Boiled Eggs

The airship circled above Mount Maku. The gorge below lay like a torn wound, its cliff faces rising sheer on both sides while a swift river at the bottom reflected shattered glints of noon sunlight.

Netero stood before the applicants and waved with a smile. "Menchi, you announce the new test."

Menchi crossed her arms and swept her gaze across the crowd. "This test is about—boiled eggs. The ingredient is Grape Spider eggs, which are laid in spider nests on the cliff walls inside that gorge."

The applicants leaned over to look down. It was a bottomless abyss. A few white spider nests clung to the cliff face, with eggs faintly visible inside.

Leorio took one look over the edge and immediately pulled back. "This is even more ridiculous than those pigs—"

Hanzo frowned. "There's nowhere to stand halfway down the cliff. How are we supposed to get down?"

"I'll demonstrate only once. Watch carefully."

Menchi stood at the cliff's edge and removed her shoes and socks. Sunlight shone on her bare feet. She glanced back at the applicants, then leaped forward. Her green ponytail traced an arc through the wind as she dropped straight into the chasm like an arrow.

In midair, she adjusted her posture and drifted toward the cliff wall. Reaching into a spider nest, she took out an egg and continued falling. Just before she hit the rushing river at the bottom, an updraft suddenly surged up and steadily supported her body. She flipped with the current, stepped onto several protrusions in the rock face, and bounded back to the top.

The entire process took less than thirty seconds.

She stood by the cliff and raised the egg high for everyone to see. It gave off a faint golden sheen beneath the sunlight, its surface covered in delicate patterns.

"This is a Grape Spider egg. The shell is very fragile, so you can't simply drop down with it or it'll crack. But to obtain an egg, you have to jump down, since the nests are fairly deep along the cliff. How to safely take an egg while falling, and how to seize the updraft at the right moment to return quickly—you'll have to figure that out yourselves."

The applicants fell silent. Gon pressed his lips together and silently memorized where Menchi had jumped and the positions of the cliff's protrusions.

Netero added from the side, "These eggs may be rare, but as long as you can bring them back, you can boil as many as you want."

That made the eyes of quite a few hesitant applicants light up.

Gon was the first to step forward. "I'll give it a try."

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath—using his nose to sense the direction and speed of the wind. The other applicants copied him. Some could vaguely feel the changes in the airflow, while others simply held their breath until their faces turned red.

The wind shifted, and Gon suddenly opened his eyes. "Now!"

He leaped down, seized the timing perfectly—taking an egg, flipping with the updraft, and returning to the cliff in one fluid motion. He held up the egg with a broad grin. "Got one!"

Killua followed right after him. His movements were even more relaxed than Gon's, and he looked as though he were playing a game.

After watching the first few people jump, Kurapika found the pattern and calculated precisely. He jumped down steadily and returned just as steadily.

Leorio lay at the cliff's edge, his legs trembling uncontrollably. "How is any of this supposed to be easy—" After yelling that, he shut his eyes, gritted his teeth, and jumped. He fell crookedly, screamed, "I'm gonna die!" from the bottom of the gorge, and was caught by the updraft at just the right moment. He seized an egg and was flung back onto the cliff. He collapsed on the ground, gasping for breath, yet the egg was somehow still intact.

Even as Hanzo jumped, he was analyzing the relationship between the airflow and the algae. After flying back up to the cliff, he did a somersault in midair before steadying himself. Once he landed, he stared at the egg in surprise. "This egg is actually so light?"

Saitama stood at the edge of the cliff and peered down. Then he looked at the T-shirt he had just cleaned.

"It'll get my clothes dirty."

He turned to leave. Before he had taken two steps, he stepped on loose gravel by the cliff's edge. The gravel slipped, and his entire body fell downward.

Gon shouted, "Saitama—!"

Saitama plummeted straight down. He did not adjust his posture or use the airflow. He fell like a rock.

