Sorry this took so long! My excuse is one word: school.

Disclaimer:I do not own Hunter x hunter or my hero academia. Those rights go to the legends Togashi and Horikoshi.

Edited: 23/03/2020

Izuku POV

Sure enough, once I had walked into the forest, Kacchan was easy to find. I just hoped our own targets were close by and unsuspecting (they both went in before us) and the people with us for targets hadn't already entered the forest.

"God what took you so fucking long deku."
"B-but we're supposed to wait 2 minutes..."
"I waited longer than that!"
"D-don't shout, we don't want to draw attention to ourselves..."
"Whatever, those fucking extras can try and take my tag, no matter what they'll fail!" Kacchan exclaimed confidently, looking into the foliage expectantly.

As no one emerged in order to challenge on his statement, we kept moving forward carefully.

But we weren't careful enough.

Had it not been for his monster reflexes, Kacchan would've been dealt a fatal blow.
He jumped just in time to avoid a mortal wound, however, an arrow pierced into his leg.

"Kacchan!"

In an attempt to find the attacker, I looked through the trees in the direction the arrow came from and was surprised to see... a trap?*

Now I could see it. A wire lay on the ground, unnoticeable before due to the mud and leaves camouflaging it.

'A trap? I don't know how this works, I've never seen traps before. We need to be more careful, and watch our step.'

"Kacchan! A-are you okay?"
"What do you fucking think!"
"I..."
"Who fucking did that? Come out and fight face to face! An ambush won't work on me!"
"Kacchan! It was a t-trap. Look!"

'Is the person who set the trap nearby? They would've likely had a way of knowing if and when the trap was set if it was... and that means they could be coming for us any second! Wait, but they'll probably think it's only one person... Maybe if I hide I can ambush them? Or maybe Kacchan can hide and I can pretend I dodged it... no the arrow is stuck on his leg, if we pull it out then he'll lose too much blood,and the arrow head could get stuck in his skin... And in order to remove the arrow, I read one must enlarge the wound enough so the shaft can come back out without being lodged in the skin. But what if it pierced his bone? What should I do? I need to help Kacchan! Tend to his wound first and then plan an attack as there are no obvious direct attackers as of now... But then again what if they are coming right now? What should I do? Think! What is the best course to take?'

"Kacchan, use this to bandage it, I'll take the arrow out! After we do that, I'm going to hide. Pretend you're alone, I'll ambush them." I took the initiative and instructed Kacchan, something I never thought I'd do, as I ripped off my sleeve from my tracksuit.

He followed through, even through the pain, as I enlarged the wound so I could remove the arrow safely.

We managed to get prepared before another attack, however I didn't know how prepared Kacchan had to be with his wound.

An arrow shot through the foliage, but from a different direction this time. Chances were, it was not a trap, and was an applicant. Kacchan managed to dodge, even with his injured leg. However this put him at a disadvantage.
Slightly off balance after jumping sideways to avoid a hit, the attacker took the chance to make a direct attack.

She had a cream scarf.

I jumped down from the tree onto her back, snatching the ends of the scarf, and pulling with all my might so she would desist.
However, instead the scarf fell off, she had anticipated such an attack.

Reacting quickly, I hopped onto my feet and discarded the clothing behind me. She whipped around to face me. I could see regret and concern in her eyes, but I didn't know why. In case it was simply a ploy in order to lower my guard, I threw a hard punch straight at the temple. I didn't want to kill anyone, so I just knocked her out.

I caught her as she fell unconscious and fumbled through her pockets, in search of her tag. Sure enough, it was in there #211. One down, one to go.

"Kacchan look!" I handed him the tag. At this point in time, he had passed, although now he had to maintain those points, with a wounded leg.
"Were one of us her target or did she simply lay a trap to catch any applicant... If it were the former she would've had to follow us for a while in order to figure out where we were going, and also have enough time to create the trap..."
"Shut up Deku! We still need to find your target, and we have to idea."
"W-wait!" I desperately shouted to Kacchan as he was leaving. "We should take her near to a stream, I don't want her to d-die..."
"Who fucking cares! You wouldn't be able to knock her out for so long that she doesn't wake up for 3 days. Don't fucking waste our time. Let's go!"
"B-but.."

Before I could utter any further complaints, he grabbed my arm and dragged me through the forest, an impressive feat for someone's with a wounded leg.

"Anyway, we still have a week. We need to rest, eat and drink in that time, so let's find a stream first, before we even fucking consider carrying her to one."

It was a valid point I had overlooked. We walked off in search of any water, as I noted the place we left her.

/

After having found some water within 3 hours - resting for a few minutes every now and then for kacchan's leg - and returning to the place we left her, we found she was gone. Likely had woken up and left. I also wanted to study the trap she had set for us, so I could perhaps utilise it later, but the trap had been removed. Perhaps she knew we would return to the same spot and changed the location of the trap, but it was gone. With nothing left to do, we sought for my target, more wary for any traps, we didn't want a repeat.

/

3 more days had passed without any signs of another an applicant. We were trudging around island aimlessly, with a vague goal in mind.

Finally, we found her, already deceased. Tag, of course, gone.
Needle stabbed in the eye, mercilessly killed swiftly without struggle
This was a problem, as our only lead on my tag had disappeared. My best bet was finding 3 other applicants and stealing their tags.

Then we felt it.

Chills running down our spine, hair standing on it's end, we felt the presence of Hisoka, sizing us up as if we were simply food to be devoured.

Acting on instinct, we both sprinted away from the clown.

'Why is he here? Did he kill her? No that's unlikely, he doesn't use needles. There was that other strange applicant, Gittarackur I think though... There's no chance of us taking the tag from him, we can only try to obtain 3 other random tags if I want to pass... Actually, has Gon taken Hisoka's tag yet?'

