HP: Sacred Gear Chat Group - Chapter 56 (Patreon)

Ponzu’s heart pounded in her chest as she sprinted through the dense forest, branches whipping at her arms and legs. Panic drove her forward, each step desperate, each breath sharp and uneven.

She had to get away—get as much distance as possible from those monstrous creatures. If she slowed down even a little, she felt like they would appear behind her at any moment.

She wasn’t under any illusion. Survival on her own was impossible. She had learned Nen, yes, but her ability only allowed her to control bees.

Against those terrifying creatures—Chimera Ants with bodies tougher than steel—her power meant almost nothing. It was laughable to even think she could fight them head-on.

The memory of Pokkle came crashing into her mind. He had been the strongest among them, far more skilled in combat than she could ever hope to be.

Yet even he couldn’t withstand one of those ants—just one, and not even their leader, but a slightly stronger variant. And now… he was in their hands.

Her stomach twisted. The image of Pokkle being dragged away gnawed at her.

‘I can’t rescue him by myself. It’s impossible. I need help. Someone stronger. Someone who can actually fight them!’

Her thoughts spiraled, racing through every possibility. There was still time—there had to be. Even if the ants had captured him, they wouldn’t eat him right away. That slim chance was all she could cling to.

Finally, when her legs began to ache and the sounds of pursuit faded behind her, Ponzu stopped. She doubled over, gasping for breath.

Her chest heaved, but she forced herself to think clearly. Running wasn’t enough. She had to act.

Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a few scraps of paper. No ink. Of course not—NGL’s strict laws had banned even simple objects like ballpoint pens.

A curse left her lips before she bit into her finger, forcing a wound. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth as she smeared crimson across the paper.

With a feather she had picked up earlier that day, she scrawled a desperate message, her handwriting shaky but still readable.

A crude map followed, marking her rough location. She had cut the paper into several smaller slips, each recieving the same map and plea for help.

Binding them carefully to her bees, she steadied her hands and whispered instructions with her Manipulation Nen.

“Please… take this to the Hunter with the strongest aura you can find. Hurry.”

Her bees buzzed faintly, wings glinting in the light before they scattered into the sky, vanishing one by one between the trees. Watching them go, Ponzu pressed her bleeding finger against her lips, trying to steady her trembling body.

That was her only chance. Her only hope.

But she couldn’t just stand there. She forced her legs to move again, pushing herself back toward the border. ‘If I can make it to the edge of NGL, there will be others. I just need to reach them…’

Unaware of the danger lurking nearby, she kept running. She didn’t realize that another Chimera Ant had already found her—the same one she had seen earlier, mercilessly shooting down innocent villagers.

The sharp crack of a gunshot split the air.

PENG!

Ponzu’s body stiffened. Her world froze. For a heartbeat she thought it was over—that she had been shot and death had already claimed her.

But nothing happened. No pain. No wound.

Her eyes widened, and slowly she turned her head.

The ant stood there, tall and grotesque, its spined green shell glinting under the sun, long red hair falling wildly over its jagged teeth. One claw gripped a gun, smoke still trailing from the barrel.

It was grinning, fangs bared in cruel amusement. Then, just as quickly, that grin faltered.

“What’s this?” the ant sneered, raising its other gun and firing again. Bullets spat out one after another, the gun rattling loudly, but each round vanished in midair before reaching her. They simply disappeared, swallowed by a faint shimmer of purple mist that had appeared in front of her.

The Chimera Ant snarled, frustration breaking into its voice. “That’s no fun! I’m supposed to hunt you! Why won’t you die?!”

It kept firing, emptying both magazines in rapid succession. Shells clattered against the ground, yet Ponzu remained untouched.

‘Gyo…’ she thought quickly, focusing her aura into her eyes. The moment she did, her breath caught.

There! Some kind of Purple Mist!

The purple haze wasn’t her power at all. Something else was interfering, swallowing the bullets completely as if they never existed.

Her pulse quickened. What’s going on? Am I… saved?