As he fell, his face happened to line up with a spider nest on a protruding section of the cliff. There was an egg inside. The egg bounced out on its own and landed squarely on his head. It bounced once off his bald head, then settled there securely.

He continued falling. Sticky strands from the web caught his clothes, abruptly halting him in midair. The egg slid off the top of his head and dropped into the pocket on his chest.

Wind surged upward from the valley floor and blew him right back to the cliff top. His landing posture was almost no different from when he had set off.

He looked down at the egg in his pocket. "Oh, got one."

The entire crowd fell silent.

Menchi stared at him. "Just now, you—"

Saitama took the egg from his pocket. A little dust from the pocket clung to the shell. He looked at the egg, then at Menchi.

"How long do I boil it?"

"...Three minutes after the water boils."

Saitama turned and headed toward the pots. Menchi watched his back with her mouth half open, unable to say a word. Netero stood beside her, stroking his beard. "There are quite a few interesting applicants this year." Menchi bit her lip and said nothing.

The applicants gradually returned to the cliff top and began boiling their eggs. The water in the pots came to a boil, and the eggshells slowly turned transparent in the bubbling water. Heat control was the key—even a second off would not do.

Gon relied on instinct to control the heat and succeeded on his first try. Killua barely passed after boiling three eggs, nearly smashing the pot. The cracks in Leorio's eggshell looked like a spiderweb, but the yolk had not leaked out, so it counted as a pass. Hanzo watched the change in the egg white's color and precisely caught the golden ten seconds. The white turned completely transparent while the yolk became just half-liquid, and he narrowed his eyes in satisfaction.

Saitama tossed his egg into the pot and stood beside it in a daze. The water boiled, bubbling away.

He stared at the bubbles in the pot and remembered something. The last time he had lined up at the supermarket to buy eggs, an old lady in front of him had snatched the last discounted carton. He had stood there staring at the empty shelf for a long time. Later, Genos told him that it had not actually been the last carton; there were more in the warehouse, but they had not been put out. Still, only that one carton had been discounted. Full-price eggs were not worth buying.

The water boiled for three minutes. He fished out the egg. The white was completely transparent, and the yolk was half-liquid. Perfect.

Menchi cut open Saitama's egg. The blade passed through the egg white as if slicing congealed water. Golden yolk slowly flowed out.

She stared at the egg for a long time. Then she looked up at Saitama.

"How did you do that?"

"You said three minutes after the water boiled."

"...That's it?"

"Yeah."

Menchi fell silent. She put the egg into her mouth and closed her eyes.

"Pass."

Menchi put away her scorecard. "The second test is over. Number of successful applicants—forty-two."

Buhara grinned foolishly and waved. "See you at the next test!"

Netero had disappeared at some point.

The successful applicants were arranged to board the airship for the third test site. Food and rest cabins were available aboard the ship. Gon, Killua, Kurapika, Leorio, and Saitama sat in the dining area. Leorio lay sprawled over the table. Hanzo passed by, glanced at him, and sighed with his arms folded. "You're so afraid of heights. What are you going to do in the third test? Still, you had some guts when you jumped down just now." Kurapika sat by the window without speaking, a faint smile at the corner of his mouth.

Saitama was eating the free curry rice on the airship. He was enjoying it immensely.

Killua lounged with his legs crossed as he ate snacks, giving Saitama a sidelong glance. "How did you make that egg fall onto your head by itself?"

Saitama chewed his rice. "I didn't make it. It fell on its own."

Killua stared at him for two seconds, then gave up asking.

The airship's broadcast suddenly came on.

"Applicants, I am Netero, chairman of the Hunter Association. The site of the third test is Trick Tower. Arrival time—tomorrow morning."

Outside the airship window, a massive cylindrical tower stood amid the morning mist. Its body was pitch-black, with no windows, only an entrance at the top.

Leorio looked at the tower and swallowed. "Trick Tower... That name doesn't sound good."

Saitama looked up at it.

"Does it have an elevator?"