The severed head, yanked by Bungee Gum, flew precisely toward Chrollo's abdomen—
A clean hit.
Everything unfolded so naturally—
So perfectly timed—
So lethal.
"I stuck it on back when I was flinging corpses," Hisoka grinned.
The head zipped toward him via the elastic thread, drawing a perfect line through the carnage—
But what he didn't say was:
"You saw through it, didn't you, Chrollo…"
Just before the severed head closed in—
Several bystanders, each unknowingly stuck with Bungee Gum, shot forward like projectiles, slingshotted by the sudden contraction of the aura strands.
They collided violently with both Chrollo and the incoming head.
Boom!
The spectator that hit the flying head detonated, their body blown in half.
As for the one who collided with Chrollo—
Chrollo's left hand—which had been buried in his pocket the whole time—finally emerged, clutching a cell phone.
"This spot. Detonate."
He held the phone to his face and muttered calmly.
Hisoka's eye twitched.
A brief pause.
A sliver of hesitation—fatal.
From the corner of his eye, he noticed one of the launched spectators—
Slow, almost deliberate—
A Black Voice antenna pierced their nape.
Boom!
The manipulated human clasped their hands.
Hisoka barely raised his left arm before the explosion ripped through the air.
He'd been caught.
That second antenna—hidden the entire time—
was here, planted in one of the escapees.
Blown through the air, Hisoka barely registered the pain—
his mind was already racing, reconstructing the entire flow.
I thought I had him cornered.
But he was predicting me the whole time.
Hisoka had figured Chrollo discovered the head connected to Bungee Gum, and laid a trap around it.
That much was correct.
A Black Voice-controlled human had indeed been stationed beside the corpse where the head originally was.
But the one that just exploded wasn't that person.
The second antenna target was someone Hisoka himself had flung.
How…?
Hisoka had assumed the decoy Chrollo removed the antenna manually, then another puppet picked it up.
But Chrollo couldn't precisely manipulate puppets like that.
So the truth must be—
The first antenna (No.1) was still linked to a second puppet via a hidden aura thread, cloaked using In.
If Hisoka chose to pursue the decoy, that thread would be cut—
But if he didn't, the second Black Voice puppet could simply retract antenna No.1 and replant it elsewhere.
And he did.
The second target must have been someone already marked with the Moon seal—
So Chrollo could plant the antenna with just a touch and create another living time bomb.
Meanwhile, the second Black Voice puppet remained nearby, ready to act as Chrollo's live detonator.
Hisoka realized his mistake:
The fleeing spectators he allowed to survive during his charge toward Chrollo?
A glaring opening.
He'd projected the image of merciless slaughter—yet spared several escapees.
That alone tipped Chrollo off.
Chrollo saw the plan—saw the Bungee Gum lines—
And countered perfectly, smuggling a live Moon-marked bomb into Hisoka's blind spot.
If the second puppet had been the killer…
Hisoka wouldn't even have an arm left.
But now—
He was one-armed, grounded, and completely surrounded.
Chrollo had already disappeared back into the sea of puppets and panicked spectators.
Back to square one.
Hisoka's face went blank.
Then—
He fired a Bungee Gum line to the ceiling and yanked.
Lift-off.
The puppets chased, relentless as ever—
Some climbed each other's shoulders, forming macabre ladders to reach him.
Hisoka swung laterally toward the second-floor gallery, aiming to stick to the wall—
But the puppets were already climbing.
Even worse, new puppets appeared on the second floor—
Only these weren't the mindless grapplers from before.
These ones leapt out, slapping their Moon and Sun-marked hands together midair.
Boom. Boom. BOOM!
Chain detonations erupted around him, concussive blasts tossing Hisoka back toward the main arena.
Below?
A mob of puppets, crowding the ring like hyenas waiting for the fall.
Midair, Hisoka flipped and kicked off the ceiling.
He could NOT fall.
If he hit the ring, the swarm would devour him—
But staying along the wall meant enduring continuous suicide bombers.
And now—
He'd completely lost track of Chrollo.
I lost.
He knew it.
Chrollo now had options.
Too many.
Hisoka had none.
Unless…
WHAM!
A living person—flung from somewhere—collided with him midair.
As Hisoka turned—he saw him.
Chrollo.
Standing bold atop the second-floor railing.
Grinning.
Holding another panicked spectator by the collar, ready to throw again.
"Am I… going to die?"
The Bungee Gum strand holding him to the ceiling—
snapped under the impact.
And he fell.
But instead of fear, Hisoka's face bloomed with joy.
"Either way… I die."
He curled up mid-fall.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
The explosions swallowed the entire stage.
The arena shook.
And Hisoka disappeared beneath the blast.