Hunter x Hunter: Deathless Spider

[The Devoted Reader]

Synopsis

Aren wakes in Meteor City with bullet holes in his chest and a body that refuses to stay dead.

Around him are the children who will one day become the Phantom Troupe.
The world was meant to fear the Spiders.

Aren was never meant to become one.

Tags

action, adventure, animefanfiction, antihero, fanfiction, hunterxhunter, hxh, malereader, mature, overpoweredmc, phantomtroupe, reincarnation, ruthlessmc, transmigration

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

x

x

x

001 - The Undying

A pure white space, empty and unknown.

An indistinct figure stood in silence, gazing at the small sphere resting in its hand.

To the people of this world, Gaia had worn many names: god, creator, truth. It preferred something simpler: the planet's will.

The planet was dying.

Gaia had sensed the sickness long ago. Something like a virus had appeared somewhere deep within the world. Not a single strain, but a cluster of parasite-like things quietly gnawing away at the planet's life force.

Gaia wanted to root them out, but no matter how hard it searched, it could never find them.

Now, all it could do was pin its hopes on the sphere that had appeared at the same moment as those parasites.

At first, the object had seemed ordinary, noteworthy only because it had arrived alongside the sickness eating the world.

The longer Gaia studied it, the clearer it became that the sphere was anything but ordinary.

It could copy any shape. It could imitate all things. Given enough time, it might even become anything in the world.

And so, the planet's will released it into the world below. Perhaps this sphere would become the turning point the dying planet needed.

The moment it let go, the sphere began to fall.

But just as it was about to strike a small stone on the ground, the space around it twisted.

The distortion swallowed the sphere whole.

For the first time, Gaia betrayed an almost human flicker of surprise.

The next instant, it appeared at the place where space had warped.

There was nothing there.

For a long while, the planet's will said nothing.

...

Meteor City.

Its land area was roughly equal to that of the Lapet Republic.

For fifteen hundred years, the city had served as a dumping ground. Official records listed it as uninhabited territory, which meant that even if an infant was abandoned there, no national ID number or biological data had to be registered.

Anything could be thrown away there.

Garbage. Weapons. Corpses. Children.

Everything the world discarded, its people accepted.

A place like that bred dangerous people in unusual numbers. The residents survived by scavenging and recycling the waste others cast aside, while the underworld supplied them with heavy metals and weapons, drawing in those born and raised in violence.

"We reject no one, so take nothing from us."

Bloodshed was never rare there, whether the dead came from inside the city or beyond it.

At that moment, on one of the countless garbage heaps, a fight was already nearing its end.

"You Fanobi bastards! Are you trying to start a war with the Nostrade Family?"

A man in a plain black suit clutched the gunshot wound in his right shoulder and glared at another black-suited man standing across from him with a mocking smile.

"War?" the Fanobi leader said, bursting into laughter. "With an upstart little outfit like yours? What makes you think you get to use that word with us?"

His grin sharpened.

"A little family that only started making a name for itself a year or two ago, sneaking into Meteor City to hire muscle behind our backs. What, were you planning to challenge our place in Gambi Town?"

He raised one hand.

"Kill them."

The men behind him lifted their submachine guns and pulled the triggers without hesitation.

"Damn it!"

The Nostrade men had no chance to resist. They were outnumbered, outgunned, and had walked straight into a prepared ambush.

When the smoke cleared, they were all dead.

Before leaving, the Fanobi leader spat on the pile of bodies.

His family had ruled Gambi Town for sixty years. In that place, their word was law. Every local power had to fall in line.

And yet this upstart family had dared to come to Meteor City in secret and recruit muscle of its own.

If the Fanobi Family had not maintained a relationship with the city's Sixth Elder, and if that elder had not warned them immediately, the Nostrades might actually have brought those recruits back.

The Fanobi leader did not believe they could threaten his family's rule, not even if they succeeded.

But that was not the point.

In the underworld, violence was not the most important thing.

Reputation was.

Violence was only the tool used to protect it.

The gunmen had barely left when the space above the heap of corpses suddenly twisted.

Among the dead was a young man with pure white hair, his body riddled with bullets. A pale, illusory sphere emerged through the distortion and sank into his chest, rippling faintly as it disappeared.

He was one of the recruits the Nostrades had bought from the Third Elder.

Pain crashed through Aren Voss in waves, as if someone had stuffed him into a sack and beaten him until every bone ached.

A stench followed.

It was so foul it felt almost physical, like rotting rats sealed in a vat with sewage and left to ferment.

The smell hit him with unreasonable force.

If he could have pinched his nose shut, Aren would have done it immediately.

But he could not.

Right now, he could not move so much as a finger. He could not even open his eyes.

His mind was terrifyingly clear, yet his body refused to respond, as if he had woken trapped in a nightmare of sleep paralysis.

'What happened?'

'Wasn't I in a hotel?'

'Why do I feel like someone beat me half to death and threw me into a sewer?'

'Had the woman from last night been hiding someone after all?'

Aren had no idea why he was here. His last memory was of a hotel room, a woman he had spent the night with, and the cigarette he had smoked afterward on the balcony.

He had been a psychologist. Between his looks and his ability to read people with unsettling precision, his private life had always been a mess.

'No. She was single. I'm sure of it.'

'Unless one of the men around her found out and lost his mind?'

He had read people for a living. If she had been hiding something that obvious, he should have noticed.

Before he could think any further, a vast flood of memories surged into his mind.

It was too much.

In an instant, Aren's thoughts crashed to a halt, and he lost consciousness again.

As he lay there, something instinctive stirred inside his bloodstained, bullet-riddled body.

His flesh twisted, then began to knit itself back together. One by one, the bullets lodged inside him were forced out.

A moment later, every injury on his body had vanished.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

002 - Meteor City

"Move it! This place is ours now. Everybody else, get lost!"

The clash between the Nostrade and Fanobi families had made enough noise to draw scavengers from every corner of the surrounding waste. A pack of Meteor City hyenas had been waiting at the edge of the battlefield for the killing to end.

Once they were sure the Fanobi men had left, they rushed in to strip the Nostrade corpses.

Clothes, weapons, even bodies.

In Meteor City, everything had value.

Before the hyenas could get close, a rough voice barked from behind them.

The crowd froze.

Everyone who worked this part of the city knew that brute all too well.

One of the scavengers glanced at the feast of loot in front of him, unwilling to back down so easily. He turned toward the towering boy behind him and snapped, "Uvogin! You think you can swallow a prize this big by yourself?"

Uvogin bared his teeth in a savage grin.

"Hehahahaha. Got a problem with it? Then let's fight. Anyone who has a complaint can come at me together."

He lowered his stance and fixed his eyes on the speaker.

Behind him, the other two shifted as well.

The boy with the samurai topknot, a little shorter than Uvogin, rested one hand on the battered sword at his waist. Beside him, a girl with purplish-pink hair began winding steel thread through her fingers.

Killing intent rolled off the three of them, far too cold and practiced for children their age.

The air locked tight.

The hyena who had spoken first broke into a sweat. Greed had made him forget exactly what kind of trio he was facing.

Now that their attention was on him, reason returned in a hurry.

