Chapter 96: The Cleaning Squad
Shizuku tilted her head in a curious, bird-like gesture, looking at Ronin. "Who else?"
"The Phantom Troupe."
"I know them," Shizuku nodded, her expression remaining blank. "You want me to join your team. Then... I need proof of your commitment."
"What kind of proof?" Ronin asked.
"If you bring me Spence's head, I'll join you," Shizuku stated her condition plainly. She added, "If the Phantom Troupe comes to recruit me, I'll give them the same ultimatum."
"Wasn't Spence killed by your father?" Ronin asked, recalling Damian's report.
Shizuku shook her head slowly. "No. He's still alive. Everything that happened... it was just a trap he set."
"Deal," Ronin agreed.
From Shizuku's words, it was clear that Damian's intel was incomplete. The situation regarding her father ran much deeper than a simple botched heist.
"Okay," Shizuku pushed her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "Since we have an agreement, tell me your name again. If you succeed, we'll meet here. I'll go with you and follow your lead."
"Ronin. I've said it once, but I'll say it again. Also, there's no need to wait; we can just go kill him now." Ronin frowned slightly at her detached manner.
"Right. I've got it. Ronin," Shizuku said, her gaze drifting toward the window. She didn't seem to be in any hurry to flee.
Outside, the tank was grinding to a halt in front of the building.
"I'll handle this," Ronin said. He stood up, leaving the remaining snacks on the table. He tucked his manga into his backpack, pulled his mask back over his face, and walked toward the door.
Shizuku muttered to herself as she followed him. "Ronin... Ronin. He seems like a nice person, but he does very bad things."
She followed him out with a neutral expression.
Despite her demeanor, she clearly didn't want the house—the only place she had left with happy memories—to be leveled by tank fire.
Shizuku tapped her temple, a slight frown crossing her face. She felt like she had been forgetting a lot of things lately, but they probably weren't important.
Stepping outside, Ronin spotted the Nen user standing atop the tank. Seeing the man instantly drop into a combat-ready stance, Ronin mused at the sheer density of Nen users in Meteor City.
The environment here really breeds monsters.
He glanced down the street and saw Damian's car. The P.I. hadn't abandoned them; he had ducked into a side alley to avoid being crushed by the tank.
Good. I'll still need him for intel on Spence and our extraction.
If Damian had bolted, Ronin would have had to deal with Hisoka again to find a new guide, which was a headache he didn't need.
Ronin turned his focus back to the tank. The man on top looked down at him with predatory eyes.
He was tall and gaunt, his hands covered in thick martial arts calluses. A revolver was tucked into his waistband. With his sharp, aquiline nose and his hunched posture, he looked like a sinister vulture.
"Who the hell are you?" the Vulture barked.
"Stupid question," Ronin replied. He didn't feel like chatting. He dropped into a low crouch, aura surging toward his legs and fists.
In the blink of an eye, he vanished.
BOOM!
The tank's gunner didn't wait for orders. The moment Ronin disappeared from his sights, he fired the main cannon.
It was a mistake.
A massive boot appeared on top of the projectile as it left the muzzle.
Ronin had intercepted the shell in mid-air. With a burst of explosive physical force, he stomped the shell straight into the ground.
At the rear, Shizuku's hands blurred as she conjured a vacuum cleaner with a wide, toothy mouth.
Blinky.
It was her Nen ability. One end was a storage dimension; the other end had eyes, a mouth, and sharp teeth.
Shizuku gave it a silent command. Blinky's mouth opened, ready to inhale anything Shizuku deemed "inanimate."
KABOOM!
The tank shell detonated as it hit the pavement. Ronin, who had used the stomp to redirect the blast, remained completely unscathed. In fact, he used the shockwave of the explosion as a propellant, launching himself at the tank with even greater speed.
Enhancement was the art of being unreasonable.
With his body reinforced by Nen and months of gravity training, a point-blank explosion was just a source of momentum to him.
CLANG!
Ronin's fist slammed into the tank's barrel. The reinforced steel groaned and buckled, the massive tube bending like a plastic straw.
The Vulture on top of the tank didn't retreat. As Ronin leaped up to strike him, the gaunt man lashed out.
Ronin's vision blurred. The man's arm seemed to vanish for a microsecond.
His Sharingan caught the movement instantly. It wasn't an Emitter's teleportation; it was raw, blinding speed. The guy was a specialist in high-speed strikes, likely an Enhancer or a high-level Transmuter.
Ronin saw the trajectory. He saw the aura coating the strike like a venomous snake.
His Hatsu?
Ronin didn't change his punch's direction. Instead, he adjusted his aura distribution—using Ryu—to harden the point where the man's strike would land.
The exchange happened in a heartbeat.
The Vulture's hand, shaped like a striking cobra, pecked at Ronin's forearm. Ronin's fist, meanwhile, slammed into the man's other arm, which he had raised to block.
Two abilities collided.
Ronin felt a sharp sting on his arm, like a woodpecker's strike. But the Vulture's blocking arm buckled at a sickening angle under Ronin's weight.
Yet, there was no sound of bone breaking.
The gaunt man skittered backward across the top of the tank, trying to reset the distance.
Ronin looked at the man's arm. It hung limp and boneless, swinging like a wet rope. A second later, aura flowed through it, and the arm snapped back into a rigid, functional shape. It lashed out again like a whip.
Snake? Whip?
Ronin's curiosity was piqued. He opened his fist, shifting his fingers into a claw-like grip.
If bludgeoning doesn't break you, I'll just rip you apart.
The Vulture sensed the shift in intent.
He flared his aura. His boneless arm suddenly hardened again mid-swing. His fingers, shaped like a snake's mouth, bypassed Ronin's grabbing hand and lunged straight for Ronin's chest.
Ronin saw it all. He aborted the grab, flattening his hand into a knife-edge and slashing horizontally at the incoming arm.
The moment they touched, the arm turned "soft" again. Ronin's hand-blade passed through it without meeting resistance, making the Vulture's strike weak and ineffective against Ronin's chest, but also preventing Ronin from severing the limb.
Ronin finally understood the mechanic.
It was a combination of Transmutation and Enhancement—the ability to modulate the physical properties of his limbs between "liquid-soft" and "steel-hard" in an instant.
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