When Takuya wrote the second hand seal on the blackboard, he only wrote half of it.
The white chalk line stopped in the middle, like a bridge someone had deliberately torn apart halfway through. A small stir ran through the classroom. Kiyo craned his neck to look for a long while, then finally raised his hand.
"Sensei, did the chalk break?"
Takuya lowered his head and glanced at the chalk in his hand. "No."
"Then why did you only write half?"
"Because today, I'm only teaching half."
Kiyo slowly lowered his hand, wearing a pained expression. "Can knowledge be sliced up and sold like this too?"
Morita Yu said, "You could finish learning yesterday's lesson first."
"Yesterday's lesson is already lining up in my head."
Che looked up at the half-seal on the blackboard. It was not a complete hand seal, merely the opening movement of the second one. The directions of the thumb, heel of the palm, and angle of the wrist were all clearly drawn, yet the most crucial closing movement had been left out. To ordinary children, this was just the teacher preventing them from practicing recklessly in private. To Che, it was like a door that could clearly be pushed open, only to be held shut from the other side.
The sense of analysis quietly surfaced in his mind.
If he followed the fire-nature flow from the first hand seal and connected it to this half-seal, chakra would turn from the palm's angle toward the side of the wrist. The missing latter half was probably meant to gather and stabilize the fire flow, or lock in the direction of the release beforehand. If he looked a few more times, he might be able to guess most of it.
Che moved his gaze away and looked at