The humidity in the air was near tangible with its suffocating density. All 369 remaining participants stood together in a compact crowd before Satotz, waiting to hear the details of what fresh new hell awaited them next as he began to explain the instructions of the upcoming phase.
Y/n gazed upon Kurapika nervously, and when they joined eye contact she could only flash him a modest smile. The blond was quick to return it but quicker to turn away, and when he did she dropped her eyes to the muddy floor below that surrounded her shoes like quicksand. She was beginning to feel afraid. Afraid of how he made her feel. Afraid of what could happen if she let herself feel for anyone but herself. It made her shiver in anxiety. She had never felt anything like this since her past, forgotten life. A childhood turned disastrous...
But how can I not? It'd simply be inevitable. Would it be even worth fighting against?
She narrowed her eyes at nothing in particular and crossed her arms, walking into the crowd in an attempt to distract herself with the examiner's directions, before an advancement in the state of affairs occurred.
False examiners, what a drag. Could that man really be lying? Nonsense, a true Hunter wouldn't fall so easily to a Swindler Swamp creature, right? If things really go south, I'll figure something out.
Y/n grew tired of thinking and tuned them out.
A tall man stepped through the crowd, halting next to Y/n. He was so close she could see the individual fibers of his ritzy clothing and see his figure shifting slightly to his breathing. He seemed to be listening intently to a commotion in the front. He was so close she involuntarily discovered he smelled like an expensive aroma and some irony smell. She searched her brain to put a name on exactly what the smell was-- blood.
The magician Hisoka reeked of perfume and blood.
His eyes met hers and she stood still, staring back at the mysterious man whose amber eyes shone with nothing but mischievous wickedness. Y/n could somehow feel his entire being was dripping with the same sensation that played in his eyes.
He angled a couple of inches towards her, to which she panicked and her eyes darted to the abyss in front of her in an attempt to ignore the unignorable.
"Watch this," he said in a soft yet powerful bassy voice that made her feel a little disturbed.
Before she could even glance back at his words, the magician had sent an array of playing cards cutting into the air, some landing into an imposter ape while the others caught expertly in between the true examiner's fingers.
"You are the real examiner," Hisoka said pridefully.
Quieted gasps could be heard as dozens of pairs of eyes stared at the trickster in horror.
Y/n looked closely at his decorated face.
"So you are the magician..." she said, eyes filled with as much curiosity as a child witnessing their first circus performance.
He looked at her and hummed with a smirk.
Walking towards the front, the magician began to explain his little trick to the entertainment of the crowd.
This exam will only get more barbarous, Y/n thought, as the next phase began.
And the following trials were indeed barbarous. Running through the wet, consuming wilderness, Y/n, Kurapika, and Leorio had quickly lost sight of the examiner.
Once, Y/n held onto Leorio's wrist to keep him tumbling down to a wildly agape pit of bright pink liquid. Another contestant pushed them aside to run in front of them, and fell in the boiling pot, reducing the man to nothing but slowly dissolving bones, popping and gurgling as they sunk into the Lovecraftian creature below.
"That must have been a sort of extremely evolved use of hydrochloric acid," Kurapika said as they ran.
"Whatever it was, I don't want to know!" Leorio screamed back.
"Keep your eyes, peeled, boys!"
Another time, Y/n had to save Kurapika and Leorio from what were called 'Spindler Children', ill-looking creatures that transformed into children carrying scepters made of wood and yarn, that would stab and impale if you got too close. These creatures had limited mind-reading abilities: they could shift their appearance into a sloppy replica of the last child their victim had ever seen.
Disturbing children's cries and snickers could be heard around them.
"You guys..." Leorio edged.
"We must stay together," Kurapika warned quietly, unveiling his sword set.
Y/n slendered her eyes to analyze the images that sprung through the greeny cloud that enveloped the three of them.
Inaccurate, careless copies of Gon, stained with different colored eyes, and clothed in outdated garbs the real Gon would never wear.
Cheap mind tricks... those bastards, invading our mindscapes like that.
She turned sharply to warn them, but both Leorio and Kurapika had disappeared from sight. She also no longer could see the little performers through the wisps of fluorescent fog.
"Kura..." her voice left her lips as a whisper.
Hopeless.
