Days passed quickly. Kien spent most of his time either in his room, enjoying his luxurious bed, or wandering the tower.
Tickets were cheap and cheaper still if you were an arena fighter, so he watched matches for fun. It seemed everyone on floor 200 and above used nen. How that was allowed, he had no idea.
Wasn't nen a trade secret? Didn't the audience wonder how it was all being done, or did they believe it was fake, like some wrestling is?
He understood why the arena would want to broadcast it, though. Those fights brought in huge crowds and big bettors. They probably made so much money off these fighters, so why they hell didn't they pay out anymore?
He passed two weeks without thinking, barely even bothering to train, so caught up in wondering whether to participate or drop out.
Then, he ran into someone familiar. Again.
"Oh? I don't believe I've had the pleasure of meeting you here," a silky voice drawled.
He turned around to see a man he knew to be a murderer.
"Oh, you're that guy with the playing cards. Why is everyone from the exam turning up here?"
"My, I wouldn't know. Tell me, have you been welcomed yet?"
"Welcomed? No idea."
"Then allow me to have the pleasure," the man said, cheshire grin and piercing eyes.
Suddenly, the hallway filled with nen laced with malice. Kien's ten quickly shot out to protect him, but not before he felt the wave of pure evil. His entire body shook with disgust.
"Eh-yuck, man. The fuck was that for?"
"Hm, decent. Well, I hope you prove to be more capable than you look," the man said, nen halting and receding, before he waltzed away with a friendly wave.
It was then that Kien understood what he had meant.
"Ah, so people always get jumped when they get up here, huh? Yikes."
The place was becoming less likeable by the day.
After watching a few more high ranked matches, Kien realised he wouldn't be able to fight, whether he wanted to or not.
"Jesus, you can do all that with nen? I can't believe I've just been playing with water. Not to mention weapons. Do I even know how to use any weapons?"
He pictured himself with a baseball bat, a sword, a shield, but couldn't think of a way to incorporate his power into it.
Could he potentially buy a gun and use water bullets as ammo? And use emitter or enhancer techniques to create the power to shoot them out?
The truth was, his nen knowledge was extremely limited, and his teacher was no longer available to answer his questions. How was he going to create new abilities without guidance?
His first plan was to hang out on floor 200 and scout out the competition for anyone potentially kind enough to share some tips. He sat on a bench in the hallway near the elevator, waiting for people to pass by. That's when those brats turned up.
The elevator arrived with a ding, and opened to reveal the two boys he was becoming steadily familiar with.
"Huh, you guys up here already?"
"You!" the pale one accused. "We could have died!" the boy yelled at him.
"... what?" he responded.
"Whatever, we're learning nen now, so we don't need your help."
"Oh. Good for you. In fact, you probably would need to at this point, or else somebody would have given you a pretty cold welcome."
"Wait, you knew Hisoka was gonna do that?" the green one asked.
"Who? I'm pretty there's lots of people around here that like to try to bully newbies."
"Ah, I see."
"Cmon, Gon, let's go."
And off they walked. It was only seconds before a familiar aura spread through the hallways. That guy has beef with those kids? Or maybe he's just a dick.
The feeling disappeared again, and Kien decided he wouldn't bother that guy for advice, even if he was desperate.
Wait a minute, who taught those kids nen? Some random kind stranger? Or... a competent teacher?! Shit, I gotta find out.
He hopped up and wandered in the direction of the boys. He found them at the reception, getting an overview of the new rules for the upper arena.
The receptionist seemed to be talking about wins and losses, champions, honour and crap, which he vaguely recalled hearing about but already forgot. The boys clearly thought just as little of it as he did. The pale one looked over his shoulder and spotted him.
"What do you want?" the boy sniped.
"Who'd you get to teach you nen?"
"None of yo-"
"Wing-san taught us!"
"Gon!"
He chuckled at the imbalance of personalities between the two.
"Yeah? This 'Wing' guy any good?"
"Why do you care? If you wanna fight someone, sign up."
"Nah, I'm not ready to fight yet."
"Huh, why not?" the green boy asked.
