What happened next unfolded just as described earlier.
Riding aboard the good ship Lakshya, Dio raised his gun and instantly killed Marol, who had only a third of his aura left.
Filled with the grief and outrage of Why are you only biting me?, Lakshya fought a desperate battle against the Leader Catfish.
Uh, let's call it a battle...
Dio flipped away, immediately entered Zetsu to evade the giant beast's detection, and hid deep in the corridor, listening to the agonized screams from the other end.
He had already protected his entire body with Ripple. Without it, that malicious Nen Aura would have tortured him until he broke down, body and mind.
Meanwhile, bound by his own experience and unaware of the Leader Catfish's new mechanism, Lakshya's first reaction to the beast charging at him was to unleash even more aura.
The more aura he unleashed, the more furiously the Leader Catfish attacked him.
To the giant beast, Dio, who had entered Zetsu, might as well not have existed.
Of course, even if Lakshya had discovered the Leader Catfish's new mechanism, the result would have been the same.
Under that malicious Nen, suppressing his own Nen and entering Zetsu without Ripple's protection would have been suicide!
In other words, from the moment Lakshya activated Snowfield Silence, entered the venue, and forced Qi Peixin to decide to alter Vision-
The outcome had already been sealed.
When Lakshya pulled Marol's Thread End, his ability, Accompany Me, instead helped Dio escape, hastening that outcome even further.
In fact, without the rookie female squad member whose head had been eaten, Dio would never have encountered that lone catfish with Nen on the first floor.
The mercenary squad that had come to kill Dio had, step by step, become the stairs leading him to victory!
Before long, a tremendous crash rang out, and the screams abruptly stopped.
Mis-ter-Mer-ce-na-ry-
What a fine death you died.
Dio calmly acted out a little scene in his mind. He did not know who the man he had just shot was, nor did he care.
That mercenary was an enemy, and an enemy's companions were enemies too. Killing him in passing was only natural.
Now he used Ripple to cling to the ceiling, all the Nen Aura in his body sealed away by his practiced Zetsu.
Before accepting the commission, Dio had spent a long time practicing Zetsu. He had become proficient enough to approach an ordinary Nen user like Drobada practically face-to-face without being noticed.
At that moment, the Ripple throughout his body surged wildly, warning him of the terrifying beast nearby.
With only Ripple protecting him in his current state, a full-force charge or a single bite would probably leave him in pieces scattered all over the place.
With the Leader Catfish no longer hunting, the corridor suddenly became unnaturally quiet. Only swathes of thick mist, now serving no purpose, drifted aimlessly.
It could no longer detect a single Nen user within its ability's range.
As if acting on instinct, it slowly began its Return Migration, swimming toward the auction venue it had just left.
Its enormous body parted the surrounding mist. As its tail swayed, a low voice emerged from its hideous maw:
"Hungry..."
As the mist dispersed, Dio's figure emerged on the ceiling, crawling slowly after it like a spider.
He stared intently at the terrifying beast just a short distance away, his eyes focused as though searching for something.
A long while passed.
"Found them..."
Dio's gaze sharpened and settled on what he had been looking for-a few points gleaming silver under the lights.
They were the bullets Dio had fired at the Fish Fry during the earlier battle!
The Leader Catfish had blocked every one with its body. They had done no damage, but the bullets had lodged firmly in its outer skin.
The golden figure of The World slowly emerged as Dio counted down the cooldown in his mind.
"Time's up. The World!"
Dio decisively activated Time Stop, flipped down from the ceiling, and landed on the motionless Leader Catfish's back.
To guard against the possibility that the Leader Catfish had switched its detection mechanism back to vibrations, he had deliberately used Time Stop to eliminate any disturbance caused by landing on its back.
While on the ceiling, he had also used Ripple to cancel out the vibrations from his movements.
Naturally, Dio was not taking all these precautions simply to enjoy a ride on a giant fish.
His real targets were the Light Steel Bullets embedded in its back!
Metallic Ripple Nen strengthened metal weapons while also dissolving other people's Nen Aura.
Thanks to Dio's nature as an Emission user, a very faint trace of Nen Aura still remained on those bullets.
Perhaps the bullets had been counted as part of its body. The Leader Catfish's aura completely masked those faint fluctuations, leaving it unresponsive to the bullets despite their traces of Nen Aura.
Although the Nen on them was probably very weak by now, as long as even a little remained, he could inject Ripple into them again...
Dio pressed his finger against one bullet and channeled Metallic Ripple back into it. At once, the aura-dissolving Metallic Ripple Nen materialized.
That Ripple Nen gradually spread across the giant fish's surface, eating away at it. For now, Dio's Ripple alone forcibly sustained it.
This turned the bullet into something like a Nen Nail that could continuously produce Metallic Ripple Nen, steadily dissolving the Leader Catfish's aura without its knowledge!
Dio had developed this method long ago, but he had always considered it too impractical to use.
After all, if he could shoot Ripple Nen directly into someone with a bullet, why risk getting close to channel it in?
Besides, an enemy was not paralyzed. They would not simply stand there without reacting while he approached and poured Ripple into them.
Most importantly, if he could get close, why not finish them off with a barrage of punches?
Yet today, he had actually encountered an enemy whose defenses a barrage could not break, but who did not react at all when Dio approached and channeled Ripple into it.
Ripple linked the bullets on the Leader Catfish's back into a network, continuously dissolving its enormous reserves of Nen.
Dio did not expect to completely dissolve the Leader Catfish with this method. That was unrealistic, and he did not have enough Ripple stored up.
But the fish's current state was clearly not its normal form. In other words, this form depended on a temporary surge of powerful Nen Aura.
He estimated that dissolving a fifth of its aura at most-or perhaps even just a seventh-would cause this form to collapse on its own.
I'll just wait...
Dio thought about the time.
The giant fish beneath him seemed to feel uncomfortable. It swam a little faster, slowly and dully uttering a low sound:
"Hungry..."
"Hungry..."
Its voice sounded bewildered and lost, echoing emptily and insistently through the corridor, lingering deep within the thick mist.
But in the end, it noticed nothing wrong. It returned to its sluggish pace and swam toward the venue where it had been "born"...
Before you continue