She looked around wildly but couldn’t see anyone nearby. That was when the Chimera Ant suddenly let out a strangled groan.

Its body convulsed, claws thrashing as if caught by an invisible force. It clawed at the air, then at its own shell, struggling desperately before its form began to crumble away. In the span of seconds, its body disintegrated into nothing but dust.

Behind the collapsing remains, a figure stood. A young man.

Ponzu’s eyes went wide as recognition struck her. She had seen him before—during the Hunter Exam, the same year she and Pokkle had participated. He was the one who had passed back then.

He was stronger than she had remembered.

Her legs gave out, the exhaustion and terror finally overwhelming her. She stumbled forward and collapsed against him, tears spilling freely down her cheeks. The words tumbled out before she could stop herself.

“Please… help me.”

Her body trembled, but the crushing weight inside her chest lifted slightly. Relief, pure and undeniable, flooded her.

And then everything went dark. She hadn’t realized when she exhausted herself that much, but she suddenly felt weak. Her consciousness slipped away, the last sensation she felt was the strength of firm arms catching her as she fell.

———

POV: Harry Potter

‘That was close.’ Harry let out a quiet sigh as he adjusted the unconscious woman in his arms. Her face was pale, but her breathing was steady. He recognized her almost instantly—the “Bee Lady” from the Hunter Exam.

It had been a while since then, but he hadn’t forgotten the peculiar girl who fought by sending out swarms of bees.

He had been watching everything from the very beginning. The chase, her desperate attempt to escape, and even the moment she nearly died to that gun-wielding Chimera Ant.

If he hadn’t intervened, she would have been nothing more than another corpse in this forest.

By this point, Harry had devoured hundreds of Chimera Ants. His body carried the results of all that consumption, and his Nen reserves had swelled to levels far beyond what most Hunters could ever imagine. That had been his goal all along—devour, absorb, and grow stronger.

The Chimera Ants were the perfect fuel.

But now… things were different. He was starting to hit a wall. The weaker ants, the ones that hadn’t awakened Nen, barely provided him with anything anymore.

A few more devours, a few more kills—it was hardly worth the effort.

He glanced out across the forest. His Nen stretched outward in a massive haze, a usually invisible mist that rolled through the trees and covered everything in sight.

It wasn’t just a trick. This mist was part of him, both weapon and sense. As it spread, it also worked as his En, alerting him to every movement inside several kilometers.

At this range, his En rivaled that of the Chimera Ant Royal Guards that had yet to even be born.

It was proof of how far he had come. But it also proofed that the easy growth was over.

What he needed now was stronger prey. And that was the problem.

Hunting ordinary soldiers would give him nothing. Hunting Squadron Leaders or stronger Chimera Ants, however… that was tempting.

But he couldn’t do that yet. Not now. If he killed them too early, he would lose his best opportunity.

Those higher-ranked ants were destined to awaken Nen. And when they did, they would create Hatsu abilities born from pure instinct. Abilities forged not by years of training or theory, but by raw survival and natural talent.

Harry wasn’t after just any kind of Nen. He wanted those instinct-born abilities. The kind that broke the usual logic of Nen, that bent rules in ways even veteran Hunters would struggle to understand.

Hatsus created by monsters who didn’t even know what Nen truly was, yet could manifest devastating effects with it.

His lips curled into a faint smile. “It’d be a waste to take them out too soon.”

He remembered some of them from what he’d observed. There was that cheetah-like one—if his memory was right, that creature would eventually develop a technique resembling a Domain Expansion. Something on that level was far too valuable to throw away before it matured.

And even the regular Peons would recieve a Power up once they awakened their own Nen, making it once again worth to hunt them in mass.

That was why Harry had been content to sit back for now. Watching. Waiting. Letting the pieces fall into place. The Hunters who entered NGL weren’t just fighting for their lives—they were bait.

Their struggles were the trigger the Chimera Ants needed.

