Kisho had no idea what was happening behind him.
He held his raccoon-tailed mandrill in both hands, stroking its chin like a cat as he slowly walked down the long staircase into the ruins.
At the end of the staircase, the terrain leveled out.
Kisho looked around. This was a deep passage about ten meters wide and five meters high.
The walls were built from massive stone blocks, and from the cracks between the stones grew countless patches of faintly glowing moss.
The moss crept across the entire wall, half-covering the original relief carvings engraved upon it.
Kisho moved forward at an unhurried pace.
At the end of the passage appeared a pitch-black hall devoid of light. Corridors extended in all directions from every corner of the hall, leading deeper into the ruins.
Four stone pillars stood within the hall, supporting the dome above—so thick that even five people together could not encircle one.
And Amos's voice came from behind one of them:
"Hey~ Kisho!"
"Were you waiting for me?" Kisho looked toward the voice and smiled as he spoke.
Amos said, "Yeah. I figured I could carry you through this stage."
His gaze passed over Kisho's shoulder. Seeing no one else behind him, he let out a sigh of relief.
"The rules for this stage are pretty great. Not easy to shake off those two guys."
Kisho nodded in agreement and lightly bumped his fist against Amos's.
"Then let's move. Mr. C·L and Tonpa will be coming down any second."
After taking a few steps, Kisho paused. He pointed his thumb toward a certain examinee lying face-down behind the pillar, frowning slightly.
"That guy…"
"I took care of him—don't worry, just knocked him out."
But before he could finish, Amos pulled a crystal from his pocket and smiled.
"Though I feel a little bad, I'm not the easy prey he imagined."
Kisho nodded in understanding and glanced around again.
"What about the ones hiding in the corridors, peeking around? Shouldn't we deal with them?"
Amos shook his head.
"Too many side passages. They branch everywhere."
"The earlier examinees probably used the past few hours to scout out this area. Hard to catch them. Better not waste time."
"Your call."
Kisho nodded, then grinned.
"Besides, you just said you can carry me through this stage."
Amos curled his lips slightly and walked ahead toward one of the corridors.
"Let's head deeper. Time to show you my Nen ability."
"Whoa?"
Kisho responded with interest and quickened his pace to follow.
The two entered one of the hall's corridors.
A few minutes later, C·L slowly descended the stairs.
He still held a book in his hand—perhaps he hadn't yet had the chance to put it back into his backpack—and stopped in the center of the hall.
The corners of his lips lifted faintly.
Two people emerged from an unknown corridor behind him.
One of them, a scar-faced man holding a dagger, spoke coldly to C·L's back:
"Hey, kid. Hand over your magical beast and you'll suffer less."
Beside him, another examinee wearing a yellow hat gripped a short blade tightly and struck a flashy pose as he threatened:
"You don't want your exam to end this soon, do you? If your eyes get gouged out or your pretty little face gets sliced—"
Before he could finish, C·L's figure vanished.
No one saw when he turned around. No one saw how he crossed dozens of meters in a single second.
He passed between the two men with effortless grace, the smile at his lips never changing.
Behind him, the scar-faced man and the one in the yellow hat fell soundlessly.
Even as their breathing stopped, their faces still held that arrogant expression.
"Gulu gulu~"
"Zzzzzz!"
Two Tanuki-Tail Fiends leapt down from the examinees' bodies. As if sensing danger, they shrieked and bounded away, quickly fleeing the scene.
The examinees who had been watching from within the corridors, too slow to step out, likewise fled without a sound.
—They had assumed the pale pretty boy and the two kids formed a group, and that the two capable kids were the core.
Turns out they were wrong.
The most terrifying one was this pretty-faced boy who killed without blinking—he was the true fiend.
C·L ignored the two Tanuki-Tail Fiends and paid no attention to the others who had fled.
He lightly flicked the object in his hand, and blood slid down one side of it, dripping onto the floor in blooming crimson splashes.
The object that had just taken two examinees' lives was nothing more than a plastic bookmark C·L had pulled from his book a second earlier.
He gently slid the bookmark back into the book.
"Mm. I really don't like getting my hands dirty. It'd be better if someone else could do it for me."
He chuckled softly.
"Already slipped away? What a pity."
He glanced at the raccoon-tailed mandrill in his hand, its eyes vacant, having served no purpose as a guide. Smiling indifferently, he closed his five fingers.
With a crisp snap, the dull-eyed mandrill transformed into a gemstone in his palm.
"Looks like I'll have to stretch a little in this stage after all."
...
Inside another pitch-black corridor.
At some unknown moment, a manga volume had appeared in Amos's hands.
He flipped it open. On one page, the protagonist of the manga wore a number badge on his chest marked "140"—the very examinee numbered 140 in this Hunter Exam.
Then, on the blank pages of the manga, the figure of Examinee 140 continuously appeared.
Wherever he went, whatever he said—even the details he himself might have overlooked when brushing past others—all of it manifested within the manga.
"Your Nen ability is seriously impressive!"
Kisho and Amos ran swiftly along the route taken by Number 140, following closely behind while speaking in low voices.
One of Amos's Nen abilities: [The Uncontrolled Protagonist].
By sketching a target person, the amount of Nen Amos consumed during the drawing depended on the difference between his Nen quantity and the target's.
If the drawing succeeded, the manga would form from that person's perspective, allowing Amos to see what had happened in the past hour and what would happen in the next hour around that person.
"It's not that amazing."
Amos glanced at the manga and led Kisho into a branching corridor.
"You can only track one protagonist at a time, and only within a two-hour window. Once I close the book, the ability ends. And I can't use it consecutively on the same person within a single day."
Kisho nodded lightly in understanding.
Amos suddenly slowed, his expression sharpening. He pressed a finger against the open manga and pointed gently toward the corner ahead.
Behind that turn in the corridor, Examinee 140—wearing two curved blades at his waist—had already sensed the enemies following him.
Hidden within the shadow beyond the corner, unseen by Kisho and Amos, he stared coldly at the unknown pursuers beyond the wall, twin crescent-shaped blades in his hands poised to strike.
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