"They really were an interesting bunch."
Standing on the high ground and watching them leave, Luffy grinned from ear to ear.
"They really were," Sanji agreed with a nod.
Their connection had been strange, almost to the point of feeling cursed, but because of that, it had become something memorable. And that, in its own way, was what made it fun.
"Yohohohoho!"
Brook glanced at Sanji and asked, "By the way, are you absolutely sure that fellow wasn't your long-lost twin brother?"
"Bastard, of course not!" Sanji roared, veins bulging on his forehead. "Brook, damn it, I almost forgot about you!"
He was, of course, talking about the way Brook had laughed at the fact that he and that man looked exactly alike.
"Yohohoho~"
Brook skipped away just in time to avoid Sanji's kick, laughing as he ran. "But Sanji-san, at the time, he really did look exactly like you."
"You bastard!"
"Hahahahaha!"
Watching Sanji chase after Brook, the rest of the crew burst out laughing.
"They won't get lost, will they?" Zoro suddenly asked.
Usopp stared at him in disbelief.
"Why would you be the one to say that?" he shot back, leaning toward Zoro. "You're the idiot who couldn't even find our own ship!"
He had already heard about it. Zoro had somehow remembered not 41, but 1.
At that point, Usopp did not even know where to begin.
A vein throbbed on Zoro's forehead.
"Shut up! I just didn't have time to get back there."
"Then why were you heading for Grove 1?"
Zoro fell silent.
"Because... I remembered it as Grove 1..."
The more he spoke, the less confidence he had. By the end, even he looked awkward.
Jin stared at him.
"1?"
"Wasn't it 41?"
He looked at Zoro with utter disbelief. How in the world had this idiot memorized the number?
"Could it be..." Robin said, thinking it over. "When you looked at the number, was the 4 hidden behind a bubble?"
The group froze for a second, then immediately exploded into laughter.
"Hahahahaha!"
"Zoro, you're way too funny!"
Zoro's face darkened, but he could not even argue.
Because... that was exactly what had happened.
Now that he thought about it, there really had been a huge bubble floating in front of the sign. At the time, he had thought it was not blocking the number.
Turns out... he had been very, very wrong.
That realization gave him a headache.
Just then, Jin seemed to sense something, and his expression changed instantly.
"What's wrong?"
The others saw the shift in his face and quickly stopped laughing, all of them turning to look at him.
"Admiral Kizaru... has arrived," Jin said grimly. "Just now, that guy blew up my clone..."
He was truly terrifying. For people at the level of the Supernovas... he could send them flying with a single kick.
So this is an Admiral...
No wonder they were called the Navy Headquarters' greatest military power. His strength really was monstrous.
And Jin had already figured out the man's Devil Fruit.
Not only was it a Logia—it was light.
A power like that was outrageous.
It carried devastating destructive force, and its speed was equally absurd.
If not for the Sharingan, he might not even have been able to catch the trajectory of Kizaru's movements.
At that moment, that old face rose in his mind again, along with the man's signature line.
Speed is weight. Have you ever been kicked at the speed of light?
Light...
That kind of power was practically cheating.
"A-Admiral?!"
The others all paled as well.
"Let's move. We need to get out of here," Zoro said immediately.
"We're going to that bar from before, right?"
"Yeah."
"Alright, then let's go," Luffy said with a nod.
That place still had a ton of food in the fridge, after all.
Nami glanced at the two idiots still making noise ahead of them, clenched her fist, and bellowed, "You two bastards, cut it out!"
A second later, she practically flashed across the distance.
Bang! Bang!
Before either Sanji or Brook could react, she punched them both flat.
"S-So scary..."
"Quit whining and move! If an Admiral catches us, we're finished!"
"Got it!"
As he ran with the others, Jin cast a glance toward the side.
Grove 29...
That was very far from here. If all went well, they should make it safely to Shakky's place.
Hopefully... nothing unexpected happened.
...
"So I got played."
Standing in the middle of the street, Kizaru looked down at the spot where Jin's clone had just vanished and frowned.
"No wonder that brat dared come looking for trouble all by himself. So it was a clone..."
Thinking about it carefully, the report he had received earlier had mentioned that the boy possessed some kind of clone ability.
But the problem was, Kizaru's Observation Haki had not picked up anything strange at all. It had genuinely felt like the presence of a living person.
"So that's why Onigumo and the others said they couldn't tell the original from the clone..."
"How troublesome. Makes me feel rather annoyed."
