Time flew by in the blink of an eye.
Several months passed, and by the end of August, Yorknew City was buzzing with energy.
Crowds of people swarmed the bustling metropolis, all drawn by the upcoming auctions.
The city's crime rate was spiking, but the GDP was climbing just as steadily, leaving the mayor grinning from ear to ear.
As for the crime rate? The Mafia had that under control. Even if the stats went through the roof, the Mafia would be the first to panic, not the city officials.
After all, the Yorknew Auction was secretly orchestrated by the Ten Dons. If people stopped showing up because they were scared of getting mugged, the mobsters trying to fence their stolen goods would be the ones taking the hit.
The Phantom Troupe arrived in Yorknew in waves.
They moved in three-man cells.
This time, they had two main objectives: hunt down and kill Ronin—the guy who had been a thorn in their side for months—and acquire the Greed Island game console.
The massacre in Moldin City hadn't deterred the bounty hunters or blacklist hunters from tailing the Troupe.
In fact, the sheer scale of the slaughter had only driven the bounties on the A-Class criminal organization even higher.
Of course, anyone still daring to track the Spiders at this point was a heavy hitter.
And that was exactly why the Troupe was so annoyed.
Normally, after completing a group mission, the members would split up and do their own thing. But this time, the main group had only separated recently, and the break was short-lived. They were set to regroup shortly after arriving in Yorknew.
Uvogin had been having a rough time lately.
His burn wounds had healed, but they left massive, jagged scars. Combined with his hair, which hadn't grown back fully yet, he looked somewhere between terrifying and ridiculous.
Being sensitive about his looks, his temper was on a hair-trigger.
Even Nobunaga, his usual partner, was getting sick of his constant outbursts. Fortunately, the Boss had assigned Machi to their team. Her presence forced Uvogin to dial it back a notch.
mostly because Machi would literally tie him up if he acted out.
Uvogin still hadn't figured out how to break Machi's threads. It didn't help that she had a nasty habit of ambushing him while he slept, which only fueled his rage.
As time passed, his hatred for Ronin grew exponentially.
If he ever got another shot at that guy, he wouldn't lose like last time. He wouldn't give Ronin a single second to use those weird abilities.
After multiple skirmishes, Uvogin was certain of one thing: Ronin needed to form specific hand signs to activate his special powers.
If he could stop the hand signs, he could stop the attacks.
If it came down to a pure physical brawl, Uvogin knew he would win!
He refused to believe that Ronin could have improved drastically in just three months. Uvogin had been training like a maniac, putting in two hundred times the effort of a normal person.
With that kind of grind, his gains were unmatched.
Ronin wouldn't stand a chance.
"Don't even think about soloing him. You'll die," Machi said, ruthlessly popping his bubble.
Even though they hadn't found Ronin yet, one look at Uvogin's confident smirk told her exactly what the simpleton was thinking.
After nearly getting roasted alive last time, the guy still hadn't learned his lesson.
Machi was genuinely worried that Ronin would dangle a little bait, and Uvogin—being the idiot he was—would hook, line, and sinker right into a trap.
Are all Enhancers this single-minded? Machi couldn't help but mentally roll her eyes.
"I know, I know," Uvogin grumbled, shaking his reattached arm.
It was a masterpiece of patchwork by Machi and Franklin, though Uvogin felt it was a bit unnecessary.
The arm had digital tattoos on it—Franklin's style—and even contained some of Franklin's residual Nen.
Just then, a car drove past the trio walking on the sidewalk. Behind the wheel was a tough-looking young man who looked like he shouldn't be messed with.
In the passenger seat sat a young woman with long pink hair, and in the back was a blonde girl wearing a hat.
Uvogin instinctively glanced at the car, sensing something, but he didn't recognize any of the faces. He scratched his stubbly head, confused.
Honk!
A loud horn interrupted Uvogin's urge to chase the car.
It was a heavy-duty truck. As the truck roared past, the three Spiders vanished from the sidewalk. The truck driver glanced in his rearview mirror and blinked.
Did I hit them?
The driver didn't even think about hitting the brakes. If he hit them, well, maybe they got lucky.
Maybe they got "Truck-kun'd" and sent to a fantasy world.
The driver turned up the volume on his audiobook about an isekai adventure, wondering if getting hit by a truck really was the ticket to a magical land. Whatever, he thought, I'm not done living yet.
Unbeknownst to him, Uvogin and his team were currently perched on top of his cargo, hitching a ride into the city.
---
"That was Uvogin's crew. Just the three of them?"
Inside the car that Uvogin had stared at, the tough-looking driver dissolved his Transformation Jutsu, revealing Ronin.
In the back seat, a mechanical pencil appeared in Neon's hand. The pencil danced in the air, leaving a trail of Nen that formed a line of text.
> The Frost Moon shall sink together with the Scarlet.
"I don't get it," Neon shrugged, deactivating her ability.
In that brief moment, she had targeted Uvogin for a short-term fortune. The prediction was only valid for twenty-four hours, but the content was Greek to her.
"Frost Moon corresponds to November. In the Troupe, the months correspond to their member numbers. Uvogin is number eleven," Ronin interpreted. He turned to look at Neon, revealing his crimson Sharingan. "And 'Scarlet' is obviously me."
"Sink together... does that mean you die together? Mutual destruction?" Kurapika, who had been disguised in the passenger seat, offered his reading of the last line.
"It likely means there's an ambush. Either those three walking out in the open are bait, or Uvogin is prepared to trade his life for mine," Ronin added.
"The latter is highly probable," Kurapika agreed with a nod. "Do you think it involves Post-Mortem Nen? I'm curious."
"Hard to say. But after those burns I gave him, his hatred is intense. If he can't kill me outright, or torture me, that obsession might turn into a powerful curse the moment I kill him," Ronin analyzed.
Enhancers were prone to tunnel vision—just look at Gon.
Ronin wasn't afraid of the probable, but he was cautious of the possible. If he was going to crush Uvogin, he needed absolute certainty. He had to account for every variable before delivering the final blow.
He wouldn't give the Spider even a sliver of a chance to flip the table.
"Then we'd better not touch him today. There's no rush. We'll have plenty of chances," Kurapika said.
Neon's short-term prophecy was only good for one day.
However, once September 1st rolled around, she could perform a full fortune for Uvogin. But since they still didn't know Uvogin's exact birth date and blood type, she was limited to these short-term, active predictions.
Consequently, even if they got Uvogin's info in September, she wouldn't be able to predict his future again for that month.
This was the limitation—and the utility—of the short-term divination Neon could actively use after mastering her ability, Lovely Ghostwriter.