Ambush in a Dark Alley

Night in Heaven's Arena's lower district was dimly lit and chaotic. On his way home, Ryan walked as steadily as usual, yet an unease lingered in his heart.

He had always been keenly aware when something was wrong—not only because his perception from practicing Nen had begun to awaken, but also because, over the years, he had lived every second in this city with extreme caution.

As he turned past the third alleyway, the disturbance finally revealed itself.

A faint flashlight beam suddenly reflected off a corner wall, followed by low curses and the clatter of metal. At the end of the alley ahead, five or six teenage-looking thugs were closing in from behind the fence of an abandoned construction site. Most had their faces wrapped in cloth, but the ferocity in their exposed eyes was far too fierce for ordinary street punks.

Ryan recognized one of them. It was Dono, the one with the snake-patterned arm whom he had subdued last month for provoking him. It seemed the other man had returned this time with even greater fury.

"That's him! Don't let him get away!" Dono roared through gritted teeth.

So they came specifically for me. Ryan sighed inwardly. He was not someone who sought fights, but with hostility laid so openly before him, he had no choice but to respond.

He swiftly surveyed the terrain. Ahead was a dead end. To the left lay the construction area, filled with planks and scaffolding supports. To the right was an unfinished concrete staircase leading to a half-built second-floor platform.

Fighting them head-on would be unwise. With that thought, he turned and dashed into the narrow alley within the construction site.

Curses and pounding footsteps rang out behind him. "Damn it, he's running! Get him!"

One man charged into the alley first, a rusty steel rod in hand. Before he had taken two steps, a flying piece of gravel struck him in the forehead, sending him staggering to the ground. The man behind him paused, looking around in confusion, then suddenly realized someone was behind him—Ryan burst out from behind a stack of cement bags and sent him crashing into the scaffolding with a lightning-fast sweep kick.

The sound of the metal frame shaking and colliding alerted the others, and the alley immediately descended into chaos. Ryan did not linger. Using the dim shadows and lights of the site, he quickly slipped behind a concrete pillar.

He waited—for the next person to enter alone.

The third man cautiously stepped into the narrow passage, sweeping his flashlight from side to side. As the beam swayed, he failed to notice the thin string beneath his feet, connected to a brick. The instant the string moved, an iron bucket hanging overhead dropped and smashed into his shoulder with a bang.

"Aah!!"

The scream was followed by confusion and panic. The remaining men finally realized they were walking step by step into a hunter's traps. Ryan knew this was his chance to turn the situation around.

Amid the chaos, he silently approached one man from behind and drove his knee into the man's lower back. The man dropped to his knees in pain, and just as he tried to turn around, Ryan knocked him unconscious with a hand chop.

But there were too many of them. Though this strategy of picking them off one by one was effective, it took too long. Just as he prepared to shift positions, a club suddenly swept out from the shadows—it was Dono, finally showing himself.

The wind from the swing rushed toward his face. Ryan quickly crouched to evade it and pulled back half a step. He noticed that Dono had come better prepared this time. He held a wooden club coated in anti-slip rubber, while another man with a short knife circled toward Ryan's flank.

"This brat can fight, but you're not getting away tonight." Dono grinned viciously as he closed in.

"Not necessarily." Ryan's lips curled as he suddenly lunged forward.

The fight erupted at close quarters. Clubs and knives sliced through the night air as he relied on his superior fighting skills to weave and evade beneath the assault of two men. Even so, the knife grazed his arm, and blood dripped from his sleeve.

"Finish him already!" Dono roared.

Ryan endured the searing pain and calculated the rhythm of their attacks. His right arm snapped outward, and the gravel he had long held ready in his sleeve struck the knife wielder precisely at the corner of his eye. The man cried out and stumbled back. Ryan seized the opening, stepped in, and slammed an elbow into his jaw, knocking him to the ground.

The next instant, the club came crashing down from above at an angle—this time, he failed to dodge completely. It struck his shoulder, throwing off his balance and sending him staggering back several steps.

Driven by the intense pain, he let out a roar and charged forward with all his strength. A straight punch slammed into Dono's chest. The club fell from Dono's hand, and he dropped to his knees coughing.

"It's over." Ryan panted, his expression cold. He did not strike again. Instead, he tied up the hands and feet of the unconscious men around him, tore a strip from one man's clothes to gag Dono, and bound him beneath the scaffolding as well.

