Chapter 13: Winning Feels Good
Kai sat on Butch's back, the wolf at his side, a few freshly-gathered stones in his hand.
He focused his Aura into his fingertips, a simple combination of Ten, Ren, and Gyo. In HxH, this application of distributing Aura to different body parts is called Ryu. His fingertips, now harder than steel, carved into the stones as if they were tofu, etching a perfect pentagram symbol onto each one.
While he worked, his five bird-scouts were busy. They circled high above, locking onto the poacher team—one, two, three, four... exactly five of them. The birds soared, using their all-seeing-eyes to track the targets, guiding Kai through the forest.
Suddenly, one of the floating eyeballs high in the sky swiveled, its pupil locking onto the approaching birds.
Down on the tiger, Kai's eye twitched. He looked up. Even with Gyo, the tiny, floating eyeball was almost invisible.
So, there's a real pro in this group.
Without a doubt, that floating eye was a Hatsu.
Kai kept moving, ordering his birds to fly past the eyeball. Just as the owner likely dismissed them as a normal flock, Kai sprung his trap. He ordered one of the gray birds to peel off, dive-bombing like an arrow. It pierced the air and struck the floating eyeball dead-on.
Pop.
The eyeball burst like a bubble, dissolving into a wisp of white Aura.
"Aargh!!"
The bald man leading the poacher team, Garo, let out a sharp cry, clutching his right eye.
The other four jumped. "Gara-bro, what's wrong?"
"Damned bird!" Garo gritted his teeth, hissing in pain. When he lowered his hand, his right eye socket was a dark, empty hole. "My eye in the sky... it was attacked by a passing bird."
The others were speechless. That's some bad luck.
"Heh, maybe it thought it was a bug?" one of them, a huge man carrying a heavy sack that easily weighed hundreds of pounds, tried to joke. But Garo's single, cold-blue left eye snapped to him, and the man immediately shut up.
Another man tried to smooth things over. "It's thanks to Garo-bro's Third Eye of God that this trip has been so smooth. We've hit so many good spots, and no one's ever caught us. A stupid bird was bound to get in the way eventually."
"Exactly! Garo-bro is a Floor Master from Heaven's Arena! Without him, we'd be nothing. We even bagged a Pale Moon Tiger! We should just cash out. Once we sell this, we're rich!"
"Both of you, shut up!"
A ball of white Aura condensed in Garo's empty socket, forming a new, perfect eye.
The Nen-eye swiveled. "Animals have instincts. A normal bird wouldn't just attack my Hatsu. It would be scared," Garo said, his voice cold. "Everyone, on alert. This isn't bad luck."
"You got it, boss." The other four fanned out, raising their rifles and drawing combat knives.
Garo chambered a round in his pistol, his Nen-eye glowing as he scanned the sky for the birds.
Fwip!
A split-second whistle, and the man who had first tried to de-escalate cried out, clutching his face as he was thrown back. He immediately raised his submachine gun and sprayed wildly into the trees. "Rat-a-tat-tat-tat!"
"Enemy contact! We've been spotted!"
"Cease fire, you idiot! You'll bring the whole 'Blanchett Company' security team down on us!"
The other three cursed, but they formed a tight, back-to-back circle.
The brawny poacher carrying the tiger-sack caught a black shadow in his periphery. Another Pale Moon Tiger?
He was swinging his gun to fire when BAM!—a different kind of explosion. He looked down. His hand, the one holding the gun, had been mangled by some unseen projectile.
CRACK!
Garo's Nen-eye flashed. He fired his pistol, the bullet striking Butch, who was mid-pounce. The tiger roared, ignoring the hit, and slammed into the brawny man. He smelled his own kind in that sack.
"ROAR!"
Butch tackled the man, his jaws clamping down and tearing off half the man's head. He then rolled, using the momentum to slam into the next poacher before vanishing back into the trees.
One of the three remaining men stared in horror at his gurgling, twitching companion. As he did, he felt a sharp, stabbing pain in his own neck, as if he'd been shot.
"Aaaahhh!" He panicked, one hand grabbing his neck, the other firing his gun at the sky. "Who's there?! Show yourself!"
"It's not just the tiger! There's someone else!"
"Quiet! Stay calm!" Garo roared. His Nen-eye flashed, scanning the trees. He saw it. A small, fast-moving figure. You can't outrun my sight!
Boom! Boom! Boom!
