The moment Omokage instinctively relied on his puppet, his fate was sealed.
A Shooting Star at 200% power...
This was no joke!
Moreover, part of Omokage's aura was still dispersed along the long street. In such a situation, there was absolutely no way he could withstand this lethal strike.
Morrow turned and walked away. After putting some distance between himself and the scene, he paused upon hearing the explosive impact of the Shooting Star. He casually raised the back of his hand and glanced at it.
Lv.22 → Lv.31
Nine levels up...
Looking at the number at the center of his Tree Rings tattoo, Morrow's eyes gleamed faintly, a sense of satisfaction welling within him.
In just half a month, he had climbed from Lv.7 all the way to Lv.31...
If he had relied solely on pure, grueling training, half a month would have only allowed him to advance two or three levels from Lv.7.
And the higher the level, the more exponentially the required training time would grow.
But by hunting high-level Nen users, he could bypass the constraints of time, seizing the rewards that should have belonged to the future and making them his own in the present.
The only difference was:
Hunting Nen users inevitably carried the risk of death.
Omokage's level was probably between Lv.45 and Lv.60...
Morrow estimated Omokage's potential aura.
At first, the distance had been too great to observe clearly.
By the time he got closer, Omokage had already dispersed part of his aura elsewhere, making an accurate assessment difficult. He could only widen the estimated range.
Enough thinking. Time to run.
With the Tree Rings tattoo providing direct feedback, Morrow didn't need to worry about any so-called feigned death tactics. He immediately bolted in the opposite direction down the passageway.
Attacking Omokage had been a high-risk, high-reward gamble.
Now that the reward was secured, the next step was to escape any potential fallout.
If he had waited until Hisoka fully acknowledged Omokage's feigned death before making his move, the risk might have been lower.
But in that case...
Omokage would have been at his absolute peak, making an ambush kill nearly impossible.
Choices matter so much...
Morrow sprinted forward, the thought echoing in his mind.
Passing through the corridor formed by the surrounding buildings, Morrow emerged onto a tree-lined sidewalk where plane trees stood tall.
"Chirp, chirp..."
The sound of sparrows came from the branches above.
Morrow suddenly stopped and looked up, spotting a few sparrows perched on the tree trunk.
Beep... Woo... Beep... Woo...
From all directions along the long street, the urgent wails of police sirens blared.
Startled by the sharp noise, the sparrows flapped their wings and took off into the sky.
Morrow reacted instantly, leaping up and snatching one of the sparrows with his right hand.
"Squeak!"
The captured sparrow struggled violently, its cries turning shrill as it pecked frantically at Morrow's knuckles.
Morrow looked down at the bird.
Starlight Convergence
His aura shattered into starlight, swirling around him.
He extended his left Index Finger, slowly pressing it toward the sparrow.
Terrified, the sparrow pecked even more desperately at his finger, but Morrow dodged each strike effortlessly.
A few seconds later...
Morrow withdrew his ability and released the sparrow, then turned his gaze toward the source of the sirens.
In the distance, a convoy of police cars sped down the road, forcing civilian vehicles to swerve out of the way.
Pedestrians on the street, unaccustomed to such a spectacle, turned to stare. Morrow quickly averted his gaze, glancing instead at the sparrow that had already flown far away, then continued sprinting in the opposite direction.
His astonishing speed immediately drew gasps from the surrounding pedestrians.
But Morrow had no time to care about that. His only thought was to put as much distance as possible between himself and the eye of the storm, avoiding any unnecessary complications.
After a long while, just as Morrow was still running with his head down, he suddenly heard even more frantic exclamations from behind him.
Hmm?
Alert, Morrow swiftly turned his head, his pupils involuntarily constricting.
What greeted his vision was a red Spider-Man swinging rapidly through the air toward him.
No, it was Hisoka!
In the air, a strand of Pink Adhesive Thread latched onto the top of a traffic light at the intersection.
At the other end of the thread was Hisoka, his entire body radiating a ravenous killing intent, his face twisted like a demon's.
As the thread abruptly retracted, Hisoka shot past the traffic light at blinding speed, descending from above and hurtling straight toward Morrow's location.
Nearly everyone on the road and sidewalks noticed Hisoka.
Though they couldn't clearly see his grotesque, terrifying face, they could sense a chilling, malevolent aura emanating from his high-speed figure, like a venomous snake coiling around their throats, suffocating them in an instant.
Had Hisoka's eyes not completely disregarded their existence…
That overwhelming killing intent, amplified by his aura, could have shattered their consciousness from dozens of meters away.
A police car speeding down the road spotted Hisoka from a distance and slammed on its brakes before immediately turning around.
But Hisoka paid no attention to the police.
His eyes were locked solely on Morrow.
The remnants of your killing intent haven't faded yet… I can tell. The lingering satisfaction still lingers in your aura.
High above, Hisoka retracted the Pink Adhesive Thread, using its incredible elasticity to launch himself downward like an arrow loosed from a bow, aimed directly at Morrow, now only a few hundred meters away.
Boom.
The arrow-like figure slammed into the ground, the impact shattering large sections of pavement.
Broken fragments scattered, kicking up a faint cloud of dust.
Hisoka's silhouette burst through the rising dust, his narrowed eyes trembling, golden pupils flickering within the slits.
Several dozen meters ahead.
Hearing the sound of Hisoka's landing, Morrow immediately abandoned his escape.
In a bustling city, trying to outrun Spider-Man, no, Hisoka, by sheer sprinting was an impossible task.
So Morrow simply stopped and turned, facing the terrifying aura radiating from Hisoka ahead.
From that aura, he could clearly sense the madness, hunger, and killing intent: an overwhelming mix of emotions.
Paired with Hisoka's demonic expression, this was probably the filthiest thing Morrow had encountered since arriving in this world.
He's fast as hell… Is this guy part bloodhound or something? And this aura… definitely above Lv60…
Watching the surging Nen around Hisoka, as if it were about to tear free from his body, Morrow internally assessed the situation with absolute certainty.
Without some kind of opportunistic advantage, well, without perfect timing, terrain, and luck, there was no way he could defeat Hisoka in his current state of ravenous bloodlust.
"What do you want?" Morrow opened his aura nodes, allowing the maximum amount of aura to flow through his body. As he called out to Hisoka, the aura gathered in his right hand suddenly took on a sharp shape.
Hisoka's eyes and mouth corners drew closer together, making his expression appear even more sinister.
He slowly glanced at the undisguised aura in Morrow's right hand and narrowed his eyes. "An Emitter..." he murmured.
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Bonus chapter for every new review and every time the story gets 20 Power Stones.