In the basement of the Eternal Library, Shizuku materialized Blinky as soon as Pyon turned on the lights. The vacuum cleaner's single eye swiveled briefly before it released the black jade Buddha statue.
Shizuku's technique was practiced and smooth. The multi-armed Buddha statue, covered in spider-web cracks, settled firmly on the floor without so much as a wobble.
Liam looked at True Martial King Wangu Hui Guo Rou's face carved into the Buddha, then at Pyon. "So? Is it real?"
"If what you told me about discovering it is true, especially the spatial teleportation ability it was imbued with, then it's almost certainly genuine." Pyon observed the Buddha's face up close, not missing a single detail. "The true appearance of True Martial King Wangu Hui Guo Rou, particularly the faces on these stone statues carved from his likeness, and certain carving techniques and habits, are extremely difficult to imitate."
"If it was a fake," Shizuku said, "it would already be on the auction market."
"No," Pyon corrected. "Kakin has officially sanctioned and confiscated imitation national treasures before."
"Is the Kakin Kingdom really that powerful?" Liam muttered.
"There's no obvious gap between Kakin's national strength and any individual V5 member. What do you think?" Pyon raised her hand and materialized a laptop. "When it comes to national treasure-level cultural relics, if Kakin wants to pursue an incident to the end, V5 won't have sufficient reason to object."
Kurapika, still wearing his hospital gown under a coat, spoke up. "From your tone, a specific case probably happened before."
"That's right." Pyon held the laptop in one hand, her fingers flying across the keyboard.
In an instant, what looked like an En woven from green code expanded outward from Pyon as the center, immediately covering the black jade Buddha statue in front of them.
Beep beep beep...
On Pyon's laptop screen, a model of the black jade Buddha statue began building rapidly.
"So?" Liam asked. "What happened in this case you mentioned?"
"A counterfeiting gang infiltrated the Kakin National Museum, carefully observed every detail of ten statues on display at the time, and successfully produced a fake after returning."
"Why only one?" Shizuku looked confused.
Kurapika considered this. "Who would be stupid enough to create fake cultural relics whose location is very certain when the genuine articles are preserved and accounted for?"
He looked at Pyon. "The counterfeiting gang you're talking about didn't imitate any of the Kakin national treasure statues that have been exhibited. Instead, through observation and study, they created a statue that has never appeared before the public. I remember you said academic circles have been arguing about the absence of Buddha statues among the twenty-nine preserved by Kakin, believing the real total should be higher."
"Exactly. The counterfeiting gang at that time observed the carving techniques of those ten statues on display, especially the facial details of True Martial King Wangu Hui Guo Rou on each one. It reportedly took them a full twenty months. Finally, they created a statue of Guanyin Bestowing Children." Pyon paused. "It was lifelike, with almost no flaws. It caused quite a stir at the time. Kakin officials immediately issued a solemn statement, demanding the Republic of Padokea provide an explanation. Oh, by the way, news about the fake Guanyin statue broke in the Republic of Padokea."
The Republic of Padokea, one of the V5 member states, was the country where the Hunter Association headquarters was located on the Hunter world map.
"Of course Padokea was unwilling to give any explanation, so the two countries began an official standoff."
On Pyon's laptop screen, the details of the black jade Buddha statue became clearer, the model increasingly accurate. "Thirteen days after the incident broke, all six people in the counterfeiting gang and the ten people in charge of the underground auction house that had agreed to auction it either died mysteriously or disappeared. Their bodies have never been found to this day. Naturally, the Guanyin Bestowing Children statue went missing as well."
Oh, so Kakin's Hui Guo Rou family was that crazy?
Transnational law enforcement, right?
Crossing into one of V5's territories to enforce the law? Murder, robbery, destroying corpses and eliminating evidence, leaving an unsolved case everyone knew the truth about... They really went all out.
Shizuku raised her hand. "Since no one has ever seen any Buddha statues in the national treasure series, how could they tell the statue they imitated was fake?"
"There was Nen on it, right? There must not have been Nen on the Guanyin statue made by the counterfeiters?" Liam said to Shizuku.
Kurapika said, "Pyon said there was no Nen on the statues she saw in the museum."
Liam said, "Those might be high-quality fakes made by Kakin themselves."
"But that's just speculation," Kurapika pointed out.
