Chapter I: Ging in the Dark Continent
Beasts scoured the Dark Continent atop each precipice, around each corner and under each fold, and Ging moved quickly forward without thought. He had memorized much of the land from a map one survivor drew who lived to tell its torture, because to think more than was necessary about the topography of this wretched place was to lose time on reaching his destination and increase the already towering chance of death. Whether he ranked among the 5 most powerful Nen users meant nothing. The sheer suffocation of the Dark Continent's oppression dwarfed such petty trivialities.
The Dark Continent was armageddon manifest, practice for the apocalypse, but so despairing no one could tell you how it wasn't Hell itself, or how contained from consuming every continent and sea. The beasts are unlike anything anyone could imagine. It was Alluka's origin, as was it the Chimera ants'. No human could realistically survive it unless by luck and divine intervention. The V5 made the biggest mistake of their lives allowing passage. Nearly everyone who had boarded the Black Whale was dead. Beyond was nowhere to be found. Pariston, the zodiacs, and the rest of the hunters on the vessel like Biscuit called a state of emergency and were on their way back to an international summit to address the failed expedition. Most of the hunters who had trained for the journey all died.
A winged wraith approached overhead. Ging ducked. Its body sloped downward, then grazed upward over brush, revealing a spoiled milky flesh whose color crawled like maggots, and glistened with a wet secretion so foul the brush it had touched died, withering to dust, and would have killed Ging if not for the Nen barrier enveloping , it didn't spot him. He activated Zetsu and kept moving.
He reached a clearing. A wide mountain range breathing deeply marked the halfway point but was still more than a day's journey off. By the precedent the Dark Continent set for the difficulty Ging would have to face, the trek would take more than twice that, given he wouldn't be trapped and killed by anything before then; and, the map would only lead him so far before he'd have to rely on experience and intuition to deliver him to his destination.
Even now atop the clearing he was safer than he could have hoped for. Although exposed to every flying beast and creature, Ging was less vulnerable to attack. Surprise attempts on his life by hungry predators would be difficult.
Fatigue set in. His feet were sore. He looked down to find them bleeding. Upon closer inspection, he saw the clearing was not made of earth but small needle-thin beasts stabbing through his footwear sucking his blood. Zetsu was useless if the tiny beasts could physically feel him. He needed to get off the clearing. He ran off. Less than 5 minutes past before he spotted and cautiously entered a cavernous opening beneath his feet.
Ever since the departure to the Dark Continent upon the King of Khakin's ship, he'd been the only one to make it as far as he had come. The Zoldyck family submitted a request for Ging to find Alluka's origins: only one in a handful of times the Zoldyck family requested a job from a hunter outside their family.
In addition to their request, Ging's sister Mito got a hold of him before his journey. She knew superficially the kinds of appeals the Dark Continent held for him, but all that mattered to her was finding a cure for Gon's lost Nen. She couldn't bear to see him without a way to reach his dream any longer. "If you are a father of any kind you're not going to let your child suffer! I raised him and now it's time you did something in return. He wants to go but I won't let him. He'll die, so you better help him get his Nen back and do something for once in your homeless life that helps your family! No, sending home money isn't enough! Money isn't you doing anything meaningful for your son!" She'd furiously hung up. Shouganai. Ging's brow furrowed. He trudged somewhat despondently to the end of the cavern. Nothing. Empty. "I'll rest here for a while," he concluded. "Any more time and I'll be dead. Any less, I won't survive to see even the next two hours." He switched from Zetsu, extending En to the opening of the cavern so if any unwelcomed intruders happened upon him, he'd be ready to take them, and having readied himself, fell asleep.
Ging awoke to his head dusting the ground. Water whose wetness permeated the underside of his chin dripped from ragged stalactites. The crevice he'd crawled into was thin, but the opening was now a pulsing orifice. He was no longer in the same cave he'd fallen asleep in, and dangling from one leg.
"Hello, delicious!" Ging looked as far as he could past his peripheral vision at the blurry gray figure who composed the words. "Spin slowly now; take time." Nen? Nope. His body wouldn't move. "I'm sure you've figured out by now you can't quite use your Nen." Ging turned around enough to see the figure clearly. It was gray and thin-faced, emaciated, jaundiced, stirring a cauldron over a fire. "Look, uh…" Ging groaned a perpetual vocal fry, stuck on what word he should call the thing. "I am a Nen ghoul," it finally said. Ging had not sensed it with En. He let it speak more. "Arousing the stress in my prey makes their Nen tastier. But in humans, I find the toe far more pleasing. It's the most delightful part. I'll steam it, then peel it. Comes right off like the skin on a grape. Then the flesh will fall right off the bone. And the best part is the flesh underneath the toenail. I'll rip the nail off and use it to scoop the tender flesh hiding underneath." The ghoul had trailed off in such a reverie by the time it finished speaking and refocused attention toward Ging, he saw he'd no longer been dangling upside down but on hit feet.
"Do you really think you'll leave this cave?"
"Yep. There's no way I'm letting you suck on my toe."
Ging shifted his right foot to the front, putting up his hands. The ghoul scrunched his shoulders into his neck while folding its arms under its stomach in an upright posture, finger tips pointed to either hand, then manifested an aura filling the inside of the cave. Ging with no Ten could release no aura, but why waste any where none was needed? His stance slackened. "It seems you're not the only other ghoul here today. "There," Ging pointed, over the ghoul's shoulder.
With widened aperture, its bright wet eye rolled to gauge its periphery, then snapped back to face Ging, realizing he'd run toward the opening of the cave. The ghoul projected a loud wail that reverberated throughout Ging's body. Running with his head turned back at the ghoul, he said, "Told you I wouldn't let you suck my toe." But then as Ging reached the opening of the cave, its orifice pulsed violently shut.
