Before he knew it, time had slipped into October 1995. A light snow suddenly fell on this bustling city, dusting the towering Heavens Arena in white.
Jaku fluttered its feathers on the hotel roof and spread its wings happily.
Not long after, a black-haired girl wearing glasses emerged from the crowd at the entrance of a bustling breakfast shop. Jaku quietly flew over to follow her.
Shizuku carried two large bags of breakfast and walked along the busy street. As soon as she turned the corner, the two large bags disappeared from her hands. She walked back to the rented apartment with an indifferent expression.
The apartment she'd rented with Liam was on the fourth floor.
As soon as she reached the base of the building, Shizuku felt she'd stepped into a realm of subtle aura.
This was Liam's En.
Shizuku looked up. The apartment on the fourth floor was about 20 meters from the ground.
As she climbed the stairs, she remained covered by Liam's En the entire time. The feeling of being watched by some kind of eyes was something a strong Nen user like Shizuku couldn't ignore.
Even the little gray bird flying nearby seemed sensitive to the En and chirped nervously.
Click. Shizuku walked up to the fourth floor. When she opened the door and entered, the aura in her hand transformed into Blinky. While sucking away the snowflakes from herself and Jaku, she also released the two large bags of breakfast.
Each box of breakfast was still hot, just like when it had been packed from the store.
The En in the room dissipated like wind. The last place it shrank to was the bedroom.
The bedroom door opened. Liam, wearing only a tank top and boxer in the cold weather, walked out. "Why two portions?"
"Eat together." Shizuku took out the two large bags of breakfast.
"Then let's eat!" Liam nodded, grabbed a pair of chopsticks, and sat on the same side as Shizuku to start eating.
Hot breakfast. Warm girl.
Day after day of practice. Strength gradually growing.
Over the past two or three months, Liam hadn't put all his energy into accumulating aura. But half a month ago, his total aura had finally exceeded the 20,000 mark.
As of today, his total aura was about 22,000!
Compared to the Chimera Ant arc in the manga, it was a little higher than Gon's aura after being trained twice by Bisky.
If he used all 22,000 aura throughout the entire process via Ken practice, it would take a full 6 hours and 6 minutes.
Because of this, Liam could only practice complete Ken once a day at most.
How many 6-hour blocks could there be in a day?
Eating, drinking, bathroom breaks also took time. The basic Nen skills of Ten, Zetsu, Ren, and Hatsu also required daily practice. The derived techniques of Gyo, Ryu, Ko, and Shu needed work. And En? Which one didn't require diligent practice? As the saying went, practice makes perfect. The foundation of aura capacity was important, but these basic skills to bring out the strength of that aura couldn't be neglected.
So at this stage, Liam's aura growth had begun to slow down.
This was roughly similar to the stage Wing had mentioned at the beginning.
For those with gifted Nen abilities, aura growth in the initial stage would be very smooth.
The amount of aura increased approximately every 10,000 units, which was the length of time to maintain Ken. Every 3 hours was equivalent to a step or threshold.
No matter how talented Liam was, at this stage, his growth in strength wasn't as significant as it had been initially.
In other words, Liam's current level had reached a pretty good standard.
With a Nen capacity of 20,000 aura, anyone with Nen ability in the world would definitely be formidable.
His proficiency and solidity in basic skills like Ten, Hatsu, Gyo, and Ko were at a level that even Netero, the President of the Hunter Association, would look at with admiration.
It would be strange if such comprehensive strength could continue surging every three days and skyrocketing every five days like before.
Liam could feel that if he wanted to continue making progress, especially if he wanted to keep improving his total aura, the ordinary Ken practice method might not be enough.
His practice method could no longer keep up with the version of his own strength.
Nen ability existed in the heart. If Liam himself had begun doubting the efficiency of Ken practice at this stage, there was no need to pretend to persist. He needed to find another way.
Morel always had at least 70,000 aura. He wondered if a master like him had ever been in a stage like this.
How did they get through it?
Was there a more efficient practice method?
70,000 aura, all Ken once, would take almost 19 and a half hours!
You couldn't just stand there all day without sleeping, eating, or working, and still be exhausted, right? Who could bear that? And if you couldn't practice every day, slacking off constantly and only coming here occasionally, how much could you gain from practice?
