Chapter 82: Hidden Seal
Moon, who didn’t have the slightest hint of consciousness, was still lying on the stone bed without the slightest trace of clothes covering his body.Along the way, Samuel drained the blood off his enlarged eyelids and damaged left foot, giving them the natural dimensions he could work with for his seal placements.
And now that he was done with external placement, it was time for the next part.
"Are you done?" Ed asked, unaware of the true complexity of the process. He only knew it was cruel by the sight of his friend every time he attempted a new seal, or when one failed.
He wasn’t worried about Moon now, but back then, he was worried about Samuel, yet he also hated that their paths were different, hated his inability to help.
Samuel wasn’t aware or bothered by what his friend thought, he was completely focused on making a complete seal map that is perfectly balanced, something Moon can live with for the rest of his life without having him undergo the suffering he went through.
Yet, he also was planning on teaching Moon about these seals, their nature, the methods of arrangement and the craftsmanship behind them, though time was not on his side, he was going to try what he can for now.
He let out a pent up breath before giving the questioning Ed his answer. "No, it’s only halfway."
"Halfway?" Ed exclaimed. "What else do you need to seal?"
Samuel set the needles aside for now. "These seals are based on body proportional balance." He rubbed his nose bridge.
Ed squinted, and Samuel knew what this look meant exactly.
With no other option but to explain, "Each seal is responsible for a diameter and depth, but it also needs another seal to prevent it from producing damage instead of functioning properly."
Samuel inhaled and exhaled slowly. "So, the seals I just finished are just skeletal seals, responsible for skin, flesh and bones. Soon I’ll start building systemic seals, he will need them to keep his organs and vessels from rupturing."
Ed opened his mouth to ask, but Samuel raised a finger stopping him. "Eyes and ears are external so they’re placed together," he added.
Ed had nothing to say, so he could only nod, but he had to place it all together.
Getting back to business, Samuel fished out a long thirteen centimeter needle that was very hard like a weapon. He also took a lens that was perfectly circular and golden rimmed and placed it over his left eye, before running his index finger on his right eye, leaving behind a golden seal over it and the amazed Ed.
"No wonder you are the teacher and I’m the cook," Ed chuckled lightly.
Unbothered, Samuel proceeded to the next phase right away. Through the lens, he could see Moon’s organs perfectly.
He avoided using his other eye to not break his focus, relying on position, his hands and what he could see to judge perfectly.
He first flipped Moon over, getting his back to face the ceiling and face into the gap of the stone bed. He stabbed the needle under his last rib, directly reaching his kidney.
And proceeded with the seals, though these varied in size. Kidneys, liver, spleen, lungs, stomach, pancreas.
One by one, each got a seal of different size befitting its distance and size. Lungs got very big seals but they were placed on the inner tissue providing perfect distance away from skeletal seals.
Each organ had major arteries and veins moving blood back and forth, these got smaller seals, almost microscopic, though Samuel managed to make them easily with the large dagger like needle he was using.
He even moved across the exposed nerves making their way across the spinal cord. Some membranes where organs are usually floating in liquid and protected were also engraved by seals.
By the time he was nearly done, he sealed the ethmoid bone, the lower bone protecting the brain through the nose.
The inner side of the throat, and of course, the thyroid as well.
And now, all that was left was the heart, the one at the center of it all and the most complicated of them all.
The seal of the heart was multi phase, first the membrane where the heart lies, followed by the arteries and veins.
Moving on, the heart needed to be engraved as one single unit for perfect balance in that storm of seals. He had to engrave every single part of it with seals different from the ones he had been using, though closer to the one he used on the eye, the ring like ones.
He laid Moon on his right side, his left side now facing him. He moved his arm forward and pointed the needle at where the heart was.
He stabbed, bypassing the lungs with precise angle and getting directly into the protective membrane of the heart.
Shuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu~
Something unexpected happened.
"What is that?" Ed shouted.
"This... it’s my first time seeing something like this," Samuel started, taking a step back pulling the needle away.
In front of their eyes, a blinding flash of light exploded from Moon’s heart, like a wave of echo that felt timeless and unfathomable.
"Is that a seal?" Ed asked, knowing too damn well it wasn’t Samuel’s doing. He wasn’t a technical person but he could tell by the way it felt.
Samuel nodded. "This... I’ve never seen before," his eyes fixed on the lines.
The seal, when it erupted with light, lifted Moon off the stone bed, radiating colors of copper and silver intersecting, looking like a wrap around the heart, or a ribbon that was tightly knotted around it.
Ed wanted to know what it was for, but he also knew Samuel didn’t know, and probably even Moon was unaware of something like that existing within his body.
He had promised himself to do everything he can for Moon, but this was rather too complicated, even the king of seals has never seen such a thing in his life, not even once.
On the other hand, Samuel had unsealed his eye and was looking intently at the seal he never knew existed, now before his eyes.
He let go of the needle in his hand, but it didn’t fall to the ground, instead it floated by his side.
His hand waved and more needles found their way to him, along with the bottle of the unknown golden liquid that now seemed a little transparent at the top with so much of it used.
At one end of the ribbon like seal, Samuel moved forward with a needle in hand, dragging the end into a line, and the line into the matrix of seals he had built.
The end blended perfectly into the golden matrix, Samuel didn’t simply connect each end, but each of them had multiple loose branches and he had to swiftly finish the integration.
Ed stuttered at the sight. "Wh-what are you doing?" he asked. "This is something we don’t know its origins or what it does."
Samuel began connecting the second end. He didn’t give Ed a look nor an answer, it was even questionable if he was aware of anything in his room but this very seal he was entranced with.