly stood and answered without his expression wavering, "Of course esteemed judges, I am taking this competition seriously."
"They explain to us why you have painted… an ugly woman on such a large canvas! What's more, it was all black!" The judges turned red in anger as they could not get their eyes to look at the painting again.
The painting was depicting a woman with facial features that were recognizable but it was so out of proportion that one would think that Raphael intentionally deformed her features.
They could not believe that this kind of painting even deserved to be displayed in the gallery.
"Ahahaha!" Gifford, who was listening to the farce, could not help but laugh as well as the rest of the participants close to Vanderford.
Anna looked at Raphael encouragingly.
She believed that Raphael had a plan because the two of them trained hard for the finals. She knows that there is a reason why Raphael's painting turned out to be like this.
"Please dear juries… would you mind calming down a little and taking time to listen to my introduction?"
Raphael did not frown at the laughter from his competitors but instead maintained a distant demeanor and politely coaxed the judges.
The judges' expressions still remained livid but seeing Raphael's attitude their tones softened and eyed him to start his explanation.
Receiving the permission of the judges, Raphael signaled the gallery assistants. Then he looked at the judges and started introducing his work.
"This painting is called 'Beauty after the Light…"
"Pffft!!! Where's the beauty of it… I must have turned blind for I cannot see any trace of beauty in that dark black blob on the canvas! Hahaha!" Gifford led the rest of the painters in taunting Raphael's work.
"Silence!" The head jury bellowed, his face was dark. He was already having a hard time dealing with Raphael's ridiculous work, but now he still had to think clearly while surrounded by such unwanted noise.
Finally, the gallery became silent, only then did Raphael smile and continue.
"There is a definite reason why it was called beauty after the light. I am confident that this painting is the first in the world of this kind!"
Then Raphael clapped his hand and signaled the gallery assistants to let down the drapes in the window.
"What in the wo-" Everyone was shocked at the assistants' actions but Raphael caught their attention immediately.
"Dear judges, please do not mind the darkness and keep your eyes on the painting."
The judges did as Raphael told and were amazed the next moment.
Before their eyes, a painting of a lovely woman, with silver hair, luscious pink lips, and long lashes as it smiled gently with her eyes closed.
What's more, she was adorned by glimmering pearl-like jewels making the painting more striking and captivating.
"Heavens! How?!"
"Is this real…"
"How could this be!"
Raphael saw that the juries were now drawn, he then clapped once again and in an instant, the assistants pulled the curtains up. Instantly, the beautiful woman in the painting disappeared and went back to her original state.
"It's indeed real!"
"My word!"
"Student Raphael, how in the world did this happen?!" The judges tried hard to think of how Raphael was able to create his work but no idea came to mind.
"The process involved grinding a bunch of luminescent pearls and dissolving them into a transparent liquid mixture.
I purposely used a bunch of colorful luminescent pearls to incorporate the colors but all of them were with my secret mixture." Raphael explained and showed them a jar of the 'invisible ink' he used.
"To be able to paint in invisible ink?!"
"How did he even manage to estimate the color's intensity?!"
The juries and the painters started to discuss wildly. Raphael remained calm but his heart was relieved that the judges were no longer aggressive towards his painting.
Actually, he already thought of this idea when Princess Arielle and he brainstormed about what kind of painting medium will he use for exploration.
One night, Princess Arielle looked at the bright stars and gently told him, "Did you know that the stars do not actually disappear during the daytime? It was only because the sunlight was so bright that no one could notice the puny twinkling of the stars…"
At that moment, Raphael had an epitome! He wanted to make a painting that would only manifest its true beauty under certain conditions, in this case, the darkness!
Now that he had an idea in mind, the next problem was how they would do that.
They tried searching through all the books in the libraries of the palace but to no avail.
If not for Princess Arielle suddenly lamenting about it during a tea party with the rest of the Imperial women and Eli, they will not find a solution!
"Oh… you are talking about an ink that would glow in the dark…" Eli answered.
"You can actually make an ink by mixing a type of phosphor into a compatible medium." Eli continued.
"Phosphor?" The women looked at Eli in curiosity.
"Yes… phosphor! It is a material that is able to absorb light and would emit light when exposed to some type of radiant energy." Eli explained patiently.
Knowing that they will have a hard time understanding her scientific explanation, she decided to take a luminescent pearl and continued her explanation.
"The best example would be this luminescent pearl. Usually, phosphors need to become exposed to ultraviolet light in order to glow, however, the atmosphere of Prasinos is rich in mana.
Therefore there is no need to invent ultraviolet light to trigger the luminescent pearl to emit light in the dark, we only need mana to be present in our surroundings!"
"I get it! Thank you so much for this idea, Lady Eli!" Suddenly, Arielle's expression lit up, as if she had an epiphany.
"Glad to be of help. Though I only told you about the material, the medium is still important. In terms of the matters of painting, I can not say what kind of carrier will work best on phosphor material." Eli reminded them.
She was not able to do thorough research on the matter and so she could only give them clues.
"No worries, Lady Eli… Raphael and I will figure it out!"
Flash forward to the present, Princess Arielle and Raphael experimented a lot in order to find the perfect mixture to carry the luminescent powder and control it as fluid as a normal ink.
With their hard work, Raphael soon found his brand new medium - Glow in the Dark Painting!
"This is phenomenal!!!"
"It is indeed as Student Raphael has said! This painting is the first in the world of this kind!"
"Good, good! Not only did the painting industry of the Seirende Empire disappear. It turns out, it was in the process of having such an overwhelming breakthrough!" The head jury chuckled in satisfaction.
While the judges were happy, Gifford and the other rival painters had a sour expressions. They did not expect that Raphael would prepare such a gimmick.
Remembering what happened during the string competition finals, they could not help but taunt the Farauld delegates in their hearts.
A bunch of dreamers who know a lot of tricks!
While the painters were bitterly cursing Raphael in their hearts, Anna smiled meaningfully at Raphael the moment their eyes met.
'I will not lose to you…' She opened her lips and mouthed these words.
'Bring it on…' Raphael returned the smile and responded.
The commotion died down and the judges had once again reluctantly gone over to go to the next painting.
The next painter was originally gloating upon seeing Raphael's work. But after the revelation, he was now preparing himself mentally that his work will not be able to best the creature before him.
And so the next reviews of the painting ended so easily. Even the two paintings that were at par with Gifford's first impression no longer sparked such a drastic reaction.
Finally, the juries were now down to the last painting.
This painting was also able to catch their eyes because the painting was done so masterfully that it immediately caught their eyes even if it was positioned at the far end of the gallery.
The creator of the painting was none other than Anna.
"Student Anna, you are also from the Farauld Institute. This time we learned our lesson not to judge your painting without introduction, and so would you like to introduce your work?" One of the judges said respectfully.
"Yes… perhaps your painting happened to also be twofold like student Raphael's?"
Although they were expecting that it is, the level of anticipation was a little bit lessened because of Raphael's stunning work and so, there was already a lesser element of surprise on their part.
Nevertheless, Anna still smiled and nodded,
"Indeed juries. Please do not take offense because we were inspired by the same mentor. Although what I can guarantee you was that, both Raphael and my techniques were individually developed by ourselves."
"Alright then… show us, Student Anna… WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" The judge was supposed to gently allow Anna to introduce her work but he was not able to do so.
That was because Anna's next action told them that the lady was about to destroy her work!
