At this moment, Nereus was sitting atop Hermes, whose size had been enlarged several times, while Nanamo and Big Pan stood behind him.
But in the eyes of Wano Country's residents, it was an entirely different scene.
Upon a massive white cloud, or rather, a magical cloud, a handsome man was gazing down below with a somewhat cold expression.
Behind him, on one side stood an attendant as large as a giant, and on the other side seemed to be a maid?
Previously, Kawamatsu and the other two looked too different from humans, so the locals had directly treated them as monsters.
While appearance doesn't directly increase one's combat strength, it undeniably affects first impressions.
A person who is handsome yet utterly evil and has committed countless crimes can still attract some fans based on looks. But someone who is both ugly and evil, not even funny, looks like nothing more than an NPC at first glance.
A monster's cloud shouldn't be this white.
A monster's residence shouldn't be called Ryugu…[TN: Dragon King's palace]
Under the influence of various folklores, the first person knelt down in prayer.
Soon after, everyone on the beach knelt down as well. However, their eyes did not show piety or faith, but rather fear—fear of angering a god and facing the consequences.
"Dad, your reputation is really something. But this is the first time I've seen a country this afraid of you."
Nanamo looked down below Hermes at the "strange people" as if she had discovered a whole new world, but was immediately flicked on the forehead by Nereus.
"What nonsense are you talking about? Didn't you hear them mentioning 'Toyotamahiko'? It's probably some kind of deity from their legends.
I told you before, the people in this country are quite ignorant. Obviously, they've misunderstood something."
"So should I start calling you Father God now?"
[My Princess Nanamo! I usually tell you to mind your etiquette and call him Father*, and you ignore it. Why are you joking at a time like this?!] [TN: The term author uses here translates to "father king" or simply "father" in English, specifically as a historical term used by royal children to address their emperor or king father.]
Hermes grew anxious beneath them, but it couldn't use telepathy, and it certainly couldn't say such things in front of Nereus.
Lost in its own imagination about succession dramas, Hermes didn't even notice that Nereus didn't care about such matters at all, nor did it notice that Nanamo was signaling it to descend.
It only reacted after being patted several times.
"Lord Nereus! You really came to save us! It seems you heard my prayers!"
"What prayers? I deduced your location based on the direction of the sea currents and where your ship sank. Where is your mother?"
"Mother is in the forest over there. She's injured. Originally, we planned to wait until she recovered before setting out to sea and finding a way back to Fishman Island, and then…"
Seeing Nereus again, Kawamatsu opened up like a floodgate, pouring out all the grievances he had experienced during this time.
"The people of this country are too ignorant! It's terrible! I tried to ask them for help before, but they only threw stones at me…"
"That's right! Wano Country is awful! Absolutely terrible!"
As Kawamatsu complained about the country, the two Minks beside him loudly echoed his words.
They had nearly been burned alive by these people just now, so they had no good impression of Wano Country.
"Kawamatsu, your new friends?"
"More like fellow unlucky souls, I guess. The two of them seemed to have drowned, but before I could save them, we were all captured together."
"My name is Nekomamushi."
"My name is Inuarashi."
"We are from the Mokomo Dukedom."
"Your name saved our lives. Thank you."
Inuarashi and Nekomamushi took turns introducing themselves. They had only heard ancient legends from their elders back in the Mokomo Dukedom.
It was said that hundreds of years ago, the Minks and the samurai of the Kozuki family of Wano Country formed a brotherly alliance of mutual aid. With that in mind, they set out to sea to search for this unknown island.
But everything on the island left them deeply disappointed.
The same had happened in the original timeline. If they hadn't ultimately been saved by Kozuki Oden, they would never have held any favorable impression of Wano Country.
Now that Kozuki Oden had yet to appear, their impression of Wano Country naturally remained negative.
"Lord Nereus, your policies are absolutely correct. The Ryugu Kingdom needs to step into the world. Only by letting the entire world truly understand us can situations like this be avoided."
"Big Pan, go with Kawamatsu to where his mother is and check on her condition. Be careful not to make too much noise."
"Got it, Boss. Come on, little baby, I'll take you to find your mom, Bushishishi~"
Big Pan grabbed Kawamatsu and placed him on top of his head, letting him point out the direction. Then he activated his Devil Fruit ability, submerging most of his body into the ground.
Although the Swim-Swim Fruit allowed Big Pan to treat the ground like water, for others it was still solid earth, and they couldn't dive in along with him.
Only after awakening the fruit and being able to assimilate surrounding matter could group "swimming" be achieved.
Kawamatsu pointed in the direction where his mother was hiding, but for some reason, Big Pan's laughter gave him a strange feeling. He felt like he was being mocked without realizing it.
"Dad, what about these people? Are we just going to let them keep kneeling here?"
"If they want to kneel, then let them kneel."
Nereus didn't tell them to get up either. According to Kawamatsu, these people had nearly burned him, Inuarashi, and Nekomamushi together.
Letting them kneel for a while was already being lenient.
Hearing this, those people lowered their heads even further, not daring to stand up at all.
In their eyes, Big Pan's ability to burrow through the ground was that of the earth god. Being able to command such a being only further convinced them that Nereus was a sea god.
"The scenery here is pretty nice, but why is there still a sea here? I remember that from the outside, this place looked like a mountain, right?"
"That was a long time ago. The current location of Wano Country is not its original one. This is actually halfway up the mountain.
The original Wano Country lies beneath this inland sea.
Hundreds of years ago, for some unknown reason, the people of Wano Country built towering walls around it. Then, due to heavy rains and other factors, the original area was gradually submerged."
Back then, that remarkable craftsman of Wano Country, for some reason, forgot to include any drainage system for the massive walls.
After the water filled up, it somehow connected to another water source, causing the inland sea's water to flow endlessly, making it impossible to drain.
"Such profound knowledge…"
"Benefactor! Do you know how many islands there are in the world? Is it five?"
"Idiot, Nekomamushi! How could there be only five islands? It's at least five!"
In a sense, Zou Island's situation was quite similar to Wano Country's—they both lacked understanding of the outside world. To this day, Inuarashi and Nekomamushi still believed there were only a handful of islands in the world.
At this moment, within Wano Country's inland sea, a man wearing nothing but a loincloth had just surfaced from the water…
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