No matter how he looked at it, it was absolutely impossible for a Nen master at Morel's level to simply accumulate aura using Liam's previous practice method.
Of course, it was also possible people were born with good constitutions. When they lived to that age, their aura naturally increased to 70,000.
After Liam had eaten and drunk his fill, he leaned back in his chair and touched his belly.
Shizuku raised her hand to summon Blinky and sucked away the pile of lunch boxes on the table.
Liam suddenly laughed. "It's not a good thing if En's range is too wide."
Shizuku was confused.
"There are people doing morning exercises at home early in the morning..." Liam complained.
Although the apartment building wasn't full, there were many residents.
As Liam's En skills became more solid and proficient, the range of aura dissipation also continued expanding. Today it could form an area with a radius of almost 30 meters.
And this also resulted in whenever he practiced En in his bedroom, he was always forced to see certain situations in the homes of other residents in the building.
It's a pity I'm really not good at Transmutation. Otherwise, I'd have to change the shape of En no matter what, leaving a few holes in the field. Otherwise, I'm forced to monitor other people's homes in detail every time I practice, making me look like a voyeur.
"By the way," Shizuku fumbled in her pocket and took out a phone. "There's a notification from Heavens Arena."
This was Liam's phone. When Liam usually practiced, he let Shizuku watch his phone so as not to miss any news.
Liam opened his phone and looked. "Finally. It's time."
This notice from Heavens Arena was naturally about the Floor Master challenge Liam had applied for.
October 20th, 1 PM, 244th floor!
"Menk Rin Zourlo..." Liam looked at the name of the Floor Master who'd accepted his challenge in the notice. "I wonder who's stronger compared to the one who defeated Tetsuro?"
Two months ago, Tetsuro's Floor Master Challenge had started, and Liam had naturally gone to watch.
Tetsuro, who'd been determined to give up his Nen ability that forced a 50-50 split in the ring, had eventually lost to his opponent. But judging from Tetsuro's appearance at the time, he probably hadn't given up and continued challenging.
At that time, Liam had wanted to directly apply to challenge the Floor Master who'd beaten Tetsuro, which would have saved him two more months of waiting. However, after winning against Tetsuro, that Floor Master had immediately disappeared and flown to some cool corner of the world.
Just like these 200th-floor fighters had a truce period, as long as each Floor Master won one match, they could refuse challenge applications for at least one year. This was also time for the challenged Floor Masters to rest and recover.
As for losing? If you lost, you'd lose your qualification as Floor Master and be replaced by the challenger. There was nothing to say about that.
"If I miss this, who knows when I'd have to apply again!" Liam walked to the window and stretched.
He'd made up his mind. If he lost this time, he'd be too lazy to continue applying to challenge Floor Masters. Who could bear waiting for several more months or a year?
"Can't help it. I've been putting it off for a long time. If I refuse this time, they might take away my challenger qualifications. Who can bear that?"
The entire 244th floor of Heavens Arena belonged to the master of that floor.
At this moment, in the luxurious room on that floor, a dark-skinned young man with thick lips and a bath towel was talking to someone on the phone carelessly. He said with a carefree smile, "Doesn't take much effort anyway. I just have a few more days off. I'll let Rabid Dogs take care of things, and I'll come to Heavens Arena to relax and teach the younger generation what it means to have people beyond people, heavens beyond heavens!"
If Liam were here, he'd probably recognize this person.
This was a Shadow Beast he'd accidentally encountered on his way to Heavens Arena to reunite with Shizuku.
The person on the other end of the call was speechless. "I really don't understand you. You're a mighty Shadow Beast. Why do you still care about the position of Floor Master?"
The Shadow Beast Purple Ape's expression became serious. "You're wrong. Don't underestimate the Floor Masters on the highest floors just because most of Heavens Arena is trash. The Floor Masters are usually very skilled. Who knows if there are any real masters among those with Floor Master challenger?"
"Like you?" the other person asked.
"That's right. Just like me!" Shadow Beast Purple Ape said calmly. "And Alpha Edward."
