The seven-day evolution seemed to have finally reached its end...
Halfway up the mountain, inside the butler villa, dazzling red light pierced through the blood cocoon and bloomed wildly.
A bright, powerful surge of aura shot into the sky, condensing into Ren and forming wave after wave of cutting wind that swept through the surroundings.
On Kukuroo Mountain, Netero and Silva, who were closest, suddenly turned their heads.
Rip—
A pale hand pierced through the blood cocoon and reached out.
[Notice: First Embrace complete!]
[Your follower "Gotoh" has completed evolution.]
Whoosh—
As aura-winds surged madly, another series of tearing sounds rang continuously through the butler villa.
Inside the villa, Kuraging, who had been explaining Nen to her younger brother Kurapika, pushed back her chair and abruptly stood up.
A rush of footsteps could be heard, mixed with noisy, panicked voices.
"It's the trainee butlers who don't understand what's going on!"
"Sister."
Kurapika stood up with Kuraging.
The boy poked his head toward the window. A hazy red light spread out together with the morning glow, and just looking at it made him dizzy. His legs weakened, and he nearly lost his balance and fell.
Fortunately, Kuraging had sharp eyes and quick hands. Prepared in advance, she caught him and placed him back on the chair.
"Sit."
As she spoke, she opened her aura nodes and immediately wrapped a layer of Nen around the boy.
Only then did Kurapika feel a little better. He clutched his chest and quietly let out a breath.
"Sister, is that Nen?"
"Yes."
Kuraging's expression was serious. She immediately used Ten, trying to resist the impact of that powerful aura. Fortunately, the person releasing Ren did not seem hostile toward her or Kurapika. It felt more like someone who had just woken up and was throwing a bit of a morning temper.
Realizing this, Kuraging told Kurapika to stay in the room and not move. Then she pulled open the door and quickly ran toward Gotoh's bedroom.
Rip... rip... rip...
A hand emerged.
Then a foot.
Then the chest appeared.
Then the head lifted.
Amid the aura storm, the blood cocoon shattered completely.
At the center of the storm, the butler with gold-rimmed glasses and a melancholy beard slowly opened his eyes.
Inside the Zoldyck family castle, Illumi's hand paused around his knife and fork. He even forgot to chew the bacon in his mouth.
"Hm. Not bad. He has some skill now."
At the dining table, Maha was still drinking porridge. A light flashed in his eyes. He tore off a piece of baguette, dipped it in mushroom soup, softened it, and put it in his mouth. Then he casually glanced down the mountain.
It was unclear whether he was talking about Roy or Gotoh.
"It's all right, I suppose."
Roy scooped up a spoonful of steamed egg and put it into his mouth, mumbling, "A week isn't long, but it isn't short either. At least the wait wasn't for nothing."
Then he glanced at the panel.
The follower panel opened, and everything was displayed clearly.
[Follower: Gotoh]
[Note: Evolution complete.]
[Current Progress: 7/7 days]
[Loyalty: Overflowing Loyalty]
[Vow: Covenant of Life and Death
(Note: swears by life itself in exchange for enormous combat strength. Condition: must detect that the host is in mortal danger.)]
[Current Constitution: 1274 → 2189
(Note: increased by 1,800 points compared to before evolution. Will continue increasing passively as the host evolves.)]
[Manifest Aura: C+ (15,000 / 100,000) → B- (870,000 / 1,000,000)
(Will continue increasing passively as the host evolves.)]
[Latent Aura: B- (200,000 / 1,000,000) → B (500,000 / 1,000,000)
(Will continue increasing passively as the host evolves.)]
[Category: Emission]
[Initial Nen Ability: Coin Conjecture]
[First Embrace Nen Ability: awakened. Category: Enhancement. Name: Peak Contraction.]
[Note: Peak Contraction can compress and stretch muscles into spring-like shapes. Through the "force of deformation," it can abruptly increase the explosive output of aura. The amplification depends on the follower's current constitution and understanding of Nen.]
[Gotoh's current "explosive amplification" multiplier is: 2.7 times maximum output.]
[Rating: B-]
[Note: Using the Chimera Ants as reference, your follower "Gotoh" has surpassed the level of a top Chimera Ant squadron leader and officially entered B-. His current strength has reached Shaiapouf level, below only combat-type Royal Guards such as Neferpitou and Menthuthuyoupi. His potential is slightly higher than the Three Royal Guards.]
[Current controllable state — absolute control.]
The prompt ended.
Roy focused mainly on Peak Contraction.