If even he, a Marine Admiral, could not distinguish the real one from the fake, then no one else stood a chance.
Catching that boy was not going to be easy.
That thought alone was enough to give him a headache.
Still, it confirmed one thing.
The report from the Marine who had said the Straw Hats were heading this way—
was false.
What had come here was not the Straw Hat crew at all, but only one of Jin's ninja clones.
"A diversion, huh..."
Heh. The brat really was clever.
He had actually managed to drag nearly all of the Marines' attention over to this side.
"Which means... they might still be over there?"
Thinking of that, Kizaru turned his gaze toward Grove 1 and narrowed his eyes.
"What a terrifying little fellow. Even that Blood-Eyed Ninja wasn't able to beat him."
From the rooftop in the distance, Scratchmen Apoo watched Kizaru with a grave expression.
That Blood-Eyed Ninja's very first bounty had already reached 400 million. His strength was unquestionably terrifying.
And yet... even he could not handle an Admiral.
So this was the pressure of the Navy Headquarters' highest combat power.
It was... exciting.
"Apoo, Captain, we should get out of here!" one of his crewmen urged nervously. "If we keep staying here, the Admiral might notice us!"
He had personally seen what happened to the other Supernovas who had been kicked away by Kizaru.
That overwhelming power had scared the hell out of him.
If they got targeted by something that monstrous, death would be the only outcome.
"Heh. Of course we're leaving. But..." Apoo narrowed his eyes. "Leaving without doing anything first isn't my style."
The other Supernovas had dared attack a Marine Admiral.
Naturally, he had that same courage.
Even if... the enemy had already shown overwhelming power.
"Huh?"
"What do you mean huh?" Apoo snapped. "Get the others and head for the coast. Wait for me there."
"But, Captain Apoo..."
"Go!"
"Yes..."
The crewman had no choice but to obey. With his captain having already made up his mind, there was nothing else to say.
Shaking his head, he left with the others.
After watching them go, Apoo turned back toward Kizaru and grinned.
"Running away is way more fun after you've pissed your enemy off first~"
With that thought, he jumped down from hiding, landed near the edge of a tall building, and activated his Devil Fruit ability. Different parts of his body transformed into instruments, and music began to ring out.
"Hm?"
Hearing the music from above, Kizaru looked up in mild confusion.
"Who's that supposed to be?"
What exactly was the point of suddenly playing music up there?
Before he could think further, Apoo grinned and slammed his right hand against his own head.
Clang!
"Slash!"
A formless blade shot through the air and severed Kizaru's arm instantly.
"Oh?"
"What an odd ability."
"Hahaha! It works!" Apoo shouted excitedly. "Try this one too!"
Bang!
The sound of drums rang out, and Kizaru's abdomen exploded, blasting his body clean into two halves.
"Hm... The world really does have all kinds of strange powers."
Lying on the ground in two pieces, Kizaru muttered, "So even music can attack."
"Yoho!!"
"Hahahaha, looks like my power works just fine~" Apoo laughed wildly.
Even a Marine Admiral had been blown in half by him.
That thought only made him grin wider as he turned and fled.
"See you later, Admiral~"
"Ah..."
"How rude, what a troublesome youngster," Kizaru said lazily. "Blowing me in half and then running away..."
As he spoke, he turned his body into light and seamlessly reassembled himself.
"So that's a Logia user..."
Watching Kizaru restore himself completely, the nearby pirates could only stare in shock.
How were you even supposed to fight someone like that?
"So, trying to run away now?"
Kizaru glanced toward Apoo, who had already put quite some distance between them, and narrowed his eyes.
"That's rather too much underestimating me."
"Yata no Kagami."
A mirror-like beam of light formed in Kizaru's hand, then shot forward, reflecting between buildings with impossible speed until it reached Apoo.
"What the hell is that?"
Apoo looked at the bright light at his side, baffled.
Then—
"Yo~"
"Wh-?!"
Kizaru suddenly appeared directly in front of him, and Apoo's pupils shrank to pinpricks.
The man had crossed that entire distance in an instant and appeared right in his face.
So this was... the power of a Logia?
Boom!!
Kizaru's kick landed like a heavy whip across Apoo's body, sending him crashing downward.
The impact blasted a massive crater into the ground.
Apoo spat out a mouthful of blood, his face pale.
That single kick had nearly killed him.
"This... is the power of a Marine Admiral..."
Drake clenched his fists, cold sweat pouring down his face.
