Creak.
The thick oak cabin door was pushed outward from within. The sound was not loud, yet it cut clean through the noise outside.
Harsh sunlight poured straight into Bullet's eyes.
He narrowed them slightly, giving himself a moment to adjust to the sudden brightness.
Outside the door, just as he had expected, quite a crowd had gathered.
Around a dozen crewmen stood in a loose half circle, faces lit with the excitement of a good show, or coolly indifferent as they watched and judged.
At the very front stood a giant of a man, close to three meters tall, muscles knotted like an iron tower.
His skin was dark, his head shaved completely bald, his face packed with heavy, brutish features. His upper body was bare save for a single leather shoulder strap, and at his waist hung a massive double-bladed battle axe the size of a door.
This was Great Axe Kent.
His thick arms were folded across his chest as he grinned, looking Bullet over with open contempt as the boy stepped out of the cabin.
Bullet did not respond to Kent. His gaze swept over the deck first.
At the edge of the crowd sat a man in a straw hat, unshaven, red-haired, tilting his head back as he chugged from a bottle. Gol D. Roger.
He seemed to spare only a casual glance in their direction before going back to wrestling with his drink, yet there was the faintest hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth.
A little closer stood a blond man with short hair and glasses, leaning against the mainmast. He was running a soft cloth along the blade of a long sword in his hand.
Silvers Rayleigh.
His movements looked lazy, but Bullet could feel it clearly. The man's attention was already locked onto this spot.
Beside Rayleigh stood another man with glasses, twin axes strapped across his back.
Scopper Gaban, the real "strongest man" here, the one who would one day settle down and live his life with a giantess.
Closer still, two boys younger than Bullet stood shoulder to shoulder.
Red-haired Shanks watched with sharp eyes and a serious expression.
Buggy, on the other hand, wore pure schadenfreude on his face, as if he only lacked a bucket of popcorn to complete the picture.
Good.
Everyone who should be here, seemed to be here.
Bullet's heart was perfectly calm.
"Ha!"
"So you finally decided to come out?"
"I thought you pissed yourself in there!"
Kent grew bolder the longer Bullet stayed silent. He waved a big hand and barked,
"Brat, do not say I am bullying you."
"According to the rules on this ship, the newbie has to show what he can do."
"If you can take three swings from me, you have earned yourself a place to stand on this ship."
"If you cannot..."
He grinned viciously and slapped the haft of the axe at his waist.
"Then crawl back to whatever corner you belong in and lick your wounds!"
Roars of laughter and whistles erupted from the surrounding crew. The atmosphere was electric.
On this ship that chased dreams and adventure, strength was the most direct way to earn respect.
Scenes like this "welcome party" were anything but rare.
Bullet finally let his gaze settle fully on Kent.
He did not speak. Instead, he took a single step forward and came to a stop less than three meters away from the man.
For Kent and his enormous axe, this distance was already a killing zone.
The boy's silence, and those eyes that were far too calm, stirred a vague irritation in Kent's chest.
"Quit pretending to be mysterious!"
He growled and stopped wasting words. His right hand snapped down to seize the giant axe at his waist.
With a heavy surge of wind pressure, the axe swept up and came crashing down in a diagonal chop toward Bullet's shoulder, brutal and direct.
If that blow landed, it might not kill him outright, but bones would shatter, muscles would tear, and he would be lucky to get back on his feet in a few months.
Kent clearly had no intention of holding back.
He wanted an overwhelming victory, the kind that would firmly cement his authority.
The axe blade howled through the air, its cold light glaring.
At that instant, Bullet moved.
His right arm swelled from the shoulder in an instant.
The bronze skin darkened as a layer of deep, pitch-black scales rippled out to cover it, each scale catching a faint dark-golden gleam along its edge.
His five fingers stretched and elongated into razor-edged dragon claws, the nails turning a shadowy black, gleaming with a metallic sheen.
The whole arm bulged with corded muscle, its lines filled with a destructive, brutal beauty, and at the same time emanating an ancient majesty that did not belong to the human world.
"What?!"
Kent, closest to the transformation, felt his pupils contract sharply.
The aura pouring off that arm made his heart clench with primal dread.
But the axe was already in motion, and there was no taking it back.
Bullet's partially dragonized right arm did not dodge. It met the descending giant axe head-on, driving forward in a straight punch.
No technique, no flourish, only the purest, simplest straight strike.
Clang!
The impact thundered like a cannon blast.
A violent shockwave burst from the point of collision between the two.
Several nearby crewmen staggered backward, knocked off balance by the air pressure alone.
Kent felt an indescribable, monstrous force slam into his axe. The sheer weight of it was terrifying.
It was as if he had not clashed with a fist, but with some ancient behemoth charging him at full speed.
The arm strength he was so proud of, the massive battle axe he trusted with his life, were reduced to little more than children's toys before that power.
Crack.
A crisp, sickening sound rang out.
The thick steel axe head was forced inward, a clear dent punched into its surface, spiderweb cracks spreading outward from the impact point.
"Urgh!"
Kent's tiger's mouth split open, blood spurting from the torn flesh of his grip. His hands could no longer hold the haft. The giant axe was ripped from his grasp and went spinning through the air.