The Name of the Tower

Southeast of Tower City, buildings cast long shadows in the dusk.

That evening, Ryan went to the construction site with his father as usual. He carried a tool bag on his left arm and had a safety harness wrapped around his waist, using the most common disguise of a "construction worker's child." It was not his first time there, but he never passed up a chance to listen to the workers talk—too much knowledge in this world was hidden in the gaps outside the classroom.

This time, he happened to hear that one remark.

"...Have you heard? That arena isn't just about boxing."

"You mean those freaks who send out some kind of energy without even moving their hands?"

"Yeah. They say once you get past the 200th floor, you run into things that common sense can't explain at all. An old coworker of ours used to work security there. When he came back, he kept muttering about how he saw a girl knock someone unconscious with just one look."

"Seriously?!"

"He quit afterward. Said that wasn't a place ordinary people should go. The higher you go, the less it feels like reality."

The men smoked and joked around in the corner of the site shed as though they were merely chatting after dinner. Not far from them, Ryan's fingertips tightened slightly against the edge of a concrete block.

He did not turn around immediately. Instead, he slowly closed his eyes.

Those few phrases—"past the 200th floor," "not normal strength," "just one look"—

Every word struck a familiar echo in his mind.

Nen Ability.

He knew this was not an urban legend.

It was not "superpowers," not "magic," nor some imagined illusion.

It was another layer of reality, truly hidden beneath this world's rules.

He remembered the setting of Heaven's Arena from the anime in his previous life. He also remembered that "the 200th floor and above is where true fighters begin."

Now, however, it was no longer merely a "memory." It was something confirmed by other people in reality.

After returning home that night, Ryan did not begin training right away. Instead, he opened his notebook and flipped to the first page.

Using a red pen, he wrote down two phrases:

Nen Ability · Confirmed to exist

Sky Tower route · Confirmed accessible

He realized something important:

Continuing to train his body, materialization, and tactics was important, but if he could not truly learn Nen, he would forever remain within the category of a non-Nen user.

And the true Hunter world was the world of Nen users.

He began listing two possible paths to Nen:

Route One: Through the Hunter Exam

Advantages: A legitimate route, access to Association resources, and comprehensive information access privileges;

Disadvantages: Delayed timing, high entry threshold, and information could still be restricted by rank;

Risks: Failure or delay would mean losing the initiative, rhythm, and window to enter the Nen world.

Route Two: Go to Heaven's Arena

Advantages: Face Nen users in actual combat and directly observe, sense, and test them;

Disadvantages: High risk, opaque information, and no guarantee of a legitimate identity;

Potential variables: Whether he could get in, whether he could win challenges, whether he could survive—everything was unknown.

He wrote down his conclusion:

He would take both paths.

He would first use the Hunter Exam as his main route to establish a solid foundation and use the system to understand Nen's logic, rules, and structure;

At the same time, depending on his growth in combat, he would prepare to infiltrate Heaven's Arena and seek opportunities for firsthand experience through "Nen-sense verification × pressure breakthrough."

That night, he walked onto the balcony and looked at the towering structure faintly visible in the distance to the west—Heaven's Arena.

Its body appeared and vanished in the darkness, like a spear thrust into the sky, and like a barrier standing between ordinary people and the strong.

"The 200th floor."

That was his entire goal at the moment.

He murmured softly:

"If I do not master Nen, then I am not truly part of this world."

The night wind grew sharper. Heaven's Arena stood far away, its summit nearly invisible, with only the lights around its lower levels outlining the edge of the city.

Ever since hearing the rumors about "superpowered people" at the construction site, Ryan had spent three full days without doing any slingshot training. Instead, he devoted all his time to "systematic self-examination" and "rebuilding his combat logic."

He reassessed his growth curve:

Physical ability: Close-quarters fighting, load-bearing endurance, and neural reflexes had all reached the preparatory standard of an adult Hunter;

Ranged attacks: He had formed the beginnings of a materialization technique and could already maintain a stable "Nen-energy outline" in his mental imagery;

Tactical play: From simulated deduction to on-the-spot judgment, he possessed a foundation for real combat response;

Meditation system: His aura sense had achieved "internal rotation and circulation," but had yet to "break through the boundary of outward release."

But he knew that all of it meant he was still only standing before the threshold of Nen.

If he could not truly learn the three fundamental building blocks of Nen—Ten, Zetsu, and Ren—he would never enter the cognitive dimension of a systematic Hunter.

And this system was hidden from the outside world.

He began intensively investigating Heaven's Arena's outer structure and entry rules.

Through expired newspapers in the library, cached online searches, and even his father's construction-site materials, he gathered a set of basic information:

The arena's lower levels were open up to the 150th floor. Registered challengers could advance under their real names, but core information was difficult to access.

From the 151st floor onward, information on those advancing became restricted and could not be publicly searched; there was no official explanation for anything above the 200th floor.

Rumors claimed that some people who had not passed the Hunter Exam had also awakened "aura" in Sky Tower.

Though incomplete, this information was enough to show—

Heaven's Arena was the second entrance to the Nen system. It was dangerous, but real.

What made him even more wary was what else he discovered:

Around Sky Tower, there existed a gray progression chain maintained through underground channels:

Illegal betting groups secretly nurtured newcomers, sending "black-card challengers" to the 150th floor to observe whether they could trigger Nen sense;

Some peripheral observers of the Hunter Association conducted "awakening intervention experiments" on the upper floors, searching for gifted individuals;

Certain Nen users even used "teaching" as bait to demand "Nen debts," forcing those who awakened to sign long-term agreements of servitude.

These black-market trails had been buried deeply, but they were enough to set alarm bells ringing in Ryan's mind.

Nen was not merely power. It was also structural control.

If he could not open that door with his own strength, he would have to bear the cost of being controlled by others.

He wrote in his training notebook:

[Nen Ability Strategic Entry Route · Dual-Track Draft]

Path A: Hunter Exam → Awakening through the Association's internal system (safe/slow/long-term control)

Path B: Heaven's Arena → Awakening through real combat in a high-pressure battlefield (fast/dangerous/self-directed pace)

Activation condition: Before entering the "Nen-energy circle," he had to achieve "willpower dominance × combat awakening × controlled release"

That night, during meditation, he actively simulated a battle against a Nen user for the first time.

He imagined himself surrounded by an assassin capable of concealing their aura. Within three seconds, he had to make three levels of decisions:

Whether there was any "aura infiltration" at the edge of his perception;

The direction from which the aura originated;

His countermeasure: Whether to expose himself, whether to burst forth with aura, and whether to lure the enemy into a misplaced position.

During the meditation, the surface of his body abruptly grew hot. The rotational frequency of the aura sense in his palms intensified, and his breathing began to approach the state of Ren—

At that instant, he saw it—

A faint ring of airflow expanded three inches outward from his body, brushing lightly along the corners of the room and cutting through the night.

This was not an imagined meditation scene.

This was the edge of Nen's gate responding to his "combat projection."

He opened his eyes, his lips moving slightly.

"Nen... isn't gained through training. It's activated in battle."

He understood:

One more battle pushed far enough to the limit, and he would truly be able to force open that door.