Chapter 14: Who Doesn't Have a Special Ability?
"Have you ever heard that a Fish-man's wrist strength is ten times that of a human?"
"Wha... What?!"
The captain of the Fat Bottle Pirates tried to pull his sword out of Nanamo's palm.
However, no matter how hard he pulled, the blade seemed welded in place, motionless, showing not even a sign of budging.
Nanamo's hand gripped his weapon firmly like an iron clamp.
Due to racial differences, the wrist strength of the Fish-man race was naturally ten times that of humans.
This "ten times" calculation was based on racial averages—much like how the Marines and Cipher Pol calculated Doriki (Power Level), considering an armed Marine soldier's Doriki as 10.
Comparisons of strength naturally relied on an average baseline. Through training and exercise, certain individuals could overcome this difference.
Moreover, strength didn't come from nothing. Bone density, muscle strength, and the leverage of other body parts constituted natural physical advantages.
"Forget it. Explaining this to someone like you is pointless."
Nanamo tightened her grip on the blade. The sharp edge couldn't leave even a scratch on her seemingly delicate skin.
Instead, the blade itself began to groan under the immense pressure.
This wasn't the effect of Haki, but an innate ability.
In fact, every race living on the sea possessed unique talents.
Because the living habits of different races varied drastically, the environments and battlegrounds they adapted to were also vastly different.
Therefore, crudely judging which race was stronger or weaker was extremely difficult and unfair.
However, finding someone with exceptional talent within a single group was much simpler.
Among humans, Charlotte Linlin's talent could be said to be in the topmost tier.
Even as a child, she possessed monstrous strength, capable of killing a giant brown bear with a single slap, and her skin was as hard as steel.
Neither conventional cannons nor sharp blades could leave a mark on her.
This was Charlotte Linlin's talent—the "Iron Balloon."
As the only one among Charlotte Linlin's children to inherit this talent, Nanamo's starting point was a finish line many could never hope to reach.
Clang...
Half of the broken blade fell to the ground. The sound wasn't loud, but in this environment, it was exceptionally piercing.
The captain of the Fat Bottle Pirates looked at the broken edge of his blade in terror and disbelief.
It hadn't snapped due to brute force; it looked more like it had been corroded and melted by something.
"Fish-Man Karate: Water Shot · Acid Rain!"
A glob of liquid seemed to condense in Nanamo's right hand, which had just been holding the blade, looking as if it were about to drip.
But as she swung her fist, the liquid instantly transformed into countless tiny water arrows, shooting toward the pirates trying to ambush her from behind like a torrential storm.
Water Shot (Uchimizu) was one of the most basic techniques of the Fish-Man Karate style and its fundamental ranged attack.
Its principle was simple: shoot the liquid condensed in the hand like a bullet. The range and piercing power depended on the user's strength.
The Water Shot fired from Nanamo's hand acted like a shotgun blast, piercing through the bodies of several pirates. The water arrows didn't lose power after exiting their bodies, embedding themselves directly into the wall behind them.
But afterward, the small holes in the wall emitted sizzling sounds of corrosion. Accompanied by wisps of white smoke, the holes expanded and deepened at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"Ugh... Ahh!..."
In that dense volley just now, the pirates who were hit directly in vital spots and died instantly were the lucky ones.
Because Nanamo fired a shotgun-like attack, hitting specific locations was somewhat uncontrollable.
Some lucky ones avoided vital hits, but the acid remaining in their wounds and inside their bodies began to corrode them from within.
An intense burning sensation, as if from the depths of hell, erupted violently inside them. The agony left them unable to speak.
In the end, they could only curl up on the ground in excruciating pain, their bodies twitching uncontrollably, their throats squeezing out broken, tuneless sounds of suffering.
From this perspective, avoiding a fatal wound just now wasn't luck—it was misfortune.
However, this pain didn't last long. Their bodily functions gradually collapsed under the acid's corrosion, and soon they lost the ability to feel pain altogether as their lives faded away.
"Mon... Monsters! Both of these damn brats are monsters! Run! Run!"
Having witnessed Katakuri slaughtering his subordinates like chopping melons and vegetables on one side...
And seeing the pirates drop dead from a single strike by Nanamo on the other side...
The captain's final psychological defense completely crumbled.
He threw away the broken hilt in his hand, disregarded the lives of his remaining crew, and fled frantically toward the rear.
"Honestly. You're in the New World; how can you be so uncultured? Even calling me a Devil Fruit user would make more sense."
Nanamo was very dissatisfied with the evaluation of "monster." There were plenty of bizarre abilities on the sea, most related to Devil Fruits.
"With your strength and cognition... no, I should say only someone with a brain as smooth as yours could do something this stupid."
Nanamo's ability indeed wasn't from a Devil Fruit, but a talent she was born with—her Fish-man subspecies.
For example, Arlong, as a shark Fish-man, could rapidly regenerate teeth. Sebastian, as a scorpionfish Fish-man (Wotan), could use camouflage to turn invisible.
These abilities were greatly enhanced in Fish-men and merfolk.
Due to genetics, Fish-man offspring didn't necessarily share the same subspecies as their parents; there was a certain degree of randomness.
Moreover, the variety of fish in this sea far exceeded common knowledge. The category of Fish-men and merfolk also included marine creatures like seahorses and octopuses, so special abilities occasionally appeared.
Often, Fish-men and merfolk themselves couldn't explain their own conditions and could only infer based on books.
Nanamo's subspecies was a type of marine creature capable of releasing corrosive liquid. In her hands, this acid was further enhanced, easily corroding even metal.
The captain of the Fat Bottle Pirates didn't hear what Nanamo said. He just wanted to escape this place, flee from this hell.
Although he didn't know where to run, the primal instinct to survive urged him to sprint into the distance.
Reality, however, is often cruel. There was no dawn of survival waiting for him—only the trident thrown by Katakuri.