Chapter 85: Training Begins
Looking at Moon searching his body for the seals, Ed knew he was not sure how to explain this if someone saw them. He’s been running around shirtless, seemingly so proud of the bones he has.
Ed’s eyes fell on Moon’s ribs again, and he pursed his lips.
He had been asleep for a few days ever since the day of the first round. Ed felt rather bad, the progress he had made in fattening him up was getting ruined whenever he made a breakthrough.
He felt the food he made was not enough to cover the kid in a decent amount of meat.
Shaking his head, he decided not to think about it for now. He would fatten Moon within the next couple weeks. In his head, the plan was slowly coming together well.
But for now, he couldn’t look at this skeleton anymore. He knew Moon was searching uselessly for the old seal.
"No one saw them," Ed stated flatly.
"What are you talking about?" Moon asked back skeptically.
"The old seals, no one could see them. You don’t have to worry," Ed said with a wave of his hand.
"How so? I always saw them before leaving my room," Moon explained, sure everyone could see them.
"You don’t have to worry, I said. Samuel has his way of doing things," Ed stated dismissively.
"Bu-"
"No buts. Can you see where the new seal was?" he cut Moon off and asked.
Moon wasn’t sure. He didn’t take a good look at himself in the mirror before leaving the room. He just walked out when he found himself finally awake.
He decided to take off his shirt and search for it, but once his hands reached for the lower end of it.
"Don’t, stop." Ed was getting tired of looking at that starved, bony body of his. "It’s on your left hand," he just told him.
Moon checked both palms. They looked the same; he couldn’t find any trace of seals. "Are you sure?" he asked skeptically.
Ed rolled his eyes. "Stop with your bullshit already and start the Echo training I gave you."
Moon opened his mouth. "Erm, aren’t we not allowed to use Echo though?" He remembered the rules.
"To attack, and if I permit it, you can do what I say. Here we make the rules!" Ed looked fed up.
Moon went silent and tried to follow Ed’s instructions, forming knives or claws of Echo on all five of his fingers.
"Make sure you try doing it in your head as well," Ed reminded him before walking away, leaving the kitchen and the eatery altogether, giving Moon time to focus.
Once outside, Ed spoke his mind out loud. "That brat can’t focus on anything other than fighting?"
He looked to the left. "Did you figure out what that seal is?"
Samuel stepped forward, hands behind his back. "Not a clue," he stated before adding, "I’ll need to study it for now."
Ed pursed his lips. There weren’t many seals Samuel was unaware of, yet there they were now facing one they knew nothing about.
Not even the material or resources needed to replicate it were known, but Samuel was just going to study it. To Ed, it sounded more like a headache and a mountain load of work.
But he also hoped it would be helpful to an extent. Maybe Samuel would learn a few things from it. But on second thought, he hated to imagine how much of a monster he could become by that time.
’At this rate, I might eat his dust,’ Ed thought to himself.
"Anyway, when are you teaching the kid?" Ed asked.
"For now, you take care of that. Send him to Uon in the morning to relearn Flowing Light," Samuel answered like he already had a plan.
"He should be fully healed by tomorrow; it’s faster than expected anyway," Ed stated. "So maybe tomorrow night you’ll have a chance to teach him that."
"Maybe," Samuel said, turning his back. "Teach him what you need before I start."
Ed raised an eyebrow. "You teaching him about seals?" he asked.
"If he can learn it, that is." With that said, Samuel walked away.
On the other hand, Moon was trying to shape his Echo, but every time it came out in a weird or awkward shape, like a lump.
A roundish thing that came out every time he tried.
He tried to split this lump into five. He thought once split, it could be easier to sharpen them.
But it failed. Like a whole unit, the Echo kept refusing to split and maintained the lump form again and again.
Moon licked his lips.
Now that he thought about it, it felt like he was forcing all of his Echo out just to do this, which was probably the reason it kept failing.
He tried releasing smaller amounts instead.
Retracting everything, he decided that his approach was not right, letting a small amount slip slowly and coat his index finger.
’Let’s try this slow.’ He took a deep breath.
The Echo covering his finger was also roundish, without the slightest sharpness to it. He tried to extend it, elongate it, slim it down.
One attempt at a time, yet they all ended in failure.
His Echo reverted rapidly like bouncy slime, unwilling to take shape.
’This is problematic,’ he thought.
Every attempt, he tried to play it out in his head, and there it worked fine. It took claw shapes.
But every once in a while, it would fail the same way it happened in reality.
He scratched his head, trying again, but this time he retracted everything and tried reducing the amount of Echo even further.
Letting only a tiny amount come through.
Though the unexpected happened. A little more than he intended was dragged out along with what he tried to squeeze.
Moon wasn’t bored or rushing, though. He was somewhat enjoying the process without the slightest frustration.
For now at least.
The fact that he could already release and retract his Echo, the Echo that once refused to come out and, when out, refused to return, was an amazing experience in its own way.
Before long, he was done with the huge amount of food Ed gave him and started trying with both hands at the same time.
He tried to do the same thing, but now with two index fingers simultaneously, though what applied to the single finger applied to the second as well.
It failed again.
He then tried to do both hands at the same time, splitting the Echo volume between both hands.
"Let’s see if this works," he whispered.
The Echo turned into lumps together once again, refusing to take shape. Like stretched rubber, it gathered back together.
It came from his chest instead of both hands.
He tapped the table where he sat rhythmically, one time after another.
This attempt also ended in failure, making it feel more complicated than expected, but still, he was far from giving up.
This was becoming like a game. He was playing with something that was his own, but he never knew existed, never felt before.
Instead, a new idea came to his mind.
"What if I try gathering all of it in one hand?"
He gathered all the Echo effortlessly in his left hand, again looking like a transparent, elastic ball-like object.
Making small differences with each try, another failed attempt followed, while he slowly grew more familiar with his own Echo.