Chapter 124: Maha Zoldyck
The crimson skeleton flared back into existence, but the withered, skeletal hand of the old man didn't stop. It slammed into the Susanoo with the force of a falling mountain.
For a heartbeat, the two forces held. Then, the sound of shattering glass echoed through the stadium. The withered palm didn't just strike the armor; it punched through the Susanoo's ribcage. As it continued its trajectory toward Ronin's heart, it suddenly jerked and froze in mid-air.
"Eh?"
The tiny, shriveled elder let out a sound of genuine curiosity.
This was the oldest living legend of the Zoldyck family: Maha Zoldyck.
A trickle of blood escaped Ronin's left eye. The moment the Susanoo fractured, he had gambled everything on Amenotokotachi: Celestial Stasis. He had locked the specific coordinates of the air surrounding the old man's arm, freezing time and space in a localized bubble.
Strong! He's too strong!
The fact that the Susanoo—an absolute defense—had been pierced in a single blow was a wake-up call. Through his Sharingan, Ronin saw the terrifying truth: Maha had concentrated 100% of his immense aura into his fingertips. It was the ultimate application of Ko. A suicidal offensive gamble that had almost ended the fight in one second.
Ronin didn't wait for a counter. His right eye burned with a dark, hateful light.
"Amaterasu."
Black flames manifested, aimed directly at Maha's face.
But the fire consumed only empty air.
Maha had vanished. In his place, suspended in the frozen space of the stasis field, was nothing but a severed, withered hand.
Decisive. Ruthless.
The old man hadn't hesitated for a millisecond. The moment he sensed the lethal nature of the black flames, he had severed his own limb to escape the spatial lock.
The stasis broke as Ronin deactivated the eye. He raised his hands to form a seal.
But even as the severed hand began to fall, the residual Nen within it flared. The fingers twitched, and the hand lunged forward again, clawing for Ronin's chest like a parasitic spider.
The severed limb was still operating on Maha's final command.
Ronin realized he couldn't block it. The hand was already digging into his Ken. He completed the seal for his exit strategy.
Flying Raijin!
In a flash of blue light, Ronin and the severed hand vanished from the ring.
Maha's head snapped to the side, his ancient eyes tracking a signature.
Illumi appeared in the ring a second later, standing exactly where Ronin had been. He held a cluster of needles, his expression as blank as a doll's, but his target was gone.
"Follow me," Maha said. He could still feel the thread of his Nen connected to his hand. With a blur of motion, the two assassins leaped toward the fighter's tunnel.
The stadium was in a state of total pandemonium. The referee stood paralyzed, and the audience erupted in a mix of terror and awe. They had just watched the "Fire God" and two legendary assassins vanish into thin air like ghosts.
As the crowd watched the empty ring, the shock turned to fury.
"Where is the security?!"
"First the Spider, now the Zoldycks? Does Heavens Arena even care about its fighters?!"
The Arena management was beyond livid. They had hired Pro Hunters specifically to prevent this kind of ambush.
The two Pro Hunters in the stands exchanged a look of pure dread as their phones vibrated with calls from the management.
"Are you kidding me?" one whispered. "Nobody told us the kid was a spatial-warping monster. He was fighting Hisoka like it was a warm-up."
"And that old man..." the other added, wiping cold sweat from his brow. "His aura was a bottomless abyss. If we go after them, we're not 'protecting' anyone—we're just delivering our own heads on a platter."
But with their licenses and reputation on the line, they had no choice but to follow.
Ronin materialized on the 188th Floor.
This was his original secret safehouse. Even after moving to the 200s, he had kept the lease as a fallback point.
The moment he arrived, he looked down at the hand on his chest. It was still clawing at him, the withered fingers trying to puncture his internal organs.
Ronin grabbed the wrist with a grunt. He flared his Enhancement aura and yanked.
The hand came away with a wet tear. Although it was incredibly strong, without the rest of Maha's body to provide leverage, it couldn't overcome Ronin's raw physical power.
Emitter/Manipulator hybrid, Ronin analyzed. He's controlling his own limbs from a distance.
He prepared to incinerate the hand with Amaterasu, but before he could trigger his eye, the hand simply... dissolved. It vanished into the air, returning to its owner via a spatial jump.
Ronin narrowed his eyes. He's an Emitter who has mastered long-range teleportation. That explains how he bypassed my Susanoo in the ring.
He didn't care about the hand escaping. His vision was throbbing, and his eyes felt heavy with fatigue. Overusing the Mangekyō in such a short window was dangerous.
It's not worth a permanent injury to hunt a Zoldyck patriarch in a crowded tower.
He needed to leave. Maha would be able to trace the hand's return path straight to this room.
As for his promise to heal Hisoka? He'd leave a message with Miria. She knew how to reach him.
Ronin wove a seal for the Flying Raijin again. His form flickered and vanished.
Less than two minutes later, the door to Room 188 was blasted off its hinges.
Maha and Illumi burst inside.
But Ronin was gone. Standing in the center of the room was a Shadow Clone.
The clone wasn't holding a weapon. Instead, a massive, swirling orb of concentrated blue energy was rotating in its palm—so dense it hummed with the sound of a storm.
Ultra-Big Ball Rasengan.
The clone smiled.
BOOM!
From the street level blocks away, Ronin looked up.
A massive explosion blew out the entire side of the 188th floor. Fire and glass rained down into the city.
Ronin didn't know if the blast killed them—he doubted it would end Maha—but the message was sent: Stop following me, or the next one is in your bedroom.
The Zoldycks were businessmen. Picking a fight with a man who had no home, no clan, and a pocket full of S-Rank Jutsu was a bad investment.
A black sedan pulled up beside him. The door opened.
Kurapika, Shizuku, and Neon were inside.
"Get in, Brother," Kurapika said. "The airship is waiting."
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