"Fair enough. Maybe Old King just liked keeping statues of gods without attached Nen in his palace warehouse, treasured by future generations, while hiding the Buddha statues with Nen in famous mountains and rivers in other corners of the world, waiting for fated people to visit..."
Liam had originally been teasing Kurapika, but as he spoke, he suddenly felt there might actually be some truth to it.
"Fated people, you mean us?"
"Maybe Kakin has their own method for distinguishing authenticity." Kurapika changed his explanation and looked at Pyon.
Pyon said casually, "When Kakin acted at that time, they hired several Professional Hunters. Those hunters dealt with the counterfeiting team and the underground auction house personnel one by one, and when they authenticated the Guanyin statue, those Professional Hunters were present every step of the way. So yes, they had their own method, and it was definitely a fake."
"They came to Padokea to cause trouble and hired people from your Hunter Association as helpers?" Liam asked.
"If you put it that way, then yes, that's the case." Pyon glanced at him. "Although the Hunter Association is headquartered in the Republic of Padokea, that doesn't mean the Association is affiliated with Padokea. The Hunter Association doesn't belong to any country. In principle, it doesn't represent any country's interests. Someone pays to issue a task, and there are hunters willing to accept it. Once they accept, they complete it with full effort. That's all."
Kurapika analyzed, "But since the Hunter Association is headquartered in the Republic of Padokea, it would be hard to believe the Hunter Association has no connection with Padokea whatsoever. Since Kakin operated across ocean continents, I don't think they themselves lacked the force to complete the task. Going through the Hunter Association was probably intentional. With the Hunter Association mediating in the middle, Padokea could turn a blind eye."
Pyon glanced at the Kurta Clan orphan, her expression neutral. "If you think so, that's fine. By the way, there seems to be something inside this Buddha statue's head."
As she spoke, she pressed a key, and the model of the black jade Buddha statue on the laptop screen instantly zoomed in on its head.
She hit a few more keys, and the Buddha statue with True Martial King Wangu Hui Guo Rou's face quickly disassembled and separated along the fine cracks. Among these piles of black jade-like rubble, many pieces had traces of jet black on their inner surfaces, showing a color difference from the black jade material itself...
Liam and the other three pairs of eyes fixed on the screen.
Pyon operated a few more times, highlighting the dark spots with color differences. She removed the black jade rubble and made the jade itself transparent. The image on the screen instantly became clear.
"It's divine script," she said.
"Can it be restored?" Liam said earnestly. "To be honest, I don't care if it's a national treasure or not. But divine script is genuinely tempting!"
When Pyon heard this, she immediately understood this boy must have already discovered the divine script inside the Buddha statue's head.
His En proficiency was pretty good?
But looking at the situation, Liam and the others had no clue about the divine script in the Buddha's broken head. Had he suddenly sent her that photo to lure her here because he was interested in her analytical abilities?
Pyon looked at the bright black patterns scattered across the transparent rubble on her laptop screen. "There should be no problem restoring it, but I'll need a little time."
Liam said happily, "There's plenty of time! Oh, plenty of time before the 22nd."
He'd called Melody earlier to ask about their upcoming mission to recover Scarlet Eyes... or rather, the gang wedding they were attending, which was on the 22nd of this month.
"It won't take that long." Pyon said. "But I'm going to say this first. I hope you, or all of you, don't have expectations that are too high for this divine script."
"Huh? What do you mean?" Liam asked.
Pyon said, "Based on the story you told about finding this Buddha statue in the mountains, the reason you're so curious about the divine script hidden in the Buddha's head and insist on restoring it is because you're interested in the so-called fixed-point teleportation Nen effect, right?"
Liam nodded honestly.
Being able to mark a safe location and crush a "Little Jade Buddha" at any time within a mountain range to teleport home... that was a town portal scroll ability. Who wouldn't want it?
"That's the problem." Pyon reminded him. "Generally speaking, the more complex, special, and powerful a Nen ability is, the more complex the corresponding divine script array needs to be. Simply put, the greater the number of character combinations that need to be engraved in the divine script array, the more energy and time it takes to write them."
She glanced around the spacious basement and gestured with her slender legs in a circle. "To achieve the teleportation ability effect you described, the divine script array would need to be arranged in advance, covering at least an area as large as a boxing ring. Even if done by an expert hunter proficient in divine script knowledge, it would take at least three days. If their aura reserves aren't sufficient, it would take even longer."
