The Troupe Hunts Hisoka

The reader's first sight of the Phantom Troupe aboard: Chrollo, alone, in a steerage hall whose number reads 'massacre' in wordplay. The succession war is not the only lethal game on the ship.

Kakin's three mafia families boarded to stake territory on the New Continent, each with a direct line to a prince: Xi-Yu to Zhang Lei, Heil-Ly to Tserriednich, Cha-R to Luzurus. Five Spiders surface in Tier 5, hunting a man taller than 190 centimeters.

All Spiders gather in the central dining hall: Illumi Zoldyck has replaced Uvogin at Hisoka's own request — with a contract to be honored if Illumi kills him. Tier 5 has been swept clean of Hisoka; Chrollo orders his death prioritized, methods free.

The Heil-Ly hold Tier 3, the Xi-Yu Tier 4, the Cha-R Tier 5; moving between the lower tiers requires the army's stamp or the mafia's. Unregistered passengers boarded outside the manifest — the ship has a shadow population.

Onior and Brocco order their underbosses to find Hisoka before the Troupe does: Ken'i floats ten million per tip, Hinrigh plans ID checks through Queen Tang Zhao Li's influence. Everyone wants the clown found — nobody wants him fought.

The Cha-R underboss offers Nobunaga, Phinks, and Feitan a working arrangement: hunt the warehouse killer for the family. Franklin, unimpressed by searching, decides to simply wait for Hisoka in Tier 5.

Caught in a Tier 3 curfew sweep with Kalluto, Illumi tells Mizaistom plainly that every Troupe member is on the ship — then refuses to elaborate. Mizaistom weighs whether to burden Kurapika with the news.

Ken'i and Vice Boss Tajao explain the custom: hits between families must be squared between bosses within 24 hours, with the boss off home turf when it happens. Over 300 workers are missing, Morena's Tier 1 room is empty, and no call has come — war with the Heil-Ly is now procedural fact.

Onior directs Hinrigh to find Hisoka on Tier 3 while ceding Tier 4's search to the Spiders — keeping the Troupe where the family can watch it — and to kill Morena along the way.

Zakuro's blood-drop search flags a tall man with his hair down: Lynch's soul-punch confirms nothing before she is dropped by a reflex counter, and the terrified Zakuro takes the man's overwhelming aura as proof. The reader will learn in ch 405 that this Hisoka is Bonolenov, planted by Chrollo to be found.

Luini surfaces at the Cha-R office proposing the Troupe help him kill both families, the royals, and then the old world. Nobunaga stabs him mid-pitch, bisects the corpse, and leaves it as the Troupe's declaration of war on the Heil-Ly.

In auditorium 8, Hinrigh offers the found 'Hisoka' a VVIP room on Tier 1 to sit out the mafia war, invoking the doctrine of balance. 'Hisoka' accepts on one condition — he will not refuse a fight the Troupe starts. The mafia believes it has contained a man who was never there.

A flashback opens the Troupe's origin: child Chrollo dubbing foreign videos in a church, Pakunoda, Sheila, and Sarasa voicing the heroines, Uvogin won over by a performance. A theater company forms in a city whose children are stolen for sport.

Sarasa is abducted, dismembered, and staged with a filmed message by outsiders who prey on Meteor City. Over her grave Chrollo vows to build a criminal haven that will lure her killers back, live as a villain the world shudders at, and kill — and Uvogin names him the Troupe's head.

Chrollo asks Uvogin for three years to build his power and a system for Meteor City; Uvogin answers that if Chrollo is the head, he will follow him until he dies. Eight children raise their fingers, and the group that will terrify the world takes its shape.

The real Hisoka surfaces at last: winning absurd hands at the VIP casino, rolling triple sevens, and monologuing that group abilities and ceremony-made beasts turn him off — he wants one person, one-on-one, to love to death. He has been above the hunt the entire time.

Chrollo's balance play is revealed: Bonolenov impersonated Hisoka so the mafia would 'find' and stash him, freeing the Troupe's search. Lynch's soul-punch pierced the act, so he killed her, spared the unknowing Zakuro as a messenger, and now spots the real Hisoka across the casino floor.

After Tajao pledges the Cha-R and Xi-Yu's full support to the Troupe's Heil-Ly extermination, Ken'i privately addresses Morena — 'we have a problem' — and considers deploying their 'joker.' The Cha-R underboss has been hers all along.

Tajao leads three Spiders up through the ship's outermost shell and the sewage plant between Tiers 4 and 5 — subcontracted turf where, Nobunaga realizes, killers posing as waste contractors could murder on an assembly line. Phinks and Feitan continue up; Nobunaga turns back toward the Heil-Ly.

Lynch is found with her neck professionally broken. Working backward from Zakuro's account, Hinrigh reconstructs the truth: the found 'Hisoka' was a fake; Lynch's ability exposed him, so he killed her and impersonated her to steer the mafia's conclusions. The Xi-Yu vows revenge on the culprit, whoever it is.

Amid the funeral crowds, Chrollo reveals his real prize: the Seed Urn, the Lotus Anchorite, and the Sword of Good Omens — the ritual engine of Kakin's prosperity, surely kept on Tier 1. Stealing something of national-treasure grade would evolve Skill Hunter into the weapon he needs to finish Hisoka for good.