The Hundred-Type Guanyin?!
As the hundreds of arms slowly rotated, some were clenched into fists, some stood upright in open-palmed strikes, some pinched their fingers together, some chopped downward, some sliced sideways… a hundred arms, a hundred hands, each in a different pose, all spread behind the massive image of Guanyin. Then Guanyin pressed her lips into a faint smile and looked down upon them…
Roy's expression tightened.
In an instant, he felt an overwhelming pressure. As Netero slowly turned his gaze toward him, Roy's breathing quickened.
"Bisky told me you had an old soul in you," Netero said quietly. "Back at Heaven's Arena, that offhand line of yours—'Thus have I heard; I rejoice and praise it'—stuck with her for a long time. Now it seems she wasn't wrong…"
Radiant and solemn, Netero stood beneath the bowing Guanyin, as though the heavens themselves had tipped over, blocking out that hazy, boundless light of the mind. He stared at Roy and pointed toward the Guanyin behind him.
"You know Her?"
In a space of the mind, lies had nowhere to hide.
Even if Roy wanted to lie, his mental projection in this place would expose him instantly.
Roy lifted his right hand to shield his eyes and looked up at Guanyin with a sigh.
"She really is tall. The sacred appearance is very similar too. But there are still parts that aren't the same as what I imagined."
"Which parts?"
"There."
Roy pointed at Guanyin as well.
But—
his finger stopped slightly higher than Netero's, passing right over Guanyin's shoulders and landing on the hundred arms rotating behind Her.
Honestly, Roy said to Netero, "The one I know doesn't have a hundred arms…"
"She has a thousand."
The Great Compassionate Thousand-Armed Guanyin, one of the Western Pure Land Trinity, the embodiment of perfect merit and virtue among the Bodhisattvas, the left attendant of Amitabha Buddha.
The "thousand" in that rank symbolizes boundlessness and perfection. She is usually depicted with "a thousand hands" and "a thousand eyes." The thousand hands represent infinite great compassion, and the thousand eyes represent perfect, unobstructed wisdom. As the Dharani Sutra says: the Thousand-Armed, Thousand-Eyed Avalokitesvara can bring benefit and peace to all sentient beings, responding to their needs in accordance with the five divisions and five methods, fulfilling every prayer and wish.
In other words, in terms of majesty, spiritual rank, Buddhist truth, wisdom, and divine power, the Guanyin image before them—despite its size—was still worlds apart from the true Thousand-Armed Guanyin. Calling the difference heaven and earth would not be an exaggeration.
Rumble…
The Buddhist hall shook. Dust and rubble rained down.
The moment Roy finished speaking, Netero's turbulent emotions projected directly into the hall. Even the Buddhist heart he had cultivated for nearly eighty years began to tremble and waver.
This time, Netero was genuinely surprised.
The strongest human looked Roy over from top to bottom, as if seeing him for the first time. He studied him for a long while before finally speaking.
"Bisky was wrong. Your understanding of Buddhism runs even deeper than either she or I imagined…"
"Ho ho ho… strange, truly strange… A family full of cold-blooded assassins, and yet one of them gives birth to a child with such deep karmic roots. Old man, to tell the truth… I really am jealous of you."
"Hmph."
A soft snort curled through the air. It sounded half tsundere, half proud.
Maha let out that cold huff, the faintest trace of smug satisfaction appearing at the corners of his mouth as he rocked a little faster in his chair.
Inside the vast world formed by [Heart's Drop: Fist Listening] x [Heart's Drop: Sword Listening]…
Roy sat quietly on the little stool, turned slightly sideways to the Buddhist hall. He neither admitted nor denied anything. There was no pride, no self-satisfaction. His words were plain and calm, and everything he said was simply… true.
After all, the Hunter world was full of religions and faiths. Netero's Hundred-Type Guanyin represented Buddhism. Chrollo's cross symbolized Christianity. Hanzo's ninjutsu reflected the path of the shinobi. It was enough to show that this world was not some false illusion, but rather a kind of reflection of the real world through reverse manifestation.
And Roy's advantage lay in the fact that he had transmigrated, that he had been reborn, that he possessed two lifetimes' worth of experience—something no native of this world could ever have.
So having some understanding of Buddhism, Christianity, and the way of the ninja was nothing particularly extraordinary for him.
