Traveling by airship isn't bad, but an 18-hour flight leaves me a little antsy. I was more than ready when we landed. I managed to find a taxi pretty quickly, and we made our way to Hotel Janus. Morel was waiting for me in the lobby. It was the first time I'd met him. He was bigger than I'd expected, and I had known he was a large man. I guessed he was about a decade older than me, though the way Nen slows aging, it was hard to tell.
"You must be Mar," he said, extending his hand. "Glad you could join us. I'll show you to your room, and after you get settled, you can join us in our suite next door so that we can plan our mission. Do you need anything to eat?"
"I'm good," I said. "I ate shortly before we landed."
"Great!" he said. Then he frowned. "I should warn you - Shoot found out at the last minute that his father was dying, so he isn't with us after all. I didn't have time to find another person; hopefully I won't regret that."
In front of the door to my room, he handed me my key. "We're in there," he said, pointing to the door on the right. "Come over when you're ready."
####
Nen users develop different abilities, according to their type and personality. Many create abilities they can use as weapons, but some of us have less combative abilities. Biscuit Krueger, for example, while skilled at combat, had largely focused on restorative massage. I was one of this group. I was able to use En in a much more complex way over a more extended range than most Nen users. By concentrating, I could extend my En into a 90 degree cone up to one kilometer in front of me. Within this cone, I could detect others' Nen. Not only could I gauge how powerful and healthy they were, but if I had met them before, I could tell you who they were. I could not "see" people as if they were on a screen, like Palm Siberia could, and I did not have the ability to identify any individual and that person's attitudes that Meruem eventually developed. But, if Killua had had my ability when he first encountered Palm after she had been transformed, he wouldn't have simply sensed that someone was watching him; he would have been able to tell that she was following him at a certain distance and was no longer herself. I was able to use my ability to some extent while moving and on all sides, but it was much more effective if I could stand still, focus forward, and filter out known Nen users by keeping them behind me.
Morel, Knuckle, Meleoron, and I poured over a map of the park. My ability would help the team search the forest for the unknown source of the Hunters' insanity, though it was still going to be tedious work. "The only solution I can see is to slowly sweep the park. We're going to have to stop frequently for Mar to get a handle on what's around us. It will be slow-going, and if we're correct that the source is a human or magical creature, they probably will be on the move, making it even more difficult, but I see no other way," Morel said. None of us could think of something better, so we agreed to the plan. The second group of Hunters to enter the park had evidently run across the Source, as we called it, after a few days, so we hoped that we would, too.
"I'd like to get started right away," Morel continued, "but before we go, I think Mar should meet the two surviving Hunters in the hospital. They're still incoherent, but she can take a look at their auras and get a feel for what an insane Hunter is like. We'll do that tomorrow just before we leave.
"We'll travel light. We can catch or gather what food we need. We'll take turns cooking, and everyone is responsible for setting up and tearing down the campsite and cleaning up after meals."
I swallowed hard at "cooking." "Um..." I said, a bit hesitant to make my confession. All eyes were on me, so I forged ahead. "I can't cook."
"You can't cook?" Knuckle asked. Morel raised an eyebrow.
"When I was a little girl, my father's friend, a Hunter, visited our family. While he was with us, he told stories about his adventures, and I hung on his every word. I knew that the only thing I ever wanted to do was to be a Hunter. So I kept my grades up to make my folks happy, so that they'd let me take the Hunter Exam someday, and the rest of the time I trained. I pretty much let everything else go," I explained.
"Well, you're not a Gourmet Hunter," Knuckle said with a smirk.
"How can you survive on your own if you can't cook?" Morel asked.
"I make do. I rely on others, I eat what I buy in the towns and carry with me, or I forage. I don't mind raw eggs," I said.
"Everyone should know how to cook," he said. "You'll take turns with whoever's cooking. We'll look for eggs tomorrow. We might as well start with those." He stood. "Now, let's get some sleep. We'll leave for the hospital at 7 tomorrow morning, and we'll go straight from there to the park."
I said goodnight and returned to my room. I was tired, but I couldn't rest. Our task seemed impossible - like finding a needle in a haystack. My range might be further than most Nen users, but it was going to slow us down. I focused, trying to push my range, but I was too exhausted. I couldn't sense anything more than three-quarters of a kilometer away. Disgusted, I lay down and finally drifted off to sleep.
