"Hey… judging by the Jolly Roger on your clothes, you're that crew's captain, right? Do you have a bounty?"
"Hah? Who are you, kid?"
"Enough—lie down before you talk to me!"
"Bang bang bang bang bang…"
In a tavern in the royal capital, the seats were packed with ferocious-looking pirates. On different parts of their bodies, each bore the same emblem.
Karl walked up to the strongest presence—the pirate captain—and first asked the drunken man a question.
Then, disliking the hassle, he simply moved with a shave-like burst of speed and sent the captain and the surrounding pirates flying.
Just as the captain and his men were about to smash through walls and get embedded in the ceiling, they slammed into a transparent barrier, which prevented any further damage to the tavern.
"Hey, does your captain have a bounty?"
Karl left one last pirate, looked at the stunned underling on the floor, and asked.
"Y-yes… y-yes, yes…"
Staring at his captain and comrades sprawled out, the underling's hand shook around his cup. Seeing Karl's impatient face, he nodded frantically, stammering, "Our captain is Lajin Haus of the famous West Blue 'Haus Pirates,' a great pirate with a bounty of sixty… sixty-one and a half million Berries."
Gulp.
After he finished, the pirate swallowed hard.
If his own captain was a famed great pirate, then what level of monster was this guy who felled their captain in an instant—and with him, everyone else?
…The Grand Line, huh?
Terrifying… Mama, I quit being a pirate—I'm going home!
"Over sixty million? You'd never guess, looking at him," Karl said, mildly surprised.
"Please, not everyone's a monster like you."
Carina rolled her eyes, withdrew her fruit's power, took a small stack of Berries from her person and set it on the table, then pointed at the captain who'd fainted from the pain. "I've memorized their emblem. Take that guy along. I'm going to loot their treasure first."
"Got it."
Karl grabbed the pirate captain named Lajin Haus and followed behind Carina and Nami out of the tavern.
Very quickly, the gossip that a certain famous West Blue pirate crew had been wiped out by a handsome trio—one man and two women—spread from that tavern.
Since Carina left compensation, the tavern owner didn't "report it," and the standing army didn't come to cause trouble.
At the port, Carina swiftly found the pirate ship bearing the same emblem as the captain's.
After tossing every guard on board into the sea, the three ransacked the ship's treasure hold.
It had to be said: pirates who had just reached their first stop were very wealthy.
Before entering the Grand Line they'd stocked up thoroughly, so the ship was loaded with treasure, provisions, fresh water, and even a large supply of blades and firearms.
Karl wasn't interested in the weapons, nor did he care to fence second-hand gear, so they only took the treasure and some fresh food.
After hauling everything back to their own ship, and with Karl's astonishing sensing ability on watch, Carina wasn't worried about theft.
Then she led Karl and Nami to the largest navigational-supplies shop in the capital.
"The islands marked on this map—are these the mandatory stops on this route?"
The moment they stepped in, the trio's eyes went to a giant wall map.
It marked out an entire route with start, midpoint nodes, and end.
From the "Bugas Kingdom" to "Sabaody Archipelago" at the end of the first half.
"Yes."
The attendant smiled politely. "We put that up to warn guests who enter the Grand Line for the first time but happen to pick this particular route."
"A warning?" Carina asked curiously.
"The Grand Line is a very special sea where the geomagnetism, sky, currents, and winds are all chaotic. Without a Log Pose, even confirming your position is difficult."
The attendant explained in detail. "Besides that, the Grand Line has some very special islands—some require months, even a year or two, to store their magnetism.
"And there are also islands on which magnetism doesn't exist at all.
"This route, unfortunately, has both."
With a pointer rod, the attendant first indicated the route's end, "Sabaody Archipelago," then pointed to a stop only two islands away from "Bugas Kingdom." "At the end of the first half of the Grand Line lies the world-famous Sabaody Archipelago, a cluster of islands formed by the world's largest red tree, the Yarukiman Mangrove.
"Apart from that greatest of archipelagoes, this route also contains another archipelago—that is—"
"The Boin Archipelago!"
The four words burst out of both Karl and the attendant at once.
After Karl spoke them, a gleam flashed in his eyes.
Surprised, the attendant glanced at Karl and continued, "The Boin Archipelago, like Sabaody, is a special kind of archipelago—formed by a number of carnivorous plants floating on the sea, whose scientific name is 'Stomach Baron.'
"In that sea area they're absolute rulers. Those who wander into their territory by mistake stand an eight-in-ten chance of becoming food.
"So, I advise newcomers to detour."
From behind the counter the attendant produced a special glass sphere. "This is an Eternal Pose. It permanently stores the magnetism of one island and can be used to bypass the Boin Archipelago and head straight to the next island."
"I see…"
After listening, Carina and Nami both looked enlightened.
Karl, meanwhile, looked excited.
The island he most wanted to visit was actually on this route.
Indeed, the island Karl wanted to visit most was the Boin Archipelago.
On that archipelago—where, in the original tale, Usopp was swatted away by Bartholomew Kuma—edible plants grew everywhere. It was practically a gourmet paradise.
Though riddled with dangers and crawling with countless man-eating plants, not worth the risk just for a taste—
That is, for other people.
For Karl, an island overflowing with food was a gigantic pool of experience.
His infinitely evolving monster physique required constant eating to trigger evolution.
And the "EXP" needed for each evolution was practically bottomless.
Since his first evolution at nine, Karl figured he'd eaten—counting it all up—the equivalent of at least a two-digit number of Sea Kings over the years.
Yet his body still hadn't reached a second evolution.
So he'd imagined more than once: if only there were an island of infinite food—he could "cheat" his way to evolution number two.
This world happened to have exactly that "gourmet heaven."
One of them was the Boin Archipelago.
Karl had planned that, when he got the chance, he'd seek the Boin Archipelago's location no matter what.
And look—what he wanted most, what he absolutely had to visit, lay on this very route.
Truly, heaven helps me!
Second evolution, here I come!