Heartfelt Anticipation

Heartfelt Anticipation

"100 million!"

"300 million!"

"500 million!"

"1 billion!"

Soon, the gala reached its main event: the charity auction. A group of Mafia bosses competed to raise their paddles and shout their bids, each trying to outdo the others in grandeur as the prices climbed higher and higher. Every winning bidder received the attention and applause of the entire room, their vanity utterly satisfied.

The Ten Dons held events like this several times almost every year.

There were also those who spent beyond their means for the sake of appearances, paying a price they could barely afford to save face, only to go bankrupt not long afterward.

"5 billion!"

Oboro gave David, beside him, a look. The old man understood at once and raised his paddle.

"Oh! The Fills Family! Mr. Oboro, the head of our Fills Family, has bid 5 billion!" the host onstage cried exaggeratedly. As he shouted, a spotlight fell upon Oboro.

The Mafia bigwigs around them were somewhat alarmed. Oboro's increase in bid was a little outrageous.

The auction had only just begun. It had not even reached its most heated stage, yet the benchmark had already been pushed to 5 billion.

For a moment, all other bids fell silent.

"6 billion!"

Suddenly, a cold voice rang out.

Oboro looked over and found that the person calling out was the middle-aged man sitting with Badim—the same man who had spoken with him in the hotel lobby earlier.

The man had been secretly watching him all along, his gaze unfriendly.

"10 billion!"

Oboro said nothing, but David understood his meaning and raised the paddle again.

"My heavens!"

This time, even the host cried out in shock.

Everyone knew that the Fills Family operated casinos, but such extravagant spending was still unimaginable! The tycoon beside Badim lowered his eyes and clenched his teeth, yet ultimately did not dare continue bidding.

Oboro successfully obtained an auction item.

A pure white porcelain vase... It would be nice for growing flowers.

Oboro's goal was to become one of the Ten Dons, so he did not care how much money he threw away. Once he succeeded in taking that position, this money would be an insignificant sum by comparison.

For a true wealthy man in this world, one could look to Battera, who later bought the Greed Island game for the person he loved.

He was the billionaire who hired Gon and Killua and let them enter the game successfully. He spent several tens of billions on a single set of game equipment and even offered a 50-billion reward for clearing the game... Keep in mind that he bought and collected thirty-two sets of the game in total, while only seven sets had been sold at the auction in Southpiece.

Altogether, that consumed half of his total assets.

During that time, Feitan and Phinks stole one set from him.

In other words, measured in money, the wealth of the top billionaires was at least in the trillions.

The Fills Family had absorbed the assets of the Kenny Family and Mike Family, but 10 billion was still no small amount given the family's current scale... And this was only the first bid! Time slowly passed.

The Fills Family became the focus of the night! Oboro seized a total of ten auction items and spent around a trillion... That amount was equivalent to combining the assets the Fills Family had just absorbed from the Kenny Family and Mike Family, then having to make up a little more on top of that.

It would not drive them bankrupt, but it was close to draining them dry.

The Fills Family and Oboro became the center of discussion.

When the gala ended, Mafia members filed out of the venue, watching Oboro and David as they walked away.

The Mafia leaders who had wanted to make Oboro suffer and teach him a lesson were among them as well.

"He got all the glory!" One of them stubbed out his cigarette, tossed it onto the ground, and said coldly.

"Does he think he can make the Ten Dons view him differently with such a method?"

"..."

Badim remained silent. A trillion!

Everyone understood that the auction was merely a process, one of the Ten Dons' means of collecting money.

Even the lofty Ten Dons would be moved by that amount of money! The others simply did not want to admit it.

They could all afford a trillion, but there was no need to destroy their foundations over it!

It was only an auction, an event held every year...

"By spending that much, the Fills Family is practically cutting off its own arms!"

"There will be no Fills Family in the future..."

"You moved quickly enough..."

"Go separately later."

After a while, Oboro and David exited the hotel one after the other.

"Yes."

The Old Butler lowered his head.

He had a feeling something would happen...

Being too conspicuous was not a good thing, especially at an occasion where Mafia groups of every size had gathered.