When he saw that nobody else planned to stand with him, his courage collapsed. He cursed under his breath and slowly backed away, keeping his eyes on Uvogin until he was clear.

The others followed. With no chance to fish in troubled waters, they withdrew one by one.

"Tch. Boring." Uvogin clicked his tongue.

Still, the haul in front of them was worth at least a week's usual scavenging. He had no real interest in chasing people down when there was loot to claim.

"Forget them," the swordsman said, clapping him on the shoulder. "This should feed the three of us for several days."

"Hahahaha. Then you can fight me later, Nobunaga." Uvogin hooked an arm around his neck.

"Fine by me. One black ration bar says I win."

Nobunaga twisted free, not backing down at all.

The pink-haired girl was clearly used to this. She only shook her head and walked toward the bodies to check for anything they might have missed.

"Hey, Machi! Wait for us."

It did not take long for the three of them to strip the Nostrade corpses of anything useful.

Mafia battles in Meteor City were not rare. Most ended the same way, unless luck left something unusual behind.

Weapons. Clothes. Corpses.

This time was no different. Aside from a phone and a small amount of Jenny, there was almost nothing worth taking.

"Machi, why are you staring at that body?" Uvogin asked after he and Nobunaga finished their search. "Hurry up. We can trade that phone for meat."

She stood over a white-haired boy in a bloodstained, ruined suit.

"He's alive," Machi said coolly.

Uvogin blinked. "Then he's lucky."

He did not think any deeper than that, but Nobunaga's expression sharpened.

"No. Look at his clothes. He was shot a lot, but his body doesn't have a mark on it."

Anyone raised in Meteor City learned the same rule: do not touch what you do not understand.

The trash hid treasure, but it hid dangers too. Radioactive material. Poison. Things that could kill you before you knew what you had found.

Normally, scavengers wore protective gear when they went through the piles. Today they had rushed out without any, chasing after news of a mafia battle.

Faced with something this strange, Nobunaga's instincts told him to leave at once.

"Let's go. Leave him."

He had just reached for Machi when she spoke again.

"No. My sixth sense says bringing him with us will help."

Uvogin and Nobunaga both stopped.

Machi was only eleven, but there was a reason she could stand beside monsters like them.

Her stitching was precise enough to close wounds quickly after a fight, and her sixth sense had saved them from danger again and again. At times, it felt almost supernatural.

They trusted that instinct without question.

After a moment of silence, Uvogin nodded first.

"If you say so, we'll take him."

He hoisted the white-haired boy over one shoulder.

Nobunaga opened his mouth, then closed it again without arguing.

...

"Ah!"

Aren woke with a violent jolt.

Cold sweat covered his forehead. He lifted a hand and wiped at it, still breathing hard.

The flood of memories that had crashed through his mind belonged to the body's original owner.

Like most of Meteor City's residents, that boy had been discarded by the world. He had grown up in the trash without knowing his parents, and even his name had been something chosen casually, more for convenience than meaning.

In that forgotten place, survival had been the only law.

Robbery. Theft. Murder. Poison.

If it could secure supplies, he had done it.

Over time, those methods had earned him a small reputation among the local hyenas. That was why the Third Elder had noticed him and traded him to the Nostrade Family in exchange for the promise of a legal identity outside Meteor City.

The memories were full of killing. Blood. Organs. The sensation of flesh tearing under his hands.

Worse, they were tangled with memories of strange food, foul smells, and textures Aren's modern mind could barely process.

He still had not recovered. His breaths came harsh and uneven.

At last, his stomach twisted too hard to ignore.

Just as he opened his mouth to vomit, a young, cold female voice came from the side.

"If you throw up in here, I'll kick you out."

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

003 - Machi's Trio

"If you throw up in here, I'll kick you out."

The sudden voice snapped Aren's stomach back under control.

His body moved before his mind caught up. He forced down the nausea and turned toward the sound, half raising his guard.

A girl of about eleven leaned against the doorway, watching him with cool eyes. Her hair was a familiar shade of purplish pink, and the hard calm on her young face made his thoughts stall.

Machi.

From his old world, Aren knew this place as Hunter x Hunter. He had realized that much while absorbing the body's memories, but knowing the world and waking up in front of a future Phantom Troupe member were very different things.

From the look of it, she was also the one who had brought him back.

Before he lost consciousness, his whole body had been burning with pain. The memories said he had been shot several times. Now he could sit up without so much as an ache.

"You look like you know me," Machi said.

She had trusted her sixth sense since childhood. She did not doubt it now.

"I've heard of you," Aren said after a beat. "You, Uvogin, and Nobunaga are famous even in my old district."

The body's memories gave him enough truth to work with. Machi and her two companions really did have a reputation.

She nodded, accepting the answer. If nothing else, it confirmed that the boy in front of her was from Meteor City, not the mafia.

"Did you save me?" Aren asked.

In the story he remembered, Machi had never been the type to rescue strangers out of simple kindness.

"No. You were already like that when I found you."

She studied him a moment longer before denying it.

'Was that what came with being thrown into this world?'

Aren frowned and flexed one hand. At this point, he still did not know that he had fused with the thing called the Undying.

His strength felt the same as it did in the memories. Whether anything else had changed would have to wait.

"I see. Either way, thanks for bringing me back." He gave her a small nod. "I haven't introduced myself. I'm Aren Voss."

Machi only glanced at him. She did not explain her sixth sense to someone she had just met.

Silence settled between them.

Before it could turn truly awkward, a booming laugh crashed through the doorway.

"Hahahaha! Machi, look what we traded for! Not just black ration bars. Two whole chickens!"

Uvogin burst inside, holding up the birds like trophies.

Then he noticed Aren was awake.

"Oh, you're up."

The heavy atmosphere broke at once, and Aren quietly let out a breath.

"Hello. I'm Aren Voss. Thank you for bringing me back."

"Ahahaha, good to meet you. I'm Uvogin. No need to thank me, though. Machi's the one who told me to carry you."

He waved the thanks away without the slightest awkwardness.

"Uvogin, you bastard!" another voice shouted from behind him. "You ran off with both chickens and left me to carry the whole crate of ration cakes!"

Nobunaga appeared behind him and kicked him through the doorway.

After stepping inside, he saw Aren sitting up. He was still wary, but his trust in Machi's instinct won out.

"Oh. You're awake..."

He did not get to finish.

Uvogin caught his balance and punched him flying.

"Nobunaga! You want a fight, don't you? Hahahaha. Good. Time for duel number three hundred seventy-six!"

Nobunaga scrambled up, furious. "Fine! Come on, you idiot!"

"Hahahaha, bring it!"

The two crashed into each other in a flurry of fists and kicks.

Aren's mouth twitched. He turned toward Machi. "Are they always this close?"

Machi rubbed her temple like she had a headache.

She was the youngest of the trio, but she clearly made most of their decisions. Uvogin and Nobunaga were Enhancer types through and through, and neither of them was built for subtle leadership.

Nobunaga was a little better, but one good provocation was enough to throw his brain out the window.

"Don't break the house," Machi said.

The fight was getting wider by the second.

"Relax. We won't break any- ah!"

