Arlong laughed loudly when he saw the warship leisurely sailing toward their direction from over there.
"Kwahahaha! Humans really are hopelessly inferior! To think they’d cave so easily for just 2 million Berries!"
Kuroobi joined in Arlong’s sneering.
"Indeed, Arlong. If our fish-men had control of the Marines, we wouldn’t even have to watch them torment our kin. Humans really are utterly inferior."
"Kwahahaha! Exactly! Is that not only natural? We fish-men are the race of gods! The most superior race in this world!"
Swoosh.
When the Marine warship stopped at the gate of Arlong Park, Hachi, who was in charge of guarding the entrance, asked,
"Nyu, Arlong, should I open the gate?"
"Yes, Hachi. Open it and welcome our new ‘friend.’"
Having received Arlong’s permission, Hachi immediately dove beneath the water and opened Arlong Park’s gate.
The gate opened, and the Marine warship slowly entered the central pool of Arlong Park.
Then a man leaped down from the deck of the Marine ship.
Arlong took a good look at the new ‘friend’ who had arrived.
He was roughly over 190 centimeters tall, and the Marine coat draped over his shoulders proved his officer rank.
He had long yellow hair streaked with fiery red, and he didn’t seem heavily armed. Just a single sword at his waist.
"Oh? A swordsman this time? That Nezumi bastard was just a gun-toting punk."
"Are you Arlong, the one with a 20 million Berry bounty?"
When the Marine officer asked the question, Arlong, who had been sitting arrogantly, straightened up.
"Yes, I’m Arlong. And you are...? Looks like you’re an officer from Branch 77. What rank might you be?"
Instead of answering immediately, the Marine officer asked back.
"Why do you not first ask after your comrade Chu?"
At that sudden question, Arlong felt a flicker of suspicion.
"Hey now... don’t tell me you killed Chu?"
"No, I did not kill him."
"Kwahahaha! Good! Chu may have a low bounty, but he’s still my subordinate! One of the three top officers of Arlong Park! There’s no way he’d be taken down by an inferior race like you!"
Arlong stood and walked toward the Marine officer.
"So, where is Chu?"
"He is dead."
"What did you say?"
At the Marine officer’s words, not only Arlong but all the fish-men gathered around him looked shocked, and that shock quickly turned into hostility toward the Marine officer.
"You bastard... how dare you play games with words..."
"Wait, Arlong! You don’t need to step in!"
As Arlong ground his teeth and looked ready to kill the Marine officer, a white fish-man stepped forward from beside him.
The leader among Arlong Park’s three top officers.
It was Kuroobi, with a bounty of 9 million Berries.
"Listen, human. I don’t know what trick you used to kill Chu, but if you came here all alone, you must have been prepared for this, right?"
"Prepared for what?"
At the Marine officer’s question, Kuroobi shook his head and sighed.
"Tsk tsk. A puppy doesn’t know the tiger’s fear... Have you gone mad in the head? Or were you stupid to begin with?"
"The word ‘prepared’ means to firmly set one’s mind toward something one must do or something that is about to happen."
The Marine officer kept speaking in that incomprehensible way.
"To firmly set one’s mind. That is what it means to be prepared. And it is a word used when something that serious is about to happen."
"What are you talking about! Fish-Man Karate! Hundred Tile Palm!"
Kuroobi threw a punch straight at the Marine officer’s face, who kept spouting nonsense.
Bang!
It sounded like something hard had been struck with great force.
"Oh, Fish-Man Karate..."
Grab!
The Marine officer, who had taken Kuroobi’s strike dead on, acted as if nothing had happened—no, as if it truly had not affected him at all—as he seized Kuroobi’s wrist.
"What rank are you?"
"What? Gahhh!"
Before Kuroobi could even answer, the Marine officer crushed his arm.
Without borrowing any special strength, simply with the crushing grip of one hand.
"Kuroobi!"
"Did I not ask what rank you were? Surely fish-men are not deaf in the eardrums?"
"4, 40th rank..."
"Fortieth rank... You were already recorded as 40th rank eight years ago. You’ve spent eight years exploiting the villages here and living in luxury, and you’re still only 40th rank?"
"W-what are you trying to say!"
The Marine officer let go of Kuroobi’s wrist, then took the exact same stance as him.
"That stance... Fish-Man Karate?"
The surrounding fish-men were stunned. The martial art they had thought was passed down only to their own race was now being performed by a human.
"Hmph! Don’t get cocky just because you copied the stance! Fish-Man Karate is the martial art best suited to a fish-man’s body!"
Kuroobi grabbed his shattered right arm with his left hand and forcibly set the bones in place.
"Fish-Man Karate!!! Ceiling Tile Palm!!!"
Ceiling Tile Palm was the strongest blow Kuroobi, a 40th-rank Fish-Man Karate master, could unleash at this point.
"Fish-Man Karate, First Tile Palm!"
Unlike Kuroobi, who shouted like a roar, the Marine officer cried out briefly and sharply.
"Wh-what?"
"T-this is gettin’ w-worse..."
"My body’s already st-st-st..."
A massive shock of water pressure crushed most of the fish-men present.
BOOM!!
With a violent explosion, dozens of fish-men near the central pool of Arlong Park were all blasted backward.
And Kuroobi, who had collided head-on with the Marine officer, somehow endured the shockwave of First Tile Palm.
