Basic OC Appearance Info
eye color: gold
hair color: caramel brown
hair type and style: nearly down to the waist; braided; long bangs
current clothing: an orange hoodie with blue jeans
Chapter 1: An x Unlikely x Alliance
This year's exam-site was a large area of land, bordered by tall electric fences. Long blades of grass that reached upto her waist went on for acres, interrupted only by a tall tower in the middle of the field. It reminded her of a lighthouse, painted a faded red and white.
"Do you think he's the examiner?" Hanako stared at the short man standing atop the tower, hands on his hips.
Hisoka only hummed in response, wide eyes dancing across the examinees. Of course.
"What do you think the exam this year is going to be?" She nudged his leg with a knee, annoyed.
"Who knows~" He continued his nonchalant assessment.
"You're in a mood." She scoffed. "What? Nervous? Excited? Or... bored?"
Hisoka tilted his head up to the skies, lost in thought. "Who knows~" He repeated, smiling down on her.
"Huh?" She glared up at him. "You're only doing that because you know it pisses me off."
"Who knows~" He patted her head in a mocking show of affection, walking away. When she began to follow him, he paused. "You know you can go off somewhere without me too."
"But- you like it when I'm with you... don't you?"
"Who knows~" He shrugged, continuing his pace.
"Fine." She rolled her matching golden eyes at his retreating figure. "I can manage on my own too, you know. I don't need you." She made an effort to say the last part louder, only getting more frustrated when he refused to 'grace' her with a reaction. Narcissist.
Before she could recover from that blow to her ego, a short stout man with a poor excuse of a friendly smile began to approach. Bad timing.
"Oh hey!" He babbled. "You know that guy? He looks pretty intimidating, huh?"
Hanako crossed her arms, turning away. "Who knows."
The man blinked stupidly before regaining his composure. "Right... I forgot to introduce myself. How rude! My name is Tonpa-" After a judging pause, he proudly added, "-and this is my 33rd attempt at the hunter exam."
"Psht. Thirty-three? You're really that weak? I mean you look weak, sure but... that's a bit too much."
She could sense Tonpa's aura flaring in suppressed anger as he gave her a nervous laugh. He can use nen? But no... his aura isn't strong enough to have been trained. Maybe he doesn't even know about it himself?
"If you keep failing so much, why keep trying?" She attempted to prod.
"Well," He smiled, scratching the back of his head with one hand, "I guess I'm a bit addicted to it."
"Sure." Hanako was unconvinced.
"Hmm... I'd say we have a toast to friendship!" Without waiting for an answer, he sets his rucksack on the ground and begins to go through it, careful to hide the remaining contents from her sight.
Is his plan now to team up with someone strong to pass? She wouldn't mind playing around with him really. At first notice, he appeared quite simple and week. Yet, she could sense something brewing under the surface, a potential waiting to be unlocked. After all, finding the exam site thirty-three times and not dying in each of his thirty two attempts so far has to count for something.
"Here!" He pulled out two cans of orange juice, holding one out for her.
"Cool." She mumbled as she accepted. She was thirsty anyway. The moment she pressed her lips to the can, Tonpa's aura shook with glee. Something was wrong. She pretended to take a sip.
"Like it?" He grinned.
Hanako shrugged. After a moment, she continued. "You wanna team up?"
Tonpa's eyes widened. "Wanna what?"
She shrugged once more. "Team up. I doubt it's agains the rules or anything."
"Why would you wanna team up with me?" He was on high alert.
"Maybe I just wanna see you pass." She glanced at the examiner high atop the tower, so high in fact that she could barely discern his appearance. "Who knows~"
Tonpa gulped. "Fine." He sounded more serious now. As the two shook hands, Hanako attempted to agitate his aura. He only frowned, pulling away a bit early.
"So... what's your name?" Tonpa asked, slightly more at ease.
"Just call me by my number. I don't like giving out names unless I have to."
"Sure." Tonpa read out the tag attached to her bright orange hoodie. "Number fifty-one. It's gonna be quite a while before the others arrive, huh? How about we find a nice place to sit?"
"Uh huh." The two walked on for a bit, before Hanako decided to settle down against the tower, placing the still-full can of juice next to her. At least the grass was shorter there. As she pressed the side of her head to the wall, however, a faint rumble shook her brain. What?
Backing off, she pressed her hands to the wall instead. A series of faint rumbles. Some over the other. A lack of a pattern. Couldn't be a machine.
"Hey," She frowned at Tonpa. "What do you think could be-"
"ALRIGHT!" The sudden announcement from above rattled her. The microphone sizzled before the examiner continued, "WELCOME TO THE TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY SIXTH HUNTER EXAM!" Shit. The stupid speaker was only a few feet above her. She ran a good few metres back with Tonpa at her heel before stopping to glare up at the examiner.
"I will be the examiner for your first phase, that shall begin in ten seconds. Survive to pass!" With that, he began counting down. "Ten! Nine! Eight!" Everyone took a wary fighting stance as one side of the bottom wall of the tower began shifting up to reveal metal bars. A cage? "Seven! Six! Five! Four! Three!" As the door stopped extending, the entire cage came into view. Beasts of all shapes and sized snarled inside, restless for blood. They were somewhat trained though, Hanako noticed. Despite being crammed into such a space, none of them were attacking each other. "Two! One! ZERO!"
More than half the examinees let out panicked cries, running away from the tower as the metal bars suddenly disappeared at 'zero'. Tonpa, too, was about to break into a run, before Hanako grabbed him by the collar. "As long as you stay close to me, I'll protect you, yeah?"
Trembling with fear, Tonpa nodded. The idiot was already trusting her with his life. Fine.