The instant Nobunaga looked away to answer her, Uvogin's eyes gleamed.

"Opening spotted!"

He landed a shameless cheap shot from behind.

Nobunaga doubled over, trembling with rage and pain.

"Yes! That's two hundred five wins, seventy-eight draws, and ninety-three losses! Hahahaha. You're still no match for me!"

"That wasn't a win, you bastard," Nobunaga hissed. "That was an ambush."

Machi picked up the chickens Uvogin had tossed aside and put an end to the nonsense.

"Enough. Eat before they go bad."

Then she looked back at Aren. After a short pause, she said, "You can eat with us this time. We traded your companions' things for it anyway."

Food was precious in Meteor City. Meat even more so. Most residents could go an entire year without tasting any.

For Machi to share it with him was more generous than Aren had expected. He had already assumed he would be going hungry tonight.

"Thank you, Machi."

Given his looks, that smile usually had an effect.

On Machi, it did nothing.

After Machi's simple, rough cooking, the two chickens came out slightly scorched but edible.

There was no seasoning, no sauce, not even a proper marinade.

Natural flavor was one thing. This was something else.

Aren stared at the roast chicken and had no idea where to begin.

His previous life had not taught him hardship. He had been good-looking, well-off, and very satisfied with his comfortable modern life. He had never once wished to be thrown into another world.

Across from him, Uvogin and Nobunaga ate the chicken with black ration bars.

The cakes reminded Aren far too much of those protein blocks from an old dystopian film, the kind nobody wanted to know the ingredients of.

That image nearly brought his nausea back. Since he also felt no hunger at all, his appetite vanished completely.

Uvogin noticed. "Aren, why aren't you eating?"

"It's nothing. I just..."

Aren was about to say he was not hungry and would save it for later.

Then something inside his body stirred.

Following that instinct, he opened his right hand.

A medium-rare Kobe steak appeared in his palm.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

004 - Uvogin's Tears

The smell of the Kobe steak filled the room.

For a moment, all four of them froze.

"Aren... were you hiding food on you?" Uvogin blurted first. "No, that can't be right. I checked you before. You didn't have anything."

"No," Machi said calmly. "It appeared directly in his hand. He didn't take it out."

Nobunaga's eyes sharpened. "If he made it appear, is that like the strange powers the elders' bodyguards have?"

Aren knew what he meant.

Nen.

He had no idea how he had gained this ability, but he was sure he had not awakened Nen. If he had, he should have felt something.

For now, he had no good explanation.

"I don't know," he said. "I just felt like I could do it, so I did."

Uvogin's eyes lit up.

"Forget how for now. Can you make more?"

For once, the loudest person in the room had asked the most important question.

They did not need to know the source of Aren's power. Not immediately. What mattered was the result.

If he could keep making food, they would never have to worry about starving again.

In Meteor City, food was survival.

Nobunaga gave Uvogin a surprised look. "I didn't know you could ask smart questions."

Machi glanced at him. "Even fools get lucky sometimes."

Uvogin ignored both of them. "Aren, try it again."

"I... probably can."

Before he finished speaking, another steak appeared in his left hand.

Uvogin snatched it and bit straight into the meat.

Juice, tenderness, rich beef, sauce balanced so perfectly it felt unreal.

For Uvogin, who had spent his entire life in Meteor City, the taste hit like a miracle.

He had once believed Machi's roast chicken was the best food in the world.

Now that world shattered.

Tears ran down his face.

Even so, his mouth never stopped moving.

Nobunaga, who had known him longer than anyone, had never seen him like this. He grabbed Uvogin by the shoulders and shook him.

"Uvogin! Hey, what's wrong with you?"

Uvogin swallowed the last bite, drew in a huge breath, and roared, "That was incredible!"

The shout made Aren's ears ring. Nobunaga, standing right beside him, suffered even worse.

Only Machi escaped. The moment she saw Uvogin inhale, she covered her ears.

"Idiot!" Nobunaga slapped him over the head. "Why are you yelling?"

Uvogin did not care. He pointed at the others, practically glowing.

"Nobunaga, Machi, hurry up and try it. I'm telling you, it's so good you won't believe it."

"Can it really be that dramatic?" Nobunaga muttered.

He admitted the meat looked good, but Uvogin had cried over it. That seemed excessive.

"It is. Try it. Aren, give us a few more."

From the feeling he had just experienced, creating food did not seem to cost him anything.

Aren aimed his right hand at a plate and produced a dozen steaks in a neat stack.

Considering Uvogin's size, a few pieces would not be enough.

Uvogin grabbed one in each hand and looked at Nobunaga and Machi expectantly, like someone desperate for his friends to understand his discovery.

Under that stare, they each picked up a piece and tasted it.

The instant the beef touched their tongues, both of their eyes widened.

A warmth they had never known spread from the taste itself through their entire bodies.

Now they understood why Uvogin had cried.

It really was that good.

"Hahahaha! See? I told you I wasn't lying."

For a while, nobody spoke. They simply ate.

Even Machi, usually the coldest one in the room, lost some of her restraint.

In the end, she was still a child raised in a place where food was never guaranteed.

Watching her eat with such focus made something in Aren's chest soften.

As for Uvogin and Nobunaga, their size made sympathy a little harder to summon.

Machi seemed to sense his gaze. She looked up and narrowed her eyes, as if asking whether he had been thinking something rude.

Aren only smiled.

She stared at him for another moment, then surrendered to the steak in front of her.

'For all that ice, she's still young.'

Aren cut into his own steak. He still felt no hunger, but good food could soothe the mind even when the body did not need it.

After the day he had endured, he would take that comfort.

When the meal ended, Uvogin and Nobunaga sprawled shamelessly on the floor, hands on their swollen stomachs and faces full of bliss.

Machi was less obvious, but even she had eaten her fill.

Aren had created more than thirty steaks. He had eaten two. The other three had handled the rest.

By the end, he could only stare.

This really was the kind of world where a child with a bit of training could push a ton. The appetites here were just as unreasonable.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

005 - A Place to Sleep

"You really can always trust Machi," Uvogin said from the floor.

There was no arguing with that.

If Machi had not noticed Aren lying among the corpses and decided to bring him back, none of them would have eaten anything like that meal.

"She's amazing," Nobunaga agreed, still full and satisfied.

Uvogin laughed. "Funny. I wonder which coward said we shouldn't bring Aren back."

"Hey! That's called being cautious. I wasn't being a coward."

Being exposed in front of the person in question clearly embarrassed Nobunaga.

"Hahahaha. Sounded like cowardice to me."

Uvogin saw no problem with saying that in front of Aren.

After a moment, Nobunaga sat up and faced him properly.

"Aren, you're from Meteor City too, so you know how it is. We don't take risks with things we don't understand. I should apologize for that. Sorry."

Aren waved it off. "It's fine. I understand."

Pity and sympathy were poison in Meteor City.

Bringing a stranger home without knowing what he was could easily get everyone killed.

From what Uvogin and Nobunaga had said, Aren now understood why they had brought him back at all.

Machi's sixth sense.

She must have felt he would benefit them somehow.