Only after confirming that no one could break free did he let out a long breath and slowly walk out of the construction site alley.

The sky had gone completely dark. Lonely streetlights cast orange halos over the sweat and blood at his temple.

"I'm still not strong enough..." he muttered, looking at his scarred hands.

He had won this night battle, but it made him realize a cruel truth once more—if he had not set traps in advance, if any of his opponents had been a true Nen Ability user, he would likely have already died in the streets.

He understood that Nen was the one power he absolutely had to master as soon as possible.

He started walking and vanished into the night as though nothing had happened. Only the chaos and unconscious men behind him silently testified to the chilling edge hidden beneath the boy's outward appearance.

The night grew late, and the streets in Heaven's Arena's southern district gradually fell silent. Ryan walked home without hearing any pursuing footsteps behind him, but he did not relax his guard even once.

His wounds still throbbed faintly, especially the bruise on his shoulder from the club strike. Only after his breathing eased did the dull pain beneath the numbness gradually emerge. He did not want to waste strength using Ten to forcibly suppress the pain, so he simply gritted his teeth and continued onward.

If Dono had held something other than a club tonight, if he had been someone who possessed Nen Ability... Ryan did not dare think any further.

The pharmacy on the corner had long since closed. He did not try to buy medicine. Instead, he went around to the back alley and crawled through an inconspicuous drain entrance into a familiar abandoned passage—one of the backup routes he had deliberately arranged throughout the city, leading to a temporary hideout.

He cleared the dust from the floor, locked the iron door, then dug out a first-aid kit and spare clothes he had hidden beneath the floorboards. He skillfully cut open his sleeve to treat the wound, rinsed the bruise with cold water, and bandaged it to stop the bleeding, every movement free of excess.

After cleaning himself up, he sat quietly on a battered chair and turned on the only wall lamp.

"I overestimated myself."

He was not referring to his fighting skills or the limits of his stamina. Rather—he had been far too optimistic about what he could accomplish without Nen.

If he had not set traps in advance tonight and made good use of the terrain and psychological advantage of tactics, the outcome would never have been so one-sided.

"Among the strong, there are no second chances."

Never before had he understood so clearly that what Nen Ability represented was not merely a difference in strength, but the threshold to the right to survive. He had drawn close to the world of Hunters, yet had not officially stepped through the true door of Nen.

He began calmly reviewing the battle.

From the routes the enemies had taken when entering the construction site, to the positions exposed by each of his attacks, to the instinctive defensive reactions displayed by Dono, that thug with basic fighting experience.

If he had even the slightest contact with Nen... that blow from the club might not have been an injury, but a break.

That sense of helplessness was what Ryan could not tolerate most.

He opened his eyes, picked up the spare dagger from the floor that had already bent out of shape, and his gaze turned faintly cold.

"I have to pick up the pace."

He knew that the Nen within his body had begun to awaken. In actual combat, he had even unconsciously used fragments of Ten. But it was nowhere near enough.

"If I want to fully master Nen, I can't rely on fumbling around alone." He murmured, "I have to actively find a way—a person who can truly teach me."

His eyes shifted slightly as he recalled a casual conversation with Killua several days ago. Killua had inadvertently mentioned a special place of high risk and high reward—the sealed combat zone above the 150th floor of Heaven's Arena.

That was where Nen Ability users truly began to gather.

"Maybe it's time to climb the tower." He slowly clenched his fist.

The wind outside gradually picked up, and a night bird swept over the roof. Ryan rose to his feet and looked toward the broken window covered in dust.

This was the place he had prepared for rest and recovery, and a witness to the years he had spent training alone. After tonight, he would abandon it.

He knew he was about to step onto a path from which there was no return.

Before leaving, he made one final inspection of the old room and took the spare marbles hidden between the floor tiles, a stored-value card, and a crumpled note—a reminder he had written to himself, containing only one sentence:

"No one will give you a second chance forever."

He folded the note and put it back into his pocket.

Before leaving, he looked back once at the room beneath its dim yellow light and softly said, "Thank you."

Then he pulled the door shut and walked into the night without looking back.

That night, many people slept and dreamed ordinary dreams. But Ryan had already taken his first silent step toward a higher stage.