Time passed little by little.
Although flowers had bloomed all across the floating island, that was all they did.
It was as if this sea of flowers bore no malice toward anything existing above it. This situation continued until the sky completely darkened.
Then, above the sea of flowers, blue figures began appearing one after another.
No.
Rather than calling those things living beings, it would be more accurate to call them ghosts.
Large numbers of ghosts began emerging from the flowers and wandering across the entire flower sea. Any creature that came into contact with them would quickly freeze and fall to the ground.
Then Ronin and the others saw that the beings that had fallen to the ground began melting, making the flowers on the earth bloom even more beautifully.
This situation soon spread to the floating island as well. After all, beautiful flowers had also bloomed on the floating island.
The laboratory's defenses had no effect on these ghosts at all. The walls and doors were easily passed through by them.
Before the ghosts had fully approached, the cold sensation they carried already made everyone's hair stand slightly on end.
The first to attack was still Ronin.
Fire Release: Phoenix Sage Fire Technique became the best probing method. Although the appearance of the flames caused the temperature inside the room to rise again, the moment those flames touched the ghosts, they passed straight through their bodies.
Through the Sharingan's insight, Ronin saw that after coming into contact with the flames, the ghosts became even more transparent.
But that was all.
The ghosts' speed as they approached them was not reduced in the slightest by the Phoenix Sage Fire Technique.
In fact, everyone felt even colder.
Ging also launched an attack. While Ronin used flames, Ging directly wove his Nen into a large net.
The large net dropped over the ghost, trying to capture it completely.
And he actually succeeded.
The ghost caught by the net fell to the ground together with it.
But after only two short seconds, the net controlled by Ging began showing signs of freezing. Then, under the ghost's struggle, it shattered inch by inch.
At this moment, more ghosts began passing through the laboratory walls and entering the room.
Ronin directly formed a cross-shaped seal and used the Shadow Clone Technique.
Amid a series of puffs, large numbers of shadow clones appeared. Each clone began forming seals immediately after appearing and used Rasengan.
These shadow clones showed no fear at all. They charged straight toward the ghosts.
Seeing people charging toward them, the ghosts excitedly dove forward as well. For an instant, it actually formed a scene of both sides rushing toward each other.
When the two sides truly collided, solid ice began appearing on the shadow clones' bodies. But the Rasengan in the shadow clones' hands was also driven directly into the ghosts' bodies.
Violent energy erupted in that instant.
The Rasengan exploded.
The frozen shadow clones exploded along with it, and even the arrogant ghosts were instantly torn apart by the violent energy.
At the same time, the flowers blooming across the floating island also began to wither.
However, Ronin's attention was focused more on the ghost in front of him. The ghost torn apart by the Rasengan shattered directly into countless specks of energy light.
But what shocked everyone was that these specks of light were actually drifting toward the nearby ghosts that had not been torn apart by the shadow clones.
Judging from their movement, if they were not stopped, the remaining ghosts would likely become stronger after inheriting this wave of energy.
"Suck them up, Blinky. Suck up all the light specks."
Shizuku's voice suddenly sounded from behind Ronin.
And at that moment, the specks of energy light that had been gathering toward the nearby ghosts suddenly changed direction and surged toward the vacuum cleaner in Shizuku's hand.
In Shizuku's judgment, the ghosts themselves counted as living beings, but shattered ghosts naturally did not.
"Good," Ronin said immediately.
At the same time, more shadow clones appeared beside him.
Since Rasengan could destroy the ghosts, Ronin naturally would not be stingy with it.
"There's something abnormal happening to the flowers on the floating island."
Ging's voice came from behind Ronin at that moment.
It turned out that recently, Ronin and Ging had installed the surveillance equipment they brought with them across the floating island.
During the previous cicada incident, those surveillance devices had not yet been fully powered on. After all, they had to convert the electricity generated by the floating island's Unmanned Stones into a form usable by the monitoring equipment they had brought.
This involved quite a bit of knowledge. If Ging had not also dabbled in electrical work, who knew how long it would have taken Ronin alone to finish setting up the equipment?
The place where the ghosts attacked them was the laboratory.
And inside this laboratory, there were surveillance images of the floating island. Through those images, Ging clearly saw that the flowers on the island were withering.
This was obviously related to the ghosts being destroyed.
Since destroying ghosts could cause the flowers to wither, did that mean destroying the flowers could also affect the ghosts?
Compared to destroying these freezing ghosts, the flowers were clearly much easier targets.
Moreover, these ghosts had clearly been produced by those flowers. But right now, the number of flowers on the floating island far exceeded the number of ghosts.
So the moment Ging finished speaking, he had already rushed toward the laboratory entrance.
In his hand, there was also an extra scroll.
It was a scroll he had requested from Ronin, sealed with one of Ronin's shadow clones. Compared to using Emitter-type Nen to destroy the flowers himself, Ging clearly believed Ronin's Fire Release ninjutsu was the greatest counter to those flowers.
Ronin did not disappoint Ging either.
As Ging rushed out, a shadow clone had already followed him, driving Rasengan one after another into the ghosts along the way.
Boom, boom, boom.
The sounds echoed nonstop inside the laboratory.
They were the sounds of ghosts being torn apart by Rasengan.
The laboratory door was instantly opened, and Ging's figure appeared outside.
The moment he emerged, he saw even more ghosts struggling out of the flowers outside the laboratory and drifting toward it.
Under the moonlight, the flowers swayed and the ghosts struggled. It truly formed a beautiful image of hell on the floating island.
However, Ging had no time to admire that beauty. The instant he appeared, he tore open the scroll in his hand.
Ronin's shadow clone appeared instantly, and at the first moment after appearing, it established contact with the main body.
The shadow clone immediately began forming seals with both hands. By the time the hand seals were completed, a large number of ghosts had already discovered them and changed targets, pouncing straight down at them.
A tiny spark condensed in front of Ronin's shadow clone and slowly flew out.
The instant it fell to the ground, flames burst open violently, forming a blazing sea of crimson fire across the island.
Fire Release: Searing Migraine!
~~~