Youth X Boy X One-Eyed Old Man
To avoid new friends who join us not liking to read the work introduction, I'm writing it here as well.
This work is purely out of personal interest, driven by love, and mixed with a lot of personal settings (as reasonable as possible). Warning:
The protagonist is an ordinary person, so he won't be decisive with killing nor cleanly resolve everything, but he will grow slowly!
The protagonist is a transmigrator, and does not know the anime plot!
The protagonist has it a bit miserable in the early stage, a bit miserable, a bit miserable! Important things said three times.
Therefore, if some plots do not suit your taste, you do not accept the protagonist being tormented, and feel that unwillingness to kill indiscriminately makes one a holy mother, for your and the author's physical and mental health, please immediately leave the scene. There are tens of millions of Tomato novels, why waste time on a novel that doesn't suit your taste?
Thank you for your cooperation.
(Discussion of the plot is welcome, but writing guidance is declined)
This article is suitable for all readers who have watched the Hunter anime and those who haven't. It can be read with a brain; the author will try his best to deliberate and ensure every character is written with a brain, and the plot is written to be very [Hunter]. But reading it without a brain will also yield different joys~
(ps: brain storage location)
The wind whipped up fallen leaves and gravel, hammering against the top of the shack, making clattering sounds.
The air was filled with the pungent smell of garbage baking under the blazing sun, mixed with a faint scent of blood.
A youth wearing a black suit walked slowly into the alley. At the end of the alley, at that shack with no discernible storefront, he gently knocked on the door, then pushed it open and walked in.
The room was so stuffy that hardly a breath of wind could enter; it was both dim and dirty. At the counter inside the room-let's call that piece of wood with things placed on it a counter-sat a disheveled old man.
"Sorry for the trouble, I'd like four abilities this time."
The youth smiled and spoke to the old man.
On his forehead was a dark cyan inverted cross tattoo, with black hair and dark eyes. His demeanor was clean and clear, like an intellectual from upper society or a university professor-completely out of place with the dirty and wretched District 12 of Meteor City.
The old man slowly opened his eyes-he had only one eye, and his turbid eyeball sized up the newcomer, while the other eye socket, which should have had an eye, was only a hollow void.
"Four abilities, one ability is worth ten thousand, the making fee is ten thousand, a total of fifty thousand Jenny."
The old man spoke. His voice was frighteningly hoarse, like two pieces of metal rubbing together.
The youth placed a stack of banknotes with a denomination of ten thousand Jenny on the counter. Greed flashed in the old man's only remaining eye, and he said in a hoarse voice, "The guest might as well state what other requirements you have."
The youth smiled gently: "I want to see the person who manufactures the ability badges."
The old man's expression suddenly turned cold: "This isn't according to the rules-"
But the youth placed another stack of banknotes of ten thousand Jenny on the table.
Suspicion, struggle, greed, and murderous intent flashed consecutively in the old man's eyes. He stared fixedly at the youth for a moment, sneered, and said, "Follow me."
The youth nodded and pulled back the hand pressing on the banknotes.
He followed the old man into the dark door behind the counter, walking down a long corridor. At the end of the corridor was a room, and just as they were about to reach the door, the old man turned back to exchange a glance with the youth, his gaze carrying a warning.
The youth smiled, nodded, and spread his hands, indicating that he would not go any further.
Only then did the old man pace step by step to the door of the room-beside the door sat a wooden box one meter wide and one meter high. He slowly squatted down and unlocked the lock on the box lid.
Being not far away, combined with the use of Gyo in Nen, the youth was enough to see what was inside the box.
Inside the box was a white-haired boy. It was unknown how old he was, but he only had the stature of a seven-year-old child. He sat in the box completely naked, his leg bones and hand bones broken and turned outward, with chains around his ankles and heavy shackles around his neck locking him to the wall of the box. The bottom of the box was full of filth mixed with bloody grime, and the smell was likely comparable to District 11, which served as the largest garbage dump.
The boy opened his eyes wide. His blue-gray eyes were empty and lifeless, like a broken doll whose soul had been sucked out. The moment he saw the old-one-eyed man, the boy convulsed and trembled all over, emitting whimpering sounds.
The old man sneered with satisfaction, picked a moldy piece of bread from a shelf nearby, and squatted halfway in front of the box, holding the bread up before the boy's eyes.
"Ah... ah..."
The boy's fear was replaced once again by the desire to eat. He drooled uncontrollably, struggling to lift his already broken hand to reach for it. His eyes stared fixedly at that piece of moldy bread, and only at that piece of bread.
The old man held the bread higher, while his other hand knocked four times on the box: "Four."
The boy paid no heed, still reaching out his hand to grab the bread. The old man gripped the hand he had managed to raise with difficulty and bent it slightly-
"Ah ah-ah ah..."
The boy let out a painful moan, snot and tears falling together. He twisted his body and convulsed, the back of his head heavily knocking against the box wall time and time again, making bumping sounds.
