What a dense blood aura!
A certain fruit farmer once remarked that [Enhancement] Nen users were all brawn and no brains. While somewhat biased, when it came to pure physical constitution, if [Enhancement] claimed second place, no one would dare claim first.
A faint, hazy blood aura drifted out the window and into the air. Netero stopped in front of the butler's mansion and abruptly looked up at the second floor.
Caught off guard by his sudden halt, Beanman couldn't brake in time and nearly crashed headlong into him. Stumbling to stand upright, he tilted his head to glance at Netero. Netero furrowed his brow, a rare look of solemnity appearing beneath his long white eyebrows and Buddha-like ears. He had clearly noticed something...
"Eh..."
Beanman rolled his small, pea-sized eyes and followed his gaze to the second floor.
Creak. At that moment, the front door of the butler's mansion opened. Zebro stood by the door, extending a hand in an inviting gesture. "Chairman, please."
Netero cast one last glance at the second floor, gave Zebro a slight nod, and walked inside with Beanman without a word.
One step, two steps. Through the corridor, around the corner, and up the stairs. As they drew closer to the bedroom on the second floor, the naturally permeating blood aura grew thicker and thicker, until...
They reached the second floor. The bedroom was right in front of them. Netero could even hear the faint yet powerful thumping of a heartbeat, echoing in his ears like the beating of a war drum.
The strongest man in humanity suddenly stopped in his tracks and closed his eyes to listen.
A hazy, wondrous state centered around his feet and slowly spread toward the bedroom.
Noticing this, Beanman made a soft shushing sound, stopping Zebro from opening the door to lead the way. "Shh, there's no need. The Chairman is already 'looking'."
Zebro, with his hand on the doorknob, cast a surprised look at Netero. He gently withdrew his hand and stood silently to the side.
Buzz. That hazy, wondrous state slipped through the crack in the door, gliding along the floor until it enveloped the entire blood cocoon.
Inside the blood cocoon, Gotoh, who was sleeping peacefully with his hands folded over his lower abdomen, furrowed his brow imperceptibly.
In his dazed consciousness, it felt as though he had been pulled into a vast, white void. There was no sense of direction, no concept of time or space. There was only him, facing it all in utter bewilderment.
The Zoldyck Family Castle.
Clang. It was eight in the morning, and the sunlight was already beginning to turn scorching hot.
Roy finished his breakfast under Tsubone's attendance. After receiving a message from Zebro, he paused for a moment before heading to the training room, casually flipping through the [Game Guide] Silva had given him. At a certain moment, his heart stirred.
His heartbeat slowed by a fraction. The young man's beautiful silver hair swayed in the wind, its tips displaying a dazzling, glazed golden glow. He looked up out the window, his profound gaze seemingly piercing through the lush mountain forest to land directly on the butler's mansion.
A head of white hair drifted over leisurely. Before Roy could make a move, Zeno walked up with his hands behind his back. He glanced at Tsubone and said, "Killua is awake and crying for milk. Kikyo needs a hand over there, so you should head up."
Tsubone respectfully replied, "Yes."
She then bowed slightly to Roy, gathered the clothes he needed to wash, and withdrew.
Tap, tap... The sound of footsteps gradually faded away.
Roy kept his gaze fixed out the window, seemingly oblivious.
Zeno casually pulled up a chair and sat beside him, speaking as if to himself, "It seems you also sensed that flow of intent."
This flow of intent was different from [En]. Relying on Nen and fueled by imagination, it was more like a state of being... a state of detaching the mind and walking solely on consciousness... commonly known as [Heart Drop · Fist Listen]!
[Heart Drop · Fist Listen]: Listening to the heart, listening to the fist. It used spiritual will to govern physical sensation in order to achieve a form of extrasensory state. It often occurred during duels between top-tier masters and exhibited several distinct, extraordinary traits.
First: A person in the state of [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] could preemptively read their opponent's psychological activities. Often, in the very instant of an exchange, they could "hear" the opponent's inner thoughts or intentions, rather than relying solely on movement prediction.
Second: Physical perception of time slowed down. Subjectively, time felt elongated, similar to a "life flashing before one's eyes" effect, but triggered voluntarily. It could be used to enhance reaction speed.
Third: It was not true time manipulation. Through [Trance], one broke free from the physical body's reliance on time, thereby altering their own perception of it. However... in reality, the actual flow of time remained unchanged.
