"Bisky, what is Battera's phone number?"
They were standing outside the desolate airport, waiting for their ride. The airship had departed, leaving them standing near the edge of a vast, empty wasteland. Liam pulled out his cell phone and waved it in Bisky's direction.
The ancient castle Battera had gifted them was located in an incredibly remote area. During their first visit, Battera's specialized transport had driven them for a very long time to reach it. Jaku had been busy chatting with Shizuku and Bisky throughout that initial journey, so the little bird hadn't actually memorized the specific route they had taken.
Liam looked around. Even for a private facility, this airstrip was exceptionally deserted. There was absolutely nothing but dry dirt and scrub brush stretching out toward the horizon. Aside from the small terminal buildings for the airport and the nearby train station, there were practically no signs of human habitation for dozens of kilometers in any direction. Liam honestly couldn't fathom why an airport or a train station had even been constructed in the middle of nowhere.
Bisky sighed, pulling a white windbreaker over her shoulders to conceal her regenerating right arm, which had currently grown back down to the elbow. "You really are too much," she said, sounding genuinely exasperated. "A great philanthropist hands you eight hundred billion Jenny and a private ancient castle, and you don't even care enough to remember his phone number or the address?"
"What great philanthropist?" Liam countered defensively. "I earned all of that with my own skills and abilities."
"Whatever. There is no need to call him anyway," Bisky said, pointing down the empty access road. "I remember the route to the castle perfectly well. And our ride is already here."
Right on cue, two identical vehicles with no license plates drove up the dusty road and rolled to a stop in front of the group. The driver of the lead vehicle—a brand-new, heavy-duty pickup truck—stepped out. He was a silent, capable-looking man dressed in a sharp suit. Without saying a word, he tossed the truck keys through the air.
Bisky caught the keys effortlessly with her left hand. She immediately flicked them over to Shizuku and gave her a subtle nod, signaling her to hand over the duffel bag full of cash they had prepared.
The man in the suit caught the heavy bag, unzipped the top just enough to verify the stacks of bills inside, and gave a brief nod. He turned around, climbed into the back seat of the second car, and the driver immediately hit the gas. With a loud vroom, the second car sped off down the dirt road, leaving them alone with the pickup truck.
Kurapika caught the keys Shizuku tossed to him and walked around to unlock the heavy rear door of the truck's cargo bed.
"You must be suffocating in there," Liam muttered. He unbuckled his thick belt and tossed it directly into the back of the truck.
While still in mid-air, the leather belt erupted into a blinding ball of white light. The light surged and twisted, rapidly expanding until it solidified into the massive form of a pale tiger. Lumos landed heavily on the metal floor of the truck bed, the suspension groaning under his immense weight. The big cat paced restlessly for a moment, circling the confined space twice before finally lying down on his stomach. He rested his large head on his paws, looking out the open back doors at the setting sun.
Jaku hopped up onto the edge of the truck bed, followed quickly by Shizuku, Kurapika, and Menchi, who all climbed into the back to sit near the tiger. Bisky walked around to claim the passenger seat in the front cab.
Before the back doors were shut, Liam leaned out over the tailgate. He tilted his head back and let out a sharp, piercing whistle that echoed across the empty plains. Then, he pulled the heavy metal doors shut, slapped the side of the truck bed twice with his open palm, and shouted toward the front, "Driver, let's go!"
Machi sat in the driver's seat, her expression entirely unreadable. She turned the key in the ignition. The powerful engine roared to life, and she shifted the truck into gear, launching them forward down the dirt road.
High above, the gray Jaku had been circling in the sky, keeping watch. Seeing the pickup truck begin to leave the airport, it folded its wings and entered a steep dive. It leveled out just above the road, matching the truck's speed, and smoothly flew right through the open passenger-side window. Bisky caught the little bird with her one good hand, stroked its feathers twice, and then tossed it gently into the back seat.
Guided by Bisky's directions from the passenger seat, Machi kept her foot heavy on the accelerator, driving steadily toward the distant mountains without ever looking back.
More than half a year ago, when Liam and the others had first arrived at the remote castle in Battera's luxury car, it had been late at night, the darkness hiding the landscape. This time, the powerful truck covered the distance much faster. By the time the jagged silhouette of the castle finally came into view, the sun was just beginning to sink below the horizon. It was the peak of dusk, the sky bleeding deep orange and purple.
