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New World - Upon Zou, vast as a mountain, walking across the sea, towering into the clouds
"Tap..."
"Tap..."
"Tap..."
Liam stepped through the air with Geppo, holding Robin in his arms as they passed through layers of clouds, finally landing in a leap onto the moss-covered back of the elephant.
It was close to dawn, and the night had lightened slightly. Under the cold moonlight, the outline of the ancient city before them was far clearer than what they had previously seen through the eyes of a Flower Clone...
"Are you still not going to let go?" Robin asked.
"Let me hold you a little longer."
Robin smiled softly. After a while, Liam finally loosened his embrace and set her down on the ground.
The two of them walked across the uneven terrain of the elephant's back toward the ancient city ahead. Liam suddenly stamped on the ground beneath his feet and asked curiously, "With your Hana Jizai, can you make a Flower Clone of this thing?"
"In theory, it should be possible..."
Now that Robin was here, her Flower-Flower Fruit (Hana Hana no Mi) had clearly already recorded the aura of this giant elephant.
However, when she extended her palm toward the endless sea behind them and attempted to use Hana Jizai to replicate the giant elephant, she was immediately overcome by a wave of exhaustion.
"No, it won't work. Its size is far too enormous." Robin gave up and shook her head. "My stamina can't support it at all... Even with armor, my strength would still be nowhere near enough."
The endless and perilous sea...
An ancient elephant as massive as a mountain...
Before nature's grand miracles, human power seemed insignificantly small.
The two companions walked together to the foot of the city wall. There was no gate here, so this was likely not the front entrance, merely one side of the city wall.
At that moment, the urgent bell chimes suddenly rang out again from the tower overhead.
Dong! Dong! Dong...
Liam paid it no mind and jumped together with Robin onto the top of the city wall—but before they even landed, the bell abruptly stopped, as if someone had ordered it silenced.
Standing atop the city wall, the two felt the cool breeze of the high altitude as they gazed over the ancient city.
At the center stood a dense cluster of buildings, while thick forests were scattered around it. Beyond those forests lay the circular city wall they were currently standing on.
On the streets of the central city, they could barely make out numerous residents gathering together, seemingly drawn by the bell to look in their direction.
Robin thought to herself: whichever tower's bell rang among the four towering corner towers would immediately reveal the direction from which outsiders had arrived...
Her gaze drifted past the city to the forest behind it, where a gigantic shadow loomed vaguely in the night.
Was that some kind of statue?
"Hehe, don't blame them for being too nervous. You two startled them, after all..."
A voice sounded beside them.
Robin turned her head and, sure enough, saw the huge figure their Flower Clone had encountered earlier, a... cat?
Nekomamushi sat on top of the city wall, a pipe clenched between his interlocking fangs, making it look like nothing more than a toothpick. He scratched at his paw and glanced at Robin.
"I saw you in the newspaper, Jolyne Cujoh..." he said casually. "Pirate captain with a bounty of 300 million Belly. Meow-haha, you're quite an impressive one! Never expected you to cut off your only crewmate's head and, wah!!"
At that moment, he noticed Liam standing on Robin's other side and was so startled that all his fur puffed up like a frightened cat.
"That scared me half to death! Why is that severed head from earlier still alive?!"
'So you're the one getting scared…' Robin thought.
"Hey, big cat." Liam gestured above Robin's head to indicate his own height. "I'm this much taller than her. How did you only notice me now?"
Nekomamushi took two puffs from his pipe and calmly asked, "What are you here for?"
'That emotional shift was a little too fast…' Robin thought.
Without mentioning anything related to history, culture, or archaeology, she simply smiled and replied, "A giant elephant carrying an entire city on its back while walking across the sea... Isn't it normal to be curious?"
Nekomamushi burst into loud laughter.
"Exactly! Amazing creatures! Islands never seen before! That's the fun of a pirate's adventure! Hahaha!"
Robin asked in surprise, "You're a pirate?"
"That was a very long time ago..." Nekomamushi said while smoking his pipe. "Back then, I used to sail on the same ship as an annoying dog..."
"Nekomamushi… Boss!!!"
At that moment, two figures flew up from below Zou, or more accurately, they had been grabbed and tossed up by something.
One was a short young man resembling a monkey, while the other was a child who looked like a little cat. After landing, the monkey-mink youth who had shouted hurriedly ran toward Nekomamushi, Liam, and Robin atop the city wall.
Meanwhile, the cat child stood where she was, eyes sparkling with stars, and said to B., "Thank you for bringing us up here, Mister Ghost."
The Black Battle Armor seemed not to hear her at all. Its narrow eyes glowed faintly as it lowered its head, staring at the giant elephant beneath its feet.
"Boss Nekomamushi!"