"Everything has been arranged as I instructed?"

"The people below have already been notified..."

"Mm."

Oboro was very satisfied with the butler's efficiency.

People continued to emerge around them and greet him, while luxury cars on the street drove away one after another.

Oboro got into a car alone and vanished into the stream of taillights with the family convoy.

The car was quiet, with only Oboro and the driver inside.

The vehicle moved extremely fast. Before long, it left the city and drove along the main route back to Koke City.

Then, outside the window... several escort vehicles traveling alongside them suddenly let out piercing screeches of brakes... The car Oboro was in also began slowing down before coming to a stop.

"Are you planning to dump my corpse in the wilderness?"

Oboro remained calm.

All of his family's men had already been taken out... The other side had disguised everything and cleaned up the traces in an extremely short time.

It looked perfect...

A group of gunmen got out of the cars outside. Without a word, they aimed their weapons at the rear seat where Oboro sat.

"This is a gift from Boss River."

The driver in the front raised his head and spoke coldly through the rearview mirror.

The next second, gunfire erupted...

A moment later, Oboro threw away his tattered suit jacket and stood alone on an uninhabited country road, making a phone call... Several corpses lay sprawled behind him.

The driver's mangled head had also slumped onto the steering wheel.

Beep, beep, beep...

The phone rang a few times before being answered.

"Did you find them?"

Oboro asked casually.

"We found them, but their car is moving very fast... Given your current distance, Patriarch, I'm afraid..." David's voice came from the other end of the phone.

"It's fine. I can catch them."

Oboro replied, asked for their approximate location, and hung up.

Then he stood in the middle of the road and stretched his limbs.

"When was the last time I ran a marathon?"

Stretching his arms, Oboro raised an eyebrow. Back when he was in school, perhaps? He could not remember...

Immediately afterward, he bounced lightly on his toes. The next second, his body shot forward from the road in an instant. He was so fast that several seconds after he had already rushed away, the faint burst of air pressure and a vague gust of wind slowly followed behind him.

Meanwhile, Brown, one of the Ten Dons, also received the reports and results from after the gala.

The person who had "donated" the most that night was Oboro, the head of the Fills Family.

He had spent a trillion!

Such generosity had to pique his interest in the young man.

So, he now sat alone in his room, holding a cup of coffee as he watched footage from the venue... Oboro's appearance and bearing entered his sight. To be honest, this young man's presence did not feel like that of someone from the underworld. He seemed completely out of place among the people around him. He lacked the bandit-like brutality and bloodiness of the Mafia. At first glance, he instead carried a somewhat casual, detached air.

Of course, what Oboro did was completely different from the impression he gave.

The television's light reflected in Brown's pupils, making his expression difficult to read.

After a long while, he picked up the remote and turned off the footage.

Without saying anything, he rose and left the room.

A few hours later, he washed up and prepared to sleep.

Then he suddenly received a call from one of his subordinates.

"What is it?"

"Sir... River is dead..."

"Who did it?"

"Someone from the Fills Family... Oboro."

"..."

Brown.

The River Family was one of the strongest Mafia groups in his territory, alongside Badim's group. Though they were not close, River was still one of the subordinates Brown valued more highly.

This time, Brown considered it for a moment and gave no instructions. He merely said that he understood.

The person on the other end understood what he meant.

The underworld was, in the end, just a small, isolated circle of Mafia forces. Even the slightest disturbance spread quickly.

By the next day, a piece of news had ignited the Mafia.

The Fills Family and River Family had gone to war!

The head of the River Family had been killed...

What shocked the Mafia even more was that the Ten Dons had not made any statement or shown any attitude toward such a major incident, as though... they had tacitly approved it.

No one was stupid. After giving it some thought, they understood what was happening.

The situation escalated rapidly and had a tremendous impact on the social order throughout the region... The businesses and strongholds of the two great families in various cities broke into violent clashes. The streets and alleys became scenes of terrible bloodshed.

Another great family was also dragged into it: the Chibu Family.

