At that moment, Sanji wanted nothing more than to drag a beast like Rowan down with him.
But he also knew Rowan was hard to deal with—especially the people around him. They appeared and vanished like ghosts. It was absurd.
Against Minato Namikaze, he had absolutely no way to fight back.
So in the end… he folded.
For a while after that, Sanji no longer dared run over to flirt with Nico Robin and Nami in front of Rowan.
Sure, the two women were beautiful—but beauty didn't fill your stomach, and in his case, it might even turn you into an okama.
Left with no choice, Sanji painfully gave up. Every day, he either buried himself in the kitchen cooking, or buried himself in the kitchen cooking.
As long as Rowan was around, Sanji absolutely would not step out of the kitchen.
Which finally bought Rowan a few peaceful days.
Then one day, Rowan got another call from Tsunade.
"We got it. We're on our way back now. We should reach the East Blue in a few days."
The moment he heard that, Rowan snapped his fingers and made a decision.
They would head to Reverse Mountain right now and meet Tsunade's group there.
Nico Robin, Nami, Kanae, Karin, and Minato Namikaze naturally had no objections.
So the whole group set sail and headed straight for Reverse Mountain.
Four days later, the two sides met up smoothly near Reverse Mountain.
But what shocked Rowan was that this time, Tsunade's group hadn't just brought back the Door-Door Fruit.
They had also brought back the Slow-Slow Fruit, the Bomb-Bomb Fruit, and the Castle-Castle Fruit—three completely different Devil Fruits.
Tsunade had mentioned the Slow-Slow Fruit before.
But the other two? She had never said a word about them.
Rowan was naturally curious and asked how they had gotten those two fruits as well.
Tsunade said, "When I called you earlier, you told us to run a few more experiments."
Rowan nodded. He had indeed said that.
Tsunade continued, "After we got the Slow-Slow Fruit and left Long Ring Long Land, we ran into the current user of the Castle-Castle Fruit."
Rowan remembered that the Castle-Castle Fruit belonged to Capone Bege, captain of the Fire Tank Pirates.
The guy was basically a mafia godfather from the West Blue. Even as a child, he had loved war games, and when he grew up, he united the entire underworld of the West Blue.
Maybe because it had all been too easy, he got bored of the whole mafia game and went to sea instead, forming the Fire Tank Pirates and taking pleasure in collecting the heads of his enemies.
The first time he appeared in the manga was during the Sabaody Archipelago arc.
At that time, Capone Bege had already become one of the Supernovas, with a bounty of over 130 million berries, ranking ninth among them.
Later, after Luffy's crew punched a Celestial Dragon on Sabaody and Admiral Kizaru showed up, Bege managed to break through thanks to the power of the Castle-Castle Fruit.
Of course, the real reason he got away wasn't because the Castle-Castle Fruit was that amazing.
It was because he never actually ran into Kizaru.
After escaping, he made it to the New World following the Summit War, and when he appeared again two years later, he had not only joined one of the Four Emperors, Big Mom—
he had also married Big Mom's twenty-second daughter, Charlotte Chiffon, and had a son named Capone Pez.
But because of Big Mom's instability, Bege eventually betrayed her and teamed up with the Straw Hats to try to assassinate Charlotte Linlin.
Even though the attempt failed and the Big Mom Pirates hunted him down, he still managed to escape in the end, which made him one lucky bastard.
But this time, Capone Bege wasn't nearly so lucky.
Tsunade told Rowan that after they encountered Bege upon leaving Long Ring Long Land, they immediately decided to use him as another test subject and try taking the Castle-Castle Fruit.
So first they trapped Capone Bege inside the Four Red Yang Formation.
Then Kabuto Yakushi made the kill.
The process was a bit troublesome, but the result was excellent.
After Bege was killed, the Devil Fruit really did reincarnate inside the Four Red Yang Formation.
That proved their theory was correct. The earlier success hadn't just been luck—Four Red Yang Formation really could help them seize Devil Fruits.
So the group decisively headed into Water 7, assassinated the CP9 agent Blueno, and took the Door-Door Fruit.
"Taking him out must have been a pain, right?"
Tsunade had said it like it was nothing, but Rowan knew Blueno wasn't easy to deal with.
That wasn't because Blueno himself was especially strong. Honestly, his strength was just whatever.
The real problem was his ability.
The Door-Door Fruit.
It was a fruit that let its user create doors anywhere and freely pass through them. Those doors could be opened in the air, on flames, on the human body, and on basically anything—no matter how hard or intangible it was.
The user could create different kinds of doors, in different sizes and shapes: sliding doors, push doors, revolving doors—you name it. The user could even turn their own body into a door.
And more importantly, the true essence of the fruit was free movement through space. By opening a door in the air, the user could create a green pocket dimension.
Other people could enter that space too and use it for movement.
It could even be used as an emergency shelter.
Once a door closed, the place where it had been opened would return to normal, leaving no trace at all.
In battle, if Blueno couldn't win, he could simply open a door into another space and dodge his enemy's attacks.
And what did that mean?
It meant that even the Four Red Yang Formation couldn't truly trap him.
The moment Blueno realized he wasn't Kabuto's match, he could simply open a door in the air and slip into his pocket dimension. Once he closed the door, not even Kabuto—hell, not even Tobirama or Hashirama—would be able to catch him.
And if the mission failed once, Blueno would be on guard.
At that point, assassinating him would become even more troublesome.
It might even alert the World Government.
Kabuto pushed up his glasses and smiled. "If you want to call it troublesome, I guess—but honestly, he wasn't that hard to deal with."
"Not that hard?" Rowan was surprised.
Kabuto said, "After we reached Water 7, we didn't go after Blueno right away. Instead, we looked for someone else first."
"Who?"
"Another CP9 agent—Kalifa."
"And what did you want with her?" Rowan looked completely puzzled.
Kabuto replied calmly, "To observe her closely. Her every move, her figure, her little habits, and even her catchphrases."
The moment he heard that, Rowan immediately realized what he meant.
Kabuto smiled. "Once I had completely figured out Kalifa's mannerisms, I turned into Kalifa… and went to pay Mr. Blueno a visit."
~~~
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