Hunter X Hunter : The Boundary

Chapter 15: Confrontation

It was nearly noon, and the old market in Tower City's southern district was a chaotic tableau of life—the smell of food, the shouts of vendors, the blare of tricycle horns.

Ryan, wearing a grey trench coat, was passing through an alley after picking up a map atlas from a bookstore.

As he passed an old hardware store, a sharp shout erupted from within.

"Don't move! Hand over the money!"

The shout was followed by the clatter of falling cans and the thud of an overturned crate. Ryan's body instinctively pressed flat against the wall. Through the half-open rolling door, he saw it all: two men brandishing short metal pipes, an old shopkeeper cowering behind the counter, coins scattered on the floor.

He exhaled once, a plume of white in the cool air. His mind processed the environment in a flash. Entrance is clear. Trash can in the alley some leftover lime powder. I have gloves and a metal buckle rope. Single exit. Time is critical.

His hands moved with efficiency. He grabbed the bag of lime, twisted it into a tight, makeshift packet, and crept into the shaded blind spot by the store's entrance.

Inside, the robbers were getting impatient. "Hurry it up! All of it!" one hissed. Their attention was completely fixed on the cash register.

The moment was now.

Ryan exploded from the corner. In a low, fast dash, he threw the packet not at the men, but in a high arc at the shelf just beside their heads.

BANG.

The packet burst, and a cloud of white lime powder erupted, filling the small space.

"Agh—what the hell?!" one of the men choked, instinctively shielding his eyes.

Ryan was already inside. He moved like a ghost along the wall, a blur of motion in the swirling dust. He hooked the nearest man's ankle with a sweeping kick— as the man stumbled off-balance, Ryan's knee drove hard into the back of his thigh, collapsing him to the floor.

The second robber, realizing what was happening, roared and swung his wooden bat down in a wild arc— but Ryan had already analyzed his dominant hand and the trajectory of the swing.

He flowed forward with the momentum, his shoulder rotating as he slapped the side of the pipe. The weapon's inertia was broken. He caught the wooden bat as it grazed his cheek, spun with the force, and slammed the wood into the man's own wrist.

Click.

The man shrieked as his wrist went limp, and he crumpled to the ground. In less than eight seconds, it was over. Two men were subdued on the floor. Ryan stood in the center of the store, his face smudged with lime, his breathing perfectly calm.

Onlookers, drawn by the commotion, gasped at the scene. "Who threw that?" "It was that kid! He took them down!"

The shaken shopkeeper stared at Ryan. "Thank you," he stammered. "Young man, you saved me... that was you, right?"

Ryan ignored the offered towel and simply shook his head. "Call the police," he said, his voice flat. He turned and slipped through the gathering crowd, disappearing into the flow of the city without a backward glance.

He didn't go straight home. He sat by an old garage five blocks away for twenty minutes, running a check for any tails or surveillance. He then took out his notebook.

He recalled the moment the pipe had swung at his head. He had almost been hit. Not because of a lack of skill, but because the opponent's panicked reaction had deviated from expectations.

For the first time, he truly understood the meaning of "unexpected." His training had always been against "someone" predictable. Today, he had fought not against someone imaginary, but a person. Panic, error, unstable rhythm—this was reality.

He wrote a new line, his pen pressing hard into the paper. Combat is not fixed; it is dynamic. Victory is not an assumption; it is the product of superior judgment, planning, speed, and control. It is not just of strength, but also of a precise mind.

That night, he began to structure a new mental framework, a philosophy of action.

One: Perception. When to intervene. When to act. How to use the environment.

Two: Resources. How to turn the immediate environment into an advantage.

Three: Execution. How to control the opening, suppress the area, and plan for deviation.

He closed the notebook. This wasn't a game plan. It was a hard-won lesson from his first confrontation with the real world. He knew that the next time, he would be prepared.

And he was only one final, critical push away from awakening Nen.