"The guys on this floor are a different breed. Compared to them, I'm an amateur, even if some of them seem kinda lame."
"You mean they use nen," the pale one noted.
"Of course. You should see some of the crap they can do."
"Wow, that sounds exciting. I'm so ready to fight!" the green one cheered, which threw Kien off.
"Wait, didn't you just learn ten? Do you even know the rest of the basics?"
"We're more suited to learning as we go," the pale one tried to brush off, as if they weren't acting suicidal.
"You can't do that with nen. If you kids fight before you know the basics, you'll get killed. I'm not joking."
"Oh, so now you feel like helping us."
"You're not supposed to teach nen to strangers, but now that you have to fight it, you should at least know what you're up against. Take the three months to learn everything else," he advised, and they seemed to consider it.
"Mah. Maybe he's right, Gon. Four-eyes said to wait two months..." the white one murmured to his friend.
"I need to find out. I have to learn more..." the green one said with a distant look.
"You won't learn shit signing up right now, you will fucking die, you idiot. Give me that," Kien snapped, striding over and snatching the forms out of his hands. "You seriously need to use your brain or you will die. Watch one match and you'll get it, trust me. There's a lot more to nen than you think. Not to mention, if your teacher advised you to wait, it was for a damn good reason, and disobeying is a sure way of losing a willing teacher. How dumb are you?" He ranted, the boy before him slowly looking more and more scolded until he deflated completely.
"Ah... I... um..." the boy mumbled, unable to meet his eyes.
The other boy looked slightly amused but otherwise wary. Then they noticed the presence of others.
"Ugh, not you three. What do you want?" he grumbled at the three musketeers who were standing creepily nearby, watching them.
"Ohoho, finally signing up, are we?" Peg-Leg asked.
"Not on your life. Piss off."
"Well, if you're not, then maybe they are," said Righty.
"They're not, go away."
"No need to speak for them, I'm sure they're going to sign up," wheelchair guy egged.
"Don't bother with the warm welcome, they already got it, and they're not fighting, so seriously, fuck off."
"So hostile."
"Who are they?" the pale one asked, quiet and subtly.
"Bunch of losers, local bullies, that kind of thing. I'm pretty sure they pressure newbies into fights for easy wins. Don't bother with them, alright?"
The pale boy seemed to consider the strangers, Kien, and his friend, before nodding.
"I'll make sure he doesn't fight until we learn more. We'll be heading off now," he said, getting room keys from the receptionist and dragging the green boy who seemed reluctant and torn.
"That wasn't very nice. We're just looking for some friendly battles," said Righty.
"Nothing friendly about your numbers," he spat, then wandered off to his own room, no closer to finding a teacher for himself.
As he brainstormed, a thought came to him.
Those kids know ten. But just a few weeks ago, they didn't even know what nen was. That means... they learned it that quickly?! It took him months! Either those kids are genuine prodigies, or they've got a teacher who knows shortcuts. Possibly both.
He wondered if all the run ins he'd had with them were more than coincidence. Was destiny pointing him towards them? Would their teacher be able and willing to help him? He hadn't much endeared himself to them, but he had a feeling he'd only need to convince the green boy to introduce him to his teacher.
Early the next morning, he went to the reception desk to get started on his plan.
"Good morning, how can I help?"
"Hi. Um, y'know that little kid who got here just yesterday? The one with black hair and wore lots of bright green?"
"Yes...?" the woman seemed a bit suspicious.
"I need to talk to him. What room is he staying in?"
"I'm sorry, sir, but I cannot disclose that information."
"What? Seriously? How the hell am I supposed to find him then?"
"I'm sorry, sir. Those are the rules."
"Ah, fair enough. Sorry to bother you."
Guess he'd have to stalk the elevator all day... God, he felt like such a creep.
And so he sat on the bench in the hallway, and waited, hoping at least one of those kids decided to go somewhere. After a couple hours, only a few strangers had taken the elevator, and one person passed by while making heavy eye contact with him.
Then, he heard their voices.
"Idiot, didn't you hear what he said? Do you want to die?"
"I won't die."
"And what about four-eyes? What if he doesn't want to teach you after this?"
