Sword Sect, Aura Sect

Menchi said, "He left on his own. He wasn't with Ochima's people to begin with."

"True." Jing Yang waved a hand and left directly.

Watching the three figures disappear into the distance, Dago stood there for a long time before turning back toward West Town.

"Shizuku, don't you live in West Town?"

Walking outside East Town toward the amusement park, Jing Yang glanced at Shizuku.

Shizuku said, "The mission is over. Do you have other plans?"

Menchi chuckled. "As the boss, you have to be responsible for arranging things for your underlings!"

"Heh, do you want to be one too?" Jing Yang said. "I'll arrange you along with them."

Menchi bared her teeth and glared at him.

"Why aren't we going through town?" Shizuku pointed curiously toward East Town.

Menchi laughed. "There's a slaughterhouse by the docks. Jing Yang said he couldn't stand the heavy smell of blood... Maybe he has a dog's nose. It works even better than mine, and I'm a chef!"

Seeing something off in Jing Yang's gaze, Menchi hurriedly said, "Anyway, I'm leaving first. See you at West Town Harbor the morning after tomorrow!"

"What do you mean, the morning after tomorrow? You're not training today or tomorrow?"

"Then see you at the usual place this afternoon." Menchi smiled and waved to Shizuku. "Shizuku will come too, right? I'll make your share of the food in advance."

Watching Menchi's retreating back, Shizuku looked at Jing Yang with puzzled eyes.

Jing Yang said, "Menchi is a Gourmet Hunter. Her cooking is delicious."

"Oh." Shizuku nodded.

They had not gone far when they spotted a moon-white tiger strolling over in the distance. It was Wu Er.

"Haha, why does it feel like we haven't seen each other in ages?" Jing Yang laughed as he went over and rubbed the tiger's head.

He looked toward the nearby woods. Many birds were perched on the branches—green birds, white birds, all kinds of birds, along with two crows...

"Chirp chirp!"

Little Gray Bird, Rock Sparrow, shot over and landed on Jing Yang's shoulder, chirping away excitedly for who knew what reason.

"Caw, caw..."

The two crows also left the treetops and flew over with outstretched wings.

Seeing Shizuku's curious expression, Jing Yang asked, "Don't you remember them?"

He pointed at the crows, as well as Wu Er, who had once "attacked" Shizuku.

"Why would I remember them?" Shizuku said in confusion. "I've never seen them before."

Jing Yang smiled. "But they seem to think they've seen you before."

"That's impossible," Shizuku said.

What powerful confidence! Jing Yang was filled with respect. "Anyway, let's go get something to eat first."

"Oh, okay." Shizuku had only taken two steps when she suddenly grew puzzled. If they were going to eat, why had they let Menchi, who was supposedly such a good cook, leave?

Menchi's cooking really was delicious.

That afternoon, while they trained together in a clearing in the woods outside town, Shizuku confirmed that fact.

Menchi, meanwhile, felt a little dejected.

She had not expected Shizuku to be so much stronger than her too.

Though the strongest was still Jing Yang... Menchi looked at Jing Yang, who stood off to the side as usual, maintaining Ken and silently tempering his total Nen quantity and fundamentals. If everyone could persist in training like him, then even without his outrageous talent, they would definitely keep growing stronger.

"My strength has recovered." Barely ten minutes after finishing her meal, Shizuku sensed the changes in her remaining Aura and said in surprise, "No wonder Jing Yang invited you to join before."

Menchi waved her chopsticks smugly. "As long as a dish I make satisfies me, my ability can take effect—I never said it had to be a hot, freshly made dish! Cold dishes, boxed lunches, even things that are easy to store and carry, like cookies and cakes, might work too!"

"Might work?" Shizuku asked curiously.

"Because I haven't tried them yet, after all..." Menchi held back and held back, but in the end, she could not resist asking, "Shizuku, what's your ability?"

Shizuku said nothing. Her expression barely changed, but she said nothing.