Of course, the prerequisite for mastering [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] was... the user had to be strong enough, or rather, possess a sufficient realm of martial arts. Clearly, Netero fell into this category, and moreover...
Judging from how he could activate [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] at will, he was deeply versed in this path, already incredibly proficient and able to use it effortlessly. As expected of the founder of [Shingen-ryu], a martial arts grandmaster standing at the absolute pinnacle of [Enhancement].
Roy's beautiful silver hair draped down his back, its tips radiating a hazy, glazed golden light under the sun. He gently set down the game guide in his hands. With a soft whoosh, two suns ignited within his eyes. [Eye of Truth], activate!
[Transparent World] deployed!
A similarly wondrous, hazy state centered around the young man and slowly swept out into the surroundings.
Zeno, who had intended to explain [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] to Roy, suddenly froze. Swept by the [Transparent World], he felt as if he had suddenly fallen into a quagmire. His limbs were dragged down, sinking deeper and deeper. In an instant... he lost all physical sensation and all perception of the "flow of time"!
'[Heart Drop · Fist Listen]? My body is completely bound, and even my thoughts seem to have slowed down considerably...' Zeno's white hair fluttered slightly. He furrowed his brow and stiffly turned his neck to glance at Roy. 'No, this isn't [Heart Drop · Fist Listen]!'
'It's [Heart Drop · Sword Listen]!'
'There are sword shadows!'
A sharp, resonant sword cry echoed in Zeno's ears as the [Transparent World] unfolded.
Within the Zoldyck Family Castle, countless tiny, illusory swords seemed to flicker in the haze. Some radiated scorching heat, some were wreathed in surging flames, some possessed an attractive magnetic pull, and others wantonly bloomed with boundless light.
In a mere instant, they hovered in front of every Zoldyck, butler, servant, flower, bird, fish, insect, and every breathing or non-breathing entity... forcing everyone to halt their actions.
Swish. In a second-floor bedroom of the castle, the blackout curtains were abruptly pulled open, revealing a man holding a baby. Silva, bare-backed and displaying his robust muscles, calmly looked at the high-temperature sword hovering before him. His gaze shifted, sharply darting down toward Roy's bedroom. At the same time, the gazes of Illumi, Scarface, and One-Eye followed closely behind.
Roy seemed oblivious, his eyes quietly fixed on the mountainside. At this moment, his consciousness wandered with his mind, as if his soul had left his body. Step by step, using ethereal flying swords as a bridge, he strolled toward the butler's mansion. At a certain moment, he suddenly heard a leisurely voice ask him, "Brat, has your sword path improved again?"
Roy paused his steps, his feet resting on an illusory light sword that freely bloomed with a solar halo. He turned his head and bowed toward the dim little room on the first floor of the castle. "Great-grandfather has a keen eye. I have indeed gained a bit of insight recently."
Creak. From within the dim little room, the soft sound of a rocking chair slowly drifted out.
Taking advantage of the fact that the weather hadn't yet become suffocatingly hot, Maha, who was hiding in his small room enjoying the air conditioning, twitched his mouth imperceptibly and scolded with a laugh, "That's certainly not just 'a bit'."
Indeed, although LV4 and LV5 were only one level apart, the difference in experience... was as vast as an ocean, incredibly difficult to cross. At the very least, after intimately observing the [Sun] at negative distance and raising his sword path to LV5, Roy found that his understanding of swords and the way of the sword had deepened significantly compared to before.
Now, not only could he execute [Transparent World] effortlessly—in no way inferior to the naturally transparent Yoriichi Tsugikuni—but even when casually performing breathing sword techniques like "Sun Breathing," "Water Breathing," and "Wind Breathing," their power was unfathomably greater than before.
The young man shook his head. "A bit is a bit, no more, no less."
Roy would never forget the scene where his desperate "fusion slash," swung with all his might and draining all his Nen, was effortlessly blocked by Yamamoto Genryūsai Shigekuni with a single strike. Now was far from the time to be proud and complacent.
Tick-tock. The curse on the back of his left hand counted down Roy's life like a clock, completely unaffected by [Heart Drop · Sword Listen].
Maha gently patted the armrest of his rocking chair. After a moment of silence, he spoke faintly, "You are a child who knows what he's doing. I won't say much else, just one thing..."
Maha paused, then gave a displeased cold snort. "When someone comes knocking on our door to cause trouble, you can't just stand by and watch."
Roy's mouth twitched, rendering him momentarily speechless.
Was Netero really here specifically to cause trouble? Obviously not.
