Tower of Endless: Death Granted Entry

On the stone bed, Moon had a couple of things on his mind to ask about later, but before his mind settled on them.

~Snap

With a finger snap from Samuel, the seal, the two intersecting rings came apart, and with them, echo flooded out of Moon’s body.

”This is a magnificent sight no matter how many times I see it,” Ed commented.

Samuel turned his gaze to him. ”Can you see it?”

Ed grunted. ”Of course I can,” before his eyes he could see dividing lines where echo is set apart from Death echo. ”But I can’t help thinking, is our way too advanced or stupidly crude?” He asked Samuel before taking a step forward.

”As long as it works, it doesn’t matter.” Samuel didn’t bother thinking about it.

”I guess you are right.” With that said, Samuel waved his finger, full of echo, around Moon’s chest and shoulders.

His Echo, or rather, the blacker part of it became defensive and active all of a sudden, exactly the same way it did last time.

It flowed and gathered, defending Moon against the small yet sharp blade of echo.

Ed kept waving his finger around; more blackness gathered. He enlarged the blade, making it longer than Moon’s shoulder width. He even had to blunt it and let it touch Moon’s chest directly.

But Moon gritted his teeth and didn’t express his pain in the slightest.

But now, only now did he see all the black echo gathered. He could also see the perfect dividing line. ”Samuel, I can see it now,” he said.

Samuel nodded. ”I’m ready, cut whenever you can.”

”Alright,” Ed confirmed before turning his gaze to Moon. ”Kid, that will hurt like hell. Scream if you have to, though it would be better if you can just pass out. This isn’t flesh pain.” Ed warned Moon.

Moon pursed his lips; it was already painful as it was. ”Let’s get this over with,” he said through his breath.

”I’m cutting.”

With that said, Ed moved his other arm along the perfect line he could see, and at that moment, Moon screamed; his body started convulsing uncontrollably.

Amidst his screams, Samuel extended his index and middle finger toward the blackness, and the two golden rings followed his command, rotating around the now cut-apart black Death echo.

”What are you waiting for?” Ed asked Samuel, who was still not setting the seal and echo back onto Moon’s body.

Little did he know that Samuel wasn’t just setting the seal, but he was also thinking of a way to have it become useful to what Moon was about to learn.

Samuel stepped forward and placed a finger on Moon’s forehead, who was still screaming in pain. Moon’s eyes opened and dilated, as if he was forced to lose consciousness.

”I can’t have him suffer for so long,” said Samuel before opening the rigid left palm of Moon. ”I’ll have it sealed here,” he explained to Ed.

Ed watched. ”Why here? Wouldn’t his heart or left shoulder be even better? Or maybe an eye?” Ed wasn’t convinced.

”I’ll start setting my seals on him before he wakes up,” Samuel stated, before adding, ”I don’t want this to interfere with my seals; it might be useful to him as well.”

”How so?” Ed wasn’t exactly convinced. ”You don’t have seals on your heart or eyes.”

Samuel turned his gaze to Ed.

He didn’t say a word, but Ed, whose mouth opened slightly, couldn’t stay silent. ”You crazy son of a bitch.”

When Samuel looked at him, his pupils had ring seals surrounding a different-looking seal. ”How long has it been?” Ed asked.

”A very long time ago,” Samuel stated flatly.

”How about your heart?” Ed asked.

Samuel looked at him again. Ed pursed his lips. ”These seals are not transferable. They must be placed with needles manually.”

”Yes,” Samuel answered without flinching once again.

”How did you do it?”

”There’s only one way to do it.”

”Are you insane?”

Samuel didn’t answer. ”I need to get started before he wakes up.”

He opened his hand and a golden box appeared on his palm. When he opened it, it was full of needles of different sizes.

He took two and opened his palm again, where a small glass vial full of golden liquid appeared.

”I’ll start treating blood flow in the places where I need swelling reduced to set them right,” Samuel stated.

Ed stood there, watching wordlessly. He tried so hard to convince his old friend this morning only for him to place the entire matrix on his own, in one setting and without a pause.

Ed watched as Samuel dipped the needles inside the golden liquid and started moving them in a sewing like motion in one spot after another without pause.

Small star like lines, or rather, intersecting lines in the shape of a star, ran across Moon’s body one by one.

He stripped the rest of Moon’s clothes and proceeded.

It was a very long process, but he was very familiar with it, or rather, he had done it to his own body countless times. It was hard to do back then. Now doing the same thing for someone else was not as crazy of a process as it previously seemed.

He started with his arms, then legs, chest and back, neck, face, including his gums and teeth.

His ears, and even beneath his hair.

It was like a meticulous process where he needed to place each seal at approximate distances and relevance to each other.

Ed watched the process that took over two hours, and he knew it was not done yet. But he couldn’t help admiring his friend.

Back then, he locked himself up and screamed alone, bled alone and failed many times, resulting in the seals exploding.

He had suffered too much for what he was just applying for free to someone else without holding back, and he also knew that it was time to move on to the next part of this.

He put down the set of needles he held and brought a different looking one. It was shorter, finer and more flexible, something that couldn’t be called a needle in any way.

He came closer to Moon’s face, opened his now back to normal eyes after he drained them well so he could work with them.

He did the unthinkable and had the softer needle drawn over the pupils. As it moved, it left controlled traces of that very golden liquid.

Once he was done with both eyes, he released a little of his echo, igniting the two drawn circles into etching themselves on the pupils with a sear.

”Magnificent,” Ed exclaimed. His friend’s hands were truly miracle-making. He had never witnessed this before and now it was more amazing than he could have thought or imagined in his wildest dreams.

Samuel was too focused on what he was doing. He shifted Moon’s face to the side and inserted a new needle inside his ear, redoing a process so similar but less visually striking than the one he just did with his eyes.

Samuel then put the needles back in the pack, letting out a pent-up breath.

”Are you done?” Ed asked.

Shaking his head, ”No, it’s only halfway.”