Uvogin's expression grew unusually serious.

"Aren, I'm straightforward, so I'll just ask. How did you do it?"

Then he seemed to realize the question was too blunt and added, "You don't have to answer if you don't want to. I'm just curious."

Aren smiled helplessly. He really did not know. All he remembered was thinking about food from his previous life, feeling his body stir, and then the steak appearing in his hand.

"Honestly, I don't know. I never had this ability before. If I did, I wouldn't have been sold to the mafia by an elder."

Nobunaga came closer, rubbing his chin.

"Maybe almost dying awakened that Nen ability Chrollo talked about. You know, the strange powers used by the elders' bodyguards."

Aren's eyes sharpened.

'Chrollo?'

So Chrollo had already made contact with Uvogin and the others at this point.

Aren looked at them and estimated their age. The timing fit. The Phantom Troupe's formation should not be far off, so it was not strange that Chrollo had begun gathering people.

After hearing Nobunaga's theory, Uvogin looked convinced. If this was a superpower, then food appearing out of nowhere became easier to accept.

Aren knew better.

This was almost certainly not Nen. From what he remembered, awakening Nen came with a clear sensation. He had felt nothing of the sort.

Regeneration, object creation, the lack of hunger... either his body had changed in some unknown way, or it was tied to whatever had brought him here.

Food creation still did not fit neatly with either explanation.

It felt too specific to be that simple.

On top of that, he had not felt hunger since waking up. He had eaten two steaks without any sense of fullness either. After almost a full day without food, that should have been impossible.

Still, now was not the time to test everything. He needed privacy for that.

Beside him, Uvogin scratched his chin and muttered, "So almost dying can awaken powers..."

For Uvogin, that was a quiet voice. For everyone else, it was perfectly audible.

Aren stared at him in alarm.

That line of thinking could get a man killed for real.

Before Aren could decide how to stop him, Machi spoke.

"Don't be stupid, Uvogin. We've seen plenty of people almost die. How many of them awakened anything?"

She paused, then added, "If you really want to learn about those powers, we can talk to Chrollo later."

Nobunaga looked surprised. "Machi, weren't you the one who said we shouldn't get involved with Chrollo yet? Why change your mind?"

"Before, I saw no reason to join his group, so there was no need to approach him. But if he has information about these abilities, then he is after something. It won't hurt to hear him out."

Then she turned to Aren directly.

"What about you? Are you coming with us, or going back to your old district?"

Aren thought for a moment.

"You picked me up, Machi. I'll stay with you. I don't have anywhere else I want to go for now."

The body's original owner had been somewhat capable by local standards, but compared to Uvogin and Nobunaga, he was nowhere near enough.

Until Aren understood his own body, staying with them gave him the best chance of surviving.

Machi nodded.

"Then you'll handle our daily food. Uvogin, Nobunaga, and I will handle the rest of the supplies."

"Hahahaha. Leave your safety to me!"

Uvogin grinned broadly.

After eating Aren's steak, he could not imagine going back to black ration bars.

Aren did not refuse. He patted Uvogin's shoulder and smiled.

"I'm counting on you."

"Then that's it for tonight," Nobunaga said, relieved now that Aren had agreed to stay. "We need to get up early tomorrow and gather supplies for him."

Aren's food was too tempting. Nobody wanted him leaving.

Nobunaga started gathering the dishes, then suddenly remembered something.

"Right. Since you only arrived today, we don't have a house ready for you. For now, you'll have to squeeze in with someone."

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

006 - Machi's Frozen Heart

Their base was made up of three small houses built on a patch of ground they had cleared themselves. No other team lived nearby.

Most of Meteor City was buried beneath trash from around the world. If someone wanted a place to live, they had to clear the ground first.

Or take a cleared place from someone weaker.

From the beginning, Meteor City's purpose had been to let the world dispose of things it did not know how to handle.

That included people.

Some residents had offended the wrong people outside and fled here because they had nowhere else to go. Others had simply been abandoned.

The only area that could properly be called a residential district belonged to the elders, and even that existed because the council of elders had developed its own structure over generations.

When Uvogin's group ate, they built a small fire in front of the houses. Afterward, the scraps went straight onto the nearby garbage heap.

Strangely, the city's stench no longer hit Aren as hard as it had when he first woke. After absorbing the body's memories, his senses seemed to have adjusted back to what this place considered normal.

Most residents formed teams.

Strength in Meteor City did not only mean fighting ability. It also meant knowing how to survive.

A powerful fighter could still die from touching the wrong chemical, breathing the wrong gas, or handling radioactive waste without understanding what it was. Wounds were just as dangerous. In this polluted environment, a small injury could become an infection if nobody knew how to treat it.

Over time, people had naturally gathered into small groups and built places to live together.

Nobody slept well beside a rival team.

After all, conflict was eternal here.

The strong ate. The weak were eaten. Meteor City's rules were that simple.

Which meant there was no spare house for Aren.

He looked at Uvogin, then at Nobunaga.

Uvogin was huge. Nobunaga looked like the type to sleep beside a sword and kick in his dreams.

Machi, at least, kept her space under control.

After organizing his words, Aren said calmly, "From a practical standpoint, Machi's room is probably the only one with enough order to share. I'll stay there for now."

The reasoning was sound enough that the others accepted it.

Uvogin looked at himself and nodded. "Yeah, my bed probably doesn't have room for you."

Machi frowned. Then she remembered that Aren could create food out of nothing and finally agreed.

"If you try anything, I'll kick you out."

Growing up in Meteor City had taught her exactly what kind of people existed here. She had relied on her sixth sense more than once to avoid men who looked at children like prey.

Without that instinct, she might not have survived this long.

That was why she kept her heart frozen.

She had seen too much ugliness.

During dinner, she had sensed something unusual in Aren's gaze, but it was not the sickening feeling she knew too well. It was warmer than that.

His face helped too. No matter the world, appearance was still an advantage.

"I know, I know." Aren raised both hands to show he meant no harm.

Machi studied his face for another moment. Her instincts felt no malice from him, so she turned and headed for her house.

"Come on."

"See you tomorrow," Aren said to Uvogin and Nobunaga before following her.

The dishes, of course, were left to Nobunaga. Before Aren joined them, washing up had already been his job. Machi cooked. Uvogin was considered successful if he did not break the bowls.

"Yeah, tomorrow," Nobunaga said, carrying the dishes.

Then he looked at Uvogin, who was doing absolutely nothing, and kicked him.

"Help me carry these."

...

Only after entering Machi's house did Aren see how little she owned.

A simple cabinet. A mattress. A rough table. One chair.

That was everything.

Machi ignored him and sat down by the table. She pulled out the thin steel threads hidden in her clothes and began checking them one by one.

She had not fought today, but maintaining her weapon was clearly a habit. To her, those threads were the only thing that could protect her. Even if they had not been used, she made sure they were ready.

Since she had no intention of talking, Aren did not force the issue.

As a psychologist, he could see that her defenses were extremely high. That kind of vigilance did not form in a day or two. She had likely been guarding herself from the world for as long as she could remember.

A few friendly words would not melt that.

Too much warmth too quickly would only make her retreat.

