"So I misunderstood."
The fox inclined his head toward Kairo while holding his coffee cup, then elegantly tipped it back for another sip.
When he'd heard Droopy ask for help, he had genuinely thought Droopy meant help calling Kairo over.
Watching the fox's reaction, Kairo felt several black lines form across his forehead.
Just then, Jerry suddenly leapt up and landed squarely on Kairo's shoulder, baring his teeth at the man retreating across the deck.
Kairo decided not to waste any more words on the fox. He turned toward the horrified man in front of him and spoke calmly.
"Gin. Combat commander of the Krieg Pirates."
The instant Kairo said his name, Gin's pupils contracted again.
He could swear he had never met this man before. And though he did carry the title of "Demon Man Gin," there really weren't that many people who knew it.
Because most of the people who knew his name…
were dead.
Before Gin could react, Kairo stepped toward him.
"Let me introduce myself. My name is Kairo. I'm a traveler."
Then his tone cooled.
"And I don't like fighting and killing. As long as no one ruins the mood of my journey, I'm willing to treat anyone as a friend, no matter who they are."
"What a pity."
"Your appearance has seriously ruined my mood."
"And now you've even boarded my ship to kill."
"So even though I dislike violence…"
"I have no choice but to sink you—and that Dreadnought Sabre over there."
The moment he finished speaking, Kairo's previously easygoing expression vanished.
A sharp, crushing pressure erupted from him without the slightest restraint.
Almost at the same instant, a voice exploded from behind him.
"Kairo, you got careless!"
As the voice rang out, a figure burst up from beneath the ship and lunged straight toward him.
Boom!
A deafening impact sounded.
Before the attacker could even understand what had happened, Kairo had already turned and punched him away in one clean motion. Without pausing, Kairo closed the distance instantly and drove a second palm strike into the man's chest.
Another explosive crash followed.
The heavy shield armor protecting the attacker shattered on the spot.
The man spat blood and flew backward, crashing into the sea.
Kairo glanced at the splashing figure and said flatly,
"Pearl, second commander of the Krieg Pirates?"
"So much for your so-called iron wall defense."
The man Kairo had just blasted away was indeed Pearl, the Krieg Pirates' second commander—known as Iron Wall Pearl because of the layers of shields strapped to his body. Ever since joining Krieg's crew, no one in East Blue had ever managed to break through his defenses.
And yet Kairo had shattered them with a casual strike, then sent him flying into the ocean like trash.
But to Gin, none of that was the most terrifying part.
What truly frightened him was this:
From the moment Kairo appeared on deck, Gin had completely lost control of his body.
Especially when Kairo released that overwhelming pressure—
if Gin had still been able to move, he would have dropped to his knees already.
"You… who exactly are you?!"
Though he couldn't move, Gin could still speak. Staring straight at Kairo, and forcing the words out beneath that crushing pressure, he asked,
"Why have I never heard your name before?"
Kairo stopped right in front of him, raised one hand, then casually pressed it downward.
At once, Gin felt as if an invisible mountain had dropped onto his head.
Bang.
His knees smashed into the deck.
Looking down at the kneeling man before him, Kairo lowered his eyes slightly.
"There's no need to feel unwilling just because you're about to die."
"Pirates like you—whether you call yourselves loyal, righteous, or just driven by necessity—almost always have innocent blood on your hands."
"So tell me."
"Any last words?"
Gin could feel the pressure intensifying without end. After several failed attempts to resist, he finally gave up. Lowering his head, he spoke with difficulty.
"Attacking your ship… was our fault."
"But your pets already struck back. Admiral Krieg's fleet has been destroyed because of it."
He paused, then forced his head up through sheer will and met Kairo's gaze.
"I have no complaints about paying that price."
"But I ask one thing."
"Let me die in his place. Let Admiral Krieg live."
After saying that, Gin looked at Kairo with open pleading in his eyes.
At this point, there was nothing more he could do except try to preserve Krieg's life.
Because the man standing before him was so terrifyingly strong that Gin didn't even dare entertain the thought of resistance.
This was the first time since joining the Krieg Pirates that he had encountered an opponent this overwhelming.
Until now, the strongest man in Gin's mind had always been Krieg.
But the moment he faced Kairo, that belief collapsed completely.
Kairo shook his head.
"Sorry. You can't live, and Krieg must die too."
"You know better than anyone what kind of man he is—despicable, shameless, cold-blooded, arrogant."
"If I leave him alive, he'll only become a problem later."
"His strength means nothing to me, of course."
"But he'd still ruin my mood."
"Get up! Stand up!"
Just then, Krieg's furious roar came from the Dreadnought Sabre.
"Kill him!"
Standing on his flagship, Krieg had no idea what kind of overwhelming monster Gin was facing. Even when Pearl had been blasted away, he still hadn't grasped how bad things were.
Only when he saw Gin suddenly drop to both knees did he finally snap awake.
But by then, his rage over the destruction of his fleet had already drowned out his reason. He didn't care what Gin was facing—he just kept shouting for blood.
Kairo's brows twitched slightly.
Then, with a casual motion, he reached toward a pebble lying near the corner of the deck and pulled it into his hand from a distance.
The next second, the stone darkened rapidly in his palm, turning black and glossy.
Before Gin could even process what Kairo intended, Kairo flicked his wrist.
The pebble tore through the air, leaving an afterimage behind.
Far away on the Dreadnought Sabre, Krieg's eyes widened as the pebble swelled in his vision.
Neither Gin nor Krieg had expected it.
Krieg wanted to dodge.
He couldn't.
Boom.
From the flagship in the distance came a dull, wet blast.
Krieg's head burst apart like a brittle watermelon, smashed to pulp by the pebble.
Gin's eyes nearly fell out of his skull.
As the Krieg Pirates' combat commander, he had seen countless battles, and he had seen Krieg face powerful enemies before.
But never—
never had he seen a man kill someone like that with a pebble.
And the most terrifying part was not that Kairo had used a stone.
It was that the strongest man Gin knew, Don Krieg, had not even been able to avoid it.
Gin wasn't foolish enough to believe Krieg had simply stood there waiting to die.
The truth was obvious.
That pebble had moved too fast.
Too fast even for Gin.
Which meant his earlier instinct had been absolutely correct.
Kairo's strength was far beyond anything he had imagined.
To Kairo, neither Gin nor Krieg amounted to anything worth taking seriously.
"All right, Gin."
After blowing Krieg's head apart with a pebble, Kairo turned his attention back to the kneeling man and said indifferently,
"Since you're all part of the same pirate crew…"
"I'll make sure you leave together. Neatly."
As the words fell, Kairo raised his hand toward Gin's head.
There was no emotion in his eyes.
As though he wasn't about to kill a living man at all.
Strangely enough, Kairo himself no longer found that reaction unusual.
Ever since the system started flooding him with power, his mindset had changed far more than he had realized.
This was the first time since coming to the One Piece world that he had personally killed someone.
And yet his heart remained perfectly calm.
Just then, another ship without a flag entered the waters off Syrup Village at high speed.
On its deck, now back in her usual fiery outfit, Belo Betty stood proudly at the bow holding a flag. Behind her stood several neatly lined-up members of the Revolutionary Army's Eastern forces.
The moment their ship entered the battlefield, Belo Betty's eyes widened in disbelief at the sea littered with broken ship remains and pirate corpses.
"What happened here?!"
"Did the Marines and pirates go to war or something?!"
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