Angry Sword

"..."

Hancock said calmly, "As long as your Armament Haki is strong enough, you can defend against a Devil Fruit's powers. It's nothing surprising."

That was what she said, but she was thinking back on their brief exchange just now. No! He didn't use any Haki at all...

Sandersonia and Marigold were astonished. "How strong would his Haki have to be?! Sister, your mastery of the Love-Love Fruit has clearly reached the pinnacle, yet he still managed to defend against it..."

"It doesn't matter. He's already gone."

Hancock didn't want to say more. She formed a heart with her hands and aimed it at the four Kuja warriors who had been caught in the Love-Love Fruit's power and petrified, sending out wave after wave of broken-heart-shaped light—

"Love-Love Mellow!"

The four Kuja Pirate Women were instantly freed from petrification.

Hearts appeared in their eyes. Seeing Lady Snake Princess suddenly appear before them, they screamed like fangirls seeing a top idol radiate charm up close. As for what had happened while they were petrified, they remembered nothing...

East Blue, Goa Kingdom, Mount Colubo—

As expected of the empress. Even the green light on her was a teeny bit more intense than anyone else's!

Thinking this, Ruidio teleported back to the spot he had left less than ten minutes ago, his figure appearing out of thin air. It was still a quiet night in the East Blue.

Whoosh—

A gust rushed at the back of his head.

There was no time to dodge. Ruidio could only throw an arm up behind him to block. The thick wooden club Ace had used to ambush him struck hard and immediately snapped with a bang.

This is bad, Ace thought. Ruidio grabbed him by the arm, swung him overhead, and slammed him into the ground with a boom, leaving a body-shaped crater in the cracked earth.

"Huh?" Luffy, who had been sleeping soundly nearby, groggily sat up. "What's going on?" Seeing that Ace and the other guy were still fighting, he said, "Oh..." and sleepily lay back down, smacking his lips and mumbling, "Meat..."

"My back...!!"

Ace's face twisted in pain as he writhed like a live fish in the crater. He glared at Ruidio and forced out through clenched teeth, "How come... your wounds... seem to be... completely healed...?!"

He had used Reverse Cursed Technique to heal his entire body while in Satoru Gojo Mode. What else?

It had been easy enough.

Ruidio crouched down, held out a hand, and asked with a smile, "Going to ambush me again?"

"..."

Ace grimaced and took his hand, letting Ruidio pull him up. He rubbed the sore spot on his back and stared at Ruidio. "Why did you suddenly disappear and then suddenly appear again? Who exactly are you?" he asked seriously.

"Do you mean disappearing like this?"

As he spoke, Ruidio vanished again, right before Ace's eyes.

Ace: "..."

[Ongoing task: Don't go to that place]

[Task requirements: Take the three Boa sisters—Hancock, Sandersonia, and Marigold—and escape that nightmarish ship, then immediately return to the Kuja Pirates or the island of women, "Amazon Lily."]

[Client: Boa Hancock]

[Distance: Extremely far (teleportation available) (deployment available)]

[Estimated difficulty: ★★★★★]

"..."

Taking the three sisters and escaping some nightmarish ship was easy enough to understand.

But what did "immediately return to the Kuja Pirates or the island of women" mean?

How immediate was immediately?

Ruidio studied the system task's inexplicable requirements. After he had accepted the task aboard the Kuja ship, the deployment option had automatically appeared under distance, just as it had with Robin's Ohara task.

Clearly, this was another task that let him travel through time and space.

After returning to the East Blue, Ruidio had immediately chosen to deploy on this task to see what was going on... As he thought this, the deployment finished in an instant, and he found himself seemingly inside an enclosed room. Only a small round window overhead let in a dim beam of moonlight.

The round patch of moonlight fell on a floor covered in iron plates, its light and shadow divided by crisscrossing black lines. The already small round window was also covered with an iron grate. The little patch of moonlight swayed back and forth across the iron floor. This was evidently a cabin aboard a ship at sea.

In the dim cabin, pairs of eyes were also watching that little patch of light on the floor.

"..."

Once Ruidio's eyes adjusted to the light, he saw that the eyes belonged to little girls curled up inside the enclosed room. Their hair and faces were filthy, and their wrists and ankles were shackled.

Even though Ruidio had appeared out of thin air, they didn't scream or show much reaction. They simply hugged their legs and stared blankly at him.

"Are the three girls from the Kuja Pirates here?"

He asked as he paced around, examining the place. The cabin was empty, about ten meters long and five meters wide. Iron bars lined all four walls, turning it into a sturdy cage.

A big-eyed girl with messy, short black hair who looked no more than ten silently pointed Ruidio toward a corner of the iron-barred cabin.

It was the darkest spot in the entire room.

Ruidio walked over.

Tap, tap. His footsteps startled the three small figures curled up together. They nervously shuffled backward, their shackles clinking softly.

Twelve-year-old Boa Hancock and her two younger sisters came into Ruidio's view. All three looked haggard and pale. The two younger sisters were trembling, too afraid even to look up at him, their faces buried against their eldest sister's neck.

Hancock gritted her teeth, her eyes blazing with anger as she craned her neck and glared at Ruidio.

"There's fire in your eyes. Good."

Ruidio nodded to the stubborn young Snake Princess, then turned and walked toward the main door.

Creak, creak...

He gripped the iron bars sealing the exit with both hands and forcibly bent the iron posts apart with a series of cracks, tearing open a round hole large enough for him to pass through.

Bang!

