"Damn it, bring me better booze!"
The burly man in the little bear hat on the third level bellowed again, his voice booming like thunder through all of Hannabal.
Kairos followed the sound with his eyes, and a glint flashed in them.
That was a "familiar face."
A character who had appeared in the original story.
Bear King—the Steel-Steel Fruit user.
Looks like I'm getting a card this time.
A faint smile tugged at Kairos' lips. At his waist, Sandai Kitetsu trembled faintly in its sheath, as though eager to be drawn.
He was already getting impatient.
Before Robin could finish what she was saying, another rough voice rang out from the fourth level of Hannabal.
"Bear King, you're too loud."
A man with short pink hair and a bizarrely patterned beard swirled the liquor in his glass, looking down at Bear King with open annoyance.
Bear King looked up at him and snorted.
"Mushul. I'll kill you myself in the arena."
The moment Kairos heard the name Mushul, his eyes turned colder, and the battle lust in his chest stirred again.
Mushul.
Another canon character.
Kairos stopped caring about the rest of their argument. He turned back to Robin and smiled.
"Robin, I like this place."
Robin folded her arms and returned a graceful smile.
"As long as you like it."
Kairos then walked over to the bookie collecting entry fees. Leaning half his body over the wooden counter, he idly rolled two hundred-berry coins between his fingers and asked,
"Still taking registrations?"
"Hm?"
The bookie—a fat man draped in gold, with two women in his arms—looked up at Kairos, then at the coins spinning in his hand. He grinned broadly.
"Kid, you've got lucky timing. You just made the last registration window."
As he said that, he gave Kairos a longer look.
The man in front of him felt strangely familiar, like someone he'd seen before, but he couldn't place him.
"So after this, nobody else is joining?"
Kairos arched a brow and pressed the question.
"What do you mean?" The bookie frowned, confused.
Kairos ignored him and said something even stranger.
"You're a canon character too. If I kill you, I should get a card, right?"
The bookie didn't understand what that meant, but a razor-sharp killing intent locked onto him so suddenly that his scalp tingled and his heart went cold.
Then—
Sandai Kitetsu shot from its sheath.
A flash of steel lit up the hall.
Slash.
The bookie's fat head flew into the air. Blood fountained from his neck, splashing all over the woman in his arms.
She stared blankly at the headless corpse beside her, her mind going empty.
Then—
"Aaah—!"
The scream barely left her mouth before it was cut short. Kairos appeared behind her and struck her at the neck with a chop, knocking her cold.
"Quiet now."
Kairos glanced at the unconscious woman and dusted off his hands.
Sandai Kitetsu slid back into its sheath on its own, spotless—without a single drop of blood clinging to it, as if it had never left.
Robin watched the whole thing with perfect calm, her expression not shifting in the slightest.
She had already seen Kairos slaughter his way through Whiskey Peak. She knew exactly why he'd come to Hannabal.
And she certainly had no sympathy for pirates.
"He killed the bookie!"
"Someone's here to smash the place!"
Quite a few people had seen Kairos cut him down, and the entire underground haven was immediately thrown into chaos. Shouts and curses echoed through the massive cavern, bouncing from every level.
"Damn you! You just cost me a hundred million berries! I'm going to kill you!!"
Bear King noticed Kairos and let out a savage roar, then launched himself down like a cannonball.
With the bookie dead, the Death Sea Race was effectively ruined. The hundred-million-berry prize pool was gone. Since Bear King had been utterly certain he'd win, he instantly counted that loss as his—and blamed Kairos.
Kairos took a deep breath.
A smile spread across his face.
Not a pleasant smile.
A smile full of joy and battle hunger.
"System. Activate the SSR Shikigami Onikiri Card."
The murmur echoed through his heart.
Boom!!
A terrifying shockwave burst from beneath Kairos' feet. The entire cavern seemed to tremble.
The registration booth exploded on the spot. Planks, debris, and even the blood still spilling from the bookie's corpse were blasted into the air.
A violent gale swept through the chamber, spiraling around Kairos.
Along with it came something else—
a twisted, sinister, predatory aura.
And interwoven through it all was a ribbon of eerie violet demonic energy.
"Hahahahahaha!"
Kairos laughed.
The sound was ghostly.
Wicked.
At that moment, the air around him filled with the presence of a vengeful demon.
In his hand, a blade had appeared.
It was wrapped in swirling violet miasma.
This was a true demon sword.
Not something like Sandai Kitetsu could even begin to compare to.
This was the kind of cursed blade that could drown an entire city in blood.
Its name was—
Higekiri.
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