The new Nen ability Gotoh had evolved after the First Embrace was, in some ways, similar to Phinks' Nen ability from the original story, Ripper Cyclotron.
The difference was that Ripper Cyclotron gathered aura in the arm, increasing punching power the more the arm was rotated. Theoretically, it had no upper limit—the more rotations, the stronger the blow.
But its flaw was also obvious and deadly.
After all, enemies wouldn't just stand there stupidly and wait for you to finish spinning your arm before attacking.
In other words, Ripper Cyclotron had too long of a wind-up.
Peak Contraction, on the other hand, only required the time it took to flick a finger when firing an aura bullet. It needed no wind-up at all and could instantly amplify the power of the aura bullet. In terms of quick reactions, it was far stronger than Ripper Cyclotron.
Of course, in terms of raw upper limit, it probably could not match Ripper Cyclotron.
Fortunately, the amplification multiplier would continue to increase as Gotoh became stronger, which invisibly made up for that weakness.
Roy quietly closed the panel.
As expected, he saw Illumi set down his knife and fork, then slowly push back his chair and stand.
"Save me some soup. I'll be right back."
The boy swallowed the bacon in his mouth whole, said this expressionlessly, then turned around and left the room, his waist-length black hair falling behind him as he headed down the mountain.
Step... step...
His footsteps gradually faded away. The boy's back vanished in an instant.
Maha accepted the napkin Tsubone handed him and wiped his mouth. He glanced sideways at Roy and saw that Roy had already lifted the entire bowl of mushroom soup and drained it completely.
"Heh. You're not leaving him any?"
Roy tore off a piece of baguette and even wiped the bottom of the bowl clean with it.
"Is there any need to leave some? He won't be coming back."
"Heh heh."
Maha was full and satisfied. He lay back in the rocking chair, closed his eyes, and said leisurely, "Tell Gotoh to hit him hard. If a child's life goes too smoothly, it isn't good for his growth."
Roy gave a light hum.
After finishing everything, he turned his head and glanced out the window. The Eye of Truth activated, and silently, he saw Illumi from inside to outside, from top to bottom.
[Name: Illumi]
[Loyalty: Overflowing Loyalty]
[Note: already reached the state where he can become an official "follower."]
[Current Constitution: 1324
(Note: can open the fifth Testing Gate.)]
[Manifest Aura: C+ (70,000 / 100,000)]
[Latent Aura: B (850,000 / 1,000,000)]
[Category: Manipulation]
[Note: can control others through "Nen needles."]
[Evaluation: C+
(In Total Concentration state, can temporarily increase to B-.)]
[Note: Using Chimera Ants as reference, Illumi has reached Chimera Ant squadron leader level, but is still slightly below the top. His current strength is roughly Kite level, far below Neferpitou, Shaiapouf, and Menthuthuyoupi.]
Roy withdrew his gaze at just the right moment.
He casually took the napkin Tsubone handed him and, through the deep causal line between himself and Gotoh, quietly sent a Nen message.
"Don't hold back. Just remember to leave him one breath."
The message rode a spiral of wind and swept toward the middle of the mountain.
Halfway up the mountain, in the butler villa.
Kuraging went upstairs and reached Gotoh's bedroom. She noticed the bedroom door was wide open.
The first thing she saw was a thin man, just as before, dressed in a neat and dignified tailcoat. He was holding a handkerchief and carefully wiping down a handgun.
Seeing her look over, he turned, pushed up the gold-rimmed glasses on his nose, and smiled faintly at her.
"Morning."
Kuraging suddenly stopped.
She gave a light hum.
For some reason, she felt that this "rival" standing before her had awakened as if newly reborn from a cicada's shell. From this point on, he had grown wings and soared into the sky, no longer belonging to the ordinary world.
"Cicada... cicada..."
Outside the window, tree shadows swayed and cicadas cried.
The girl was clearly standing at the doorway, less than five meters from Gotoh, yet at this moment she felt as if an enormous chasm lay between them—one so wide she could barely see any hope of crossing it.
"You're different now," Kuraging said after a long silence, looking deeply at Gotoh.
The butler continued wiping the Infinite Handgun and said gently, "Am I?"
He turned his head and looked in the mirror.
Aside from his hair being darker and his muscle lines becoming tighter and firmer, there didn't seem to be much change.
Though...
the beard he had finally managed to grow seemed not only to have failed to grow longer during this "sleep," but had actually shortened instead.
Gotoh smiled.
"Perhaps."
