When Roy returned, Android 18 gave him a reassuring look.
Sure enough, with the Great Stamp's leader as their bargaining chip, both of them passed the first round without any suspense.
As for how much profit Android 18 had squeezed out of it in the process, Roy did not care.
For him now, money was already just a number. He simply did not care about it. As long as Android 18 was happy, that was enough.
Later, the examinees gradually returned to the site one after another, each carrying their roast whole Great Stamp.
Buhara took a bite from each one and casually declared it delicious.
"I really want to eat the leader roast whole pig!"
At that moment, Buhara especially wished the exam would end as soon as possible so he could go back and properly cook the Great Stamp leader he had paid such a huge price to obtain.
Because of that, every roast whole pig dish presented to him received the same verdict from him—
"Delicious."
After hearing the answer he wanted, Leorio clenched his fist and swung it in satisfaction.
Beside him, Gon and Kurapika also looked delighted. They had passed the first round as well.
Clang!
Buhara tossed the last bone onto the mountain of bones beside him, then patted his already full and slightly bulging stomach. Even though he still had not eaten the leader yet, he had at least enjoyed a huge meal, so he was fairly satisfied.
Clang, clang, clang!
"All right, that's the end of it. Buhara has finished eating seventy roast whole pigs." Menchi struck a gong that had appeared from who knew where and announced the final result.
Hanzo's mouth twitched. "…This monster."
"This guy is barely even human."
"What kind of body structure does he even have?"
They had thought that, even with the chief examiner's huge frame and enormous appetite, he would at most be able to eat thirty or forty. No one had expected him to devour seventy in one sitting.
"People who can become Hunters really are amazing." Gon stared at Buhara for quite a while and could not help letting out a sigh of amazement.
"Amazing is one thing, but I definitely don't want to end up looking like him." Killua put both hands behind his head.
As a member of a family of assassins, if he wanted to carry out assassination missions properly, then he needed to maintain a good physique.
So that was why Second Brother had gone down the wrong path. When I ran away from home, I even managed to stab him so easily.
Thinking that, Killua became even more determined to maintain his figure.
"The amount he just ate was obviously far larger than his body volume. A normal person couldn't possibly do something like that. But since he's a Gourmet Hunter, and a Hunter, that means…" Kurapika analyzed.
"Yeah! It's probably that." Leorio also referred to Nen with the vague phrase that.
"Ohhh, so it was that?" Gon suddenly understood.
"That? Again with that? Aaaagh, what the hell is that, exactly?!" Killua grabbed his hair in agony. For someone as insanely curious as he was, this was pure torture.
Clang, clang, clang!
Menchi walked up to all the examinees with the gong in hand and struck it once, producing an extremely loud sound.
"In the roast whole Great Stamp cooking test, seventy-two people have passed," Menchi announced in a raised voice.
"First of all, congratulations on passing the first round. But unlike Buhara, I'm not so easygoing. My standards are extremely strict!"
Menchi paced two circles at the front while glancing at Roy and Android 18.
"Hey, Roy, what's this examiner's profile like? What kind of food does she like?"
The moment Menchi finished speaking, Leorio immediately leaned close to Roy and asked in a low voice.
"Menchi, a One-Star Gourmet Hunter. Her contributions to food culture are highly recognized, so she was awarded the distinction of One-Star Hunter at the age of twenty-one. She's stubborn, willful, and extremely proud. She's very strong, and her standards for food are incredibly demanding. Once she gets angry, her standards go even higher—especially when it comes to taste."
"In other words, this examiner is probably going to be very difficult to deal with," Kurapika said in a low voice.
While Roy and the others were talking here, Satotz, standing behind the bushes farther back, was also muttering to himself about the situation at the venue, casually leaking Menchi's information out loud. What he said was more or less the same as Roy's explanation.
"Then what kind of food does she actually like?"
"She doesn't have any particular favorite food," Roy said. "But with how willful she is, if it's a cooking question, she'll probably make us prepare some specialty dish from a remote country, or from some regional cuisine that most people have never heard of."
"No way…" Leorio had barely finished speaking when Menchi said over there:
"Listen up, all of you! The final cooking question of the second phase is—sushi!"
"Sushi?"
"Sushi?!" Leorio was instantly struck by a bad feeling. He had never even heard of this dish before.
Every examinee frowned and repeated the word once, each in a different tone, but all with the same confusion as they tried to guess what kind of dish it was.
"What kind of dish is that, exactly?"
Hisoka stopped spinning the card in his hand, and Illumi—disguised as Gittarackur—tilted his head, making a series of cracking sounds.
Only one bald ninja reacted differently: when he heard the question, he froze for a moment, then a look of delight appeared on his face. Soon after, he suppressed that joy and his expression returned to calm.
(End of Chapter)
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