"Don't mention that idiot!" the other person said angrily. "I thought he was the most promising talent to take over a vacancy in the Ten Shadow Beasts, but who knew he'd inexplicably commit suicide by jumping off a building at Heavens Arena..."
Purple Ape said, "Didn't he really go to the True Martial King's ancient tomb? He went crazy because he was cursed by the tomb."
There was silence on the other side.
Purple Ape asked, "Is it true? Since Edward went to the ancient tomb of the True Martial King, did he bring back any treasures? Since he already went there, does the organization have the address of the ancient tomb? Or a treasure map or something?"
Dark Continent ruins, secret realms.
Treasures, artifacts.
Rare beasts, exotic creatures.
These weren't things only Hunters were passionate about.
Among high-level Nen users, once they got a clue and smelled the scent of treasure, who was willing to give up?
"This isn't something you should consider," the other person said coldly.
"Hey, be nice to me," Purple Ape laughed. "Would you like me to continue taking leave for the wedding next month?"
Beep, beep, beep.
The other person hung up directly.
Purple Ape curled his thick lips, picked up a few video cassettes from the coffee table, inserted them into the DVD player, turned on the widescreen TV, and sat on the sofa to watch comfortably.
These were match videos of a player named John Smith AKA Liam.
Purple Ape watched casually, occasionally focusing his eyes to observe the changes in Liam's aura in the video.
"Good foundation! Not one of those idiots who only know Ten and don't even understand Ren, thinking they can challenge a Floor Master."
"What's he doing? Throwing a baseball?"
Purple Ape stared at the video of the match between Liam and Wing and quickly frowned.
Liam's opponent had such strong Nen ability that Purple Ape couldn't help feeling wary. But the strange Nen ball thrown by Liam was even weirder. Both weird and powerful. Or maybe it was precisely because it was weird that it was powerful.
"Every time you throw it, the power of the Nen ball doubles?"
Purple Ape approached the TV, his eyes focused, observing attentively, secretly summarizing the rules of Liam's Nen ability.
It seemed this was the most powerful killing move Liam could use to defeat Wing and qualify to challenge him.
As long as he cracked this move himself and remembered the strengths and weaknesses of this technique, he had nothing to worry about.
There were bound to be shortcomings and weaknesses.
Vows and restrictions. The more powerful weird Nen abilities like this were, the more restrictions they usually had.
As for Liam's own strength, that was it. Purple Ape wasn't worried.
"Fists and kicks are pretty good, but the power..."
Purple Ape shook his head and sat back on the sofa, looking at the slow-playing match video on the screen. Liam tried his best to break off an arm and threw a Nen ball with increased power.
"This Nen ball multiplies its power and isn't under his own control. No matter what, as long as it's caught once, its power increases..."
"In other words, as long as I catch it at a power level that would kill him, I can directly smash the Nen ball into Smith's head and let him taste his own medicine..."
"Children shouldn't play with swords in front of adults, or they'll stab themselves to death!"
In the careless smile of Shadow Beast Purple Ape, time quickly came to the day of the Floor Master challenge.
Starting at noon, the 244th floor of Heavens Arena was already crowded with people. Countless fighting enthusiasts checked in, excitedly waiting for the opening of today's Floor Master challenge.
"What does this little Suzaku kid mean? Boss's major life event. Such an important match. He won't come to support it, right?"
The waiting area was empty, with only Liam complaining to Shizuku who was accompanying him.
There was no need to call to confirm. Kurapika had Liam's Star Mark on his body and was also wearing Ring C engraved with the Moon Mark. If Kurapika was in the venue, Liam would definitely be able to sense it.
Shizuku looked at him quietly.
Liam smiled and pinched both sides of her cheeks. "Do you think I can win?"
"You can definitely win with the Star Mark," Shizuku's voice was forced to become a little slurred. "If you don't use it, you probably won't lose..."
"Why are you always thinking about the Star Mark?"
Liam protested. "Am I the kind of person who just uses the Star Mark to win if I can't beat someone?"
Soon, amid the cheers of the dark auditorium, the entrance screens of the challenger Liam and the challenged Floor Master Menk Rin Zourlo appeared on the big screen.
Liam always felt the dark-skinned guy opposite him looked familiar.
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