Then, with a click, he pulled back the gun's slide. He aimed out the window at a figure rapidly approaching the butler villa.
"Yes, Young Master."
Bang.
He pulled the trigger.
Whoosh—
A Nen bullet spewed fire, pierced the air, brushed past Illumi's earlobe, and flew into a large tree behind him.
Before the boy could even turn around—
Boom!
A thunderous explosion rang out.
In one breath, the large tree was blasted into ash.
This was no longer a "Nen bullet."
It should be called a Nen cannon shell.
Just looking at that power...
Deep inside Kukuroo Mountain, beside the clear pool, Netero chuckled and slanted a glance at Silva.
"No worse than you."
Silva said nothing.
The man's tall body stood by the lake. In his sharp, hawk-like eyes, the image of the tree being swallowed by the skyward Nen bullet was reflected.
As his gaze shifted, he suddenly remembered something his father Zeno had once told him.
"That child Roy isn't only thinking about defeating you. He even wants Gotoh to defeat you."
At the time, Silva had thought it was nothing more than a ridiculous joke.
Now it seemed...
Roy had really thought that.
And he really had done it.
Silently, a suffocating sense of crisis and anxiety surged into Silva's heart, making him unable to stop rubbing his fists.
Forcing himself to stay calm, the man didn't even look at Netero.
"However strong Gotoh is, he's still a Zoldyck man. He's less troublesome than Beyond."
"That's right."
A gust of wind blew over, and a head of wild white hair appeared.
Zeno came limping over with his hands behind his back. He stood shoulder to shoulder with Silva, watching the explosion.
"As long as he's alive, he'll be a Zoldyck butler for one more day. That's not something a certain someone's son can compare to."
Netero: "..."
Why didn't the old man kick you to death?
The strongest human alive let his old face fall, several black lines appearing across his wrinkled forehead.
Like a sealed gourd, he said nothing, pretending he hadn't heard. Then he looked back toward the butler villa.
Behind the explosion, within the skyward Nen-light, a Nen needle suddenly shot out from the shadow of a tree, using the light as cover. It circled around Gotoh's line of sight and aimed straight at the back of his head.
Then came a crisp clang.
The moment Illumi leapt onto the window frame, he saw his surprise attack deflected.
Gotoh had wrapped his backhand in Ten and lightly knocked the needle aside.
En?
Illumi gave Gotoh a surprised look.
Before he had even arrived earlier, Gotoh had already captured his position and fired without hesitation. Then just now, he had countered and knocked aside the Nen needle.
The boy crouched on the window frame, carefully sensing the Nen fluctuations radiating from Gotoh's body.
The old Gotoh absolutely could not have done this.
Pop.
The needle Gotoh had deflected plunged straight into the wall.
The butler stood with his back to Kuraging and faced Illumi. He bowed.
"Young Master Illumi, please forgive my offense. The Young Master ordered me to leave you with one breath. Please understand."
"You? Leave me alive?"
Boom!
A perverse, cold, utterly emotionless Ren erupted.
At once, Kuraging felt a fierce malice wrapped in endless anger sweep toward her, like venomous snakes baring their fangs and lunging to bite.
She unconsciously stepped back twice, cold sweat pouring down all at once.
Caw—
Killing intent startled the birds into flight.
It was as if countless pitch-black birds screamed and scattered into the sky as Illumi's black hair whipped upward wildly.
Gotoh bore the brunt of that killing intent and did not move.
He simply gripped the Infinite Handgun and said gently to Kuraging, "Go back. This is not somewhere you can stay."
Then he stepped forward lightly.
A pure and gentle, yet unyieldingly firm and sharp Ren flashed with a faint red light. Like the long tail of a meteor, it condensed into a wall of aura in front of Kuraging, pulling her out of her terror.
The girl dazedly came back to herself. She looked deeply at Gotoh and Illumi, then turned and went downstairs without looking back, heading toward her own bedroom.
Gotoh was right.
This was absolutely not a battle she could involve herself in.
Earlier, when watching the Young Master and the Master fight, she had been too far away to fully feel it.
But now...
Kuraging, her high ponytail swaying, wisely went downstairs. Her two pale fists silently clenched, and she swore inwardly:
"One day, I'll catch up to them!"
Boom!
Ren clashed against Ren.
After Kuraging left, there seemed to be no more concerns.
Gotoh understood Illumi's anger. But the Young Master had given an order, so he could only silently apologize in his heart.
He raised his foot and stepped forward again.
Crack.
The floor began to crack outward from the point beneath his toes.