A big frog with wide blurry gray eyes took ridiculously high leaps towards them, Hanako's aura flared. Already, two examinees had been crushed under its weight, blood and gore stuck to its belly and feet. Suddenly, Hisoka's words before they entered the exam site echoed in her brain. "Don't show off your nen." Fair. The beast was not using any extra, so why should she?
Beside her Tonpa shuddered. "You'll take care of it, r- r- right? Because I sure as hell won't be able to."
"Of course." She took out a small but deadly sharp knife, previously hidden in her right boot. Amidst the chaos and the anxiety of the beast almost upon them, she focused. Using Gyo should be fair game. It was always useful in figuring out the weakness of the opponent. There was a complete lack of aura in his eyes. The stupidly big frog was... blind.
"Come on." She grabbed Tonpa's hand, forcing him to run along.
"Didn't you just say-" He began, panting with both mental and physical exertion.
"We don't have to fight it." She explained as they kept running towards a more emtpy area. She had stopped flinching over dead bodies a long time ago, but the amount of blood, gore and screams strewed around still kept her uneasy. The examiner was certainly a sadistic one.
Suddenly, an enlarged decapitated head of a... tiger? began rolling towards them at a great speed. The hell? It has only a single big eye where two should be and red bubbling drool oozed out of its mouth, spilling around in its trail. Where its neck should be was only a seemingly-thick layer of dark red skin. Its creepy eye was locked onto her, leaving her with no doubt that this one could in fact see. Fine then.
Leaping forward to take it head on (pun intended), she held the knife out in front of her, bringing the blade down just before she landed on its head. The beast screeched out, drool splashing in her general direction. Pulling out the knife from its eye a little too late before she jumped back, a few drops of the liquid landed on her collarbone, sizzling the skin there.
"Hisoka!" She cried out without thought as the chemical rapidly ate away at her skin and flesh. Through adrenaline blurred vision, she saw the creepy tiger head blindly rolling towards a stunned Tonpa, as she landed back on the ground. Shit. Bracing her body for a run, she- stopped.
A blur of motion and two cards were lodged at the side of its 'neck' ended. Before she could realise she was slipping, a strong hand was supporting her back. Hisoka. The moment her brain said his name, his smiling face came into view.
"Relax," He said softly, but she knew it was an order. "The chemical has cooled down. There's not much damage, except to your shirt, if you count that." With a dramatic sigh, he added. "When I said you shouldn't use nen, I meant your nen ability. Not things like Ten and Ren. Don't disappoint me." Abruptly, he let go and disappeared in another blur of motion.
Hanako struggled to catch her breath, wide eyes searching for Tonpa. There. He was crouched down in the grass, trembling arms over his head. The now-unmoving tiger head lay dead at his side.
Don't disappoint me. Hisoka's words played over in her head as she looked for another target. Since so many examinees were dead or fatally injured by now, there were less beasts running around and more feasting on their prey. The sight, on such a large scale, was an awful one. She had researched the trials on previous exams but had never even heard of one this brutal. How had he even been allowed to do this? She wondered as she noticed Hisoka fighting the bigger beasts around in the distance, his bloodlust in a frenzy. Of course he was enjoying the cruel atmosphere.
Watching him playing with the beasts like that, however, made her itch for a proper fight too. With a burst of Ren, she ran towards the nearest target. A big snake with a long tongue swallowing the eyes of a dead examinee. As she got closer, it shifted its focus on to her, releasing its whip-like tongue at her. Dodging its first attack, she used Gyo to find a vital point. Its belly. The snake hissed at her as she drew closer, launching another attack. This time, she slashed away its tongue, leaving it defenseless. As the snake helplessly thrashed around, she flipped it over with a strong kick and drove the blade in its underside. A foundtain of blue blood spIurt out of its wound as it hissed once more and twitched for the last time.
One more. Her wild eyes scanned the field, landing on a large ostrich with an unusually long neck, head bobbling as it ran around aimlessly. She ripped the knife out of the snake, wiping the blood on the tall blades of grass around. As she positioned the knife, however, an ear-splitting whistle echoes throughout the arena, catching the attention of all beasts. In a frenzied hurry, they all began dashing back towards the tower. In a minute, they were all inside, the metal bars back on. A few more seconds and the tower door slid back down as before.
Hanako sighed. Too bad.
"All survivors! Please gather around the tower. If you're still standing without major injuries, you will be permitted to move on to the next phase. You have thirty seconds."
Tonpa. She suddenly remembered once more and returned to where she had last seen him. As the examiner's loud count down assaulted her ears, she nudged his head with a foot. "Hey! Next round. Come on!"
Slowly, he turned his head up. "It's- it's o- o- over?"
"Yeah." She looked at him more closely. "You don't seem to be in much of a condition to try the next phase. You sure you wanna continue?"
The determination returning in his eyes, he stood back up, brushing away dust from his clothes with a hand. "I'm fine."
"Good for you."
Near the end of the countdown, the pair joined the small group waiting at the foot of the tower. "...Two, One, and... Zero!" The voice boomed. "Congratulations! The fifty-three remaining applicants, out of the original 239, have passed the first phase of the hunter exam. A total of eleven applicants have lost their lives while the rest 175 are too injured mentally and/or physically to continue."
Only eleven? She hadn't expected fifty-three applicants to be able to pass either. Maybe she had overestimated the examiner's penchant for sadism. Oh well.
"The buses for taking you to the next exam site will be here in a moment. In the meantime, please wait patiently. No fights allowed."
With a sigh, Hanako walked over to sit against the tower once more. A familiar rumbling greeted her and she smiled, just then realising how drenched in blood she was.
[A/N: Been a while since I wrote a decently long chapter (in my definition at least) and damn it felt good. Took nearly three hours of uninterrupted writing. Feedback appreciated!]