"Why... why did it go back?"
Leorio stared wide-eyed at the empty shadows, his voice stuttering, his heart still hammering against his ribs.
The suffocating sensation of being watched by a natural predator still lingered on his skin, turning into a fine sheen of cold sweat.
"Amazing..."
Gon's eyes, however, shone with an animal's keen awareness. His near-instinctive intuition told him-it was Lin Yan.
In that instant, something more terrifying than the huge dog had erupted from Lin Yan and scared it away.
Zebro picked his pipe up from the ground and put it back in his mouth, but the lips holding it trembled slightly.
The way he looked at Lin Yan had completely changed.
He no longer saw an ordinary intruder, but an unfathomable monster.
"What... what did you do to Mike?" he asked hoarsely.
"I just said hello."
Lin Yan looked calm, as though he hadn't been the one to drive the magical beast back. "Just established which of us stood higher on the food chain."
Said hello? Food chain?
The corner of Zebro's mouth twitched as he inwardly ranted, What the hell kind of greeting was that?
It sent Mike, who only obeyed the Zoldyck Family, running with its tail between its legs!
But he was a smart man and didn't press the matter.
He took a deep draw on his pipe, forced himself to calm down, and said gravely:
"Even if you aren't afraid of Mike, you still can't get in. If you want to see Master Killua, there's only one way: through the front gate."
He turned and pointed at the towering stone gate that stretched before them.
"This is called the Testing Gate, or, as we usually call it, the Gate of the Underworld.
"It was specially built by the Zoldyck Family to screen