A jolt ran up her spine and a fleeting thought flashed through Y/n's head, circling her head like a moon in orbit.
I should leave them.
She felt a prickle at her neck and caught a glimpse of a child, which she swung at with a wayward fist.
How could I think that? I wouldn't be here if it weren't for them... but then again, wouldn't I have gotten here on my own? They're holding me back...
She could hear the shrieks of men being slaughtered by the children, like something out of a horror film.
Y/n shook her head, pulling a fist to her hair. She just couldn't think straight.
"Come on, Y/n, your friends could be in danger! Think!"
She waved a bit of gross air from her face in frustration.
"Gah, I can't stand this fog!!" she muttered.
A spark and Y/n's eyes lit on fire in revelation.
The monsters aren't causing my confusion, it's this mist.
The aquamarine air bathed Y/n in a cosmic aura. Her eyes shone like a god and she shot open her silver staff. Spinning the staff skillfully within her hand, the mighty force of its motion fended off the fog before her. Whirling the stick to walk ably through the fog, her eyes caught onto a faint figure in the distance. She squinted to see that it was Kurapika and called out to him.
"You're okay!" she ran up to him.
Kurapika turned to her with despondent, reddened eyes. His hair was disheveled and his sleeve was torn ajar. He sniffed and turned to someone crumpled on the floor, still as a rock.
Y/n's blood grew cold.
Leorio...?
"I-I didn't know what to do... I was so disconcerted... and then he just attacked me, it all occurred in a moment. But who is this? Tell, me Y/n."
He sunk to one knee next to the thing, his head hanging in guilt.
"I feel I knew him. I just do not know... do not know..." his voice trailed off into silence.
Y/n's heart steadied. The bundle was small and crooked, and a large spindle lay at its side. It wasn't Leorio.
The creatures work with the poison. There must be a time the air's contamination spikes, and they come out to hunt. Today must have been an all-you-can-eat.
Y/n placed her staff on the ground and pulled the beast from the sleeve. It already stunk to high heaven, and both Kurapika and Y/n covered their noses.
It looked nothing like Gon, frankly. Its hair could easily be described as an unripe green, and this one's flesh was shades lighter than Gon's sunkissed glow. Teeth like a bat's or a dog's or any other animal with ivory fangs like these ran like barbs up its slimy snout. The blood that muddled the carpet of grass underneath was greasy and yellowish.
"Gon..." Kurapika whimpered.
She pulled him up from his arm. Holding his small face in her hands, she wiped a stray lock of golden hair from his sight. Her own eyes searched his.
"Kurapika, that isn't Gon."
He wandered back to the lump on the ground.
"B-but-"
"Kurapika. That is not Gon. That is a night creature that tried to eat you like a kebab. See its teeth? The blood? That smell? Humans don't rot that fast, get it?"
"I suppose..."
"It's the air... it's poisoned."
She shook her bo staff into the air, creating a fleeting rift of clarity.
"Y/n..." Kurapika clung onto her, witnessing the streaks of light reflected onto her like the scattered light from a pool of water, along with her concern and desperation to make him see.
"I can't make all this fog go away forever, you just have to trust me, Kurapika."
"I... I trust you," he said finally.
Seeing Kurapika's eyes streaked with fiery red framed in the intensity of his black lashes, she knew she had fallen in deep.
There is no way to stop the inevitable... especially if you don't want it to stop.
After pulling the blond from the little boy in green, they likewise managed to prevent Leorio from meeting his Gon-disguised demise.
"That's not Gon, Leorio!" Kurapika screamed through the now thickened air.
"Help me Leorio, I'm sick," the false Gon sobbed, in reality, gleeful at now knowing his name.
Leorio shivered. Sweat ran down his messy brow.
"Gon buddy, it's alright, I'm here."
Before the thing could land a hit on Leorio, Kurapika stuck a wooden sword all the way through it and pulled it out with a muted slash.
"How could you, mama?!" it cried, before shrieking wildly and running off on all fours.
"He looked... so real," Leorio stammered.
"It's alright Leorio, Gon is probably fine with Killua. Let's go," Y/n said, dragging him along.
With every step Y/n took there seemed to be another obstacle, all of which required quick-thinking and a steady eye. Of course, the collaboration between the three of them aided their mission when the status quo grew seemingly impossible.
