Toes curling against the floor,
Zeno pretended not to hear the old man's chilly sarcasm.
As usual, he walked behind Maha and began kneading his shoulders.
"Grandfather, Father's still alive, isn't he?"
"What do you want? If you've got something to say, spit it out. If not, get lost."
Maha didn't even lift his eyelids, rocking lazily in his chair.
"It was Roy who made me think of it," Zeno said. Even being snapped at didn't bother him; he continued smoothly down from Maha's shoulders, spine, to lower back, hands working in a practiced sequence.
"There's something I didn't fully explain over the phone. The timing of when that 'curse' appeared on that kid's hand is…odd."
White hair swaying, the words "A Kill A Day" on his chest stirring in the breeze, the former head of the Zoldyck family frowned deeply. After a pause, he said gravely:
"You know I and Silva both dove deep into Father's memories. Nothing happened to us."
"But Roy goes into the game once and gets marked immediately. These days I've been thinking… maybe Father has his eye on that kid…"
Maha kept his eyes shut and said nothing.
Zeno slid his hands up to massage the old man's head, picking his words carefully:
"You saw it too. That 'curse' isn't normal. It's more than just nen—there's something else mixed in…"
Maha cut him off impatiently.
"Quit circling around it. Say 'faith' if you mean 'faith'!"
He snorted.
"This is the Zoldyck estate, not the Dark Continent. Those things' arms aren't that long—not yet."
"Grandfather is right."
Zeno immediately squatted down, baring his forehead—presenting it like a target.
Maha raised his hand, then set it back down. After a moment, he sighed, sounding suddenly tired.
"Fine, I get it…The book is in the right-hand drawer. Take it to him."
"Yes."
Outside, night was fading. A pale light was starting to tear open the dark; dawn was almost here.
The small, dim room fell quiet again.
…
After leaving the castle, Roy ran down the mountain, through the forest, past the butlers' villa. At the mountain path, he ran into a "pig-headed" figure. The pig-head, hearing footsteps, bowed low.
"Good morning, Young Master."
The corner of his mouth twitched—tugging at bruised skin and making him wince. Clearly, he'd been beaten badly yesterday.
"Mm."
Roy spared Kastro a glance, brushed past him, ran all the way down, then turned and returned up to his room. He took a quick shower, and right on schedule, on his first day home, Gotoh arrived with a cart of food.
"What happened to your face?"
The young butler's cheeks were mottled with bruises. One eye had a split at the corner. He'd tried to cover it with makeup, but Roy saw through it immediately.
"Just gave a monkey a bit of a lesson. It's nothing."
Gotoh did not mention yesterday's fight with Kastro.
Roy didn't press. If he didn't want to talk, there was no point forcing it. He sat quietly at the table and ate breakfast while listening to the butler's report about Kuraging.
"As you ordered, I've arranged for her to undergo physical training first. Once she's used to the rhythm, we'll start talking about opening her nen."
"No rush."
Roy bit into a bacon sandwich, mind briefly brushing past Kuraging. With the Scarlet Eyes as a multiplier, a Kurta's ceiling wasn't low. She was worth cultivating.
"When she can push open two Trial Gates, then give her nen."
"Yes."
Gotoh deftly handed over a napkin. Roy took it, then looked up at him.
"And you?"
The butler pushed up his glasses.
"The sword is ready. Just waiting on you, Young Master."
He'd heard Roy mention that "breathing techniques" could boost physical ability and explosively raise combat power. If he'd known that yesterday, he wouldn't have been so miserable— even if he had technically won in the end.
"Five in the afternoon. Meet me at the forest pond."
Roy wiped his mouth, rose from his chair, and flicked his hand.
Shff–shff—
Yubashiri and the cane-sword flew in from the stand, one after the other, and landed neatly in his grasp.
The sun leapt over the horizon, spilling morning glow through the big windows and cloaking him in a soft red mantle.
Gotoh bowed.
"Good luck, Young Master."
Roy didn't look back.
"I'll take that."
A pool of swamp opened at his feet. Under the butler's astonished gaze, Roy sank straight down into the floor. The next second, he emerged outside the door.
A mountain breeze swept by. Gotoh stared blankly toward the window. He peeked again. Roy had vanished, then appeared again, flickering like a ghost—you couldn't predict from where he would pop out next.
Sure enough, "Young Master will always be Young Master."
He'd seen too many "impossible" things happen around Roy. The butler's mind quickly re-centered. He cleared away the dishes, pushed the cart toward the storeroom. Since Roy had said he'd be waiting by the pond at dusk, then he'd be there—alive and well.
Until then, all Gotoh needed to do was prepare the sword and wait.
Their paths split again.
…
Out in the hall, Roy emerged from another patch of wall and found himself outside the little dim room. The two old men had finished breakfast and now stood by the window, arms behind their backs, soaking in the morning sun.
He walked up, unhurried.
"Grandfather. Great-grandfather."
Zeno stood at Maha's side and nodded faintly. Maha watched the red sun turn white as it climbed, and said lazily:
"Go."
At 7:54 a.m., the training hall door yawned open, framing a tall man.
Silva had one foot on each of two solid stone blocks, doing a full side split, stretching, his back to the door.
Roy slipped past Zeno and Maha, and as he walked, his body shrank, skin wrinkled, spine bowed, black hair graying—until he was wearing Zigg's face. From afar, he fixed Silva with that expression, as if to say:
"Your father's here. Don't you hurry over to greet him?"
Maha, Zeno: "..."