Time would be the only way to reach her.

Aren watched her work under the candlelight. The steel thread flashed coldly between her fingers, and small cuts marked her young hands.

She must have suffered plenty to become this precise.

His expression softened despite himself.

He did not consider himself a particularly good person. Most of his choices were guided by preference, not morality.

But Machi's hard little silence, the way she handled dangerous wire as if it were the only trustworthy thing in the world, made him want to be careful with her.

'There it is again.'

Machi felt that strange gaze while checking her threads.

Her sixth sense found no malice. If anything, what reached her from Aren was a quiet fondness.

She stopped and glanced up.

When she looked over, he gave her a warm, restrained smile.

Machi did not ask what he was thinking. She simply returned to her work.

She did not understand the feeling.

But she did not hate it.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

007 - The Ability

"Aren, I'm going to sleep. What about you?"

Machi put her steel thread away and looked up at him.

"You sleep first. I spent half the day unconscious, so I'm not tired yet."

It was only half a joke.

Aren really did not feel sleepy. More importantly, he wanted to wait until Machi fell asleep so he could go outside and test what had happened to his body.

She nodded and did not pry.

When she reached the mattress, she drew an invisible line down the middle with one small hand.

"I sleep on this side. You sleep on the other. Cross the line and I kick you out."

"I won't."

Aren gave her a helpless look. Apparently, he looked that suspicious.

Machi said nothing else. She lay down, pulled a worn but clean blanket over herself, and closed her eyes.

Her breathing gradually slowed.

When Aren thought she had fallen asleep, he rose from the wall where he had been sitting. He softened his steps, opened the door, and went out to the empty clearing.

He did not know that the moment he left, Machi opened her eyes and watched his back disappear into the dark.

Outside, garbage heaps surrounded the base on all sides.

Aren stretched lightly.

Too much had happened in one day. He had been thrown into another world without warning, woken in a brutal place where people preyed on one another, and landed in one of its most dangerous corners.

Then his body had changed in ways he could not explain.

So far, those changes seemed beneficial, but as long as he did not understand them, he would not feel secure.

His thoughts were a mess.

"Whatever else is going on, the body comes first," Aren murmured, looking up at the dark sky.

With Meteor City's pollution, there was no hope of seeing a clean field of stars.

"First, regeneration."

He looked around at the surrounding piles of unknown waste. The idea of using anything from them to injure himself made his mouth twitch.

'No. Absolutely not.'

Instead, he lowered his gaze to his right hand. His nails were just long enough to scratch himself.

He pressed one nail into his left forearm and forced a shallow cut open, just deep enough to draw blood.

This was only a test. If he was wrong, there was no need to make it worse.

The wound vanished almost as soon as it appeared.

Even the pain disappeared with it.

If not for the trace of blood under his nail, he might have thought he imagined it.

"That speed is beyond what I expected."

Shock flashed through his eyes. At that rate, his regeneration might be stronger than Wolverine's.

"Too small. I still can't judge much from that."

His eyes hardened.

Aren dug his nails into his left arm again, this time dragging a long line from elbow toward wrist.

"Hiss..."

Pain forced a breath out of him. With no tool and no one else to help, testing self-healing meant being ruthless with himself.

The result was worth it.

In less than a second, the flesh shifted and closed. The entire wound vanished.

Aren stared at his arm, then turned it over again and again, excitement rising in his chest.

This level of healing was absolutely enough to become one of his greatest survival advantages in Hunter x Hunter.

Next came the food.

He turned his right hand over, and another juicy Kobe steak appeared in his palm.

Aren stared at it for a long while, still unable to understand why it had to be steak.

He had been imagining braised pork belly.

After several attempts, the result remained steak.

"Why?"

He replayed the first moment in his mind.

"Was it that instinctive stirring?"

The first time, that sensation had appeared, and then he had simply known he could make the steak real.

This was where psychology helped.

Aren guided himself into a light self-hypnotic state and recreated the feeling from earlier: watching Uvogin and the others eat black ration bars, remembering that disgusting image from his old world, feeling revulsion rise in his body.

Then he tied that disgust to a strong desire for braised pork belly.

The stirring returned.

Following the instinct, he opened his hand.

A thick slab of braised pork belly appeared.

Aren's mouth curved.

"Success. As expected of me."

If creation was tied to that stirring, and the stirring came from physical rejection and desire, then perhaps food was not the limit.

He sat cross-legged on the ground and began thinking.

His gaze fell on the arm he had just injured.

"If rejection is part of it, then maybe..."

He acted as soon as the idea formed.

The pain in his arm had happened only moments ago, so it was easy to reconstruct. This time, however, he changed the image in his mind. Instead of nails, he imagined the cut being made by a kitchen knife.

The sharp imagined pain made his body stir again.

Something began forming in his hand.

Aren grabbed the handle on instinct.

Solid wood pressed against his palm.

His eyes widened.

It had actually worked.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

008 - Why Scavenge Anymore?

Aren stared at the kitchen knife in his hand.

The edge caught what little light there was and flashed coldly.

He had only meant to try. He had not expected it to work.

"If a knife works, then what about a gun...?"

Without wasting time, he pushed himself into self-hypnosis again. This time, he drew on the body's memories of being shot.

The next moment, a black handgun appeared in his hand.

Before he could feel pleased, Aren noticed the problem.

It was only shaped like a gun.

In reality, it was a gun-shaped lump of metal.

The failure did not disappoint him. He tossed it into the garbage behind him and rubbed his chin.

"So that's the limit. I don't understand the structure, and I've never handled one before. I can picture the outside, but not the mechanism."

It was like saying a desperate person could do anything.

Except a math problem.

Aren brushed dust from his pants and stood, satisfied.

That was enough testing for now.

Regeneration and object creation. Either one would be valuable. Together, they gave him real capital in this world.

As he dusted himself off, he finally noticed the bullet-riddled suit hanging off his body.

"Right. I need new clothes."

He closed his eyes and focused on how uncomfortable the ruined suit felt against his skin.

A moment later, a set of cotton sleepwear and a clean black suit appeared in his hands.

"Convenient."

After changing into the sleepwear, he carried the suit back toward the house.

Now that he had tested his abilities, his tension eased for the first time since waking up. He still did not know where those powers came from, but for now he would treat them as whatever had come with his arrival in this world.

"It's late, though. Why am I still not sleepy?"

His biological clock felt strange, but Aren did not dwell on it. Maybe he really had been unconscious too long.

And not feeling sleepy did not mean he could not sleep. Sleep was not only physical recovery. It was a way for the mind to loosen its grip.

Inside, Machi seemed to be asleep.

Aren moved carefully, pulled the blanket back over her, and said softly, "Good night."

Then he lay down on his side of the mattress and closed his eyes.

After a full day of fear and confusion, the sudden relief dragged him into sleep quickly.

What he did not know was that Machi had been awake from the moment he entered.

She had only stayed still after confirming it was him.

When Aren reached toward the blanket, every muscle in her body tightened. Steel thread was already hidden in her hands. If he made one wrong move, she would cut him down at once.

If possible, she did not want to attack him.