"I'll apologise to Wing-san... but I have to do this."
Kien was on his feet in an instant, and power walked at the speed of light, down the hall, around the corner, up to the desk where the boys looked like deer in headlights, and promptly smacked the pen out of the boy's hand.
"What the fuck are you doing?" he questioned menacingly, eyes wide and leaning into the boy's personal space.
The boy froze, arms raised in surrender and starting to sweat.
"I- um, I-"
"You," Kien pointed at the pale boy, who stiffened in response.
"It's not my fault!" he protested.
"Don't care. We're going to your teacher right now."
"W-wait!" the green boy pleaded, but Kien simply slapped a hand around his wrist in an iron grip, and looked to the other boy to start leading the way. He looked a little uncomfortable, hesitating, but ultimately giving in with a sigh.
"Mah, it's your own fault. I wonder what four-eyes will think when this guy brings you in."
"Killua!" the boy whined in betrayal.
"Alright, follow me," the pale boy said, and led the way.
As they waited for the elevator to take them to the ground floor, the boy spoke up again.
"Who are you, anyway?" he asked, eyeing him suspiciously.
"My name is Kien. I'm nobody, just looking to have a normal life."
"Normal, huh?" the boy seemed to snort, but Kien didn't take offence. "Well, I'm Killua, and that's Gon. Our teacher's name is Wing."
"Right. So you know him long? Your teacher, I mean."
"Nah, just met him when we got here because he's teaching the only other kid around."
"And he just offered to teach you nen?"
"No, we had to convince him a bit, and even then he only decided to because we were about to get ourselves killed."
"Ah, I see. I don't know a lot about the nen community, but I thought it was all a big secret, and you weren't allowed to teach people. That's why I didn't help you."
"Sure. I don't care anymore, we're learning it now."
The elevator finished and they stepped out, eventually exiting the tower entirely and walking down the street.
"Right. So you must have learned ten pretty quickly, huh?"
"Yeah, in just a few hours."
"... what?"
"Hm?"
"A few hours? You're joking."
"No, we really did," Gon finally piped up.
"That's... that can't be possible!"
"Well, it was apparently not the official way to learn, but we were on a tight schedule," Killua explained, not that it made any more sense.
"How? How di-" he began, but was promptly cut off.
"Okay, that's enough questions. My turn. Where did you learn nen?" Killua asked, and Kien felt, with all his interrogating, he owed them some answers.
"Uh. From some friends. Well, they were friends at the time."
"Hm. So you're not an expert or anything?"
"No way. After seeing some fights with nen, I definitely have a lot to learn."
"Hm. Well, this is the place," the boy announced as they stopped in front of a building.
"Right," Kien said, and marched up to the front door, Gon's wrist still in his grip. He knocked hard and they waited.
The door opened to reveal a small boy in a martial arts uniform.
"Oh- Uh, Gon? Killua? What's going on?"
"Um, well, you see..." Gon tried to start, sheepishly itching his face with his free hand.
"I need to speak to Wing-san about Gon. Is he here?"
"Oh, yes, let me go get him," the boy said, and ran off.
A moment later, a young man came to the door. He had short black hair, glasses, a lean figure, and looked younger than Kien himself. This was their teacher?
"Hello, can I help you?"
"Is this boy your student?" he asked.
"Yes he is. Is there an issue?"
"Yeah. He tried to sign up for a fight on the two hundredth floor, twice, and I know for a fact he only knows ten," he stated, and the man's face seemed to harden in response.
"I see. Thank you for bringing this to my attention. You may have just saved his life."
"I know. Which is why I'd like a favour in return," he announced, and he could practically feel Killua's stare on his back. The man seemed to assess him, considering him before responding.
"Is that so? Well, I can't promise anything, but what is it that you want?"
"I'd like to be your student. I already know the basics, and I have a hatsu ability, but there's a lot I don't know, and I have no one to answer my questions. I can pay."
The tension seemed to slowly dissolve as Kien's request hung in the air. Then, Wing deflated with a heavy sigh, rubbing his head as if it ached.
"You kids are so much trouble..."