"Four."
The old man knocked four times on the box again, making a dull sound, and spoke once more.
The boy shivered and slowly closed his eyes. Following his movement, a four-cornered badge shimmering with cyan, blue, red, and yellow metallic lusters, with the four colors each occupying a side, materialized in front of him. The light dimmed, and before the badge dropped to the bottom of the box, it was swiftly pinched by the old man's quick hands.
The old man stood up, turned around, and faced the youth. He trembled as he handed the badge in his hand toward the youth.
The youth raised his hand to receive it.
The next second, a cold flash swept past.
The old man couldn't bear to part with those hundreds of thousands of Jenny, nor did he want to let someone who had seen the secret leave alive. But the dagger that had appeared in his hand at some point clattered to the ground, making a crisp sound.
The youth's figure crossed past the old man, and he casually stood with his hands behind his back beside the box.
His eyes met those of the boy in the box, and then he was surprised to find that the boy's eyes were not blue-gray at all; that gray was merely a layer of shadow shrouding the moon.
At this moment, the shadow scattered, and the silver-blue gaze no longer held emptiness and blurriness. What was reflected was the old man collapsed on the ground, and beyond that was endless fury and murderous intent.
The young man chuckled softly. He reached out and rested his hand on the bloodstained box.
The one-eyed old man struggled to his feet. Clutching his broken right hand, he stared at the secret that was about to be released and cried out in shock and fury, "Don't touch him-! You mustn't touch him-!"
"How interesting."
The young man tapped the box as well and said, "This box seals Nen. You can only use Nen abilities after the box is opened, and even then, you can use only the abilities that are permitted.
"This Chain might not be so easy to unlock."
The one-eyed old man saw the young man's reflection in his eyes, but it was as if he were looking at a devil. He screamed hysterically, "You mustn't touch him! Don't-don't-" Yet he didn't dare come over and stop him again.
The young man looked at the boy inside the box. The boy's gaze fell on the shackle around the young man's neck. Following his line of sight, the young man saw the collar and asked,
"Will it work if I just undo the one around your neck?"
He paused. "It's not impossible. But how will you repay me?"
He pretended to think for a moment, then smiled. "Little guy, once you're out of the box, give me your ability."
In the next instant, the young man pressed his fingers against the shackle, which was as thick as a baby's arm. With a crack, he crushed it to pieces.
The young man slowly stepped back.
The boy in the box slowly raised his head. He moved his broken hands and feet, the corners of his mouth lifting into something that could not be called a smile.
The young man saw him smile.
It was laughable, really. For a moment, this crippled boy, whom he could kill with a casual squeeze, seemed like one of his own kind.
The one-eyed old man watched the boy, who was using all his strength to prop himself up against the box wall with his elbows, trembling violently from head to toe, just as he had when the boy was locked inside the box.
Dragging his body, which the young man had gravely injured with a single blow, he turned and staggered toward the door. But he crashed into the hidden door as if he had run into a wall, then bounced back into the corridor.
He stared in shock at the layer of Nen that had somehow covered the door. Furious and terrified beyond measure, he turned and saw the young man he had brought into the corridor slowly close the black notebook in his hand.
Before he could curse in the foulest language in the world, he saw a book with a white cover appear in the boy's hands.
The boy's hollow silver-blue eyes were open as he gently raised one hand.
The one-eyed old man was swallowed by flames and whirlwinds filling the entire space, rock spikes thrusting inward from every direction, and ice spikes flying through the air.
The Nen rampage stopped a minute later, and the boy hanging against the box wall fell to the ground.
The one-eyed old man was no longer recognizable.
Spikes that had burst from the ground pierced his back. Large patches of his body had been carbonized, so after the ice spikes had melted halfway, they could no longer stay embedded and fell to the ground. Clumps of flesh and vaporized blood covered the ground around his corpse.
The Nen box that had imprisoned the boy was burned to ashes by a raging fire brimming with boundless fury. The boy didn't even try to dodge the Nen flames as they burned him. He only hoped they would burn away all the filth that had stained him.
After the Nen rampage ended, the boy's face was deathly pale. He gasped again and again. Only after an unknown amount of time did he remember that there was someone else here. He raised his head and met the gaze of the young man, who had been looking down at him with a smile the whole time.
The young man floated in midair. Flames, rock spikes, whirlwinds, and icicles from every direction filled the corridor, which was less than a meter wide, yet not a single crease had appeared in the young man's clothes.
"Ah... uh..."
The boy seemed to want to speak, but he had forgotten how. A bewildered look crossed his face. After thinking for a long while, all he managed to produce were meaningless syllables.
The boy gave up.
He tried to stand, but fell back to the ground. After a moment's silence, he closed his eyes, and his Nen slowly withdrew into his body.
The young man bent down and cautiously reached out to touch the boy. The instant his hand made contact, the boy-who had lost all the strength in his bones, and truly had-collapsed toward him.