"Huff!"

Over there, Jing Yang finally could no longer maintain Ken. He collapsed onto the ground in exhaustion and muttered, "I only extended it by a little over one minute. My total amount probably increased by less than a hundred... If I'd spent the past two or three days training, my total Nen quantity should be at least 6,500 or 6,600 Aura by now. Instead, it's still under 6,100 Aura... Looks like balancing work and training is a skill in itself!"

It was manageable for now, but if his total Nen quantity rose into the tens of thousands of Aura in the future, then every session of maintaining Ken until his Nen quantity was depleted would take at least several hours. One Ken session might last nearly half a day.

Wasn't that inefficient?

Morel of the Hunter Association had a total Nen quantity of 70,000, which already made him a top-tier expert... It seemed there was a reason for that. Everyone had the same twenty-four hours a day. If a round of Ken training wasted half the day without necessarily producing much improvement, then wouldn't it be better to spend that time improving the precision, proficiency, and breadth of one's Hatsu Nen Abilities? Or even develop abilities from other categories and expand one's tactical reserves? If he managed to create an unbeatable ability, wouldn't that be far more worthwhile than painfully grinding away at his total Nen quantity?

An unbeatable Nen ability was indeed unbeatable. As long as one's total Nen quantity was enough to sustain it, that was sufficient.

But whenever he thought of those Chimera Ants and their terrifying Nen quantities of hundreds of thousands, even millions, of Aura... No matter how unbeatable an ability was, a monster with such horrifying Nen quantity could scare the courage out of you with a single glare, or blast you with an unremarkable Nen bullet that pulverized your body... What use was an unbeatable ability if you could not even use it?

"Sword Sect, Aura Sect?"

Jing Yang inexplicably thought of that, then noticed Menchi awkwardly stuck because of Shizuku's silence. He could not help enjoying the show.

When Menchi saw that he was actually watching for amusement, she glared at him furiously.

Jing Yang smiled. "Shizuku, what's your ability?"

"It's Blobfish," Shizuku said.

With that, she raised a hand and conjured a big-mouthed vacuum cleaner out of thin air.

"You're a Conjurer too?" Menchi said in surprise.

"Blobfish's ability is..." Shizuku was still demonstrating it when Menchi hurriedly stopped her. "Forget it. Knowing your category is enough! You don't need to tell me everything. I didn't tell you all of my ability either."

Shizuku looked toward Jing Yang. Jing Yang spread his hands.

Menchi said irritably, "What about you, Jing Yang? I still don't know what category you are!"

Jing Yang rolled his eyes. "I'm a History type! Your turn to use Ken."

Menchi got to her feet indignantly. Taking a deep breath, she released Ren, then seized the moment and maintained it with the technique of Ten, forming Ken.

Shizuku copied her.

Jing Yang began working through the remaining pile of food. Only after eating for a while did he realize he was using their chopsticks.

The food seasoned with green seasoning entered his stomach, and his completely depleted Aura slowly began recovering. Thanks to the Star Mark behind Jing Yang's neck, the recovery effect was noticeably better than Menchi's and Shizuku's.

As Jing Yang ate and watched, it was obvious that the volume and outline of Shizuku's Ken were much larger than Menchi's, but Shizuku's Ken was less stable.

Jing Yang had estimated that Shizuku could hold on for nearly two hours at most, meaning a total Nen quantity of 7,200 Aura; Menchi, on the other hand, could last only a little over five minutes, with less than 300 Aura.

Just over five minutes later, Menchi lay sprawled on the ground like a dead dog, gasping as she looked at Shizuku, whose face was not red and whose breath was steady as she continued maintaining Ken. She looked deeply unwilling to accept it.

Elsewhere, aboard a ship crossing the sea, Babimayna hung up after speaking with the First Prince, ending his brief report on the mission.

Once he returned to Kakin, he would still need to write a detailed report covering every aspect of the mission.