A raindrop or two began to darken the stone pavement.
The sky, heavy with storm clouds, twisted black as though it might unleash a tempest at any moment, and the damp sea wind carried a faint scent of gunpowder and fish.
Loguetown was in an uproar.
It was proof that the Straw Hat Pirates, who had crushed Arlong and earned their first bounty of thirty million Berries, had finally landed in this city.
That noisy little brat is here, so before long, he’ll have a grand brawl with Marine Headquarters’ watchdog.
Before that boisterous festival began, I needed to collect what was mine in advance.
The thick bundle of Berry notes I had peeled off the gambling table was safely tucked inside my coat. All that remained was to acquire a few miscellaneous tools for self-defense before crossing the treacherous seas of the Grand Line.
Jingle.
With the sound of an old bell, I pushed open the door of a shabby weapons shop tucked away in a corner of the back alleys.
The shop was thick with the heavy smell of iron and oil. Long swords and firearms hung densely across the walls, while old proprietor Ipponmatsu dozed by the stove.
"Welcome... Hm?"
As I entered with my usual loose-limbed gait, the green-haired man standing before a bin of cheap fifty-thousand-Berry swords sharply turned his head.
A white gi, a vest revealing his triceps, and familiar famed blades at his waist.
...Roronoa Zoro.
The fellow whose chest had been ripped wide open by Mihawk’s black blade was already standing there, wrapped in bandages and seemingly fine, picking out swords.
Monstrous recovery. Zoro recognized me at once and faintly curled one corner of his mouth.
His eyes plainly remembered how stubbornly I had held out against the blade of that overwhelmingly powerful man at Baratie.
Rather than hostility, his gaze held interest—and a strange recognition—for a fellow professional who had survived by some bizarre means.
"...You’re that drunk swordsman from back then."
"Oh?"
I nudged the cigar in my mouth upward with the corner of my lips and gave my tricorn hat a casual tap.
"Well, if it isn’t the miraculous young fellow who got thoroughly sliced up by the pinnacle of the sea and still has all four limbs intact and breathing."
"For a man who stole a ship and escaped while splashing gunpowder and muddy water all over the place with Hawk Eyes right in front of him... you’re still annoyingly hard to kill."
Zoro let out a brief, amused snort.
I clearly was no orthodox swordsman in Zoro’s eyes, but I seemed to have left a firm impression as a vicious beast—and a capable one at that—who had somehow walked out alive from the worst possible situation.
"I’ll take that as a compliment. Surviving to plot for tomorrow is the most basic quality of a man of the sea. Though... your waist looks rather empty, doesn’t it?"
My gaze settled on his waist.
Only Wado Ichimonji hung there. The other two had been shattered to pieces by Mihawk’s strike, so it was only natural.
"I’m looking for something worthwhile."
Just as Zoro gruffly rummaged through a bin of warped swords,
the proprietor inside the shop pushed up his glasses and slammed an old, bizarre sword hilt onto the counter.
An ominous blade that seemed to exude black energy straight through its sheath.
"Heh heh... You’ve got quite an eye, sir. But that sword isn’t for sale. No, it can’t be sold."
"Huh? Why not?"
"That is a cursed sword... [Sandai Kitetsu]. Every swordsman who has worn it has met a miserable death. It’s cursed."
The proprietor’s chilling warning.
An ordinary man would have gotten goosebumps and backed away, but Zoro’s eyes only flashed more fiercely.
Without hesitation, he drew the sword.
The cold blade flashed in the air, giving off a bluish killing intent.
Well, well... To think I’d get to see that famous scene with my own eyes.
I leaned crookedly against the wall with my arms crossed, settling in to watch with keen interest.
"A curse..."
Zoro grinned, then—
unbelievably—raised that blue-gleaming cursed blade and flung it toward the shop ceiling.
Whirl, whirl, whirl—!
The blade spun fearsomely through the air as it began to fall.
And Zoro—
held his left arm straight out horizontally, placing it directly beneath the falling blade’s path.
"What the hell is that madman doing?!"
The proprietor cried out and clutched his head.
If the curse was real, the man’s forearm was about to drop onto the floor like a chunk of meat.
One-tenth of a second before the tip grazed his skin.
Whoosh—clunk!!
The blade passed Zoro’s forearm by the width of a sheet of paper,
then buried itself hilt-deep in the thick oak floorboards.
There was not even a scratch on his arm.
"...Heh. I’ll buy it."
Zoro laughed heartily as he pulled the sword free.
The proprietor’s legs gave out beneath him, and he sat on the floor with tears of emotion streaming down his face.
"I-I’ll give you the famed blade [Yubashiri] as well! It’s the finest sword in this shop! Please, take it...!"
At that touching moment, as the cramped weapons shop filled with men’s hot tears and a swordsman’s romance—
Slip.
While the proprietor and Zoro were completely engrossed in [Sandai Kitetsu] and [Yubashiri],
my fingers slithered like snakes toward the glass display case at the edge of the counter.
Lying quietly inside was
a sleek, weighty steel dagger in a silver sheath set with a red ruby.