The ancient fortress was an architectural marvel, built directly into the steep face of the mountain. It looked as though the very peak of the hill had been hollowed out and carved into a sprawling castle, seamlessly integrated with the natural rock. The lower section of the mountain housed the main access tunnel, serving as a secure passage connecting the fortress to the outside world.
Right now, however, the massive, heavy iron gates blocking the tunnel entrance were tightly shut.
Machi eased off the gas, bringing the pickup truck to a slow stop right in front of the imposing metal barrier.
A small, square security screen mounted on the stone wall beside the gate suddenly flared to life. A moment later, a calm, stern male voice echoed from the hidden speakers.
Bisky rolled down her window and leaned out slightly. She glanced at the screen, taking in the serious face of the security guard. He wore a neat military uniform and a dark beret, a thick mustache resting above his upper lip.
Without turning around to look at the truck bed, Bisky called out, "Liam, it is your security captain."
Liam poked his head out from the back of the truck, squinting at the small screen. He recognized the man almost immediately. It was the head of the security detail Battera had originally hired to protect the castle. "Oh, right. It is Saba..."
"Sabazushi," the mustached man corrected him politely through the speaker. He had clearly recognized Liam, the legal owner of the estate. The guard paused for a moment, his eyes darting back and forth as if he were checking multiple monitors off-screen. Finally, he looked directly back into the camera. "Welcome back, sir. I will open the gates to receive you."
The screen beeped sharply and went completely black.
In the back of the truck, Kurapika's brow furrowed. He reached out, gently tapping Jaku on the wing, and leaned in close to whisper. "Be careful. Theoretically, you and Shizuku were supposed to be inside the castle this entire time. Yet, he doesn't seem the least bit surprised that you are suddenly arriving from the outside..."
A loud metallic clank echoed through the valley, followed by a heavy grinding noise. The massive iron doors blocking the tunnel slowly began to part.
Liam nodded slightly, understanding Kurapika's warning. He pushed the rear cargo door open just a crack. "Bisky, can you drive?" he called out softly toward the front cab.
As the mountain gate opened wide enough for the vehicle to pass, the pickup truck slowly rolled forward into the dark tunnel.
In that brief moment of transition from the twilight outside to the shadows of the tunnel, three blurs of motion—two human-sized, one tiny—shot out from the slightly opened cargo door. Moving at a speed ordinary security cameras could never hope to capture, Machi and Shizuku vaulted out of the moving truck. They hit the stone walls of the tunnel and instantly scaled them, running straight up the sheer vertical face of the mountain as easily as if they were sprinting across flat ground. Hovering silently just above their heads, the gray Jaku led the way, guiding them through the fading light.
Under the cover of dusk, the two "former" members of the Phantom Troupe moved like literal phantoms. Clinging to the shadows of the outer walls, they took a direct, vertical shortcut straight toward the upper levels of the ancient castle.
Down below, the pickup truck finally rolled to a complete stop inside the main courtyard. Bisky, who had slid over to the driver's seat, turned off the engine and pushed her door open. Liam, a decoy "Shizuku," and Menchi filed out from the back of the truck.
Menchi stretched her arms high above her head, working the stiffness out of her joints. She looked up, marveling at the towering stone walls and intricate architecture of the fortress surrounding them. "He really was incredibly generous to just hand over a wonderful place like this directly to you," she remarked with a smile.
To their right, a wide, winding stone staircase descended from the upper levels of the fortress down into the courtyard. A squad of armed security personnel, led by the mustached captain, Sabazushi, was currently walking down the steps, marching in formation to formally welcome the return of the castle's owner.
"Yes... keep coming... nice and slow..."
The scene unfolding in the courtyard—the meeting between Liam's group and the security detail—was perfectly framed within the circular lenses of a high-powered pair of binoculars.
High up in one of the castle's towers, hidden behind a slightly open window that offered a perfect vantage point, Genthru stood watching. He held the binoculars steady with one hand, his eyes tracking the distance between Liam and Sabazushi as they walked toward each other.
