The Fourth Prince had been kidnapped.
A great many people had seen the earth dragon rise into the sky and carry the Fourth Prince away, and the incident spread through the entire Kakin Empire at terrifying speed.
The royal capital's security forces had patrolled at high intensity for a full month and found nothing. And now, instead of another failed attack, the enemy had actually succeeded.
For a time, the capital security forces were flooded with complaints.
But right now, no one cared about complaints.
The priority was rescuing the Fourth Prince.
"Dragons appearing in Kakin should have been a symbol of auspicious fortune, yet now they have been used by criminals as accomplices in their crimes…"
On the news, the host gave an impassioned speech, as if the earth dragon had already been claimed as something unique to Kakin.
"Pretty flashy, huh?" Kurapika said, looking at the Fourth Prince, who was tied to a chair. He couldn't help making a teasing remark.
"I'm ready." Ronin walked directly up to the blindfolded Fourth Prince. "But once I make a move, if he doesn't die, he'll definitely awaken Nen. When that happens, he may become a huge problem. So I need to make some preparations on him first."
"Do whatever you need," Kurapika said, stepping aside.
He had already tried communicating with the Fourth Prince, but the results had not been what he wanted.
Honestly, Kurapika didn't care what other secrets the Fourth Prince had. He simply hadn't expected that getting him to reveal the location of the Scarlet Eyes would be this difficult.
This man seemed convinced that whether he spoke or not made no difference, so no matter what Kurapika did, he couldn't get a single answer out of him.
However, the Fourth Prince's thinking was still too simple.
In the face of Nen abilities, whether he spoke or not didn't matter.
As long as the information existed in his memories, that was enough.
Ronin knew very well how much potential the Fourth Prince had.
But what truly concerned him wasn't the Fourth Prince's potential.
It was whether the Fourth Prince was Beyond's child.
If he was, then Beyond had definitely left something on him.
It was even possible that the moment Ronin captured the Fourth Prince, Beyond's people would come knocking right after.
So he had to move quickly.
The first thing he needed to do was plant sealing formulas on the Fourth Prince's body.
That was to cut off all external abilities supporting him.
After that came the Four Symbols Seal, used to seal away any Nen belonging to someone else that might emerge from the Fourth Prince's body at any moment.
That move was specifically meant to guard against Beyond's arrangements.
Only after completing this double seal would Ronin use the Mind-Reading Technique.
Ronin moved quickly.
While researching sealing scrolls, he had also deepened his study of sealing techniques considerably.
When the double seal took effect on the Fourth Prince at the same time, he looked from the outside as if he had entered a state of Zetsu.
But this Zetsu didn't just restrict the release of the Fourth Prince's life energy externally. It also restricted his life energy from within.
The Fourth Prince's eyes were covered, but he already knew what his attackers wanted.
The Scarlet Eyes.
From the moment he obtained those eyes, he had continuously received information about surviving members of the Kurta Clan.
He didn't know who had been sending him those messages, but he did know that one day, the surviving Kurta clansmen would definitely come for him.
For that reason, he had deliberately stored the Scarlet Eyes in a place no one could find.
He would not hand them over.
In fact, he even wanted to add the remaining Scarlet Eyes to his collection as well.
The expression of someone dying in the middle of revenge would surely carry intense unwillingness, wouldn't it?
And if that person's brain wasn't empty either, then they would surely become a perfect work of art.
But judging by the current situation, he had underestimated those two surviving Kurta remnants.
Would he die?
That thought surfaced in the Fourth Prince's mind.
If he had any regrets now, it would surely be that he hadn't personally killed that piece of trash, the First Prince.
Ronin placed his hand on the Fourth Prince's head.
He knew very well that he didn't have many chances.
The Fourth Prince was a monster.
Using the Mind-Reading Technique would inevitably send Nen into the Fourth Prince's body. Even though that Nen had already been converted into chakra by then, it still retained some Nen-like properties.
For example, it would passively open all of the target's aura nodes when it attacked them.
And that meant the Fourth Prince would gain the ability to use Nen as Ronin used the Mind-Reading Technique.
If it were an ordinary person, Ronin wouldn't have to worry at all.
But this was the Fourth Prince.
The same Fourth Prince who, after awakening Nen, had unknowingly obtained a Nen beast.
So Ronin had to be fast.
Before the Fourth Prince's Nen beast was born, he had to find the location of the Scarlet Eyes inside his memories.
Then, while withdrawing to deal with the Nen beast, he would completely seal the Fourth Prince.
Not kill him.
Seal him.
In Ronin's view, that was the safest method.
He had already prepared the scroll to seal the Fourth Prince.
As the technique activated, chakra smoothly entered the Fourth Prince's brain.
Beside him, Kurapika quietly used the Chain Jail on his middle finger. The chain wrapped around the Fourth Prince like a serpent.
At that moment, fluctuations had already begun appearing on the Fourth Prince's body.
That was proof the seal had been disturbed.
It was the sealing technique Ronin had left to lock all of the Fourth Prince's aura inside his body.
Ronin had another reason for doing this as well: to completely restrict the Fourth Prince's aura nodes, making it impossible for them to open even under Ronin's attack.
The Fourth Prince's body began to tremble.
Kurapika's expression was extremely grave, while fine beads of sweat gradually appeared on Ronin's forehead as time passed.
Neon watched from the side, holding a handkerchief but not daring to step forward and wipe the sweat from Ronin's brow.
Shizuku gripped Blinky in her hand, as if she would swing it like a hammer the instant anything unusual happened.
Abachi was tense as well, clutching her fishing rod tightly. However, her posture suggested she was ready to retreat at any moment.
After all, her ability was more suited to being used from a distance.
Fine, dense characters began appearing on the Fourth Prince's exposed skin.
They were the technique marks left by the sealing jutsu.
But those marks were constantly fading.
And just then, Ronin suddenly opened his eyes.
"Found it!"
He had found the place where the Scarlet Eyes were stored in the Fourth Prince's memories. While inwardly cursing the man as a lunatic, he quickly pulled his hand away from the Fourth Prince.
But his withdrawal seemed to open a gap.
The Nen gathered inside the Fourth Prince abruptly surged toward the point where Ronin and the Fourth Prince had been in contact.
In an instant, the technique marks remaining on the Fourth Prince's body shattered.
At that same moment, a strange figure began appearing beside the Fourth Prince.
It was a Nen beast.
But before the Nen beast could fully take shape, even more curse marks surged out across the Fourth Prince's body.
That was the Four Symbols Seal Ronin had prepared in advance beginning to take effect.
The massive amount of aura that was about to erupt from the Fourth Prince was completely restrained in the blink of an eye.
Ronin didn't even bother with the Nen beast still forming beside him.
The hand he had pulled away from the Fourth Prince clenched into a fist, and without hesitation, he punched straight toward the Fourth Prince's head.
~~~
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