A premium dagger, perfect for slicing meat—and equally suited for stabbing someone in the nape at close quarters.
Snatch.
My long fingers hooked the dagger,
then silently slid it deep into the inner pocket of my old coat.
Every motion was as smooth and natural as breathing.
But unfortunately,
Zoro’s sharp eyes, just as he was fastening his new swords at his waist, caught the final instant of that exquisite sleight of hand head-on.
"..."
"..."
Silence fell.
Behind the emotional proprietor, sniffling away in tears,
one of Zoro’s eyebrows arched high.
His face tangled with disbelief, absurdity, and a peculiar suppressed laugh.
"...Hey, you Captain-whatever fellow."
Zoro tilted his chin and asked quietly.
"That little trick just now... what did you slip into your coat?"
"Hm? Whatever do you mean?"
I played innocent and dusted off my coat collar.
"While that old man was crying his eyes out, you swiped the dagger from the display case like a bloody ghost."
Rather than drawing his sword or getting angry, Zoro simply crossed his arms and let out an incredulous snort.
The sheer contrast of a monstrous man who had crossed blades with Hawk Eyes on even terms, yet took advantage of an old man’s tearful display to pocket a souvenir in a back-alley shop, seemed to draw a helpless laugh from him.
"A fellow who survived without dying in front of Hawk Eyes, and this is what you do? That’s rather modest of you."
"Ah, your voice is rather loud, green-haired friend."
I placed an index finger to my lips and gave him a shameless wink.
"If your spirit draws famed blades to you, then my sleight of hand merely requisitions the sea’s minor assets through perfectly legitimate means. Consider it the admission price for witnessing such a splendid spectacle."
"You’re a funny one."
Zoro snorted and firmly readjusted the two newly acquired swords at his waist.
His eyes held a deep fondness, as though he were looking at a mischievous rascal.
"Stay alive until we meet in the Grand Line. The sea won’t be boring."
"Surviving is my specialty. Try to stay away from the execution platform, swordsman friend—wouldn’t want you struck by lightning!"
Creeeak—bang!
I pushed through the old door and leisurely slipped out into the rain-soaked alley.
Sssshhh—.
In an instant, the rain had turned into a downpour, hammering the streets.
As I savored the weighty feel of the ruby dagger in my coat and made my way out of the alley, my feet abruptly stopped.
Click, click!
"Stop right there!" "A pirate in suspicious attire! Arrest him!!"
Five or six Marine patrolmen in white sailor uniforms closed in from both ends of the alley, bayonets leveled at me.
It looked as though martial law had been declared across the city; murderous intent burned fiercely in their eyes.
"Oh, gentlemen. Working so hard without umbrellas in this rain, are we?"
I pretended to stagger backward,
then pulled out the ruby dagger I had just acquired from inside my coat.
I did not even draw its blade. I merely coated the end of its solid metal hilt with a little Haki.
Swish—thud!
"Gah?!"
I gave the first Marine to charge a light jab in the solar plexus with the dagger’s hilt, and he collapsed frothing at the mouth.
Then I slapped the barrel of another’s rifle upward as he tried to fire, making it burst sparks into the air,
before sliding over the rain-slick stones and sweeping his ankles out from beneath him.
"Aaargh!" "That bastard, his movements... urk?!"
My body swayed as though swimming through the rain.
A Jack Sparrow-style brawl that did not swing a blade even once, merely tangling up the paths of their bayonets until they crashed into one another.
In barely ten seconds, five or six Marines were sprawled across rain-filled puddles like bowling pins.
"I salute you public servants for your hard work, but I have an appointment, so I’ll excuse myself first."
I flicked an unconscious Marine’s cap away with the tip of my boot,
then turned toward the thunderous roar rising from the square beyond the alley.
Uoooooh—!!
The murmur of thousands of people surging through wind and rain.
And ringing out from its center—
a particularly shrill, gratingly familiar laugh.
"Kyahahahaha! Watch closely, you pieces of trash! On this legendary execution platform where Pirate King Gol D. Roger died, I’ll spectacularly take the head of that Straw Hat brat, Luffy!!"
...Buggy the Clown.
I tilted up my rain-soaked tricorn hat and lightly leaped onto the rooftop of a building at the corner of the square.
Loguetown’s central square stretched out beyond the curtain of rain.
Atop the enormous wooden execution platform rising high enough to pierce the sky,
I saw the Straw Hat brat, Luffy, kneeling with a heavy wooden collar around his neck.
Directly over his nape, Buggy held a massive executioner’s sword high,
while below in the square, Colonel Smoker and a Marine unit closed in amid billowing white smoke.
A desperate moment with death right at hand.
Yet the brat bound atop the execution platform
was baring his teeth and grinning at the blue-gleaming blade hanging over him.
"Ha... that crazy little brat."
Sheltering from the rain beneath the roof eaves,
I pulled out a bottle of forty-year-old rum from inside my coat and put it to my lips.
The greatest shitshow of the century was about to raise its curtain before my eyes.
At this very moment, when every eye—the clown’s, the Straw Hat’s, and the Marines’—was fixed on that high execution platform.
It was time for my plan to begin.
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