After Abaki finished speaking, everyone turned their attention toward the sea of flowers below.
Now that they knew what to look for, Ronin quickly confirmed that Abaki was right. A group of strange beings was truly moving between the flowers below.
They seemed to feed on the flowers, yet at the same time, they were also a source of nourishment for them.
The two sides supported one another, creating this vast, seemingly endless sea of flowers.
"V5's information contained no records of this flower sea. Did their expedition simply not encounter it, or was its danger insignificant to the V5 team at the time?" Ging had also noticed the abnormality below.
"Probably the former," Ronin replied.
Ronin did not particularly believe that V5's expedition team back then had been overwhelmingly powerful.
They certainly had Nen users, probably many of them, but there likely had not been many true experts. By Ronin's standards, even if someone could not reach Beyond's level, they would at least need to be comparable to a member of the Phantom Troupe to qualify as an expert.
On this continent, moving in a large group did not necessarily mean much.
Take this sea of flowers, for example.
When faced with those ghosts appearing in swarms, a large expedition team would simply become nourishment for them.
Ging neither agreed nor disagreed.
"You mean V5 is still concealing information," Kurapika guessed from Ging's attitude.
"Exactly." Ging nodded solemnly. "Everything we've been able to investigate was deliberately released by V5. It was probably even standardized and agreed upon in advance."
After thinking about it carefully, even Ronin had to agree with Ging's speculation.
Ging had collected and analyzed V5's information about the Dark Continent earlier than he had in the manga, yet what he obtained was still exactly the same as what was shown there.
Ronin had not relied solely on his knowledge from the manga to understand the Dark Continent.
But whether it was the information Kurapika had collected or the intelligence he had obtained from Chairman Netero, none of it went beyond what had been revealed in the manga.
This continued until they reached the imaginary continent, where some differences finally appeared.
And those differences came from magical beasts.
After they met the Gatekeeper, the missions he provided made it even easier to understand where the information shown in the manga had come from.
Whether it was the Unmanned Stones, the Three Origin Water, longevity rice, or the other items, all of them were written on the Gatekeeper's list of required materials.
Through that list, Ronin and the others could clearly learn the locations of the items and even some of the dangers surrounding them.
Everyone quickly sorted through and analyzed the information.
"In that case, the real intelligence may still be hidden within V5. Everything they released publicly was only meant to mislead people," Ronin said. He had no choice but to view V5 in a new light.
"There has been a book containing genuine information about the Dark Continent," Ging said seriously.
When everyone turned to look at him, he continued, "A book was once published in this world. Its title was Journey to the New World."
"Journey to the New World."
Ronin and Ging spoke the title at the same time.
Ging looked surprised.
This was top-secret information. When he had uncovered it during his investigation, even he had been astonished.
"I once thought the book Sheila showed me was Journey to the New World, but now it seems that it wasn't," Kurapika added.
"I know of that book, but I've never read it." Ronin looked at Ging expectantly.
He hoped Ging had a copy.
Unfortunately, he was destined to be disappointed. Ging shook his head with a bitter smile.
"Although I discovered that this book, which was officially classified as a fantasy novel, was closely connected to the Dark Continent, by the time I learned of its existence, it had already been completely designated as a forbidden book and even classified as an absolute secret.
"I did everything I could to find it, but I couldn't locate a single copy. It almost felt as though someone had used a special ability specifically against the book, allowing people to know it existed while making it impossible to find."
Ging's words made Ronin's eyes brighten.
After exchanging a glance with Kurapika, they both felt as if everything had suddenly become clear.
Since Ronin knew that Journey to the New World was not a fantasy novel but a realistic record of an expedition, he naturally wanted to find and read it.
However, no matter how he and Kurapika searched, they could only find statements saying that the book was prohibited. The actual novel, which had once sold quite well throughout Lake Mobius, was nowhere to be found.
That was simply unrealistic.
But after hearing Ging's speculation, it was like receiving sudden enlightenment.
No one understood the threat posed by Journey to the New World better than V5, and no one understood how to deliberately cultivate a specific type of talent better than V5.
By combining the two, using one person's ability to erase a book from the world would not be a poor bargain for V5.
"The person who wrote the book was probably your ancestor," Kurapika said to Ging.
"Probably. He completed the eastern volume of Journey to the New World three hundred years ago. Supposedly, even after that, he continued exploring the Dark Continent while working on the western volume." Ging's eyes were filled with longing as he spoke.
"If he's still alive, I wonder how strong he must be," Ronin sighed.
Three hundred years ago, that man had already been capable of completing an exploration of the eastern side of the Dark Continent.
He had even compiled Journey to the New World and published it within Lake Mobius. That alone proved that traveling to the Dark Continent had been incredibly easy for Don Freecss at the time.
"I really wonder what the human world was like several centuries ago," Ging said, equally filled with longing.
V5 probably had not yet been established back then, and technology had not been as advanced as it was now.
While everyone reflected on this, the floating island did not stop. It continued steadily moving toward the northern side of the Dark Continent.
The dangers within the sea of flowers truly did not seem particularly severe.
After Ronin burned the entire floating island with fire, no new flowers grew on it.
As for the strange creatures moving through the flower sea, they did not even glance at the floating island.
For once, Ronin and the others became completely uninvolved spectators on the Dark Continent.
These peaceful days continued for several days, only ending when the people on the floating island could finally see the edge of the flower sea in the distance.
Because at the edge of the flower sea, signs of enormous structures appeared.
They were massive, block-shaped buildings. From afar, they looked like gigantic shipping containers arranged neatly in rows, except these "containers" were made entirely from stone.
Their orderly arrangement formed a pattern spreading outward in circles from a central point.
It seemed that if one drew a straight line through the middle of any building and extended it forward, every line would intersect at the center of the city.
However, even from high in the sky, they could not see the city's central area at a glance.
The ancient city was simply too enormous.
Sunlight rose from the distance, coating most of the city in a layer of golden light.
But hidden within that golden glow was killing intent.
Ronin felt a faint pain in his arm.
At the same time, thunderous explosions rang in his ears.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
~~~