That absolute difference in strength had placed immense pressure on him.
Almost reflexively, he touched the spot where Kizaru had kicked him earlier. It still hurt.
If I weren't an Ancient Zoan user, that kick would've knocked me out immediately...
With that realization, Drake turned sharply, trying to escape down a nearby street.
"We need to get to sea now, or else—"
"And where do you think you're going?"
"Wh-?!"
Drake looked up just in time to see a flash of light right in front of his face.
He was finished.
Admiral, I'm one of the good guys here!
Boom!!
The kick launched Drake through multiple buildings in a straight line.
"You Supernovas really are all..."
"terrifying, aren't you~"
The moment he finished speaking, Kizaru appeared directly in front of Hawkins and casually kicked him away too.
Hawkins: ...
He had hidden himself perfectly, and Kizaru had still found him?
"This is really enough to give a man a headache."
He looked down at the cards still in his hand.
His prediction had said there was no sign of death for him today.
He just had to survive long enough to make it true.
At that moment, an enormous figure came flying in from the distance and smashed into the ground.
Boom!!
"Damn it..." Urouge wiped the blood from his mouth. "Why is that Warlord so damn strong?!"
Clenching his teeth, he climbed back to his feet and immediately spotted Hawkins nearby.
"Hm?"
"You're... Hawkins?"
"And there's an Admiral too."
Urouge: ...
Turning his head and seeing Kizaru not far away, Urouge almost felt his soul leave his body.
As if one Warlord chasing him down was not bad enough, now he had run into a Marine Admiral too?
What kind of cursed luck was this?
"Damn it... Is this where it ends...?"
"You have no sign of death today," Hawkins said calmly.
"Ahahaha. Then I'll take that as a blessing."
But even so, Urouge's eyes sharpened.
"No matter what, I'm not going down without a fight!"
"Power of Karma!"
The instant he roared, his body began to tremble violently, then swelled in size at a visible rate.
Within moments, he had grown several meters tall.
"Die!!"
His enlarged fist slammed into the Pacifista pursuing him, actually driving it backward for a moment.
"Ahahaha, so it does work after all!"
"What is this guy supposed to be?" Drake, having passed nearby, frowned. "He wasn't that huge before..."
What kind of Devil Fruit user was this?
"Oh~"
"X Drake, how unusual~"
"Ki-Kizaru?!"
Seeing Kizaru looking at him with that "kind" smile, Drake's face turned green.
He had only been passing through.
Why was he still getting noticed by an Admiral?!
Whoosh—
A laser shot from the distance and pierced straight through Urouge's arm, leaving behind a bloody hole.
"AAAH!"
Urouge screamed and dropped to one knee, clutching his arm as cold sweat poured down his face.
"It burns!"
Seeing the Pacifista approaching again, despair filled his eyes.
Even after powering himself up this much, he still could not bring it down?
Grinding his teeth, Urouge forced himself up again and shouted,
"You two! If you want to live, then fight like your life depends on it!"
As he spoke, he activated his Devil Fruit once more, swelling his body even larger.
Drake and Hawkins exchanged a look, then both activated their powers too.
At a moment like this, staying out of it was impossible.
Whoever ran first would become the Admiral's first target.
As for whether they would survive—
that was up to fate.
Looking at the three massive figures before him, Kizaru said, "You rookies with bounties over a hundred million really are all like monsters..."
"How frightening~"
Then he vanished and appeared beside Urouge, kicking him in the abdomen hard enough to send him flying again.
With a single strike, Urouge was nearly knocked unconscious.
"Roar!!"
"Kizaru!!"
"Oh?"
Looking at Drake and Hawkins charging him, Kizaru gave the same lazy smile.
"How frightening~"
Then he casually kicked them both away too.
Another two buildings were blown open by the force.
At that moment, Kizaru displayed truly overwhelming power.
"So that's... the real difference."
From the rooftop of a building, Jin watched Kizaru below and frowned.
"This guy says how scary while kicking Supernovas away one by one?"
His words and actions really did not match at all.
So this was... Admiral Kizaru.
"Oh~"
"Why, isn't this Blood-Eyed Ninja Jin?"
Hearing the voice, Kizaru lifted his head, smiled, and said, "What a coincidence~"
To think that after killing the Celestial Dragons, this Blood-Eyed Ninja still dared show himself and come looking for him.
How truly... terrifying.
Looking down at Kizaru, Jin grinned as well.
"Yeah... what a coincidence."
"Admiral Kizaru."
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