They glanced at each other. Maha snorted with a laugh.
"Little brat, scaring his own father, huh?"
His old eyes stayed fixed on Roy, full of memories.
Grandfather misses Father… this kid really knows how to tug on people's nerves.
Zeno saw the look and understood what Roy was doing in a single instant:
Building momentum.
As the old saying goes: first charge is strongest, the second weaker, the third weakest. Even knowing you're weaker but still stepping forward without flinching—that's courage.
Roy, fox-borrowing-tiger's-might with Zigg's face, was hammering steel into his own spine.
The hundred steps between him and the hall grew shorter: fifty… thirty… twenty… ten…
He stopped at the doorway.
Silva turned his head, eyes cool and sharp with a faint flicker of surprise. Then—
Killing intent roared out of him, slamming forward like a tidal wave.
The floorboards crackled.
Father and son stared at each other. The air itself seemed to spark.
In the garden outside the training hall, a junior butler was chasing Milluki, trying to stop him from peeing indiscriminately. Milluki ignored him, angled himself toward Ilumi dangling in the tree, and let fly… only to be punted out of Ilumi's view like a cannonball.
Ilumi dropped from the branch, folded his arms, and leaned against the trunk, quiet now. Those empty fish-eyes of his reflected the two figures facing off in the hall. A moment later—
Twin blades flashed. Clang!
Yubashiri and the cane-sword left their sheaths together.
The boy's silver hair flew back, qi rising to its peak. His slightly bent back straightened.
The collision of killing intent and pressure warped the air, ripples spreading outward.
Silva watched him in silence.
"Your grandfather Zigg never used swords."
Roy's two blades flared red, then burst into flame. Heat rolled off his sword aura as he traced a flower of fire through the air.
"But could he play with fire?"
Crack!
The floor split.
Silva twisted threads of nen into strands, then into a whip. "Nen whip" in hand, he looked down at Roy, the corner of his mouth curling upward.
"Whether he could or not, I don't know." His eyes narrowed. "But you…"
"You're playing with fire."
Roy nodded in agreement—and then swept both swords out in a cross-slash, launching two forty-meter arcs of burning sword aura straight at Silva.
The ground tore open in two long gouges. Heat rolled like a furnace.
Before they reached him, sheer heat and force made Silva's straight silver hair lift off his back.
Ken?
Those flames were solid—orange-red on the outside, blinding white at the core. A man who'd killed as much as Silva didn't need Gyo to feel it; with bare eyes alone, he could tell his eldest son had made progress.
He'd learned Ken.
Bang—bang!
Two sharp detonations rang out, rattling eardrums.
Ken against Ken. Silva's wrist flicked; his nen whip thickened and hardened, doubling in girth.
Like a serpent, it writhed forward, fanged tip wrapping around the oncoming sword aura. The collision of nen blew the air apart.
The shockwave skimmed past both men, ripping chunks of floor from the training hall and punching holes through walls and windows. Outside, it looked like someone had strafed the house with a heavy machine gun—nothing left intact.
"Take it outside."
The voice floated in from the corridor.
Maha's heart clenched at the damage. He turned and rapped Zeno's head with a knuckle.
"Useless brat. You knew he'd learned Ken and never said a word."
Did he think plaster and floorboards were free?
Zeno swallowed the pain and the complaint both. You were mad at me already—who would dare add fuel?
Inside the hall, Silva didn't say a word. He simply shot through the shattered window and out into the open.
Roy followed. A pool of swamp opened under him as he traveled underground, using En to track Silva's position. Nen flowed out from him in all directions, a mist-like field that brushed over Ilumi, over Silva, and even brushed past Maha and Zeno, extending out to a hundred meters.
Again…
Ilumi had been lurking aside to watch the show when his heart gave a little jolt. He remembered that night in the city—same nen, same feel, same invisible gaze.
So it was my dear big brother, after all…
For once, the foolish older brother truly understood. Instead of getting angry about having his inner thoughts laid bare, he was strangely calm as he watched Roy erupt from the ground, circle behind Silva, and stab for his heart like lightning.
Now you know just how much I care about you…
Shff—
The sword point sliced the air with a shrill whistle.
Zeno clasped his hands behind his back and glanced at Maha.
"For the record, I also had no idea when exactly Roy learned En."
Maha tasted that misty nen, saw with his old eyes the sword light, felt a jolt go down his spine. He shattered the nen field with a thought and chuckled.
"Not just En. The little brat's crafty as hell—trying to eavesdrop on an old man's heart. He needs a beating."
Crack!
The nen whip, as if it had eyes, snapped backward. Though it sat in Silva's hand, it suddenly curled behind him, intercepting the flaming blade just as it neared his back, sliding along the steel and batting it aside.
Roy felt his hand go heavy. His strike was knocked off course, the flaming tip brushing past Silva's shoulder and whipping away.
Ken, with that swampy space-type trick beneath his feet. Silva cracked the whip again, now on the offense, the lash arcing toward Roy's back.
He had to admit: his son had grown since leaving home.
At the very least, that weird space ability was a surprise.
"Three lashes… Father, that's your third already, isn't it…"
The whip's whistle howled toward his spine. Alarms rang in Roy's head. Facing the hardened, steel-thick lash, he did not dodge. Instead—
Two "wings" sprouted from under his ribs; beneath his original arms, two more grew. One hand formed a magnetic field, raising a Magnetic Shield. Another hand conjured the short blade.
From dual-wielding, he'd suddenly become—
A three-blade user.
~~~
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