When Qiao Lun rode Nue into the building, Nobunaga dialed his phone, letting Shalnark on the other end know what had happened.
"Get back, now. Nobunaga's in danger." Shizuku and Franklin were with Shalnark.
Ignoring the looks from the pedestrians on the street, they raced toward the abandoned building at full speed.
"They picked the wrong target." Shalnark calculated the time. "It only takes about two minutes to get back from here. Even if they're strong enough to kill Uvogin and Machi, they can't take Nobunaga down in such a short time."
Shizuku and Franklin nodded in agreement, because they both knew just how impregnable Nobunaga's ultimate defense was once he deployed his domain.
They said Uvogin excelled at protecting others, but Nobunaga was actually the one who did.
No.
More precisely, Uvogin and Nobunaga were at their strongest when they were together.
The dead tone over the phone probably meant the two sides had already begun fighting. Shalnark immediately contacted Kortopi and Feitan.
There was no problem at all on Feitan's end, but he would also need about two minutes to return.
Kortopi, however, had gone farther away and would need about three minutes to get back.
Hisoka, who was on the same team as Kortopi, knew the moment Kortopi answered the phone that Qiao Lun had not done as he had said, but had attacked Nobunaga ahead of time.
He had no intention of interfering.
Since the other party dared to act early, he should already be fully prepared. If Hisoka meddled and deliberately slowed their return, he would instead risk exposing himself.
Outside the abandoned building, Gon and Killua had already escaped when Nobunaga was blasted out of the building.
The two did not leave immediately. Instead, they turned and saw the giant snake with white scales and black markings, along with the sword-wielding boy running along its body.
He was not someone they knew, but the strength he displayed was completely beyond anything they could match.
And when Nobunaga blocked his attack and the two erupted into combat, Gon and Killua discovered, disheartened, that they could not even make out their movements. Fast-they were far too fast!
"They're really strong!" Gon clenched his fists as he exclaimed, "He barely used any of his strength when he was dealing with us earlier."
"Yeah." A desire to fight lurked in Killua's eyes.
Even though he had already realized how weak he was when they were captured earlier, only now, as he witnessed a clash between top-level fighters firsthand, did he discover just how vast the gap between him and the experts was.
And even someone like this seemed to feel somewhat less dangerous than Illumi!
"Let's go." Killua turned, ready to leave.
"Don't you want to watch a little longer?" Gon committed the appearance of Qiao Lun, who was still fighting, to memory, then followed Killua.
"Idiot. In this little time, the Phantom Troupe couldn't have gotten very far. Nobunaga was clearly trying to get his phone to alert them earlier. They might already be on their way back. If we stay here, are we just waiting to get caught again?" Killua picked up his pace as he spoke.
But after running only a short distance, Killua keenly noticed something unusual.
He stopped and, following his instincts, looked in the direction where he sensed something was wrong.
Both Killua's and Gon's breathing grew somewhat heavy at that moment, because if they encountered returning Phantom Troupe members here, it seemed the only thing they could do was repeat their old trick and split up to run.
Whether they could escape would be up to fate.
Amid that tense atmosphere, a snow-white rabbit poked its head around the corner of a nearby building, coming into their view.
The snow-white rabbit curiously examined the two fully alert boys with its scarlet eyes, then tilted its head in confusion.
"Whew, that scared me to death." Gon let out a breath.
Killua, however, frowned deeply. He kept feeling that there was something strange about the rabbit's aura.
But if it was only a rabbit, that was fine.
With that thought, he pulled Gon along and quickened his pace, soon disappearing down the street outside the abandoned building.
Not long after the two left, Feitan appeared outside the abandoned building.
He was the fastest and the first to return. After all, Qiao Lun had escaped right under his nose earlier.
If he had intercepted Qiao Lun at the auction venue back then, none of this would have happened afterward.
So after receiving the news, he paid no attention to Phinks and Pakunoda and raced straight back at full speed.
But before he could approach the abandoned building, a snow-white rabbit suddenly sprang out from the side as he charged forward, ramming headfirst toward him.
Feitan maintained his forward speed, but the umbrella in his hand had already swept out, striking the rabbit and sending it flying.
Yet by the time he finished that simple motion, more rabbits had already appeared on the road ahead, and all of them charged toward him with scarlet eyes, heedless of whether they lived or died!
"Damn it, what's going on?"
The rabbits were weak. They could not even withstand a blow from Feitan's umbrella.
But their sheer numbers forced Feitan to slow his advance. Amid a series of thuds, rabbits were knocked flying one after another.
But Feitan's heart had already sunk at that moment.
Because he keenly noticed that those rabbits, which could not withstand even a single blow from him, slipped straight into the shadows on the ground after landing. Then, rather than disappearing, they emerged from the shadows again with their condition reset!
The new rabbits were still just as weak, just as unable to withstand a blow, but they continued ramming toward him.
Phinks and Pakunoda appeared one after another, and they too were surrounded by the rabbits pouring out.
Feitan continued advancing amid the surrounding rabbits, but his speed had fallen by an unknown amount.
Although each rabbit was weak, that weakness was only relative. In an actual comparison, any one of these rabbits was no weaker than an adult hunting dog. Even against an ordinary person, the outcome would be uncertain.
After all, these rabbits were all formed from Qiao Lun's Cursed Energy.
The trumpeting of a giant elephant erupting in the distance made the Phantom Troupe members held up by the rabbits increasingly anxious.
But likewise, the rabbits' attacks grew fiercer. Unafraid of death, they used their lives to form a wall that blocked everyone.
However, that wall crumbled in an instant when Franklin arrived!
[Double Machine Gun] unleashed endless bullets, each one capable of easily tearing through a Rabbit Escape rabbit's body. Even though a new Rabbit Escape rabbit emerged from the shadows whenever one died, they could not block the Nen bullets Franklin unleashed with a vicious grin.
His firepower was far too abundant!
Qiao Lun, who had killed Nobunaga, watched the pitch-black Nen rising from Nobunaga's body and also sensed the abnormal rate at which the Rabbit Escape rabbits
were dying.
He knew that either Franklin or Bonolenov had made a move.
Both had the ability to clear a wide area. As for Feitan, Rabbit Escape could not injure him.
And without enough damage, even if Feitan wanted to unleash his power, he would struggle to do so.
However, Qiao Lun was in no hurry to leave. He kept his gaze firmly fixed on Nobunaga's headless corpse, where a new change was taking place.