Thirty seal masters bearing insignia at the Bronze Crow Pavilion spent two days examining the eternal seal, yet couldn't determine whether it was genuine. Shang Hesheng set down a rule of life and death: if they declared it genuine, every crack that appeared on it from then on would be their responsibility; if they declared it false, they would be executed on the spot.
Lu Wujiao, an unregistered, unmarked coffin-carrying drudge, was shoved before the assembly. With the bronze seal pressed to his forehead, he couldn't find either the starting stroke or the ending stroke. Yet beneath the seventh line, he felt the hidden starting stroke.
There in the hall, he pointed out that the tall, gaunt seal master had left his lamp unmoved for two days, while the man in blue robes had first marked the seal genuine, then changed his verdict to suspicious. More than a hundred people watched as this unregistered nobody used his craft to save his own life.
But Shang Hesheng walked over and pressed a hand to his chest, precisely where it seemed he already knew something was hidden. Only then did Lu Wujiao understand: identifying the seal as genuine was just the beginning. From the moment it was pressed to his brow, the seal had ceased to be an inanimate object, and Shang Hesheng had never cared about whether it was genuine or false.