It was not easy for a newcomer to rise within the Mafia... It was equivalent to challenging the authority of the older generation of powerhouses. Moreover, the emergence of a new force represented a reshuffling of the deck in a sense, something the old guard did not wish to see.

The River Family alone was not much of a problem, but once the Chibu Family stepped in, the situation immediately changed.

In less than a week, many factories and casinos under the Fills Family were said to have been damaged, shut down, or forced to suspend operations.

Everyone thought that if the Ten Dons did not intervene, the Fills Family would be finished...

But the turn of events always came suddenly.

This earthquake among Mafia forces lasted only about a month before abruptly coming to an end.

It concluded with the River and Chibu Families being renamed and merged into the original Fills Family.

A new behemoth had emerged among the underworld forces of the territory!

One day, Oboro received a personal call from one of the Ten Dons. The man wanted to meet him.

Sitting in the car heading toward the destination, he watched the scenery outside and pondered.

The struggle between the three families had ended, and the Fills Family was now at the height of its power. Brown's reason for meeting him at this time was nothing more than to warn him and explain the "rules."

For example... telling the Fills Family to know its place.

Oboro knew that in the Mafia conflict he had instigated, the families that originally intended to deal with him were not only the River and Chibu groups. Aside from Badim, there were other forces as well... But these people had all received hints from the Ten Dons and did not act rashly.

Only the Chibu Family had defied the Ten Dons' wishes because of its marriage alliance with the River Family.

But even if they had not obeyed, the Ten Dons would not do anything to the Chibu Family for the time being... Because this had been a trial from the start. Whether the Fills Family was destroyed or the other two families fell, who won and who lost made no difference to the Ten Dons...

However, the Chibu Family's actions had certainly displeased the Ten Dons, and they could settle the score later.

Still, what Oboro cared about now was not Brown... He was more concerned with whether there were any powerful experts around him, such as... the Shadow Beasts.

Over the past few months, more than thirty Nen users had died at his hands...

Not to mention the improvement and understanding he had gained regarding combat experience and the various types of Nen abilities, his reactions and shifts in thinking when facing crises and different situations had also changed and strengthened somewhat compared to his time at Heavens Arena.

In particular, his record of fighting multiple Nen users at once by himself had taught him a few things.

The most obvious difference was that Nen users in the Mafia possessed stronger wills and more pronounced convictions. They had experienced countless battles and all walked the line between life and death... Their Nen techniques and applications had been refined through innumerable fights to the death. This kind of raw strength was not something the fodder at Heavens Arena could compare with.

And then there was... the insight Oboro had gained during this period, the "heart" Biscuit had mentioned—the power of the mind.

What lay within a person, not what appeared on the outside...

The Nen power of Mafia-affiliated Nen users was more outstanding. This did not refer to the amount of aura they possessed... If he had to describe it, it was more like... the "quality of Nen."

The stronger one's conviction, the more effective the quality of one's Nen seemed to be.

Aura capacity could be viewed as volume, the numerical amount of life energy... But the quality of Nen was the strength of that aura after it was used and transformed into Nen power by its user. That was also why Biscuit had been able to blast through his Nen defense with a single punch and cause obvious damage.

Using a lump of dirt and a diamond would produce vastly different damage and defensive power...

Unfortunately... just as Biscuit had said, such realizations had to be experienced. Oboro had gained something, but not much... Because at least so far, none of the Nen users he had encountered had posed any fatal threat to him.

And the power of the mind was clearly easier to break through in desperate situations or exceptionally difficult circumstances... Otherwise, one could only accumulate experience and become familiar with it bit by bit.

So... he truly hoped that someone around Brown would be strong enough to make his eyes light up! After all, he intended to replace the man.

He knew nothing about Brown's armed forces at present. The only certainty was that the Nen users responsible for protecting the Ten Dons and carrying out his orders must have amassed countless achievements—several times, perhaps even more than ten times, what Oboro had done over the past few months.

Though he clearly knew what would happen when he met one of the Ten Dons this time, Oboro was instead somewhat happy...

"Don't disappoint me..."

Oboro's tone carried intense anticipation.

This chapter makes up for yesterday's. 4k.

I'll keep writing. Today's update will be earlier~~