Whether Pairo's eyes would be useful, Ronin didn't know.
After all, what he needed now was to evolve his Mangekyō into the Eternal Mangekyō. In other words, once he completed that evolution, he would no longer have to worry about going blind from overusing his eyes.
Looked at that way, the upgrade didn't seem especially huge.
But what Ronin truly looked forward to was whether those evolved eyes could raise his Susanoo by another level or two.
Only then would he truly have a complete "Gundam" under his control.
During his earlier battle with Netero, he had already realized that Susanoo was the real key. As long as Susanoo existed, even if it was only responsible for defense, it could create countless opportunities for Ronin, who remained hidden inside.
At the same time, Susanoo's powerful defensive ability would trouble most Nen users.
After all, for ordinary people, even dreaming of breaking through Susanoo's defense would be pure delusion. Even a powerhouse like Chairman Netero couldn't shatter Susanoo's defense in one strike. Franklin, meanwhile, had only managed to blast it open by paying with his life.
How could Ronin possibly not place great hopes on such a powerful ability?
Aside from his eyes and Susanoo, the only other way Ronin could think of to improve himself was through developing his Enhancement-type Nen.
All this time, his Enhancement Nen development had been broad and comprehensive—strengthening his body as a whole. Even though he had once considered developing it toward healing, with the Hundred Healings Technique available to him, he had never expanded too deeply in that direction.
Because there simply hadn't been much need.
After all, even if he strengthened his healing ability to the limit, it still wouldn't be possible to reach the level of rebirth from a single drop of blood. In Ronin's view, the most it could probably achieve was regrowing severed limbs.
And if that was the limit, then the Hundred Healings Technique could more or less do the same.
So after witnessing Netero's extreme speed, Ronin became uncertain about exactly what he should strengthen.
Should he develop the ultimate in speed like Netero?
He did quite like the feeling of charging toward an enemy at insane speed.
But with Enhancement combined with Lightning Release Chakra Mode, his speed-focused development already seemed sufficient.
Then should he develop the ultimate in strength?
Ronin thought of Gon.
Adult Gon, created through vows and limitations, had unleashed offensive power pushed to the extreme. That charged-up burst of power was so overwhelming that it was impossible to see where its upper limit truly lay.
If Ronin wanted to take that path, there would be no real threshold or difficulty for him.
But he felt somewhat unwilling.
After all, that was an ability someone else had created. It was like how he had once loved using Big Bang Impact, but after mastering better methods of exerting force and combining them with taijutsu bursts, he no longer used pure Big Bang Impact.
If he really wanted to walk the same high-strength route as Gon, then what he needed to think about was how to make that explosive power properly work with his taijutsu.
Whether it was Tsunade's Monster Strength or the Eight Gates…
Ronin's brow twitched slightly.
What if he simply strengthened his healing ability, then paired that extreme healing with the Eight Gates?
Could a miracle be born where he could open the Gate of Death without dying?
No.
Ronin then thought of regeneration.
If severed limbs could regenerate, then could an eye sacrificed away also regrow?
If that was really possible, then by combining Izanagi with Enhancement-type healing and using the Eight Gates, could he kick once, trigger Izanagi to revive himself, and then use Enhancement-type healing to restore the blinded eye?
Even if Enhancement couldn't do it, there was still the cure-all herb on the Dark Continent, Greed Island's Breath of Archangel, and, if necessary, the unidentified creature. Surely there had to be some way to restore a blinded eye.
And besides, he had two eyes.
Spending one eye to open the Eighth Gate once seemed like a worthwhile trade.
The more Ronin thought about it, the more he felt there was nothing wrong with this line of thinking.
After going around in a circle, the old route of strengthening healing still seemed like the most cost-effective ability for him.
As for what the absolute limit of enhanced healing would look like, that was something he would have to explore step by step himself.
If necessary, he could even use vows and limitations to further strengthen and complete that healing ability, creating an ultimate healing technique.
His battle with Netero had pointed Ronin toward his future path.
If he had the chance to fight Netero again, Ronin would not use Susanoo. Instead, he would try opening the Eight Gates while combining them with the Sharingan to deal with Netero.
He just didn't know whether that extreme burst would allow him to push through the pressure of the Hundred-Type Guanyin and close in on Netero.
Still, there was no rush.
The next time they met, he would challenge Netero again.
He only hoped they wouldn't fall into Beyond's hands before then.
"Achoo!"
Netero, who was sitting in his room sipping tea, suddenly sneezed.
The scene of his battle with Ronin couldn't help surfacing in his mind.
If Ronin could strip away some of those flashy abilities and focus on Enhancement and taijutsu, then perhaps the battle experience would be pushed to its fullest. Still, having a mess of complicated abilities wasn't bad either. Fighting him always brought something fresh.
"Chairman, are you really just going to watch him stow away like this?" Beans hesitated for a long time before finally asking.
"I don't know whether Ronin will actually succeed in sneaking over," Netero said, his face full of anticipation. "But I do know that when I decided to leak this information to Ronin, that hidden fellow should start getting anxious."
The hidden fellow he spoke of was Beyond.
Ever since father and son made their agreement back then, the two had never met again. More than thirty years had passed in the blink of an eye.
But Netero knew that Beyond's ambition had never disappeared. He was accumulating strength, preparing to return to that vast world.
And besides, wasn't there someone in the Association who had been watching him on Beyond's behalf all this time?
Netero thought of Pariston.
That guy who was always making trouble for him and tripping him up.
How adorable.
If the Association lost Pariston, Netero felt that more than half his entertainment would disappear with him.
He just didn't know whether Pariston genuinely wanted to go to the Dark Continent too, or whether he had set his sights on Beyond's ambition and planned to pull off some shocking reversal halfway through.
Netero understood Pariston all too well.
He was a man with a truly wicked sense of humor—someone who loved crushing other people's dreams at the most critical moment.
Beans said no more.
But before leaving the room, Beans still made a decision.
He took out his phone and scrolled to a familiar number he had never once dialed.
After encrypting and editing a message, he sent it out.
The recipient's name consisted of only one word:
Ging.