The First to Pass

In the bottom-floor hall, the timer had ticked past eleven hours.

Saitama leaned back in his chair. Seven empty sausage wrappers had piled up beside him. He opened an eighth and took a bite. The proctor added another line to the register: Candidate is eating his eighth free sausage.

Meanwhile, deep inside the tower, rusty iron bars lined both sides of a narrow passage built for one. Hisoka walked alone down the dim corridor, his footsteps echoing off the stone walls.

At the end of the passage, a scar-faced man sat on the floor, twirling two curved blades. Togari. He looked up, his eyes gleaming viciously in the gloom.

"Hisoka. Long time no see."

Hisoka stopped.

"This time, I've come for revenge." Togari stood and spun a curved blade between his fingers. The jagged scar on his face seemed to dance in the candlelight. "To avenge the scar you left on my face, I spent two and a half years training in the Infinite Four-Sword Style!"

He flicked both hands. Four curved blades flew at once, stabbing toward Hisoka's vital points from above, below, left, and right. Their edges sliced through the air with a sharp whistle.

Hisoka turned aside, moving as easily as if he were dancing. The blades skimmed past his clothes and buried themselves deep in the wall behind him.

Togari grinned, clutching his last two blades. "How's that? That's what two and a half years of training got me! This time, you're dead—"

With a roar, he charged Hisoka at full speed. The blades flashed coldly in the light.

Just as the blades were about to fall, Hisoka reached out and caught two of the curved blades that had rebounded from the wall behind him. Togari froze. His raised hands hung in midair, his grin vanished, and his eyes went wide.

Hisoka toyed with the blades, smiling contemptuously. "Dodging these blades really is difficult. Catching them is much easier. And they're rather nice to handle."

He turned his wrists, spinning the blades between his fingers, and drawled, "All that work for nothing. You could've been more impressive, but you only trained for two and a half years."

Togari snapped out of it and ground his teeth. "Damn you—"

The two blades in Hisoka's hands shot out like lightning.

Cold steel flashed.

Togari staggered half a step back. His mouth opened, but no words came out. Then he toppled backward.

Hisoka wiped the blood from his hands and turned away. "What a waste of my time."

In the bottom-floor hall, the timer reached exactly twelve hours.

Saitama stuffed the last bite of his seventh free sausage into his mouth and chewed. He had seen this episode. Hisoka was the first to come out. The timer now showed sixty hours remaining. Saitama tilted his head, folded the wrapper, and stacked it with the previous six.

A door to one of the passages opened.

Hisoka emerged, holding a playing card. A spot of dark red blood stained the hem of his clothes. He glanced around the hall—

And saw the bald man in the chair.

Saitama lounged against the chair back with one leg crossed over the other, holding the wrapper from his seventh free sausage. Their eyes met.

Hisoka's pupils contracted.

This bald man. He had seen him in Visca Swamp. He had blocked the man's path and looked him over from head to toe, then toe to head. No fighting spirit, no fear, no Nen. Like a rock. Hisoka had decided he "wasn't worth killing" and stepped aside.

Now that "rock" was sitting in the finish hall, legs crossed, holding a sausage wrapper.

He had beaten Hisoka here.

Hisoka licked his lips. His voice came out hoarse. "When did you get here?"

Saitama finished chewing his last bite of sausage and thought for a moment. "Forgot. Eleven hours ago."

The proctor looked down at the notes on his register: Approximately ten minutes after the third test began, candidate jumped from the top of the tower, smashed through the bottom floor's outer wall, and entered the hall. Sat down unprompted. Slept well. Has eaten seven free sausages. Currently eating an eighth. Eleven hours. Nearly half a day ahead of Hisoka.

Hisoka's pupils widened, and his eyes grew bloodshot. The corners of his mouth pulled upward beyond his control, spreading into a dazzling, eerie smile. His body began to tremble.

The playing cards fanned out between his fingers. His hands were shaking—not from fear. From excitement. His boiling urge to fight made his fingers twitch. The muscles in his legs tightened, and his breathing grew heavy.

Saitama glanced at him. "Do you want to fight me?"

Hisoka's smile froze for half a second. He slipped the cards back into his pocket, walked to a bench on the other side of the hall, and sat down. His body still trembled faintly, his fingers absently rubbing the cards in his pocket. Because Saitama had yawned. A long yawn, mouth wide open, eyes narrowed to slits. He paid Hisoka no attention at all. For the first time, Hisoka couldn't read an opponent at all. The uncertainty made excitement threaten to burst from his chest. But there was still a fourth test, and a final test after that. He had plenty of time to probe this bald man. Attacking now would be a waste.

The proctor looked at the two men sitting on benches at opposite ends of the hall. Hisoka leaned against the wall, turning the cards over one by one between his fingers. His eyes never left the bald man on the opposite bench. His breathing was loud enough to hear throughout the hall.

Saitama folded the wrapper from his seventh sausage and tucked it into his pocket with the others. The pocket bulged and would rustle when he walked. He patted it, shifted position, and went back to sleep. The clown nearby was still staring at him. But it didn't matter—Saitama had seen this episode. Hisoka might be a freak, but there were still several tests to go. Hisoka would come looking for him on his own. He could deal with it then. For now, sleep.

Sixty hours. The timer kept ticking. Others were still making their way through the tower. Only two people remained in the bottom-floor hall—one snoring, the other trembling.