"Hah, haha! Yes! Kuroobi! As expected... huh?"
Arlong was flustered by how quickly it all happened, but seeing that Kuroobi had not fallen, he felt relieved for a moment.
But the next sight made him feel a long-lost fear.
Thud.
Kuroobi toppled backward in the very same posture as when he had struck out his palm.
A massive fist mark remained on his chest, so deep it looked as if his belly had been pressed against his back and all his organs crushed flat!
"As a fellow martial artist, I wanted to show you the bare minimum of courtesy, but you are not worthy of it."
Chu was dead, and Kuroobi was dead.
Dozens of his subordinates were also in unknown condition. Even those merely caught in the edge of that punch were half-dead.
Arlong himself had not been injured because he was right behind Kuroobi, but he had felt the powerful gust of wind that came with that punch.
The negotiation had already failed, and the Marine officer before him was absolutely no easy opponent.
"Hey, what is this even for?"
"What is it for, you say? Do you think that is the question you should be asking right now?"
For the Marines to capture pirates was only natural. The question itself was foolish.
"D-don’t do this, let’s talk it out! You know who I am, right? I’m Arlong, with a 20 million Berry bounty! The tyrant of the dark world of Fish-Man Island!"
When the Marine officer did not even blink, Arlong grew more and more desperate.
"If you join hands with me, I can raise you to a high-ranking officer at Marine Headquarters! If things go well, even a Marine Headquarters Vice Admiral won’t mean anything!"
But no matter what ideal conditions Arlong offered, the Marine officer gave no reply and simply strode toward him.
"D-damn it! Don’t come any closer! I said don’t come closer!"
Already half terrified, Arlong swung his fists wildly. This was the first time he had felt this kind of fear since meeting Borsalino in the New World long ago.
"Iron Body—Collapse."
It was nothing more than a tightly clenched fist attack.
An attack from a body much smaller than Arlong’s, from a fist much smaller than his own.
But at that small attack, Arlong immediately dropped to his knees.
"Kh, kuhk!"
This punch... it’s stronger than Brother Jinbe’s...!
Maybe he had misjudged things because he had spent eight years loafing around eating and playing, but it was still an overwhelmingly powerful blow.
Damn it... is this the only way...
Ah... damn it all...
Damn it! Damn it!
Arlong was mentally in turmoil as he thought of a certain plan, but he quickly steadied himself and put it into action.
"What are you doing? Do you really think that’s enough to make me forgive you?"
Arlong knelt.
And begged.
"I’m sorry, please spare me just this once...
I’m sorry, please spare me just this once...
I’m sorry, please spare me just this once..."
He begged and pleaded like a fly rubbing its hands together, asking the Marine officer for forgiveness.
"I was wrong. Confiscate my property, send me to Impel Down, do whatever you want—just please spare my life..."
Now he was even leaking tears and snot, showing the very peak of ugliness.
At that moment, the residents of Cocoyashi Village were gathered at the land gate of Arlong Park.
"Arlong... is crying?"
"He’s on his knees begging?"
"Did the Marines come to save us?"
At every word they exchanged, they could not hide their excitement.
When Arlong saw the villagers who had come near him, he turned toward them and slammed his head to the ground as he begged for forgiveness.
"I was wrong about everything! Everyone from Cocoyashi Village! Please spare me..."
"A-are you insane? How much money have you stolen from us until now!"
"Yeah, yeah! Over these eight years, I bet you’ve killed at least a hundred people!"
With the reassuring Marine presence behind them, the villagers finally let out all the resentment they had been holding in.
After being made the scapegoat for a long time, Arlong pressed his forehead into the ground and performed a dogeza in that same position.
But he no longer begged.
Crack.
Something shattered.
Then Arlong’s body swelled in an instant.
In just one second, he grew over 3 meters tall, then immediately slashed open his own stomach.
And he flung the blood on his fingers toward the clustered villagers.
"Even if you kill me, you will not save the villagers! [Water Bullet]!"
A technique that used blood as a medium to hurl high-pressure liquid like bullets with a fish-man’s brute strength.
A wide-area technique that attacked multiple opponents indiscriminately.
"Flame Breathing... Fourth Form...
Blooming Flame Undulation!"
The Marine officer had already drawn the sword at his waist and swung it wide before the villagers.
Then hot flames burst from the blade, becoming a massive wall of fire that blocked Arlong’s blood-pressure bullets.
"I was waiting for this!"
As the wall of fire began to fade, Arlong—his whole body soaked with water—shot forward like a human cannonball, no, a fish-man cannonball, aiming for the Marine officer’s heart.
After eating something that strengthened his blue body into a blazing red, Arlong’s speed after being ‘fired’ from the pool was three times faster than usual.
The villagers could not react in time to that speed, but the Marine officer calmly raised his sword.
It was no special technique at all, only the plain, basic foundation of swordsmanship: a downward slash.
With that most fundamental of cuts, the Marine officer stopped Arlong’s lightning-fast charge.
"Too slow."
"Gyaaaah!!"
Arlong, with 40 percent of his right side cleanly severed, writhed in agony.
At last, he realized that nothing had been a fluke.
"Y-you... just who... are you..."
The Marine officer sheathed his sword and walked toward Arlong before answering.
"Marine Headquarters Vice Admiral, [Flame Hashira] Rengoku."
The expression on Rengoku’s face throughout this entire chapter
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