"Wait, look!" Leorio stopped them and turned to a field opening in the forest. A tall figure stood in the dense fog, illuminated by the moon. Hisoka.
He was surrounded by a group of about six or seven rogue contestants. She couldn't hear what they were shouting, but she could still see them past the feeble fog. In the blink of an eye, the men dropped to the floor simultaneously with a thump!
Hisoka began to walk towards them, his pointed shoes pressing angrily on the silt. Kurapika, Leorio, and Y/n froze.
"Would the three of you care to join me in a game? I call it playing Examiner..." he stated.
Even from far away, Y/n could nearly sense his bloodlust, a heavy rumbling lust... and something else... she thought hard. Anticipation? Was it lust... of a different kind?
Why was reading him so difficult?
Y/n stared hard at the clown's silhouette as he sliced a playing card out of thin air. No way she'd be fighting him.
"Y/n? Are you listening?"
Potential. Those three... so much potential. Especially the monk and Blondie... If I can pick them off one by one, would that be getting ahead of myself? Are they worth it?
"Now, run!" Kurapika shrieked, and it sent the three of them flying in different directions.
The sneering titan chuckled before someone stepped back into the arena.
"I can't just pretend nothing happened!" Leorio said, lunging at him.
Though he had done so in good intentions of justice, he had been foolish in even attempting to land a hit on Hisoka.
Just as he swung, Hisoka reached a spiky hand to him before groaning from a hit to the face.
The little boy.
As Y/n and Kurapika met while approaching the clearing at the end of the swamp, they stopped to take a rest.
"Where's Leorio?" Y/n asked.
"I'm-," he inhaled. "I'm sure he'll be here any moment."
Y/n shrugged and trotted up to the clearing before Kurapika.
She searched through the crowd. Her eyes bounced from participant to participant.
No Leorio, hm... There's Killua! He was with him, wasn't he?
Killua too seemed to be aimlessly looking for something, his white brows furrowed in thought.
Gon's not here...
Y/n's foot took one broken step backward. Suddenly, her shoes swiveled and sprayed the dust from the ground as she deserted the finish line.
Neither was Hisoka.
"Hm, good boy... Is that a fishing pole? How creative... Do you mind if I take a look at it, sport?"
With every attempt in avoiding him, the magician appeared by Gon, congratulating him on his brave and robust efforts. When Gon tried to collapse onto him with a strike, Hisoka reached out and plucked him from the air, gripping him from the throat.
If that girl is a good candidate, this is a perfect candidate. He's weaker than her, sure, but he has oh-so-much potential. This is like waiting at the top of a roller coaster... I almost can't stand it...
"As Examiner, I hereby declare: You passed, dear boy!"
... it's so exciting.
"Gon!" Y/n yelled from across the field. Kurapika joined her side.
Y/n growled as she screamed at Hisoka.
"Let him go, you'll kill him!"
She felt stupid.
As if he would care!
In a surprise, Hisoka ejected the boy whose head had turned into a swollen blueberry from his white clasp.
Seeing their friend in peril, the two ran hurriedly to Gon.
"You have good friends, little boy."
He hauled Gon's limp friend onto his shoulder, and he was off.
His breath regained, the boy looked to his older friends as they approached.
After consulting with each other about Gon's wellbeing, Y/n looked into the bleak stretch before them.
"I'll kill him."
"Don't," Gon said, almost irritated at her concern. "I'm okay. What we need now is to find our way to the end. Follow me!"
As they ran, the golden sunrise greeted them through the trees. Gon recounted his close encounter with the infamous magician.
"Weren't you afraid?"
"Of course I was, but it was sort of fun... isn't that weird?"
The childish excitement of mortal danger, Y/n thought. Her own memories flashed before her eyes.
Childhood's for chaos, after all.
She shook her head in amusement.
"It's a little weird, you crazy kid," she said, flicking a black spike of hair with her finger.
✨Did you know?✨
Hisoka's name is a real Japanese word that means 'secret'...
Before you go!
Check out my friend Ari's work! They have plenty of amazing HXH one-shots to choose from, many of which are xKurapika readers, for my fellow Kurapika simps.
Go check them out @-Baka_Neko- !