Ruidio smashed the door handle with one punch, stepped forward, and pushed the door open.

He had already used today's Satoru Gojo use, and he hadn't expected to clear this special task on his first attempt anyway. He would scout out the map first...

Chapter 52: Angry Sword

[Cover serial: Executive Vice President Miss All Sunday 2: "Together this time"]

[A giant turtle swam calmly through the Grand Line, a parasol standing on its back. Beneath it, Robin and Olvia sat side by side on a circular sofa, looking through documents and talking quietly.]

"Hmm? What was that noise?"

Outside was a corridor. A cabin door diagonally across the way opened, and a gaunt middle-aged man came out with a ring of keys hanging from his waist. He seemed to be a jailer.

As soon as he appeared, something struck him in the chest, slamming him backward against the doorframe.

The gaunt man looked down in bewilderment. A sword had plunged deep into his chest, pinning him to the doorframe!

"Help—" He opened his mouth to shout, but an iron-like hand clamped his mouth shut, nearly crushing his jaw. Cold sweat poured down his forehead from the pain. When he looked up, he saw a black-haired young man warning him with his eyes. He hurriedly nodded as hard as he could, not daring to make another sound.

Ruidio let go and asked, "What ship is this?"

You don't know? Then how did you get aboard?

And who are you?!

The gaunt man hurriedly said, "This is Lord Leuou's slave ship... But the ship itself was already sold in Sabaody, to..."

He swallowed and didn't dare continue, but almost at the same moment, a sharp pain shot through his chest! He tried to scream, but his own fist was stuffed into his mouth. Broken teeth pierced the flesh of his fist, filling his mouth with the taste of blood.

Ruidio held his fist against his mouth while gently twisting Malevolent Shrine's hilt in his wound. "Tell me everything, all right?" he asked softly.

The gaunt man's face turned deathly pale, beads of sweat covering his forehead and face. He nodded repeatedly. When his fist, embedded with broken teeth, was removed, he mumbled through his bloody, mangled mouth, "A Celestial Dragon..."

A moment later, the gaunt man's head dropped to the floor with a thud. Blood slowly spread over his lifeless eyes.

With a flick of Malevolent Shrine, droplets of blood sprayed out in an arc, leaving the blade gleaming like new.

Ruidio took the ring of keys from the jailer's waist and tossed it into his system inventory.

Holding Malevolent Shrine in one hand, he made his way toward the next deck up, following the layout of the slave ship the man had described. He loosely closed his other hand, and the Great Grade Sword Demon Subduer, forged with Seastone mixed in, appeared in his palm.

In the passageway on the deck above, several slave-trading thugs were smoking and chatting. They didn't dare go up on deck and offend the Celestial Dragon, and being cooped up below was driving them mad.

With a clack, the hatch in the floor beside them inexplicably opened.

The thugs gathered around and peered down suspiciously. There was nothing there.

Behind them, Ruidio had already walked away, Demon Subduer in one hand and Malevolent Shrine in the other.

Malevolent Shrine didn't get blood on it when it killed, but Demon Subduer had some stone material in it, and blood had stained its blade dark red, dripping from its tip... The thugs by the open hatch fell one by one, their heads dropping as blood gushed from their severed necks.

"Huh? Who are you?" "Splurt."

"Wait..." "Splurt, splurt."

"Ah, I—" "Splurt."

Ruidio walked the length of the deck twice with both swords in hand, chopping off the head of everyone he saw. Only then did he leap lightly into the cabin above the deck, where someone stood at the helm.

"Who's there?" The helmsman heard the noise behind him and tried to turn around, only to find, strangely, that he couldn't. Unable to believe it, he reached up to feel his head, and the moment he touched it, it fell off...

Ah, I've already been cut down. As his vision quickly went dark, he saw blood fountaining from his body's severed neck in front of the wheel, while a young man carrying two swords walked over and pushed his body aside with a blade held sideways.

Thud. Everything fell quiet.

"..."

Ruidio looked out of the cabin at the slave ship's deck. Under the bright moonlight, only one person sat sprawled on the spacious deck, wearing a military uniform and a coat. He enjoyed the sea breeze as he spoke to a small Den Den Mushi on his wrist, bursting into laughter from time to time.

I thought there'd be a few stupid Celestial Dragon pigs in "American astronaut suits" for me to chop up.

A little disappointed, Ruidio left the cabin with both swords in hand and slipped onto the deck as silently as a shadow...

"Haha, you think it's funny too, don't you? What? It's not funny? Your taste is terrible! Maybe I won't give you any of the rare goods I bought this time?"

Saint Shepherd Sommers slapped his thigh and laughed without restraint. "Me? I wouldn't even consider her. A little girl that strong? I'm not interested! Little girls should be soft and weak, best if they fall apart with a squeeze. You wouldn't understand that fragile sense of them breaking, would you? Hahaha—hmm? Hello? Hello? Fuck, what's wrong?"

As he wondered, he looked down and saw that his entire left arm, with the little Den Den Mushi strapped to its wrist, had fallen to the floor. At some point, the left side of his chest had also been slashed open.

"Who's there?"

Sommers shouted in annoyance. He turned and saw an unfamiliar kid holding two swords, their blades still dripping blood!

Ruidio stared at this member of the Holy Knights. No wonder the empress was so afraid of the Celestial Dragons. She had already encountered some of the most powerful among them: the immortal God's Knights, who were also Imu's Deep Sea Contract holders.

"Are you asking to die?!"