A conversation with the Spider

At the top of the garbage mountain.

Chrollo, Franklin, Pakunoda, and Feitan stood above them.

Sunlight fell on them, casting shadows below.

"Chrollo, what do you mean by this?"

Uvogin never held his temper in check and shouted angrily at Chrollo.

Beside him, Pakunoda seemed to want to say something, but after a moment's hesitation, she remained silent.

Chrollo glanced at the calm-faced Ian and spoke softly.

"Uvogin, if Feitan's actions gave you the wrong idea, I apologize to you on his behalf."

"But as for what we promised you earlier, we do need to think it over..."

With that, he looked earnestly at Ian and said,

"You're Ian, the one who gave Uvogin and the others their power, right? Let me introduce myself. I'm Chrollo Lucilfer, and for now, I suppose you could call me the leader of this little group."

Ian nodded at his words.

He inwardly marveled at how calm and mature Chrollo sounded in conversation. It didn't feel as though he were talking to a child at all.

I can talk to this guy like an adult.

No wonder he awakened a Specialization Nen Ability and later became the leader of the Phantom Troupe.

In a way, Hisoka's method of judging Nen affinity by personality was quite accurate.

In response to Chrollo's introduction, Ian nodded slightly and smiled.

"Uvogin mentioned you before, especially you, Chrollo..."

"He said you were all a talented bunch, which is why I agreed to take you with us when we left Meteor City."

"But it looks like we got ahead of ourselves."

"You've awakened your Nen Ability too, haven't you, Chrollo?"

Hearing Ian speak with such certainty, Uvogin and Nobunaga, who stood beside him, widened their eyes.

"What!?"

"Chrollo's mastered a Nen Ability too?"

"Is that true, Chrollo?"

Uvogin and Nobunaga were astonished, and even Machi looked stunned.

Chrollo was silent for a moment after hearing Ian's words before replying calmly.

"So my ability to conceal my Nen is still too poor..."

"I thought I might be found out, but I didn't expect you to notice that I'd awakened my Nen Ability the moment we met."

Ian merely smiled.

Although Chrollo had hidden it well, when Ian observed him with Gyo, the faint "Ten" covering Chrollo's body was still all too conspicuous.

"That's right. Thanks to the Elder Council's help, I have indeed mastered a Nen Ability."

Chrollo offered no further explanation. With his hands in his pockets, he calmly watched Ian, Uvogin, and the others as he continued.

"We don't lack the power to leave Meteor City, but..."

"I don't think simply mastering a Nen Ability is necessarily enough to survive in the outside world. The outside world has its own rules for survival, while Meteor City is the foundation we depend on to survive."

At this, his gaze passed over the group. His black-and-white eyes rested calmly on Ian as he said,

"That's why I wanted to meet you, Ian."

"On this matter, I intend to hear what you think before making a decision."

Hearing Chrollo's words, Ian understood what he was thinking and couldn't help nodding.

He was worthy of being the Spider's brain in the original story. Although he was still young and inexperienced, he had seen straight to the heart of the matter.

Chrollo was exceptionally meticulous, and it was just as he had said.

The rules for survival in the outside world were completely different from those in Meteor City.

If possessing a Nen Ability meant one could do as one pleased,

Then either the Hunter Organization or Meteor City's Elder Council, which had no shortage of Nen users, ought to have held power.

But in reality, the Hunter Organization had to follow the V5's orders.

Legally speaking, the Hunter Organization was even just a civilian organization under an agency of the V5.

As for Meteor City, what influence could an area erased from the map and tacitly used by various countries as a dumping ground for garbage have?

Were Nen users trash?

Of course not!

Nen users were rare, and their Nen abilities came in all sorts of strange forms.

Even someone who had only just awakened a Nen Ability could easily fight ten or even a hundred opponents alone.

Was the upper limit of a Nen user's power low?

No, it wasn't!

Leaving everything else aside, the Hunter chairman had once been called the strongest human.

Even judging by his performance in the ant arc, when he had been far past his physical prime yet still able to fight Meruem as a formidable opponent, he was a powerful figure beyond imagination.

Yet even a man who had honed his mind to near purity had been forced to acknowledge and marvel at humanity's boundless malice.

On the surface, what ultimately killed Meruem was the Poor Man's Rose, humanity's nuclear weapon, a product of technology...

But in truth, what killed Meruem was humanity's malice at its most ruthless, and the complex, cruel systems of human society.

A single Poor Man's Rose, smaller than a palm, was enough to unleash power like the sun and destroy someone as powerful as Meruem.

And a weapon like this, cheap to make, devastating in its effects, and capable of being mass-produced in a short time,

Had originally...

Been developed and manufactured by humans to use against other humans, who were just as fragile as themselves.

In nature, few creatures could be as cruel to their own kind as humans were.

Just as Chrollo thought.

Was the strength of a Nen Ability what allowed someone to live well outside Meteor City?

The true ruler of this world was the V5, and those who held power in the V5 were not the so-called Nen users.

They were human elites who were truly skilled at making use of patterns and exploiting rules.

Perhaps their individual fighting power wasn't strong.

But these people, who had mastered "politics" and navigated the rules of humanity's complex "social systems" with ease to rise above the rest, were the very embodiment of human malice at its extreme.

Even the destruction of millions of people in a matter of minutes was no more than a signature or a declaration from them.

These people had been selected by humanity's collective will and stood at the pinnacle of the "pyramid of the system."

The resources they controlled and their nature were beyond the understanding of ordinary people and ordinary Nen users alike.

In that instant, Chrollo's words brought many things to Ian's mind.

When the humans of this world learned that the six continents they lived on were merely a few small islands in a vast lake, could they bear that shattering truth?

Were the people in power at the pinnacle of the V5 another version of Luo Ji?

Ian fell into thought for a moment.

Chrollo: "?"

For a moment, the scene fell silent. Uvogin and Nobunaga glanced at Ian, who was standing there in a daze, then exchanged looks.

Naturally, they had no idea what Ian was thinking about.

But they believed in him.

Meanwhile, beside Chrollo, Feitan clenched his fist, glanced at Chrollo, and said coldly,

"Hey, Chrollo, are you just going to let this guy ignore you like that?"

Chrollo maintained his calm demeanor and replied evenly.

"I think he must be considering something. Calling it ignoring me is too childish. Since he intends to leave Meteor City, he probably wouldn't waste time on something like this."

"Hmph!"

Hearing Chrollo's explanation, Feitan snorted coldly.

A little while later,

Ian, standing some distance away, finally came to his senses. He had lost track of time without realizing it, but he didn't mind. He said casually,

"I was just thinking about a few things!"

Even though he hadn't thought anything through,

Chrollo's words had given Ian another way to understand this world.

In any case, he would have to see it for himself to understand.

Besides, he had an unlimited supply of magical gadgets at his disposal.

He believed that even if this world had problems they couldn't solve, he would certainly be able to resolve them perfectly with the power of his system.

After all, the gadgets of the god Dora existed to make dreams come true!