On the ring, in the eyes of many fans, Manman looked like a broken doll being brutally assaulted by the man. The scene was rather bloody, causing not a few people to feel heartbroken.
Even the announcer found it too much to bear, repeatedly asking the referee if they could announce the bearded man's victory early. Yet rules were rules—though the bearded man constantly inflicted heavy damage on Manman, by the scoring system, he still hadn't formally secured the win. Evidently, the man was deliberately avoiding ways of accumulating "effective points."
"Roughly touching the level of an elite Nen-user… If I fought him with my current abilities, and considering I still don't have any 'finishing' Nen skill, there wouldn't be more than a fifty percent chance of guaranteeing I could kill him outright."
Watching for a while, Xiang Nan gauged the bearded man's strength. By "kill" he meant literally slaying the opponent. In other words, if it came to a confrontation, there was a fair probability that man could manage to escape Xiang Nan.
Though having five victories sounded impressive, who could say how much was due to questionable matchups or random luck. If Xiang Nan compared him to, say, the Shadow Beasts under the Ten Dons—this bearded man still fell quite short. Still, among the baseline Nen-users Xiang Nan had encountered so far in this world, he was indeed "impressively strong."
As for becoming a "Floor Master" (at Heaven's Arena's pinnacle), Xiang Nan found it unlikely, unless the fellow got extraordinarily lucky. After all, Heaven's Arena's matchmaking had its own logic. Someone like Manman could challenge the bearded man only after both sides agreed, so they ended up facing each other. Otherwise…
Before long, the overwhelmed Manman—willful though she was—found the gap in raw power too immense. Disheveled, she finally collapsed.
Still biting his unspent cigar, the bearded man grinned. Ignoring the audience's boos and shouts, he turned toward the stands—where Xiang Nan was—and lifted a thumbs-up, indicating he had finished the task.
Xiang Nan rose to his feet and left. He knew that the Heaven's Arena chapter was over; time for him and Manman to go back.
A few days later, Manman woke up in a local hospital room.
Her entire body was wrapped in gauze and bandages, lying in a bed.
Xiang Nan sat off to one side, reading a book by the window, which was open to the warm breeze.
Seeing her condition, Manman went blank. Usually, whenever her second persona took over and she later came to, her wounds were never this severe.
She felt scared—her eyes started reddening with tears.
"Don't worry; it's just a minor injury…" Xiang Nan comforted her.
"But it really hurts…"
"Yes, but just bear with it. It'll be fine."
"…" ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ꜰʀᴏᴍ novel~fire~net
Manman couldn't find the words.
"I'll go buy you something nice to eat later."
Just then, the hospital-room door opened, and Garo plus Sigma and the others came in.
They greeted Xiang Nan with that term.
While Xiang Nan and Manman had been at Heaven's Arena, Garo led a team—mainly some "king of soldiers" (elite troops) from the military district—to continue the Nen-hunting operations.
Their targets were the gangster families who had posted bounties on Xiang Nan. But without Xiang Nan in person, the unit suffered heavy casualties.
They'd only succeeded in killing two Nen-users in all that time. The efficiency was very low. Still, in the end, with help from both the military's resources and the Zatobi family, they eliminated several gangster clans. And all the properties and networks those clans left behind were transferred to the Zatobi family.
With Xiang Nan's support, Zatobi's boss, Mia, had thoroughly consolidated power in Zerta City, and risen to become a new strong force in the Republic of Padokea's underworld. Within the territory of a certain Ten Don, she and her clan had now become a mid-tier power.
Xiang Nan wanted to have both the military side and the gangster side under his control. By relying on the mighty resources of the army and the small private force he'd built, it wasn't too difficult to foster a local mafia family. Zatobi's boss, Mia, was a sharp individual. A newly elevated faction personally supported by him would be more obedient than some existing large group.
Eliminating those gangster clans was also to prevent further backlash—he didn't want more trouble from Illumi Zoldyck or the like.
"Captain… The higher-ups said they want to see you."
Garo and Sigma had also come to pass on that message. Now that Xiang Nan had built a personal troop and was using them for outside missions, plus covering up many details with his military authority, obviously the higher command couldn't just ignore it.
He had quite a bit of "privilege" in the military district, but not to the point of doing whatever he liked across the entire national armed forces. Some higher-up, irritated by Xiang Nan's conduct, was now summoning him.
Xiang Nan shut his book with a light snap and gave a faint smile:
"So they've finally called me in… About time I meet them."
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