The Cost of Being Seen

Lex poured the tea with steady hands, the steam curling between them like unspoken thoughts. The National Art Museum.

A stage worthy of kings.

A place where ink wasn't just preserved—it was canonized.

Lex tilted his head slightly. "That's a bold suggestion."

Professor Xu's lips curled faintly. "It is an obvious one."

Lex huffed a quiet laugh, setting the teapot down. "And what makes you so sure I belong there?"

Xu Jianhong took his time before answering, his fingers brushing the rim of his teacup. "Because I have seen what happens when a man underestimates his own ink." His gaze flicked briefly to the paintings beside them. "And because I have spent a lifetime studying calligraphy, yet even I struggle to find a flaw in your strokes."

Lex didn't react. But he heard the weight behind those words.

Perfection.

A dangerous thing to be accused of.

He exhaled, leaning back slightly. "This isn't a business move for me."

"Exactly." Xu Jianhong's voice was quiet, certain. "Which is why it matters."

Lex rolled his shoulders, stretching out the tension creeping into his spine. "You do realize my name alone would complicate things."

Xu hummed. "Your name is a powerful thing, yes. But Ling Jun? That name is clean." He met Lex's gaze. "You are not just a Latham, not just a Maddox. You are an artist. And art belongs to no one but itself."

Lex tapped a single finger against the table, his mind already weaving through the implications.

If he accepted, it meant stepping into a world that had nothing to do with finance, power plays, or market control.

It meant **being seen—**not as a strategist, not as a businessman.

But as himself.

For the first time in a long time, he wasn't sure if he was ready for that.

Professor Xu took a slow sip of tea before setting the cup down, eyes gleaming with quiet certainty. "Consider it, Ling Jun. But do not wait too long."

Lex exhaled, his gaze drifting toward the ink still drying on the page.

Lex rose from his seat, motioning for Professor Xu to follow. The older man didn't ask where they were going—he simply stood, adjusting the cuffs of his Tang jacket before trailing behind with measured steps.

They walked in silence through the hall, past dimly lit corridors and closed doors, until they entered the private gallery.

The Wave Series hung along the walls.

Twenty-one paintings.

A body of work that stretched across years, across lifetimes.

Two were missing—No. 1 and No. 11, sold at auction today. But the remaining eighteen stood like sentinels, each piece layered with a grief that had never been spoken aloud.

Lex watched as Professor Xu took it all in.

The first wave, bold and endless, a force that could not be stopped.

The next, chaotic, tides breaking upon the shore, violent and unrelenting.

Then the later pieces—calmer, colder, heavier.

Lex had painted every loss into these waters.

His grandfather—who taught him patience.

His father—who left him too soon.

His grandmother—who carried wisdom in every breath.

The bitterness of a life.

Professor Xu stepped closer, his fingers curling behind his back, his breath slow and measured.

His eyes moved from one piece to the next, tracing the strokes, the swells of ink, the weight of something unspoken but undeniable.

Then he exhaled.

Not a sigh—something deeper. A quiet, reverent recognition.

"This… is grief." His voice was barely above a whisper. "Not just loss. Not just longing. But the weight of remembering."

Lex's fingers tightened slightly at his side, but he didn't look away.

Professor Xu lifted his gaze, studying him—not as a businessman, not as a strategist, but as an artist who had bled himself into the ink.

For a long moment, neither of them spoke.

Then Lex turned, leading him away from the waves, back toward the tea room.

This time, when he stopped, he didn't gesture to the paintings on the walls.

Instead, he pulled out a single old scroll.

Carefully unrolling it, he set it on the lacquered table.

The ink had faded, but the strokes were still there—small, uneven, but full of life.

Lex folded his arms, smirking faintly. "Age three. My earliest recorded work."

Professor Xu stepped forward, his eyes scanning the clumsy yet confident strokes.

A small dragon, curled at the edges, its body wobbly but determined.

A bamboo stalk, crooked but standing tall.

And—in the bottom corner—a tiny signature.

Not in his name.

But in the careful calligraphy of his grandmother's hand: Ling Jun.

Professor Xu traced the ink lightly with his gaze.

Then, for the first time that night, he smiled.

"Ah," he murmured, voice warm. "So you have always been this way."

Lex smirked faintly at the professor's words, his arms still folded as he glanced down at the old scroll. "Always been what way?"

Professor Xu let his fingers hover just above the faded ink, his gaze distant—reading beyond the strokes, beyond the years.

"Restless." His voice was quiet, but certain. "Chasing something even before you had words for it."

Lex exhaled through his nose, shaking his head. "Sounds dramatic."

Xu Jianhong chuckled. "Perhaps. But it is not untrue."

Lex glanced at the child's scrawl of ink—so different from the waves, from the winter bloom, from the careful precision of the work he created now.

And yet—

The same hand. The same hunger.

His fingers brushed lightly against the edge of the scroll. "I don't remember painting this."

Professor Xu nodded, as if he expected that answer. "You wouldn't. But the hand remembers what the mind forgets."

Lex's smirk twitched. "That sounds like something my grandmother would say."

"Because she understood." Xu tapped a single finger against the page. "You never stopped painting, Ling Jun. Even when you tried."

Lex rolled his shoulders slightly, stretching out the tension there. "Doesn't mean I wanted to be seen."

The professor simply gave him a knowing look. "And yet, here we are."

Lex scoffed softly, leaning back. "Here we are."

Silence stretched between them, but it wasn't empty.

It was settled.

For the first time that night, Lex wasn't thinking about the next move, the next deal, the next play.

Just the ink.

Just the weight of the brush in his hand.

Professor Xu studied him for a long moment, then, softly—"Your work belongs to more than just you, Ling Jun."

Lex didn't look away from the scroll.

Didn't answer immediately.

Because for once—

He didn't know if he disagreed.

Lex's fingers traced the edge of the old scroll, the weight of years pressed into faded ink.

He could hear his grandmother's voice, soft but unwavering. Let the ink find you.

Professor Xu waited, patient as ever. He didn't push. Didn't rush.

Lex exhaled slowly, then—

"Yes."

The word settled between them like the final stroke of a signature.

Professor Xu's expression didn't shift, but something in his gaze softened. Approval. Expectation.

"Then it is decided."

Lex leaned back slightly, tilting his head. "Just like that?"

A faint, knowing smile. "You have already decided, Ling Jun. You are merely catching up to yourself."

Lex huffed, shaking his head. "You sound a lot like my grandmother."

"Then she was a wise woman."

Lex didn't argue.

The ink had always been there. The brush had never truly left his hand.

Now?

Now, the world would see it.