His ability to create food was something all of Meteor City would dream of having. More than that, her sixth sense had given no warning.

So she watched.

And all he did was cover her with the blanket and say good night.

Machi could not understand it.

No one in her world did things like that for free.

Her mind had no answer, but her senses understood something else: warmth. A kind she had never felt before.

In the end, Machi was still eleven. In another world, a child her age would be leaning into a parent's arms, not checking steel wire before sleep.

This world had frozen her instead.

After she felt Aren fall asleep, Machi opened her eyes and looked at his sleeping face with a complicated expression.

Sometimes people were not that difficult.

Sometimes, one small act at the right moment was enough to reach someone who had never been given much.

Somewhere deep inside her, something began to crack.

...

"Aren! Aren! Wake up!"

A rough shout dragged him out of sleep.

He did not need to open his eyes to know it was Uvogin. A voice that loud was wasted on ordinary conversation.

After a brief moment of fog, his mind cleared.

Machi was already gone from the mattress. She had probably gone outside.

"Uvogin? Are we gathering supplies?"

Aren rubbed his eyes as he sat up.

"Yeah. Nobunaga and I got you protective gear, so you can pick out what you need yourself."

Uvogin handed him a yellow-brown protective suit.

"Thanks."

Aren accepted it, then looked at the patched, filthy thing and felt his eye twitch.

He doubted it could block radiation at all.

He did not put it on. Instead, he studied the material for a moment.

"Actually, I tested my ability last night. Food isn't the only thing I can create. Most supplies should work too. Protective gear included."

He closed his eyes for a moment.

A brand-new protective suit appeared in his hands.

Uvogin's eyes went wide.

"Holy-"

For once, even he was too startled to say anything else.

"Aren, that ability is ridiculous. Wait here. I'm getting Machi and Nobunaga."

He threw the words over his shoulder and ran out.

Soon, he returned with both of them.

"Aren, is it true?" Nobunaga asked. "Uvogin said you can make clothes too."

Then he noticed what Aren was wearing: clean sleepwear instead of the cheap, ruined suit from yesterday.

Machi's voice came from behind him.

"I noticed his clothes had changed this morning. At first, I thought he had found something outside last night. It seems his ability is larger than we thought."

"Not only clothes," Aren said. "As long as the structure isn't too complex, I should be able to create most things."

As he spoke, a sofa appeared.

Then a table.

Then a proper double bed.

One by one, clean modern objects appeared in the clearing as if he were performing a magic trick.

Machi, Uvogin, and Nobunaga slowly froze.

Their mouths opened without them realizing it.

Aren stopped and enjoyed the rare sight of Machi losing control of her expression.

Since he met her, she had worn almost the same cool look the entire time. Right now, she finally looked like someone her age.

The same thought rose in all three minds.

With Aren here, scavenging trash suddenly seemed absurd.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

009 - Strawberry Cake for Machi

Aren had chosen to tell them about his ability after thinking it through.

First, he was not someone who enjoyed hardship.

Machi had clearly done her best to keep her house clean, but the place itself was still bare. No amount of tidying could turn a hard mattress and a rough little table into the standard of living Aren wanted.

The previous night had proven that well enough. By morning, his back ached from the mattress.

That was normal for Meteor City. No matter how much they traded or stole, the living conditions here would never reach what he considered acceptable.

If he wanted to improve that life with his ability, he could not hide it for long. Uvogin, Nobunaga, and Machi were not fools. Modern furniture and clean supplies could not simply appear in this place without raising questions.

The only way to hide everything would be to leave the team and live alone.

That was not realistic either.

Aren knew what Machi, Uvogin, and Nobunaga would become. Walking away from people who would become core members of the Phantom Troupe would be foolish. More importantly, he was not confident he could protect himself yet.

According to the body's memories, its original owner had survived through tricks, ambushes, and a bit of reputation. In a direct fight, Aren might not even beat Machi, much less Uvogin or Nobunaga.

His regeneration could keep him alive, but that did not mean he could win.

Someone could still capture him.

If enemies discovered his healing ability, he might become a living source of spare parts. The thought made him cold. In that situation, regeneration would be a curse.

So leaving alone was out.

If he could not leave and could not tolerate the current conditions, honesty was the only path.

On the other hand, Aren had read enough about these three to understand them. After spending a day with them, he trusted that impression even more.

Once they accepted someone as a companion, they did not sell that person out.

Uvogin had endured torture from Kurapika in the future Aren remembered without betraying the Troupe. Nobunaga was similar, even confronting Feitan for Gon's sake after deciding he liked the boy. Machi valued the Troupe more than her own life.

They were violent, dangerous, and not remotely good in a normal sense.

But as companions, they could be trusted.

As for whether they had already started to see Aren that way, he trusted his professional judgment.

Over the next few days, the entire base changed.

Under Aren's ability, modern conveniences appeared one after another.

Through repeated tests, he also learned more about object creation.

It was hard to say whether the ability followed material rules or mental ones.

Anything he had personally touched before, he could recreate. He did not need to understand its mechanism. As long as he had contact with it in memory and could create enough desire for it, the object would appear.

If it were purely mental, real contact should not matter.

If it were purely physical, understanding the structure should.

It was strange either way.

For now, the rules remained maddeningly unclear.

Their quality of life had finally reached a level Aren could accept.

The only pity was that he no longer had an excuse to share Machi's room.

"Ahh. That's good!"

Uvogin pulled a cold can of beer from the refrigerator, dropped onto the soft sofa, and emptied it in one breath.

He could not read the strange writing on the can, but the taste was excellent.

"Uvogin, move your foot!"

He had accidentally bumped Nobunaga, who was cleaning the katana Aren had created for him.

Across from them, Aren and Machi sat on another sofa. He had just produced a slice of strawberry cake and offered it to her.

He had not expected someone as cool as Machi to like sweets this much.

She accepted the plate naturally, which showed this was no longer the first time.

"Aren," Uvogin said, tossing the empty can into a trash bin behind him, "Allen's group has been getting restless. I heard they're planning to join up with Cullen and hit our base. What do you think?"

A cruel light flickered in his eyes.

As Aren created more and more supplies, his influence in the team had grown. People who ate his food and used his things naturally began listening to him, whether they meant to or not.

Besides, Machi had been the one making most decisions before because Uvogin and Nobunaga were not suited to leadership.

Machi herself did not seem attached to the role. If anything, the girl who had grown up without security seemed more willing than anyone to let someone reliable shoulder that pressure.

When Uvogin asked, Nobunaga stopped wiping his sword. Machi set down her spoon.

All three looked at Aren.

The message was obvious: you decide.

Aren's mouth curved.

"If Allen's people can't behave, bury them. Let's see how restless they are underground."

Their base had changed too much to hide. The nearby teams had watched it become something like a paradise. Even fear of Uvogin and Nobunaga could not suppress greed forever.

Allen led the largest of those groups, with thirty or forty hyenas under him. None had awakened Nen. Against Uvogin and Nobunaga, they were not a serious threat.

"If Cullen's people get ideas afterward, bury them too."

Uvogin trembled with excitement. The bloodthirst in his eyes deepened.

He sprang up from the sofa and rushed for the door.