"I told you, you won't leave this cave."
"So, I was right," Ging countered.
The ghoul looked confused.
"I couldn't sense you before, but when I woke up in here, I could. When you're consuming Nen, you can't be detected, but when you're using it, you can. You slipped up. The mouth of the cave, the stalactites dripping water, the whole thing's an illusion. Furthermore, you've stayed away from me this entire time, waiting to continue draining my aura, but I haven't stayed passed out because you can't keep filling up indefinitely. You're powerful, no doubt, but your body is weak. Could that be another reason you haven't approached me yet?" Ging's jabs at uncovering his enemy's capabilities shattered its predatory haughtiness. A layer of the earth beneath the ghoul gave to the gravity of its feet. It prepared to make the first move. "You're too slow." Ging needed no aura to spring from his feet with the explosive pounding of a jackhammer and crashing into its face the first punch struck, connected with the next and next thereafter. The points of impact on the ghoul's body concentrated into a large weal, making its constitution more resilient to Ging's following blows.
The ghoul laughed. "It's so easy to play dumb, isn't it?" I'm not as weak as you think.
"Yes you are. All I have to do is pop that dumb looking pimple on your chest taking all the energy from my blows, right? Then you'll explode. Besides," and Ging raising a blinding fist spiked with aura to his face, said, "I've got my Nen back." The ghoul stood awestruck like a statue for a moment, then rushed every atom to the muscles in its body against Ging, but the race was finished. The ghoul's flesh was riven, its body spilt across the cave. Surprisingly, it was still alive but with fading conscience.
"I recommend not kidnapping people and telling them you're going to suck on their toes. Don't expect things to go so well. Also, brilliant illusion. I wouldn't have been able to escape even if I hadn't defeated you." The opening of the cave was plastered with weeping briars containing an acid so dangerous one drop from it would go through the body on contact. Ging used his restored Nen to disburse the pesky things away from his only exit.
Upon stepping out, he discovered the cave he'd been in connected to a larger underground network. There were several passages through the large, interconnecting chamber. He examined the surrounding walls closely. They weren't natural. Everything rounded up to the top where light broke through a small hole. A kiln. Inside the mountain? What's more, I thought when I was back in there that this was the outside.
Ging thought about the map and some of the written records that had been left behind about the Dark Continent. He was closer to his destination, but the image he'd formed in his head would go dark soon. If this was the mountain, then he knew what lay on the other side of it hadn't been documented at all. As an Archeology and Ruins Hunter, he knew precisely what had been excavated and created by man, but this wasn't in any records within the context of the Dark Continent. However, he'd encountered an oral idyll that circulated across each continent he'd been to. It mentions tunnels of fire.
Land a dragoun once circled
sight wydespread and powr grand,
which had espied holes inside its mount.
He was affronted by soume unwinged beast
of proud constitution and flaming mane.
The mount was the wellspring of the dragoun's pride
that all the other beasts' dwellings o'er the land were humbler,
low beneath the mount.
Fie! roared the dragoun with flared maw, looking askance and who seth unto the beast:
wherefore passes thou through my mount with destructive endeavor
where I, power of this land, reside?
For from the mount came billowing thaw
the unwinged beast made. He seth unto the dragoun:
Disdaining lord of this land.
This flame-thronged layer houses contempt.
This, reconcile. Go to the animals and collect an item each.
Cast them into the flames and the burning shall cease.
Should thou save the mount,
Under a sallow an amarant will grow
restoring this nest to its peaceful ways.
Fail thou, the land will fray and restrained deep in thy mount shall ye find thyself become stone until a great force impel thy wake. And the flame will persist through the burrows of the mount.
Instead, the dragon tried killing the unwinged beast who turned him to stone,
never to raise the amarant that would quench the flame. It still burns,
and the dragoun has waited thousands of years to reawaken.
It was said years later a man stumbled upon the stone dragoun. He'd come from a city in which a nomadic clan wiped out his people. He was a rich banker. The nomads were so barbarous they wouldn't stop until every last person was dead; so he walked for miles and days, carrying his savings as he fled for any nearby village. He got lost on the way and came across the mount where he climbed its highest peak to gain a vantage point for the nearest village. At this point he had been walking all day under the sun without shade. Spotting a large tunnel, he went inside to cool off and saw the dragoun, cowering at first sight. However, once he'd realized it was stone, he thought it so mighty and fierce it would be the perfect site to store his savings. He left them and walked onward, looking for signs of a body of water. There he found a small group of people that had also been displaced by the nomadic tribe who at first startled by the man soon spoke freely knowing they suffered from the same circumstances. The man learned every village within a large radius had been hit by the nomadic tribe. Journeying farther would have been unquestionably difficult. The man thinking he wouldn't survive more than a few more days alone invited the group up into the mount where propositioned a new village be started. Deep into the sides of the mount, the people built their homes. The tunnels were sturdy, rough, and dry, and filled with ash. They thought it should be a kiln. Their village thrived. There they forged the sturdiest weapons and hardiest foods, until the dragoun's failure birthed the scourge of the land now known to the Dark Continent.
The people had heard a crackling sound. Hard rips of a yolk breaking off like thick ceramic. They went to see where it came from when they came upon the dragoun and a glowing amarant inside, with a hellish glow that made darkness visible. That man who had first stumbled across the dragoun and stowed away his fortunes there saw out of the glow come one terrifying creature after the other.
The mount was no kiln, it was a womb.
Ging looked around once more to see all the man-made marks were indeed man made. But they weren't built by man from scratch. Where he was standing was simply one of the nesting places of the many ancient beasts of the Dark Continent.
It was either Brion, Hellbell, Ai, Pap, or Zobae.
Shit. I'm in trouble now.