He barely made it through the door before collapsing onto the ground. Kurapika hurried over to help him up.
"Oh, thank goodness…"
Leorio exhaled heavily and slumped to the floor once again. Kurapika handed him a soda.
"Drink this—you need your energy back."
A few minutes later, yet another door opened. This time, a candidate emerged in even worse shape than Leorio.
He crashed heavily to the floor and lay there unmoving. A nearby candidate approached, feeling for his breath and pulse, then shook his head.
Leorio stared in a daze.
One candidate cast a dispassionate glance at the corpse.
"What an idiot. Even if you barely manage to reach this point, what good is it if you die right afterward? He should've just quit and tried again next year."
Killua, Leorio, and Kurapika all looked anxious.
"Gon…he'll be all right, won't he?"
"With his abilities, I'm sure he'll make it."
Finally, as hour ninety-six arrived, the clock on the wall began its final countdown—just one minute left. Some of the candidates got to their feet, flexing or stretching for whatever test lay ahead.
A figure burst out of the corridor.
"Made it—just barely!" Gon staggered in, gasping for breath.
"Gon!" Leorio cried out excitedly.
Across the room, Hisoka's lips curved up slightly, while Illumi noticed Killua's reaction and frowned a bit.
An examiner stepped in from another passage and addressed the group:
"Congratulations, all of you. You have cleared the third phase of the Hunter Exam. Follow me."
With those words, mechanical grinding echoed through the hall. A portion of the wall shifted, revealing a large exit; sunlight streamed in from outside. The examiner led the way, and the candidates followed.
Outside stood an airship.
"Everyone, please board the airship for the next stage of the exam. I hope you all do well."
One by one, the candidates filed on. Compared to the previous flight, the group was far smaller; the craft felt almost empty.
Ron's expression was a bit strange.
"In the old version of the story, we left by airship, and then came the Battleship Island test. That's good for me—more time to absorb all the Exam's traits, maybe even reach one hundred percent."
He headed out to the deck. The candidates either stood alone or gathered in small clusters, suspecting there might be more team-based challenges to come.
Others simply stuck with old friends. After all, the Trick Tower had forced them into group tasks, so it wasn't impossible future trials would do the same.
"Ron! Over here." Gon waved. "Hey, in Trick Tower, after we split up, what kind of trial did you get? I had a bunch of puzzles, some strength tests, a courage test…then I had to fight this robot-like thing, which cost me a ton of time."
Leorio groaned. "My path was brutal—I was swarmed by rats, thousands of them!"
Kurapika shivered at some unpleasant memory. "I think I had it the easiest, but it was still bad."
Ron shrugged. "Mine might've been the simplest of all. I just had one opponent. Once I beat him, I was done."
They all eyed him in envy. None of them knew that if they'd faced Ron's single opponent—an A-level Nen user from the infamous KUTO Thieves—they would've had zero chance of winning. For Ron, though, it wasn't too difficult; Sasuke and Natsu together were enough to take Old T down.
Killua hesitated a moment. "Before, you promised to spar with me, right?"
Ron nodded. "You want to do that now?"
"Yes. I was originally planning to wait till after the Exam, but…I don't want to wait anymore."
"Sure." Ron shrugged. "I'm good anytime. There should be a training area on the airship."
Killua's eyes lit up. Gon and the others perked up as well.
"Hey, can we watch you guys fight?" Gon asked.
Killua glanced at Ron, who said, "It's fine by me if it's fine by Killua. I'm not planning to reveal anything big here, anyway."
After all, countless match recordings existed of Ron at Heaven's Arena, and those only showed a small fraction—maybe ten percent—of his true power. He'd need even less than that ten percent in a match with Killua. Any 'intel leak' would be trivial and might even mislead future opponents.
Together, they headed for the training room. At the doorway, a figure lounged against the wall.
"Mind if I watch?" The newcomer directed the question at Killua.