I risked a glance back to our assailant's chest, noticing the presence of his tag, still attached to his clothing.
With this glance, I also noticed, he hadn't attacked us, unlike what I thought he would do.

"You're target's #80, is that so?" he smirked.

The instant I turned around, he caught my eye and rooted me to the spot with fear, facing Hisoka.

'How does he know? Wait, if he saw us rummaging through #80's corpse looking for a tag, obviously one would assume it's their target, however it could also be that we simply wanted another tag as that would still benefit us... Maybe he's looking for the answer through our facial expression?'

Although scared out of my wits, I kept a straight face as much as possible in order to not leak any information.

However I did not expect him to then pull out the very tag of #80.

'So did he kill him? Or maybe it was given to him? Or perhaps he found it...'

I had to get it to pass. Just trying to collect three random tags was plausible, but unlikely, as we had barely seen any other examinees since our first encounter. This would be my only opportunity.
The problem was, no matter how fast or suddenly I acted, he would react faster. I'd have to create a reachable opportunity, but it'd be a bit hard to pull of an ambush when the person has already located you, and was thousands of times faster than you.

I pulled myself out of my frozen stance, and tentatively stepped closer to him.
He raised a brow smugly.
Step by step, shuffling closer to him, I closed the gap between me and my target's tag.
Each step, however, became heavier and heavier, I could feel some unseen force pushing me back, dragging out every mundane action, even standing upright, to become a difficult task.

Right next to me, in spite of this strange feeling, I could see Kacchan striding past as if it was nothing.

"Hmm, I see..."
I could see something sinister light up in his eyes, as he licked his lips.
"Here. I didn't know you could use it." He smirked.

Simultaneously, I felt the strange force stop and saw the tag thrown to Kacchan, who was now a few steps away from Hisoka. A close enough range for him to kill with his outstretched arm. But he didn't. He merely stood there peacefully, at least peacefully compared to his usual self.

Once Kacchan smoothly caught the tag, he retreated backwards towards me, never taking his eyes off the magician.

As he stepped away, I followed suite, and we eventually sped up and the joker disappeared behind the trees, never moving from his spot.

"Deku, you okay?"

This was a first. I knew he cared, but he never showed the concern.

"Y-yes, Umm... Kacchan h-how did you-?"

At these words, he reverted back to his usual attitude.

"What do you mean how did I? I don't get why you fucking stopped!" In contrast to his fiery language, there was a pained look in his eyes.

He was hiding something.

I decided against prying.

/

It was peaceful the four remaining days, miraculously for us. The most action we had was gathering food for survival. Either #211 and our hunters couldn't find us, didn't want to find us, or didn't try to find us. Either way, it was a win, and the final day arrived, lying in wait near the starting point.

"The time limit for the fourth exam has ended. Would all applicants please return to the starting point at once. You will be given one hour extra. If you do not return during this time, you will fail the exam. Furthermore, you are not allowed to exchange tags once arriving at the starting point. Anyone caught swapping tags will be disqualified."

Like music to my ears, the end of the fourth phase was announced, and we emerged from our hiding spot into the open.

From a quick count, there were 8 of us, including me and Kacchan, however no sign of Gon, Kurapika or Leorio.

'Gon's target was Hisoka... And as Hisoka is here, that likely means he didn't get his tag, so he either got 3 other tags, or failed... Would he be able to get 3 other tags though? I saw Hisoka holding up 4 tags, #53 - Pokkle had 2, Killua had 2, I had 2, Kacchan had 2, #301 - Gittarackur had 2, #191 - Bodoro had 2, #294 - Hanzo had 4... All in all, that totals to 20, and with 27 examinees, that only leaves 7. That isn't enough for them all to pass even if Leorio and Kurapika obtained their target's tags...'

My worries, however, were for nothing, as arriving fashionably late were the three. It was like a running trend for them to arrive last second.

'Wait but... how would he have passed? There wouldn't be enough tags for them all... Unless if he really did get Hisoka's tag?'

Answering my thoughts, Gon held out two tags, and although I couldn't see the number from the distance, he must've had Hisoka's tag as well, as he only held two up.

The six of us, as well as 5 others, had passed the penultimate phase of the Hunter exam.

Note*: That trap is a bow trap. I was searching up different traps I could use and then I found this one and knew this was the one lol.

I'm not proud of those fight scenes... As you can see battles aren't my forte, which is a bit strange since I mainly watch shounen anime lol

I actually thought what if a hunter (as in someone who hunts animals and stuff) took the hunter exam, which isn't really a groundbreaking question but well the words are the same. So I wanted a long range weapon and thought a bow and arrow are well known , and realised Pokkle already uses a bow and arrow... But then I disregarded that since I had already done research on hunting animals (which is also another similarity with Pokkle, as he hunts animals). If you want more info on #211, her name is Mitsume, and she's 17. Her appearance is my profile pic (light brown hair in a ponytail, green eyes, purple shirt...)

Also, I'm sorry but updates are going to come really slow since the holidays are over (they will become more frequent the next holiday). I could either be posting a new chapter weekly or none at all until the next holiday so please bear with me! If a year passes and I still haven't posted the next chapter, chances are I'm either dead or stuck on a deserted island with no means of escape, it does not mean this is discontinued! I will never discontinue this (I actually enjoy writing it myself lol) (ﾟAﾟ;)

Thanks for all the likes and favourites! Thanks for all the reviews! :D

Replies to reviews:

Rayeth99: Ya, I'll try... but then the amount of time this chapter took...( please dont be upset or anything ^_^)

Pickle hater: Thanks! :)

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