Garo fired three Gaze Bullets from his eye. The blasts of Aura hammered the figure. The last one hit, sending the small target stumbling.
Got him!
That... didn't hurt much. Kai, his body protected by Ken, just shrugged off the hit and changed his position.
"Awooo!"
Another beast charged—this time, it was "Kai-Wolf."
"Brrrt-brrrt-brrrt!!"
The remaining poachers were pros. One rolled and unloaded his clip into the wolf.
Garo's Nen-eye locked on. BOOM!
A Gaze Bullet struck the wolf's neck, severing it completely. The wolf's head flew off, tumbling to the ground.
Wait. Garo realized something was wrong. Why did only one man fire?
The other two men were fumbling with their guns. Then, as if enraged, one kicked the shooter's gun away while the other clubbed him over the head, knocking him out cold.
"What are you two doing?!" Garo screamed.
Swoosh! A black dot flew at him. Garo's Nen-eye tracked it. It was... a stone, carved into a pentagram.
He raised his arm, blocking it. The stone shattered harmlessly against his Aura.
"What are we doing?"
The first poacher who'd been hit in the face turned. The carved stone, which had been stuck to his cheek, flaked away, revealing a shining, rose-gold Star Marker tattooed on his skin.
The other poacher, a matching mark on his neck, turned and grinned. "Poaching endangered animals? That's not very nice. We've seen the error of our ways. We're turning ourselves in. You should too, boss."
CRACK! CRACK!
Garo didn't hesitate. He put two bullets between their eyes, killing them instantly. He controlled them? How?
As they fell, Garo's Nen-eye suddenly swiveled backward in his socket, looking through his own skull. He spotted Kai in the trees, his thumb hooked to his finger, aiming.
BAM!
Kai unleashed his Divine Flick.
Garo dove, but the Aura-bullet grazed his thigh, tearing the flesh open. He ignored the pain and returned fire with his pistol.
CRACK!
The bullet tore through the air, spinning...
Half a meter from Kai's forehead.
Kai raised his hand.
Twenty centimeters.
Kai opened his palm, his entire body flared with Ken. The bullet slammed into the Aura-wall, deforming and crushing itself against the pressure.
It all happened in an instant.
Kai opened his hand. The flattened, scalding-hot slug rolled off, leaving only a small red mark that his Star Marker healed in a second.
My Ken is stronger than I thought! I could have taken that to the head.
BOOM!
Garo fired another Gaze Bullet.
Kai didn't have time to charge his Divine Flick. He dodged, but the blast still clipped his Ken, knocking him off balance.
At that exact moment, the birds returned. They swarmed Garo, a chaotic mass of wings and claws, completely blinding him.
"Get off!" Garo roared, swatting at them uselessly before firing his pistol wildly into the air. BANG! BANG!
He was charging his Nen-eye to blast them all when, just as suddenly, they scattered and fled.
Across the clearing, Kai was waiting. He had been charging his Divine Flick...
"Nine seconds... ten seconds..."
"No!"
Garo saw it. A terrifying, dense mass of Aura on the kid's fingertip. He screamed, pouring every last drop of his Nen into his eye, firing his strongest Gaze Bullet.
"Bang!"
Kai's 10-second, fully-charged Divine Flick shot out. It wasn't a bullet; it was a beam of light. It disintegrated Garo's attack and struck him square in the chest.
...
When the light faded, Garo was a smoking, bloody wreck. His Nen-eye was gone.
"Cough... blegh..." He spat blood, swayed, and fell to his knees. "You... you should go to... Heaven's Arena... be a... Floor Master..."
He collapsed, face-first, onto the ground.
"Yeah, you're the Floor Master," Kai panted, shaking his hand. A real fight was exhausting. Every Hatsu was an Aura-drain. That five-minute fight was harder than an hour of training.
But he'd won. And winning felt good.
Butch padded out of the woods, the bullet wound on his side already long-since healed by his own Star Marker. The poacher team was annihilated.
Butch walked over to the sack carrying his dead kin. Kai walked over to the headless wolf.
"Interesting..."
He activated Gyo. The Star Marker on the wolf's body was glowing. It was forcing the body's remaining life energy... to pull the severed head back across the dirt, trying to reattach it.
Just then, an amused voice came from the trees. "Wow, you're really amazing. You took them all out by yourself?"
Kai spun around. A young woman with short, spiky green hair was walking out of the forest, a wide grin on her face.
(End of Chapter)