Kurapika said, "What you're saying is that the broken divine script in the Buddha's head is unlikely to have spatial teleportation effects."
"Yes, it's unlikely." Pyon nodded and asked, "So, do you still want to continue the restoration?"
Liam smacked his lips and sighed. "We've already come this far..."
"Even if you said no, I would restore it anyway." Pyon said, sitting down on the floor and placing the laptop on her lap. She cracked her knuckles and stretched her fingers. "I'm also curious what exactly this is..."
Liam and the other two exchanged glances. Nothing to do but wait.
But there was no need to just sit around. The place was quiet enough that no one would disturb them. They might as well start training on the spot.
A top expert from one of the Hunter Association's Twelve Zodiacs was right next to them. It was almost like having a free guardian. If they were thick-skinned enough, they could even ask for advice on the spot if they encountered any problems during practice. This was definitely profitable.
Shizuku's Blinky always had food stored inside. In addition to emergency supplies like dry rations and water, there were even some hot dishes and soup. No need to worry about spoilage.
After the three of them completed basic training like their daily Ten practice, they wrapped themselves in Ken and silently tempered their aura.
The more confidential Kurapika kept his dolphin bookshelf Nen ability, the greater room he had to develop it, so he didn't use it for practice with Pyon present.
Shizuku had already shown Blinky, so she had no worries. While practicing her Nen, she continued working on Transmutation techniques, trying to transform her aura into a chainsaw. With the Star Mark's guaranteed self-healing ability, she could practice boldly and her progress was very smooth.
Liam could say he'd sparred with Netero so many times at Sensui Mountain. He figured the old monster Netero had probably already observed his abilities closely.
The self-operating aspect of "Flowing Star Strike" couldn't be seen by others. Netero was the world's greatest martial arts master. Liam really didn't think his movements were so perfect that he could hide them from Netero... Netero must have been able to guess he was a Manipulator. There was nothing to do about it. You couldn't seize the opportunity to compete with Netero while simultaneously hiding your abilities, right?
As for whether Pyon could identify his Manipulation type, Liam didn't know. But he'd used "Spirit Gun" before, so practicing his Emission wasn't exposing anything new.
Liam practiced Ren for a while, then practiced Emission for a while. In Emission practice, if there wasn't a specific Nen ability that needed training, then the training was nothing more than working based on the word "emission." The length of time released aura could be maintained, the maximum intensity of aura that could be released per unit time, and the maximum distance released aura could travel from the body... As a Manipulator, Liam could also practice one more thing: flexibly controlling released aura and even giving it certain instructions.
For example, making a ball of aura rotate at a fixed position at a fixed speed, or releasing several balls of aura, having them patrol along a fixed route and fly directly at hostile targets to self-destruct when encountering them...
"You work very hard. No wonder you could trade moves with President Netero."
Just as Liam was wondering if he could recreate something like a Destructo Disc, Pyon's voice reached his ears.
He turned his head. Pyon was standing there watching the three of them practice. The laptop was nowhere to be seen. She'd probably dismissed it back into her aura.
A row of sharp teeth vaguely appeared on the surface of the aura around Shizuku's hand. Following her will, it slowly rotated around her arm, stopping when she heard the words.
Liam got up and asked, "Did the restoration succeed?"
Pyon nodded, extended one foot, and while condensing her aura, drew on the ground with it, slowly writing several dark combinations of divine script.
She looked at the divine script she'd restored and said, "As expected, it doesn't have spatial teleportation effects."
"Didn't you guess that beforehand?" Liam asked, confused. "Why do you sound so disappointed?"
Pyon said calmly, "After all, the creator is True Martial King Wangu Hui Guo Rou. My guess is based on the divine script knowledge I know. Who knows what the situation is with the divine script the True Martial King mastered?"
Kurapika asked, "Are there many different schools of thought regarding divine script?"
Pyon thought for a moment, looked at the three young people, and asked, "Nen has existed since ancient times, passed down from generation to generation. So do you think divine script is the same?"
Liam said earnestly, "Rabbit-sis, please stop asking. We really don't know."
"About four hundred years ago, divine script began circulating among Nen users." Pyon said calmly. "It was like it was born out of thin air. Earlier than that, there are no records related to it. No earlier divine script has been passed down."