He had clearly been holding himself back for too long.

Aren sighed and looked at Nobunaga, who was staring at him like a man watching someone else leave for a banquet.

"Go on. Test your new sword."

Nobunaga brightened at once.

"Good. I'm going now."

Ever since receiving the katana Aren had created, he had wanted to cut someone with it.

"Uvogin! Wait for me. Don't take all of them yourself!"

Once Aren had arranged things, Machi picked up her spoon again and returned to her cake.

Aren leaned back, watching the guarded girl quietly enjoy the sweetness as if it had become part of everyday life.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

010 - Call Me Boss

Machi suddenly stopped eating her strawberry cake.

Aren noticed at once.

"What is it?"

"A bad feeling."

Her brows drew together. A moment ago, unease had struck her without warning. She knew the sensation. Her sixth sense was warning her.

Aren's eyes narrowed.

"Uvogin and Nobunaga are in danger?"

Machi shook her head.

"No. We are."

Before she could finish, a hoarse, arrogant voice came from outside.

"Gehahahaha! Machi, and you pretty boy inside, get out here! Uvogin and Nobunaga aren't around this time. Who's going to help you now?"

Aren immediately looked at the monitor.

A malformed, one-armed man stood outside with nearly twenty underlings behind him, grinning like he had already won.

"Oss." Machi stiffened. "Why is he here? He tried to sneak out of Meteor City and got hunted by the elders. How did he survive?"

Oss had once been the strongest local fighter after Uvogin's trio. With a gang under him, he had clashed with them more than once without being completely crushed.

Not long ago, he had grown tired of life in Meteor City. Since he could not get permission from the elders to leave, he tried to slip into the outside world in secret.

He failed.

The elders' bodyguards had hunted him down.

Machi had assumed he was dead. People chased by the elders rarely survived.

The gap between Nen users and ordinary people was that large.

Yet Oss was alive. He had lost an arm, but his life remained.

"Why would he dare come here?" Machi said. "Even if Uvogin and Nobunaga are away, all we need to do is hold out until they return. Then he loses."

She could not understand his confidence.

But the warning from her sixth sense was too clear. The situation could not be as simple as it looked.

"If you know what's good for you, come out," Oss shouted. "I don't want to ruin such a perfect place. Walk out on your own and I'll give you a clean death."

His greedy eyes crawled over the houses.

White walls. Proper stairs. Wooden railings. Clean rooms that did not belong anywhere in Meteor City.

This was how people were meant to live.

This was the kind of place worthy of him.

His underlings stared as well, restless with envy.

"Damn, this place is perfect."

"Boss Oss is amazing. I'd give ten years of my life to live here."

"Look at those walls. And those stairs. Are those wooden handrails?"

Their voices piled over one another.

Aren stood.

"Machi, stay here. I'll go meet them."

He did not want to fight before learning Nen unless he had no other choice. That did not mean he would hide after someone stepped onto his doorstep.

Aren considered himself weak, but with high-speed regeneration and object creation, he was confident he could last until Uvogin and Nobunaga returned.

"I'm going with you."

Machi stood without hesitation.

"Machi, you..."

Aren stopped halfway through the sentence when he saw the look in her eyes.

For someone raised in Meteor City, being told to hide behind him was not protection. It was dismissal.

If she could not stand with the team when enemies came, then she was dead weight.

And Meteor City teams did not keep dead weight.

The original Troupe would be the same. Even non-frontline members fought when a battle came.

That was the rule of people born here.

Oss might be too much for her, but his underlings were not.

At the very least, she could keep them from surrounding Aren.

He nodded.

"All right. Oss is mine. The small fry are yours."

Machi said nothing. She only nodded and followed him outside.

Oss grinned when they came out.

"Gehahahaha. Smart choice. Don't worry. I keep my word. I'll make it quick."

Then he saw Machi behind Aren, and his eyes lit up.

"Machi, how about coming to my side? Do that and I promise you won't die. You can keep living in this perfect place too. You'll just be sharing my room. What do you say? Gehahahaha."

His underlings burst into laughter.

"Yeah, come over here, Machi. Boss Oss will take good care of you."

A throwing knife answered them.

Oss's expression changed. He tilted his head and avoided it.

The underling behind him was not so lucky.

The blade sank straight into the man's forehead. Momentum carried him backward and dropped him heavily onto the ground.

Blood spread beneath him while the ugly smile remained frozen on his face.

Aren pinched his nose lightly.

"Has anyone ever told you your mouth stinks? Please stop talking. I might actually die from the smell."

Oss ignored the provocation.

He had survived in Meteor City alone, built a gang, and even escaped a Nen user's pursuit. He was not as brainless as he looked.

This entire move had been planned.

He had deliberately spread the rumor that Allen intended to join forces with Cullen to attack Uvogin's base. The goal was to lure the fighters out.

If all four left, he would sneak into the base and ambush them when they returned.

If only Uvogin or Nobunaga left, he would intercept the one alone, kill him first, then attack the base.

If both Uvogin and Nobunaga left together, he would do exactly this: capture Machi and Aren, the two members he believed had little combat power, and use them as leverage.

He had fought Uvogin's group often enough to know those two valued their companions.

With his hidden trump card, Oss believed he could finish them.

But now something felt wrong.

He had not seen where Aren's throwing knife came from.

The loose house clothes Aren wore did not look like they could hide weapons.

After being hunted by Nen users, Oss knew very well that people with strange powers existed. That was enough to make alarm bells ring in his head.

For a moment, he considered retreating.

Then he looked at the perfect houses behind Aren, and greed forced him to stay.

"Who are you?" Oss asked, his voice colder now. "I've never heard of someone like you around here."

He had known Uvogin's trio had become a group of four, but he had assumed Aren was nothing but a pretty face. None of the nearby forces had recognized him, so Oss had judged him to be some lucky dead weight Uvogin had taken in on a whim.

Now he looked very much like a possible ability user.

Aren watched the caution settle over Oss's face.

For someone who looked like a brute, the man was surprisingly careful.

Aren suddenly felt like playing along.

"Call me Boss," he said. "If that's too hard to remember, 'sir' works too."

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

011 - Baptism

"Call me Boss."

The words fell into the silence like a slap.

For an instant, even the hyenas under Oss froze. Then the meaning settled in, and several of them burst out laughing.

Machi's eyelid twitched.

She turned her face aside, as if she had not heard him at all, but the corner of her mouth moved before she could stop it.

Oss did not laugh.

He stared at Aren, trying to drag the name out of his memory. Meteor City had many monsters. Some belonged to the elders. Some belonged to no one. A young man who could stay calm after being surrounded by dozens of armed men should not be unknown.

But no matter how he searched, Oss found nothing.

That made him even greedier.

The house behind Aren was too clean. Too solid. It had food, weapons, and supplies that did not belong in a trash heap. Whatever trick this white-haired pretty boy had used to build it, Oss wanted it.

And if the boy had a hidden weapon, then taking his head first was the safest answer.

"What are you staring at?" Oss barked. "Kill him! Whoever cuts down this little Boss gets the vice-leader position."

The promise lit the hyenas on fire.