The rumbling gradually weakened. The Buddhist hall stopped shaking. After his initial shock, Netero quickly steadied himself again and said honestly, "Actually, I know Guanyin has a thousand arms. The reason only a hundred appear now isn't because of Guanyin."
"It's my fault."
"I'm too weak to support the Thousand-Armed Guanyin."
Netero flicked his hand, catching another fish, then threw it right back into the lake.
At that moment, the old man really did seem just as Roy had said—his vigor fading, his prime far behind him. A trace of evening gloom, helplessness, and weariness clung to him unnoticed, leaving Roy with a lump in his throat and nothing to say for a while.
A breeze rose and passed over the lake, stirring Netero's white brows, beard, and hair.
Their reflections rippled across the lake. Then a leaf fell, and the ripples broke them apart.
Roy's emotions stirred. In the next instant, several lines of text appeared on the surface of the heart-lake, sinking into the awareness of both Netero and Maha, who was watching from the side without stepping closer.
"All men know that immortals are good…"
Netero's lips moved as he read aloud.
"All men know that immortals are good, Yet none can forget fame and glory. Where now are the generals and ministers of old? Their graves lie barren, buried under weeds.
All men know that immortals are good, Yet none can forget gold and silver. They mourn that they have gathered too little all their lives— And when they've gathered enough, their eyes close forever.
All men know that immortals are good, Yet none can forget lovely wives. They swear eternal devotion while alive— Yet when they die, the woman follows another.
All men know that immortals are good, Yet none can forget their children and grandchildren. From ancient times, loving parents there have been in plenty— But where are the truly filial sons?"
"This…" Netero's eyes deepened as he turned sharply to Roy. "Where did you read a haiku like this?"
{Note: Haiku as a short poetic form is not uncommon in the Hunter world. A well-known example is Basho, who teamed up with Kurapika and Melody in the Yorknew arc to protect Neon. His Nen ability, [Wandering Great Poet], allows anything written as haiku on a card to become reality.
But because the mechanics are so overpowered, the ability comes with extremely strict limitations. First, it is restricted by the user's aura quantity, and its effect depends on the literary quality of the poem—if the verse is not elegant enough, the effect is greatly weakened.
Second, each haiku can only produce a single effect, and the card burns up after use. For example, he once wrote a haiku that made "whatever is blown away ignite," but in the end it only managed to set a chair on fire, showing the limits of the ability.}
Fame, wealth, lovers, descendants…
In just a few short lines, the poem encompassed every pursuit in human life and laid them bare in a blunt, almost brutal way for all to see.
Netero stared at Roy intently. He was almost certain this was not the kind of thing someone Roy's age could have written.
And yet—
if it wasn't the boy, then what, some old fossil?
Netero cast a sidelong glance through the haze of mental light toward that dim little room in the Zoldyck mansion. Maha, like him, was also an [Enhancer]. "All brawn and no brains" certainly didn't make him look like someone who'd spent his life reading poetry…
"Maha, this haiku feels so sad…"
At ten in the morning, the clock in the corner struck with a sonorous chime.
On the first floor of the Zoldyck mansion, inside that dim little room, the curtains were drawn. Then a hazy current of Nen drifted out of Maha's body, taking the form of Betty Zoldyck. She sat crookedly in Maha's lap and, through layers of walls and dense forest, cast a mournful glance toward the butler villa on the mountainside. Before she realized it, both her hands had been firmly caught in Maha's.
The old man looked half-dead, far older than Netero on the surface.
He opened those cloudy old eyes, grinned, and said, "Of course it's sad. Whoever wrote that poem saw through life and human nature. That's why they would find it meaningless. That's why they'd find no joy in it. That's why it would hurt."
Betty leaned down, resting against Maha's small chest, and nodded in full agreement.
"Where do you think Roy saw something like that?"
"In a dream."
Across half of Kukuroo Mountain, grandfather and grandson spoke in perfect unison.
A sharp gleam flashed in Netero's weathered old eyes, and he chuckled at Roy.
"So your Nen ability really is connected to dreams."
Then, thinking of Zigg's Nen ability, [re:Game of the Dead], the old man sighed with genuine feeling.
"So alike. Very alike. Both Conjurers. Both wildly imaginative. If your grandfather Zigg were still alive and saw you now, he'd be very happy."
For an instant, Netero seemed to see Zigg's shadow in Roy.
Roy had inherited perhaps thirty percent of the Zoldyck look through the family's strong genes. Even the hair, aside from the gold at the ends, was almost the same.