Just as his [Sword] would not deceive him, Netero's [Fist] would not deceive either. Roy believed that not only him, but his father Silva, his grandfather Zeno, and even... Maha himself, could easily sense it. The reason this "strongest man in humanity" suddenly unleashed [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] was clearly a gentle gesture born of curiosity to deeply understand Gotoh's condition. There was no hostility.
But orders from above must be followed. Not to mention Maha's command, Gotoh was at a critical juncture in his advancement. Roy naturally wouldn't stand idly by; he had to keep an eye on things to prevent any accidents.
Whoosh. A leisurely gust of wind rose, passing straight through Roy's illusory body.
The young man helplessly nodded toward the dim little room. Turning back, he rode the wind. With a light tap of his toes, a small sword materialized beneath his feet, lifting him up. He flew out of the castle, skimmed over the mountain forest, descended the steps, and headed straight for the butler's mansion on the mountainside. In the blink of an eye...
...he emerged beside Netero.
"Ho ho ho... It seems the old man is still angry..." A hazy phantom abruptly drilled out of Netero's physical shell the moment Roy arrived. The old man, his form and spirit unified, wearing loose robes and a broad belt, tilted his head and gave Roy a helpless smile.
His slanted old eyes rippled with a glistening light. Noticing Roy's hair color, he was slightly taken aback.
'Silver... silver hair? And it's not pure...' Netero's gaze shifted downward, noticing the glazed golden light overflowing from the tips of Roy's hair, radiating a halo as freely as the sun leaping over the horizon in the morning. The old man's eyes suddenly narrowed again, a sharp glint flashing within them. He looked deeply at Roy and said, "Zeno told me you intend to defeat Silva within a year. I only treated it as a joke at the time, but looking at it now... it seems I was too shallow-sighted."
"You're different now, Roy!"
Their parting at the Hunter Exam felt like just yesterday. Facing Roy directly, Netero saw his blood aura soaring straight into the sky, forming two thick pillars of light alongside his Nen that pierced through the mansion's roof.
Bolstered by the [Heart Drop · Fist Listen] state, his extrasensory perception was constantly telling Netero that the young man before him possessed profound Nen capacity and vigorous blood aura, completely incomparable to before. It was no longer possible to treat him as just a "kid"!
"You flatter me, Chairman." Roy politely greeted Netero. The two great suns still burning in his eye sockets freely shot out two beams of boundless light onto Netero... A string of information subsequently surfaced in Roy's mind.
Roy calmly withdrew his gaze, lingering on those few question marks for two seconds. He vaguely guessed... the reason there were question marks and so much uncertainty was perhaps related to Netero falling into a state of "vitality decline."
As the saying goes: "Fists fear the young and strong, staffs fear the old and experienced..."
Youth and vigor were when one's fists were heaviest. Decades had passed... Time, like a butcher's knife, had ravaged Netero's body, permanently sealing his peak condition on the day he comprehended his "punch of gratitude" and descended the mountain to defeat numerous dojo masters.
"Are you sad?" An emotional fluctuation, manifesting as a melancholic grayish-white, spilled from above Roy's head.
Noticing Roy's gaze, Netero looked up at him.
The young man said slowly, "No, just a bit sentimental."
Roy's gaze was profound as he looked at the fine wrinkles on Netero's old face, filling his forehead and the corners of his eyes like ravines. He said honestly, "You really have grown old, Chairman."
Netero's body suddenly jolted. With Roy's current height nearly catching up to Silva's, he could no longer look down at him. He froze for a long while before blankly snapping back to reality. Placing his hands on his hips, he laughed, "Ho ho ho... I am looking at your butler from below the bridge, and you are looking at me from upon the bridge... Ho ho ho... Roy, you must understand, not everyone is as lucky as your great-grandfather to stumble upon Longevity Rice..."
"People like me, or your grandfather Zigg, are merely human. We can never escape the fate of aging..."
Was that really the case? Perhaps it was also due to walking different "paths"... Roy thought of [God], of [Disaster], and of the mysterious Dark Sonata flowing through the continent... In the world of "Nen" where anything was possible, concepts like "aging," "death," and "birth" could not be simply summarized by a single definition.
Just like his own "transmigration" and "rebirth"—inconceivable and independent of human will.
And just like Gotoh, whom he had bestowed with the [First Embrace], undergoing a rebirth and remaking...
Crack, crack, crack... The one lying quietly in the blood cocoon suddenly moved.