Hunter: I became stronger even after I died.

Chapter 1 Love Etude

Late at night, it rained heavily.

Youkexin City, Xiashui Street.

The rain, like a curtain of beads, gathered into a stream and flowed along the veins of the city streets.

The light on the street was uncertain, but there was an antique shop that was brightly lit.

There was a common electronic screen hanging above the antique shop, with a line of red text slowly scrolling on it:
【Collecting antiques, miscellaneous items and handmade artworks - June 1997, 6】

Inside the antique shop, there are display windows along the wall.

In the orange-yellow light, pieces of antique art are displayed, but it is difficult to see their true colors.

Deep in the store, a solid wooden table is placed against the wall, with a desk lamp on the corner of the table.

Under the illumination of beams of light, a red wooden puppet sculpture about 50 cm tall stood quietly in the middle.

Suddenly, a pair of hands reached into the light and enveloped the ordinary wooden puppet.

The owner of the hand was a young man wearing casual clothes, with neat black hair and handsome features.

Click.

The young man applied a little force with his fingertips, and cracks suddenly appeared on the surface of the wooden puppet. Strands of white light, different from that of a desk lamp, seeped out from the cracks.

Then, the wooden shell shattered and fell, revealing a jade figure surrounded by a faint glow of spiritual energy.

On the transparent surface of the jade figure, there are light green lines like fish patterns, which sparkle under the light, and are obviously worth a lot of money.

Break the wood shell and turn waste into treasure.

This scene was seen by a sturdy man wearing a dog-head mask near the door of the antique shop.

But the man seemed to understand the boy's abilities and was not surprised at all.

He crossed his arms, looked directly at the boy, and said in a steady and powerful voice: "Morro, why did you reject the gift that Melina prepared for you?"

"Gift?"

The young man called Moreau suddenly looked up, met the gaze of the dog-headed man, and smiled helplessly.

"Brother Gou, you asked me to kill 21 strangers. This is also considered a gift..."

"Of course it's a gift. As long as you kill them, you can immediately reach level 21. If nothing unexpected happens, you should be able to master an additional Nen ability that caters to your needs. Even if the final result is different, you can at least use it to enhance your temperament."

The dog-headed man's voice was always steady and powerful. After a pause, he continued:

"Moro, Melena needs to get feedback on the effect of her mind power as soon as possible, so don't let her down. Besides... you can become stronger just by killing a few people. This kind of thing will only benefit you and not harm you."

"..."

Moro fell silent upon hearing this.

Just killing a few people randomly?

This is how gangsters behave.

In other words, in this world called Hunter x Hunter, disregarding life and trampling on individual existence are not uncommon things.

Moro experienced this firsthand when he traveled here a year ago...

He stared at the dog-headed man in silence.

As a time traveler, he is familiar with the plot and characters of Hunter x Hunter.

The dog-headed man in front of him, and Melina who saved him a year ago, are both characters from gangster families who appeared in the Kakin Kingdom throne succession arc.

Putting aside Melena's identity as the illegitimate daughter of the royal family of Kajin and her future identity as the gangster boss of the Aiyi family, what impressed Moro the most was...

It is always the Nen ability that Melina demonstrated in the original work.

That is a kind of mind ability that allows others to upgrade and become stronger by killing others...

"Killing people can make you stronger. It sounds so easy."

Moro suppressed the thoughts in his mind, a strange smile appeared at the corner of his mouth, but his eyes were so calm that no ripples could be seen.

"Brother Gou, the ability of mind reading is not such a superficial thing. There is a system of oaths and restrictions... Although I don't know how Melina discovered this ability, one thing is certain."

At this point, Moro suddenly looked away, lowered his head to look at the beautiful woman on the table, and said calmly: "That is the risk, a huge and unknown risk."

"..."

After hearing what Moro said, it was the dog-headed man who remained silent this time.

Silence is sometimes equivalent to consent.

However, he did not forget his position because of this. He quickly broke away from the silence and asked directly: "So your answer is no?"

"How could that be...My life was given to me by Melena."

Moro lowered his eyes and smiled somewhat self-deprecatingly, but the pair of dark and bottomless eyes of Melina flashed through his mind.

After a pause, he looked up at the dog-headed man again and said softly, "Give me a day."

"Okay, I'll tell Melena."

Upon hearing this, the dog-headed man nodded towards Moro, then turned around and left.

Just as he was about to push the door and walk out of the antique shop, he suddenly stopped as if he thought of something.

"By the way, Melina said she hasn't decided on a name for her reading ability yet, and she wants you to help her pick one."

"..."

Moreau was stunned for a moment, and couldn't help but think of some scenes from the original novel.

"Love Etude"

This is the name of Melena's telepathic ability in the original work.

As for the destructive Nen ability, why does it have such a name...

Moreau didn't know.

Thinking of this, Moro gave an answer based on the original information without any thought or hesitation: "Let's call it Love Etude, if Melina doesn't hate it..."

"Ok?"

The dog-headed man was a little surprised; he didn't expect Moreau to give this style a name.

But he didn't think much about it. He waved to Moro, pushed the door open and strode into the night rain.

Moro looked calm as he watched the dog-headed man leave.

crunch--

The door closed.

A few minutes later, Moro slowly withdrew his gaze and turned to look at the transparent beauty standing among a pile of wood shell fragments on the table.

"I can only run away..."

