The torrential rain seemed as if it wanted to drown the entire world.
Ronin's group's vision was severely obstructed. Fortunately, Ging had extremely strong wilderness survival skills and rich tracking experience, which allowed them to keep finding the right path even in the heavy rain.
Of course, the more important factor was actually the giants who had not been killed earlier.
After escaping the crow's control, perhaps because their brains were too small to think properly, they instead began running back in the direction they had come from.
That gave Ronin's group an even easier opportunity to track them.
After more than an hour of pursuit, the group finally saw the crude camp.
There were still several giants in the camp. They were hiding inside the simple shelters, shivering. It was hard to tell whether that was because of hypothermia caused by the rain, or because they had seen Ronin's group arrive.
At the very center of the camp stood the shattered stone statue.
Ronin casually picked up a fragment of the statue from the ground. He could tell that this statue should be the same thing he had seen earlier in the giant's memories.
However, he could not determine exactly why it had shattered.
Was it because he had sealed the crow's Nen? Was it because the crow had chosen to leave? Or had the crow still been inside it before they arrived, only breaking out of the statue after realizing they were coming?
All they could see was rainwater, making it impossible to distinguish any traces of movement apart from those of the giants.
Not to mention, the crow was something that could fly away through the air.
"Let's set up camp here for now," Ging suggested.
Even though they had worn raincoats along the way, their bodies had already grown somewhat cold. With rain this heavy and the wind blowing hard, even raincoats could not completely protect everyone.
This time, Shizuku did not choose to bring out the house, because the ground was already covered in water that rose past their calves.
Judging from the intensity of the rain, if she released the house now, it would probably be flooded before long.
So Ronin simply released a ship instead. If the heavy rain truly formed a flood, then hiding inside the ship would not affect them much.
The place where he released the ship was also one of the empty shelters left by the giants.
After changing clothes and taking hot showers aboard the ship, everyone gathered again.
Listening to the sound of the rain, Ronin took the crow out of his backpack.
"I don't know whether this is the only one, but I'm going to try and see if I can read its memories," Ronin said.
"Let's see if we can communicate first," Ging said, sticking to his usual approach.
"This thing's eyes aren't pleasant to look at," Ronin said, his words carrying a double meaning. "Ugly is secondary. The key point is that making eye contact with it may cause discomfort. Although I've already sealed its Nen, I'm not completely sure whether that will work."
The restriction sealing techniques placed on ability users mostly focused on forcing them into a state of Zetsu.
But being in a state of Zetsu did not mean an ability user was completely unable to activate their ability.
After all, in the manga, the ability of Kakin's Fourth Prince, Tserriednich, required him to enter a state of Zetsu before it could activate.
The crow's eyes were extremely special. If it could truly activate its ability while in Zetsu, that would not be especially surprising. So Ronin gave everyone advance warning.
Of course, he was not afraid that someone who met the crow's gaze would fall into an illusion. After all, with the Sharingan, he was not only skilled at breaking illusions himself, but could also assist others in quickly waking from them.
"Let's see it first."
This time, it was not only Ging who insisted. Even Shizuku was quite curious.
After all, a strange crow with eyes covering its entire head was far too rare. Encountering one even once could be considered a valuable experience.
Seeing that everyone was prepared, Ronin fully released the crow.
Although its Nen had already been sealed, the moment the crow's head was exposed, its many eyes quickly opened, and a deep black light emerged from them.
Although that light only lasted for an instant, Ronin knew his earlier guess had been correct.
This thing really could activate its illusion ability even while in a state of Zetsu.
However, the next second after that illusion activated, Ronin used the Sharingan to counter the crow once again.
"Caw!"
A shrill cry rang out.
This time, Ronin noticed that when he broke the crow's ability, one of the crow's many eyes quietly closed.
Even the slit left behind after it closed quickly disappeared from the crow's head, as if there had never been an eye in that empty spot at all.
This bizarre scene was seen not only by Ronin, but also by Kurapika and Ging.
Kurapika's eyes had unknowingly entered the Scarlet Eyes state. Although his expression was somewhat serious, he still looked fully conscious. It was impossible to tell what method he had used to defend himself.
"Interesting." Ging moved a little closer to the crow and carefully examined the many eyes on its head.
He seemed to want to see something from those eyes, but he was destined to fail.
Because aside from being able to activate illusions, the crow's eyes did not seem to have any other ability.
Of course, that might also be because Ronin had sealed the crow's Nen.
A strange bird call came from Ging's mouth. The response was the crow's cawing cry. Ronin and the others watched in surprise, unsure whether Ging could truly communicate with it through such strange sounds.
Only when Ging spoke did they understand.
"We can communicate a little, but everything it says is filthy. It isn't cooperating."
"If it can communicate, that means it has a certain level of intelligence. Then after knocking it out, I can directly use Mind Reading on it." Hearing Ging's answer, Ronin relaxed.
What he had been most worried about was that the crow was acting purely on instinct.
Under that kind of behavior pattern, trying to piece together a story through memories would be difficult.
The crow was still crying out, but this time, everyone understood that it was cursing them.
So no one held back. In only a short while, more than half of the crow's feathers had been plucked out, and the crow finally shut its mouth completely.
From the look of things, this creature really did have some intelligence.
When the crow looked somewhat lifeless, Ronin slapped it unconscious, then touched its somewhat disgusting head and activated the ninjutsu Mind Reading Technique.
And when Ronin's perspective became that of the statue, he knew that the crow he had caught was the only crow.
He also learned how those giants had been controlled by the crow.
It turned out that worshiping the crow granted a blessing, and that blessing was the crow's feather. Not a feather that had been plucked off, but one formed from Nen, like a mark engraved onto the bodies of all giants who worshiped the crow statue.
Ronin could not fully trace back the memories to complete his observation. It seemed that because the crow could use illusions, it had some resistance to this method of probing memories.
As Ronin searched through its memories, the memory space slowly began showing signs of collapse.
The next second, Ronin woke up, and the crow also let out a weak cry.
~~~
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