Boom!
The green-faced giant took the fireball head-on, but in the very next second, its massive ax swept horizontally toward Ronin.
At the same time, the giant stepped directly through the flames. Fire streamed past both sides of its body, seemingly unable to threaten the armored creature at all.
With a heavy clang, the enormous ax struck a giant sword.
Crimson Susanoo formed around Ronin!
A flash of surprise crossed the giant's eyes, but it immediately pulled its ax back, swung it in a wide arc, and hacked at Susanoo again.
The enormous creature seemed capable of doing nothing but swinging its ax. Yet those simple attacks contained terrifying power.
Even Susanoo could not gain the upper hand against it.
An Enhancer!
Hidden inside Susanoo and standing in front of the others, Ronin immediately judged the giant's Nen affinity.
Boom!
After an unknown number of clashes between the ax and giant sword, the giant's body suddenly stiffened.
Upon closer inspection, something could be seen winding through the gaps in its bronze armor.
Chains!
Kurapika's chains.
While the green-faced, fanged giant had focused all its attention on Ronin, Kurapika and the others had not been standing idle.
This was no time for pride or fair fights.
From the very beginning, the battle had never been a one-on-one duel between Ronin and the giant.
The giant finally noticed that something was wrong, but it was already too late.
Kurapika had used the chain on his middle finger—Chain Jail.
The joints of its armor had been locked in place. No matter how much strength the giant possessed, it could not even raise its arms.
Taking advantage of that sudden opening, Veronica leaped high into the air and drove a fist into the giant's abdomen.
Her special ability immediately took effect.
Although the chains had only caused a slight change in the giant's expression, it suddenly opened its mouth, attempting to vomit out its own internal organs.
But that was all.
After landing, Veronica watched the giant's reaction with growing frustration.
This Enhancer monster had actually used Nen to forcibly suppress the urge to vomit out its organs!
In the next second, however, Susanoo's heavy fist slammed squarely into the giant's abdomen.
The giant, which had managed to hold back only a moment earlier, immediately spewed everything out.
What came from its mouth was not a complete set of organs, but torn fragments.
Clearly, while restrained by the chains, it had been unable to endure the tremendous force of Susanoo's punch.
Veronica's eyes lit up, and her gaze locked completely onto the fragments of organs that had been expelled.
Words were written across every piece.
However, assembling those words into complete sentences proved far too difficult for Veronica.
After looking for only a short while, she realized that the number of words did not match. No matter how she arranged the visible characters, they formed nothing but strange, nonsensical combinations.
It was because the organs had been shattered!
Upon realizing the cause, Veronica turned toward Ronin with a faintly resentful look.
Ronin had also noticed the problem, but he knew they had little time left.
He completely ignored Veronica's accusing gaze and leaped out of Susanoo. As the spectral warrior dispersed, he landed directly on the giant's shoulder.
Ninja Art: Mind Reading Technique!
Ronin activated the technique at the same moment his fist slammed into the giant's head.
After taking the heavy blow, the giant's expression of disbelief and rage vanished. In the next instant, it fell into a peaceful sleep like a baby.
The moment Susanoo's punch shattered the giant's internal organs, Ronin had already understood its true level of strength.
Although it possessed an enormous amount of aura—tens of thousands, perhaps even close to a hundred thousand units—its application of Nen was extremely crude.
Ronin had only silently opened the Third Gate of the Eight Gates before knocking the giant unconscious with a single explosive punch.
An unconscious state was the ideal condition for using the Mind Reading Technique.
Large amounts of memories began unfolding before Ronin from a third-person perspective.
What he saw was the giant's monotonous daily routine.
Every morning, the giant would appear inside a massive stone building within the city. Special machines were located there, and those machines supplied it with energy—in other words, food.
It was a paste-like substance containing a tremendous amount of life energy.
That was right.
In the memories Ronin viewed, the giant could clearly see the aura glowing around its food.
After eating, the giant would pick up its ax and begin patrolling the city.
During its patrol, it encountered large numbers of Gold and Silver Ingots.
However, the Gold and Silver Ingots completely ignored it, as though the giant had long ago been recognized by the city.
By the time it finished patrolling the city—where unexpected incidents almost never occurred—it would already be five in the afternoon.
The giant would eat another nutritious meal, then return to its own house.
Inside that house, Ronin saw a bed.
The giant would collapse onto it and quickly fall asleep, after which its memories descended into darkness.
That was the world after the giant fell asleep.
The endlessly repeating memories suddenly began showing signs of collapse under Ronin's observation.
Ronin's heart tightened.
He immediately understood.
The giant was about to die!
Of course.
Its life had already been nearing its end from the moment Susanoo's punch shattered its internal organs.
But Ronin had not yet obtained all the answers he wanted from its memories.
Through its patrol route, he had already discovered several unusual herbs growing at specific locations within the city.
Unless he was mistaken, they were one of the targets that had brought them to the ancient city—
The panacea herb capable of curing every illness!
However, what Ronin wanted to know most at that moment was the situation beneath the city.
From the giant's memories, he had learned that besides the Gold and Silver Ingots, many other giants existed in the aboveground area.
However, those giants were far from united.
If two of them encountered each other inside the labyrinth, they might immediately fight to the death.
The memories ended.
Ronin slowly opened his eyes.
All that remained before him was the giant's corpse, its eyes still wide open in death.
"Keep moving."
Ronin did not possess an ability like Pakunoda's, which could fire memories directly into his companions' minds through bullets.
Since he had already discovered the location of the panacea herb within the giant's memories, there was no reason not to retrieve it.
His route through the ancient labyrinth city had now become clear.
It was the exact patrol route followed by the green-faced, fanged giant.
Shizuku walked at the very back of the group. When she passed the giant's corpse, she merely pushed up her glasses, summoned Blinky, and stored the body inside.
Naturally, Ronin and the others had no objections.
At that moment, however, Ronin noticed that the Gold and Silver Ingots previously lured away by the shadow clones had begun flying back toward the city.