There are some things he is unwilling to do and there is no room for maneuver, so Moro decides to leave Melina's circle.

It’s not that he was against killing people, but among the twenty-one people sent by Melina, there were babies and children.

This has already reached the bottom line.

Moreover, he knew better than anyone else what Melena's true purpose was hidden deep in her heart.

Destroy Kajin, destroy humanity, destroy the world, destroy everything...

This is what Melina pursued. So Moro would leave sooner or later, but she didn't expect that day to come so soon.

Over the past six months, the antique shop he runs has brought considerable profits to Melina.

If nothing unexpected had happened, he actually wanted to repay Melina for saving his life in this way as much as possible.

That’s enough…

Moro thought silently in his heart, then raised his right hand and looked at the back of his hand.

There is a tattoo pattern made up of hollow circles in six different colors, like tree rings.

The colors of the tree ring tattoo pattern, from inside to outside and from small to large, are white, green, blue, purple, red and gold.

In the very center of the tree ring is a very small black infinity symbol.

Moreau is not clear about the origin and purpose of the tree ring tattoo pattern.

A few days after he traveled through time, he noticed the outline of a tree ring tattoo suddenly appearing on the back of his hand, which gradually darkened and then froze.

The information that can be confirmed at the moment is that other people cannot see the tree ring tattoo on the back of his hand, and that the back of his hand covered by the tree ring tattoo seems to have an "indestructible" oath effect.

In addition, he can fill the hollow areas of the annual rings by absorbing the spiritual energy of antiques.

This is also the fundamental reason why he chose to run an antique shop in Youkexin.

Over the past six months, he has absorbed a lot of faint spiritual energy from antiques and handmade artworks, and now the innermost white ring is almost filled.

Moro didn't think about leaving Melina for the time being, and focused his attention on the beautiful woman who was surrounded by faint mental energy.

As long as the spiritual energy from the jade figure is absorbed, the white rings should be able to be filled up.

Even if he couldn't fill the gap, the employees he sent out would bring back some antiques that might be entangled with spiritual energy tonight.

In the quiet antique shop, Moro stretched out his hand and covered the beauty.

There was no movement or fluctuation, but the faint energy from the beauty was merging into the back of Moro's palm at a speed visible to the naked eye.

The tiny gap in the white annual ring was also filled, making it relatively complete.

It looks like there’s no need to wait for the Niuma employees to come back.

As Moro thought about it, his eyes were fixed on the white growth rings on the back of his hand. After more than half a year of hard work, he now felt a little excited.

Because in his opinion, the tree ring tattoo is very likely what people often call the golden finger of time travel.

If he could provide help at this moment, he would have more confidence to leave the Aiyi family.

Moreau waited patiently for changes, but as time passed, the white rings that filled up like energy bars did not produce any unusual phenomena.

"The worst outcome has occurred."

Seeing the motionless tree ring tattoo, Moro shook his head slightly.

In this situation, there are probably only three possibilities.

One is that all the growth rings need to be filled in to reveal the as-yet unknown abilities.

One is that the filled growth rings require certain specific conditions to reveal the ability.

The last one, the tree ring tattoo was not the golden finger he expected.

Moreau was a little disappointed, but didn't care too much.

Even if he could obtain the power of the golden finger at this moment, it would at most be a pleasant surprise to him.

His real confidence comes from the ability to release thoughts that he has cultivated diligently since he traveled through time.

As the night deepened, the rain showed no sign of abating.

The dog-headed man walked through the heavy rain and came to a black car on the side of the road.

The window of the back seat of the black sedan rolled down, revealing a delicate and elegant woman.

The woman's eyebrows are like willow leaves and her eyes are like phoenixes.

However, there were two parallel, hideous scars on her pretty face.

The scar ran from her hairline through her left eyelid to her cheek, almost spanning half of her face, which was extremely shocking.

"Melena."

The dog-headed man bent down and looked at the woman in the car.

Melena raised her eyes: "Aquan, what did he say?"

"Moreau asked you to give him a day."

The dog-headed man replied truthfully.

Melina lowered her eyes, as if she had realized something.

The dog-headed man waited for Melina's response, letting the heavy rain pour down on his body.

After a while.

Melina habitually reached out and touched the scar on her cheek.

"never mind."

She murmured softly.

The dog-headed man was slightly startled.

Melena put down her hand and looked past the dog-headed man towards the antique shop.

"Ah Quan, you know... there's something about little Morrow that I really hate."

"what?"

The dog-headed man asked.

Melena's eyes were deep and her tone gradually became cold.

“Bottom line.”

"..."

The dog-headed man didn't know what to say.

Melena said coldly: "My people can't have such things."

The dog-headed man understood what Melena meant and thought about persuading her for a moment, but he held back.

Melina retracted her gaze, "The people from the Phantom Troupe are making trouble again. Let Xiao... let him be one of the bargaining chips to settle the dispute."

"understood."

The dog-headed man responded and then said the name of the mind ability given by the Moro Gang.

Love Etude...

When Melina heard the name, a wave of emotion appeared in her eyes. It was indeed not complete enough...

Even if you can feel the loyalty of little Moreau during the deep kiss, it is meaningless because the "purpose" is completely different.

"Let's go."

Melina lowered her head slightly. Although she couldn't get any feedback, she also discovered the flaws in her abilities.

Aquan looked at Melina and heard a hint of disappointment in her tone...

(End of this chapter)