Pokkle, especially. Once he was captured, it was only a matter of time before the Ants experimented on him, studying his brain, allowing them to understand the basics of their own Nen in response.

And elsewhere in the country, Gon would soon clash with one of the Ants, that Rabbit one, striking hard enough to awaken his Nen as the first Ant.

Using that crude Method to awaken the others.

Well the Royal Guards would be born with awakened Nen.

Everything was moving toward the result Harry wanted. A world where the Chimera Ants awakened their powers, created their Hatsu, and became prey worth hunting.

For now, his role was simple: watch, wait, and keep himself from interfering too much. When the time came, when the Ants bloomed into their full potential, that was when his real feast would begin.

Right now, he was a real Hunter luring his Prey towards the direction he wanted. Fitting right into this World.

Was it cruel to just stand by and watch instead of helping?

Harry asked himself that question, though the answer hardly troubled him.

Maybe it was cruel, maybe not. In the end, the outcome would have been the same regardless of his involvement. Others had orchestrated the Events here.

The Chimera Ants would still spread, people would still die, and the balance of the world would still tilt. His presence didn’t change that—except for one detail. He needed the Ants alive, growing stronger, so he could use them as his stepping stones.

Power. That was his reason. That was his path forward.

Even the fearsome Meruem, the Chimera Ant King, along with his Royal Guard—creatures that struck terror into humanity—were nothing more than middling opponents if measured by the standards of Harry’s own world.

At best, they would barely qualify as High-Class Devils. Dangerous, yes. But hardly untouchable.

With that perspective in mind, the idea of sacrificing an entire country didn’t shake him.

NGL was rotten to the core, filled with corruption, crime, and cruelty. Its government had allowed its people to suffer under false ideals, cutting themselves off from the outside world while feeding hypocrisy at the top.

To Harry, the nation was already a corpse waiting to be buried. If its destruction could fuel his growth, then so be it.

And besides, this way, he was saving more lives than would have survived originally.

Ponzu was a perfect example. In the original flow of events, she had been fated to die a pointless death in this very forest. Shot down, her life wasted, remembered by no one.

A meaningless end. That death would not have helped Harry in the slightest. She would have been nothing more than food for the ants, another number in their growing pile of corpses.

But now? Now she was alive, resting safely in his arms. At the very least, it made him look like a good guy.

Of course, that was part of his plan too. She couldn’t remain awake, not yet. As long as she was unconscious, she couldn’t press him to rescue Pokkle.

By the time she woke, the situation with Pokkle would already be irreversible, and Harry would have a perfectly plausible excuse for why he hadn’t saved him.

That was why, after ensuring her safety, he had struck her from behind with a quick, controlled stunner trough a Portal—just enough to knock her out cleanly, without lasting harm. She would never know.

Harry turned his head, eyes drifting toward the direction of the Chimera Ant nest. His gaze sharpened, though his expression remained distant, detached.

In his mind, however, he could see everything. Every movement. Every breath. His En, spread wide in the form of his ever-present purple mist, gave him a perfect view.

A grin slowly tugged at the corners of his mouth. It wasn’t warm. It wasn’t kind. It was cruel, twisted with anticipation.

“Soon… little ants. Soon the Devil will take you.” His voice was barely more than a murmur, yet his words dripped with certainty.

The mist spread everywhere, weaving between trees and rocks, clinging to every corner of the Chimera Ant territory.

It followed them silently, unseen and unnoticed, watching their every step. They had no idea that their lives were already in his grasp, that they were prey trapped inside an invisible cage.

Right now, it was easy. None of them could sense Nen, and so his purple haze remained hidden. But once they awakened their powers, once they learned to see and feel, things would change. They would notice his presence.

They would resist. His hunt would become more dangerous, more complicated.

That was fine. That was how it should be.

For now, though, they were blind mice scurrying in a trap they didn’t even know existed. Their nest, their hunting grounds, their very world—everything was already surrounded, swallowed whole by his mist.

A cage built just for them. And no matter how strong they became, Harry’s prey would not escape.