A dirty knife rose. A broken pipe scraped against concrete. Someone licked his lips and glanced toward Machi.

"And after Boss Oss catches that girl, maybe he'll let us have a turn."

Laughter spread through the crowd.

Machi's eyes went cold.

Aren's smile thinned.

"That mouth of yours," he said, "is going to cost you."

The first hyena charged.

A blade flashed toward Aren's throat.

Aren raised one hand.

A throwing knife appeared between his fingers and shot out before the attacker could take his second step. It punched through the man's eye socket and buried itself deep enough that the handle struck bone.

The body dropped.

A second knife appeared.

Then a third.

Aren did not rush forward. He stood where he was, white clothes stained with dust and old blood, and turned himself into a living turret.

Knife after knife snapped into existence and flew.

The old owner of this body had survived in Meteor City by learning every ugly trick a weak person could use. He had not been strong. He had not been brave. But he had known how to throw a blade into a throat, an eye, a wrist, or the soft spot beneath the ribs.

Aren had inherited that muscle memory.

With object creation feeding him an endless supply of knives, the result was brutal.

Three men fell in the first breath.

Five more screamed and staggered back in the second.

At the same time, Machi moved.

Steel threads slipped from her fingers, almost invisible under the weak light. She did not fight like Uvogin. She did not charge like Nobunaga. She cut angles, stepped through gaps, and let her enemies tear themselves apart on lines they never saw.

A wrist opened.

A knee gave way.

A throat split before its owner understood what had touched him.

The two of them were outnumbered, but the hyenas had made one mistake.

They had thought numbers mattered.

Oss watched from behind the crowd, and the greedy light in his eyes changed.

'Those knives...'

They were not hidden on Aren's body. They were appearing from nowhere.

An ability user.

No, not just an ability user. A boy who could create weapons out of thin air, defend a base filled with supplies, and stand beside that sharp little girl without fear.

Oss's breathing grew heavier.

He had awakened Nen by surviving a bodyguard's attack. That baptism had taken his left arm and almost taken his life, but it had also lifted him above the trash. Above these hyenas. Above the ordinary dead who rotted in Meteor City's piles.

With Nen, he had survived men who should have crushed him.

With this boy's ability, he could do more than survive.

He could climb.

"Move," Oss growled.

The hyenas around him hesitated.

"I said move!"

They scattered.

Oss rushed forward.

He did not aim for Aren.

He aimed for Machi.

Machi noticed him at once. Her threads snapped toward his path, but Oss's body blurred. Aura wrapped around his legs and drove him forward with a speed she had never faced before.

'Too fast.'

The thought was cold and clear.

She could not dodge.

The dagger in Oss's remaining hand came low, angled for her abdomen. It was not a clean killing stroke. It was the kind of wound meant to fold a person in half and leave them alive enough to be used.

In that fragment of time, memory flashed through Machi's mind.

A blanket drawn over her shoulders.

"Good night."

New clothes.

A proper bed.

Hot food.

A sweet cake placed in front of her like something from another world.

And Aren, who had said he wanted them to keep walking together.

'If I could...'

Her fingers tightened around the steel thread.

'I wanted to keep walking with him.'

The dagger stabbed forward.

Flesh tore.

But it was not Machi's.

Aren had crossed the distance before she could blink. He stood between them, Oss's dagger buried deep in his abdomen, blood spreading through the white fabric.

Machi's eyes widened.

Aren looked back at her over his shoulder.

His face was pale, but his voice was steady.

"Machi," he said, "we'll keep walking together."

For a heartbeat, she could not breathe.

Then blood spilled down his side.

"Aren!"

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[The Devoted Reader]

012 - Overflowing Life Energy

Aren had been watching Oss from the start.

The man was crude, loud, and disgusting, but he was not stupid. A coward who survived in Meteor City long enough to lead a pack usually had one true talent: knowing when to stab someone who was looking somewhere else.

The moment Oss pulled the dagger, Aren had already moved toward Machi.

He still arrived half a breath late.

The blade tore into his abdomen.

Pain exploded through him. Hot blood soaked his clothes and ran between his fingers. The wound was deeper than anything he had taken since waking in this world.

Machi caught him from behind.

"Aren!"

Her voice cracked.

She pressed both hands against the wound, as if she could hold his life inside by force. Blood slipped through her fingers anyway.

"Don't move. Don't move, I'll..."

She did not know what she would do.

Oss stared for one stunned second, then laughed.

"Gehahahaha! You idiot. You actually took it for her."

His eyes slid toward Machi. The panic on her face made his grin stretch wider.

If Aren died here, she would be easy to control. A hostage. A prize. Maybe even the reward he had been saving for later.

Oss licked blood from the corner of his mouth.

"You should have stayed out of the way, Boss."

Aren did not answer.

Something was happening inside him.

Oss's dagger had not been an ordinary attack. Aura had ridden the blade into Aren's body and smashed open the dormant aura nodes inside him.

That was baptism.

A Nen user forcing someone else's aura nodes open through violence.

For an ordinary person, it was a gamble between awakening and death.

For Aren, it became something else.

Life energy surged out of him.

It rose like steam from a boiling sea.

Five meters. Six. Higher.

The air around Aren warped beneath the pressure. Dust scattered from the ground. The weaker hyenas who were still alive stumbled back with white faces.

Aura was life energy.

Nen was the technique used to control it, to shape it into defense, offense, and abilities that ordinary people could never understand.

Aren had fused with the Undying.

His reservoir of life force was nearly endless.

That did not mean his output was infinite. A lake could be vast while the mouth of the river remained narrow. His body still had limits on how much power could pour out at once.

But even that limited opening was enough to drown the area in aura.

The wound in his abdomen stopped bleeding.

Torn flesh tightened. Muscle drew itself together. Skin crawled over the gash and sealed as if time had been pulled backward across his body.

Machi felt it happen beneath her hands.

Her breathing stopped.

"Aren...?"

Oss's laughter died.

The aura around Aren was visible even to him. It was too dense, too heavy, too alive.

"What the hell are you?"

Aren lowered his gaze.

Fragments of memory rose from his old life. Wing teaching Gon and Killua. The idea of aura flowing from the body, then being held close. The first lesson after awakening.

Ten.

Do not let the aura spill away.

Hold it around the body.

Let it circulate.

Wrap yourself in your own life energy.

Aren closed his eyes for one breath.

The raging aura did not vanish. It folded inward.

A wall formed around him, soft and weightless, yet thick enough to feel like invisible clothing. The leaking storm settled into a steady layer clinging to his skin.

Ten.

He had done it.

More aura continued to rise from the depths of his body, pressing against the layer. His life force did not stop growing. It wanted to overflow. It wanted to expand.

But now, at least, it had a shape.

Aren opened his eyes.

The air around him sank.

Oss took a step back.

Aren smiled.

"Oss," he said softly, "how should I thank you?"

The aura around him darkened.

Malice spread outward in a slow, suffocating wave.

Machi stood behind him, hands still stained with his blood, and watched the world around Aren change.

x

x

x

Support me / read ahead: https://www.patreon.com/cw/TheDevotedReader

 

[Bibby01]

Moarrrrr