The moment Hisoka stepped forward alone, the cave itself seemed to narrow.
Twenty attackers under the leadership of the young man slowed.
One of them whispered,
"No…"
Another swallowed hard.
"That's Hisoka."
Even among Hunter applicants, without doing anything just because of his behavior and mannerism until now, fear of Hisoka was already there.
"Why is he alone?" someone asked, having a hard time believing that he wants to attack them alone.
The young attacker team leader tightened his jaw.
He had led patrol units before.
He had seen fear ripple through formations.
This felt different than usual.
Hisoka walked toward them as if approaching a casual evening stroll.
Twenty opponents stood between him and nothing, and he did not hesitate.
One of the attackers leaned toward their leader.
"I know he's crazy… but does he really think he can take all twenty of us?"
The young leader didn't answer immediately.
He locked eyes with Hisoka.
"He's confident," the leader murmured under his breath. "Not bluffing."
Then it happened.
Hisoka looked at them and showed his hands, and then with a flick of a finger, he attacked with a card in his hand.
Hisoka's voice echoed.
"Let's see if any one of you will die…"
The sentence barely finished before his body vanished into motion.
For people without nen, his movements were almost impossible to track at all.
"AGH!"
A body hit the ground.
Not dead, but due to the force of the attack and the power behind it, it was enough to put any adult human into sleep.
Before the others reacted, two more collapsed.
Hisoka didn't waste movement even when he was not killing.
Within two seconds, five more attackers dropped.
"Spread out!"
"Defensive formation!"
The young team leader shouted out loud.
But cohesion had already fractured.
Without NEN reinforcement, their durability was ordinary.
Even if they have nen, if they are not a master, it would not have much meaning in front of Hisoka.
Against someone of Hisoka's caliber, only real nen users and battle-hardened nen masters could have any chance to keep on fighting against him for some time.
Another card sliced through the air, embedding into a shoulder with brutal precision.
The pain alone knocked its target senseless.
Seven down.
Then twelve.
Then thirteen.
The young team leader finally believed that he should do something.
He overcame fear and then started running towards Hisoka.
When I got close enough.
He lunged forward with a solid punch aimed at Hisoka's flank.
Hisoka tilted his torso just slightly.
The punch missed by centimeters.
Hisoka's elbow snapped backward into the attacker's ribs.
Air was evacuated from the leader's lungs as he staggered.
Hisoka leaned close, whispering near his ear.
"Good spirit."
Then a light chop to the neck.
The leader collapsed.
He was not sleeping but on the ground, trying to gather his force to move.
Six left.
They tried to retreat as a unit now, but retreating in a narrow cave corridor against someone faster only worsened spacing.
Hisoka stood silent for a moment as he looked at the people for some time.
"Fighting against non-nen users is not fun," he murmured to himself as he looked at the people on the ground.
It was hard to not kill people that he fought with; this was something that he was not used to doing at all.
"What to do," he asked himself.
While Hisoka thought about these things, inside of a small room in the cave, a group of people were on the computers looking at the screens; there were cameras inside of the cave to watch the exam.
In the room, Togari was there too.
He looked at the battle between Hisoka and others and shook his head.
"Sir."
"Nobody is dead, but they are injured enough that it is more than likely that they are done and need hospital time."
Togari nodded.
"I can see that." Togari said to one of the assistants that works for the Hunter Exam.
Togari then took a deep breath and thought.
"For a nen user like him, fighting against these people is not much different than an adult beating down children."
"But he did not kill anybody for the time being, so whatever he does is in line with the exam."
"If he knows nen, so be it; there is nothing we can do about it."
Togari did not know why, but he believed something was about to happen.
Just a feeling, nothing real, but it was heavy.
He believed Hisoka would do something, and he was having a hard time holding himself back.