Hisoka's smile

Without the slightest hesitation, Lin Yan instinctively stepped to the right without even turning his head.

Whoosh!

A dark shape flew past, almost grazing the tip of his nose, the wind in its wake stinging his cheeks.

It was a winged fish with a mouth full of sharp teeth. Had he been half a second slower, it might have bitten his head off.

Having missed its first strike, the strange fish circled in the air and lunged at him again.

Rather than retreat, Lin Yan advanced. He closed his eyes and immersed his entire awareness in sensing qi.

Hum!

In an instant, all the surrounding noise seemed to filter away.

The rhythm of wind moving through blades of grass, the faint screams in the distance, and the trajectory of the strange fish as it tore through the air straight toward his back!

He twisted sideways again, narrowly dodging its second lunge. In the brief gap before the fish could muster another burst of force, Lin Yan snatched a sharp stone from the ground and used the momentum of his spinning body to smash it viciously into the fish's head!

Thud!

The stone struck precisely. The strange fish twitched twice on the ground, then finally went still.

Lin Yan caught his breath and looked at the corpse on the ground, shaken by how close he had come to death. His body was still weak, but this faint awareness of his surroundings really had given him a means to survive.

He dared not linger. After checking his bearings, he kept running in the general direction Satotz had taken.

He had not gone far, however, when an overwhelmingly thick stench of blood, mixed with a cloying sweetness, drifted toward him on the wind.

Lin Yan stopped dead.

That smell...

He carefully parted the bushes ahead, and his pupils abruptly contracted at the sight before him.

In a small clearing, more than a dozen bodies lay strewn in every direction. They had died in different ways, but every face wore an expression of utter terror.

Hisoka stood in the center of the clearing. He elegantly wiped the blood from his fingertips, a pleased, satisfied smile on his face, as though he had just finished a delicious meal.

Lin Yan held his breath.

Run? No! The slightest sound would make me his next target!

Hide? The area around this clearing is completely exposed. There's nowhere to hide!

In a flash, a desperate idea crossed his mind.

He backed away slowly, ever so slowly, until he reached the bushes. Then he took a deep breath and let his rigid body topple onto the pile of corpses beside him.

Thump.

With a soft sound, he landed on a body that still held some warmth.

Turtle-Breathing Technique!

It was a Daoist breath-holding method that imitated a turtle's hibernation, reducing heartbeat, breathing, and even all bodily signs of life to their lowest levels to enter a state of "feigned death."

In his previous life, he had practiced it only for his health. He had never imagined that one day he would use it to save his life.

He forcibly suppressed his pounding heart and silently recited the Qingjing Jing: "Look inward at the heart, and the heart is without a heart; look outward at form, and form is without form..."

The surrounding stench of blood, the stiffness of the corpses, and the cold against his skin continually assailed his nerves.

But he dared not move. He dared not move at all.

He felt as though he were a corpse himself, already one with the cold bodies around him.

Footsteps.

Very light, very slow footsteps were approaching his hiding place.

Lin Yan's heart sank.

The footsteps stopped in front of the bushes where he lay hidden.

One second, two seconds, three seconds.

Time seemed to stretch endlessly. He could feel that scrutinizing, amused gaze sweeping back and forth over him.

He could even smell Hisoka's distinctive scent, a mixture of blood and perfume.

Suddenly, an icy touch chilled him to the bone-a long, slender finger brushed lightly across the back of Lin Yan's neck before stopping over his carotid artery.

Every hair on Lin Yan's body nearly stood on end, but he kept that thin thread of qi locked tightly within his dantian, not daring to let it fluctuate in the slightest. His mind went almost completely blank.

He found me!

"Hmm~"

Hisoka's rich yet chilling voice sounded beside his ear, carrying a hint of mocking amusement.

"You've stopped your breathing and heartbeat... but that faint 'aura,' circulating in such a peculiar way, shines brighter than the sun in my eyes~"

Lin Yan's heart nearly stopped.

He realized that, with only his previous life's experience of cultivating for health, such a superficial disguise was far too easy for someone of Hisoka's caliber to see through.

Hisoka crouched down, a playing card with razor-sharp edges held between his fingertips. He slid it over Lin Yan's skin, barely touching, as though admiring an unfinished work of art.

"A seed I've never seen before, giving off such a peculiar fragrance..." Hisoka's voice was low and excited, tinged with perverse anticipation. "If I watered it with Nen, what sort of twisted flower would bloom? I really do want to see how this 'anomaly' grows..."

The shadow of death engulfed Lin Yan completely. He had even braced himself to have his throat slit.

Yet that oppressive presence abruptly vanished.

"Crushing you now would be such a waste." Hisoka rose with a delighted chuckle. "Do your best to grow... become something I can't resist plucking with my own hands. Until then, don't let these small fry kill you~"

Footsteps sounded again, this time turning away.

Only when the footsteps had vanished completely into the depths of the fog did Lin Yan dare to restore his breathing, slowly, little by little.

"Hah... hah! Hah... hah!"

He abruptly sat up amid the corpses, gasping like a dying fish, greedily drawing in air that was anything but fresh.

Cold sweat had already soaked his clothes completely. They clung to his skin, chilling him to the bone.

He had survived. Once again, he had survived that psychopath.

He instinctively reached for the back of his neck, and a sharp sting shot through his fingertips. Turning to look, he saw a four of hearts embedded deep in the soil beside him.

It was a mark Hisoka had left-and a death warrant.

"Damn it..." Lin Yan clenched his fists tightly as he stared at the card. The yearning for the Dao in his eyes had not faded; instead, it burned even more fiercely.

Profound and wondrous though the Turtle-Breathing Technique was, his rudimentary mastery was still woefully inadequate in the face of overwhelming power and a gulf in cultivation.

The powerful people in this world were terrifyingly sensitive to energy!

It's not enough. It's nowhere near enough! he cried inwardly, feeling the thread of qi within him grow unusually active under the pressure of extreme fear.

The heaven-reaching methods recorded in the Daoist scriptures are no fantasy. I've simply cultivated for too little time, and my mastery is still lacking.

Unless I truly attain the Golden Core Great Way, I'll always be nothing more than a 'fruit' someone can casually spare, or that 'seed giving off a peculiar fragrance' he spoke of!

This encounter had been even more perilous than his arrival in this world, but it had also made him see with absolute clarity that the Daoist principles he knew truly were a clear path to supreme power.

For now, though, he was still only a toddler taking his first unsteady steps, as weak as an ant.

Fear, too, was fuel for cultivation!

He struggled to his feet, pulled out the four of hearts, and slipped it into his pocket. Just as he was about to leave this dangerous place, he suddenly heard familiar voices not far ahead.

"Idiot! I told you not to run off!"

"But Leorio and the others..."

Lin Yan's heart tightened. He parted the grass and saw Gon and Killua apparently arguing over something.

Not far from them, several enormous toads lurking in the swamp were silently closing in.

Neither of them had noticed the danger!

Lin Yan's pupils contracted, and almost instinctively, he readied himself to shout a warning.