The monkey-mink youth, Wegeta, nimbly darted up onto the top of the city wall in one smooth motion.
"I heard the enemy alarm bell, but they aren't enemies! That weird ghost helped fish Darcy out of the sea, and even brought us... up... here..."
The two humans and the cat on the opposite side all stared at him with question marks practically floating over their heads. Only then did Wegeta realize they actually seemed to be getting along quite well.
"Don't worry, Wegeta," Nekomamushi said, puffing on his pipe. "I already told the brat ringing the bell to stop... Honestly, all he did was see a woman walking around holding a severed head and immediately assume it was an enemy attack… AHHHH!!!"
He glanced at Liam and once again got so frightened that all his fur stood on end.
"And you call that 'all he did'?!" the short monkey-mink youth snapped irritably.
Wegeta?
Liam looked at the monkey-mink, his gaze suddenly sharpening.
"Don't mind these details," Nekomamushi waved dismissively. "They just came to have an adventure in our country. They're exactly the kind of pirates I like! Hehehe..."
He calmed down suspiciously fast again...
Robin asked, "Does your country have a name? Also, I thought it was said that minks generally dislike humans."
"It's called the Mokomo Dukedom," Nekomamushi said cheerfully. "Because we're all fluffy, of course!"
Wegeta snorted.
"'Generally dislike humans'? What a narcissistic way to put it... We only dislike those who are unpleasant, regardless of race. Besides, in my eyes, you humans are nothing more than monkey-minks with less fur! Or perhaps gorilla-minks?"
"Nekomamushi, the one who likes adventure is my captain, not me," Liam said.
To Liam, "adventure" naturally meant archaeology.
"As for me, I prefer fighting..."
Nekomamushi bared his teeth in a grin.
"Fighting? Then you've come to the right place... In this country, even children are warriors!"
"But since they call you Boss, you must be the strongest one here, right?"
"Meow-hahaha! I like you even more now, Giorno Giovanna! That's right, I'm the strongest!"
Liam hooked a thumb toward the nearby forest and smiled.
"Then let's change locations and fight somewhere else."
"So why are you talking to me?!" the short monkey-mink Wegeta finally roared at Liam, unable to take it anymore. "If you're bold enough to challenge Boss Nekomamushi, then at least talk properly to the Boss!"
"No," Liam said solemnly. "What you should say is, 'Whatever, it makes no difference anyway'..."
This was originally a line from the first confrontation between Son Goku and Vegeta, but unfortunately, it was completely wasted here.
Wegeta and Nekomamushi both looked utterly confused, while Robin let out a helpless sigh.
Where are the bros who get the reference?
Liam glanced beyond the city wall and called out in the distance. Only then did B. withdraw his gaze, bringing the cat child over as well.
"Well then..." Liam turned back with a smile. "Shall we go?"
"Stop talking to me!!" Wegeta shouted angrily.
"Meow-hahaha, you really are a strange one!" Nekomamushi laughed boisterously.
You're really one to call someone strange... Robin thought, glancing at the gigantic cat over five meters tall.
Soon, Liam and Nekomamushi vanished in a flash, dashing toward the dark forest nearby.
What surprised Robin was that the giant cat was actually able to keep up with Liam's speed...
Wegeta took a moment to calm himself down before saying to the female pirate, "If you want to look around, then come with me."
At that moment, the cat child climbed up and waved below.
"Mister Ghost, you should come up too... Huh? Where'd he go?"
She blinked, then looked over to the other side of the city wall and exclaimed in delight:
"Wow! He passed straight through the wall?!"
"Darcy," Wegeta said, "let's go back. Since we have guests, stop fooling around."
The three of them jumped down one after another from the city wall.
Seeing how agile the cat child was, Robin couldn't help recalling what Nekomamushi had said earlier, that even children in this country were warriors. It really wasn't an exaggeration.
"Did you accidentally fall off the giant elephant?" Robin asked.
The cat girl called Darcy grinned.
"I jumped off by myself! I like eating fish, after all..." Wegeta snorted.
"Give it up. You can't eat fish anymore."
"Why not?" Robin asked, puzzled.
Even though she was a mink, she was still clearly a cat. Cats eating fish was perfectly normal, wasn't it?
Could it be because...
An image popped into Robin's mind: little Darcy having her throat pierced by a fish bone, blood pouring everywhere, leaving her traumatized and forever fearful of fish.
At that moment, B. said a few words to her from the side.
Robin looked surprised.
This cat girl was a Devil Fruit user?
Darcy said gloomily, "Because now I'm a fish too..."
Wegeta explained to Robin that Darcy was the user of the Fish-Fish Fruit, Ancient Zoan Model: Swordfish.
(End Of This Chapter)