But Zigg was Zigg, and Roy was Roy.
No matter what Netero thought, Roy remained true to himself. He lifted his hand and, for the first time, hooked a fish from the heart-lake. Without even looking at Netero, he said, "Who told you Grandfather Zigg is dead? I saw him not long ago."
What?!
Netero froze.
Then—
boom!
The Buddhist hall behind him collapsed from the force of his emotional upheaval. Even the smiling, full-cheeked Guanyin statue with its hundred arms cracked apart and was buried beneath the rubble.
"You brat—do you even know what you're saying?!"
Before Netero could even kick away his stool and rise—
a figure far faster, more violent, and more overwhelming than he was had already exploded into motion, dragging purple-black lightning behind it. In a flash, it appeared beside Roy and boxed him in between itself and Netero.
On Roy's left was thunder by the thousands. On his right, the collapsed ruins of Guanyin.
He suddenly felt like a lone leaf-boat that had foolishly sailed out into the middle of the sea, just waiting for a single massive wave to flip it over.
With a flick of his hand, he tossed the fish he'd just caught back into the lake.
As if sensing that the atmosphere on shore had turned dangerous, the fish bulged its dead-looking eyes, lashed its tail, and sped away. That left Roy alone, still holding the wooden stick like a fishing rod, swallowing hard before saying,
"Don't look at me like that. When I went to pay respects to Grandfather Zigg, I caught a glimpse of his figure through that Mystic Eye he modified. As for whether…"
"…it was really him, that still needs to be confirmed."
"Confirmed, my ass." Maha's temper flared and he swore outright. "It has to be him. No one but him could still be connected to that eye!"
As his emotions surged, a corner of Maha's mental projection revealed itself in full.
In the state formed by [Heart's Drop: Fist Listening] x [Heart's Drop: Sword Listening], it was possible to see the [essential nature of the heart]. Based on that, one could manifest it through Nen and develop a Nen ability unique to oneself.
Maha was standing right beside Roy. In his agitation, a fragment of his inner sky unfolded behind him.
Within that vast sky, thunder roared. Dozens of purple-black lightning dragons coiled and swam through terrifying black storm clouds, some showing only the outline of their heads, some baring five-clawed talons, some trailing long whiskers, rearing back with thunder-shaking roars.
Roy's ears rang from it. Then he looked deeper into the thunder…
Beneath that storm of lightning dragons and electric serpents sat a ruined royal court.
The broken court far surpassed Netero's mental Buddhist hall. Any single fallen pillar there was as tall as the enormous trees Roy had seen on the Dark Continent.
Roy drew in a breath and kept looking deeper. In the overgrown courtyard of the ruined palace, where the grass could nearly swallow a person whole, weathered stone walls, bloodstained armor, and discarded weapons lay scattered across the ground, stretching onward in a long trail all the way to the great stone steps before the central hall.
Roy stared, his spirit and intent moving as one. Under the support of [Heart's Drop: Sword Listening], he remained in that out-of-body state, drifting over the fallen walls, abandoned weapons, and bloodstained armor—
until he finally set one foot upon the stone steps and slowly climbed.
At last, when his head rose above the final step—
Roy's two sun-burning eyes widened.
As his view opened up, he saw the throne.
And beneath it, men and women standing in rows to either side.
Were these Great-grandfather's old subordinates?
His beautiful silver hair, the glazed gold at the tips shimmering, swayed softly as he walked up the steps.
Roy swept his gaze around and quickly found several familiar figures among them—Brooke Seil, Sebirus, even his great-grandmother—people he had once glimpsed inside his great-grandfather's unconscious domain through dreams.
A quiet understanding rose in him then, and at once he recalled a certain saying:
A person dies three times.
The first death is biological death—when the organs fail, the heart stops, the breath ceases, and the brain falls silent, marking the end of life.
The second death is the disappearance of one's place in society—when no one speaks your name anymore, no one remembers your story or your influence, and your social existence ends.
The third death is the death of memory itself—when your spirit is forgotten, when no one any longer remembers that you ever came into this world. That is true death, the complete disappearance of the self.
And right now, clearly, some people had died—
and yet still lived stubbornly on in Great-grandfather's heart.
Just as Roy could see them,
they could see Roy too.
All at once, countless gazes turned toward him—
like an ocean, swallowing him whole.
~~~
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