His other hand was stretched out behind his back, his thumb held rigidly in the air. The thumbs of the other two Bombers, Sub and Bara, were pressed tightly against his own. They were physically linked. The moment Genthru shouted the trigger word, they would instantly detonate the Nen bombs they had secretly planted on Sabazushi and every single member of his security team.
Just a little closer. Let them get just a little bit closer.
The absolute best-case scenario would be the blast instantly killing Liam and his entire entourage. With the owner dead, Genthru and his team would have all the time in the world to casually extract the hundreds of billions of Jenny Battera had gifted to the boy.
However, even if the explosion didn't manage to kill Liam and the others... it didn't really matter.
Genthru wasn't desperate. He and his two partners had already gathered all the Greed Island game consoles and safely deposited them in a secure vault for the upcoming Yorknew City auction. They had thirty consoles in total, and several of them were completely clean, lacking any saved game data. At the underground auction, those pristine consoles would sell for an absolute minimum of ten billion Jenny a piece.
If all thirty consoles sold successfully, the Bombers were guaranteed to walk away with at least two to three hundred billion Jenny.
They could retire tomorrow. They could sit around and do absolutely nothing for the rest of their lives, just waiting for the billions to automatically transfer into their bank accounts after the annual auction concluded.
Getting their hands on Liam's eight hundred billion would be an incredible, unexpected windfall. If they accidentally blew him to pieces and lost access to the funds, then it just meant their luck wasn't perfect today. Either way, Genthru and his partners were more than satisfied with the situation.
Through the lenses of his binoculars, Genthru watched as Sabazushi and the security guards finally reached the bottom of the stairs. They stopped right in front of Liam and the parked truck. Sabazushi snapped a hurried, stiff salute, his mouth moving rapidly as he clearly began to report something to Liam.
"Hmph. It is way too late to start telling the truth now. Let's start the fireworks—"
Genthru let out a dark sneer. He didn't even bother turning his head to look at Sub and Bara as he shouted the command.
"Rele—"
Before the word 'Release' could fully leave his mouth, a sudden, chilling realization hit him.
There was absolutely no movement from the men behind him. No shift in weight, no answering surge of aura. Nothing.
Genthru spun around instantly.
Sub and Bara were standing completely still. A perfectly straight, impossibly thin red line had suddenly appeared across both of their necks. Their eyes were wide open, the pupils rapidly losing focus and turning cloudy.
An invisible, razor-sharp Nen thread was pulled taut around their throats.
A second later, both of their heads simply slid off their shoulders and hit the stone floor. Blood erupted from their severed necks like geysers, the heavy spray thoroughly drenching the figure of Machi, who crouched low behind them, the deadly Nen threads still wrapped tightly around her fingers.
Before Genthru could even process the impossible sight, the world suddenly tilted violently in front of his eyes.
He felt a bizarre sensation of weightlessness. He realized, with a numb sense of detachment, that his perspective was falling backward, out of the open window. Yet, strangely, from his chest downward, his legs were still standing firmly inside the tower.
A loud, aggressive mechanical roar suddenly registered in his ears—the delayed sound of a heavy chainsaw tearing through flesh and bone.
As his upper half plummeted out of the tower, Genthru caught a fleeting glimpse of a young girl with short black hair and thick glasses. She was hanging upside down from the top frame of the window, a massive chainsaw gripped in her hands.
Then, the ground rushed up to meet him, and Genthru's consciousness faded into eternal darkness.
Down in the courtyard, completely unnoticed by the group near the truck, a heavy spray of blood painted the high stone wall of the tower. Genthru's severed upper torso plummeted down the sheer face of the cliff, vanishing into the shadows below.
Standing by the truck, Liam casually patted the pale, sweating Sabazushi on the shoulder. He offered the terrified security captain a reassuring, friendly smile.
"Hey, hey, calm down! If you want the bomb currently attached to your back to disappear safely, all you have to do is explain the whole story to me clearly from the beginning. Do you understand?"
Deep within his body, Liam felt it—three distinct, powerful surges of death energy, carrying sensations of both freezing cold and burning heat, rushed into him, fully absorbed by his system. His smile widened slightly.
If someone kills purely in self-defense, it absolutely cannot be considered a breach of contract.
Thank you for your hard work, Bombers.
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