Logia

Ruidio went deeper into the ship alone and found an empty room at random. With nothing else to do, he opened the task list under the system's [Personal Information] module and selected one entry: [Unclaimed task, client: Nico Robin].

The task details immediately unfolded:

[In the depths of the night, Nico Robin asked herself again and again: why did her mother have to die that day? If she had been a little more selfish, might her mother have been willing to abandon her dream, leave with her, and live on together?]

[Task requirement: ensure Nico Olvia survives the buster call.]

[Client: Nico Robin]

[Distance: extremely far (teleportation available)]

[Estimated difficulty: ★★★★★]

[Estimated time remaining to accept: approximately 66 years]

"..."

When the radar had found this task half a year ago, Ruidio had been utterly baffled.

Come on, man, how many years has Robin's mom been dead? You want me to help her survive the buster call? Seriously?

And now, half a year later... Ruidio was still baffled.

He still hadn't managed to accept the task, so he didn't really know what was going on.

Had the system radar bugged out and found a task that was downright impossible, or was there something else to it?

Besides, a five-star difficulty was way over the top!

It had found a five-star task for a two-star guy like him. Was this for real?

What a shitty matchmaking system.

But what would the reward for a five-star task be?

There would obviously be a ton of essence, and the chance of an item drop had to be high too, right?

He was itching to find out...

Luckily, the system's estimated time limit for accepting this somewhat unusual task was very generous, so Ruidio wasn't too worried for now.

Sixty-six years remaining. Was that the system's estimate of Nico Robin's remaining lifespan?

It seemed that Robin would keep reliving the nightmare that had destroyed Ohara seventeen years ago for the rest of her life, so the task would remain available all that time.

Perhaps some wounds could never heal.

...He really was curious about what was going on with this task!

Ruidio gritted his teeth and confirmed the system's "teleportation available" prompt.

Here goes!

The Grand Line, the desert kingdom of Alabasta—

A sandstorm roared!

Ruidio teleported in and, the moment he appeared, ran straight into the raging wind and sand. He was almost swept off his feet.

Fortunately, the system wasn't so unreliable that there were no buildings nearby to shelter in.

Ruidio pulled his shirt up over his head to cover his face and steadied his footing. Bracing against the sandstorm's gale and enduring the roar of wind and sand and the clatter of debris crashing around him, he felt his way step by step toward a broken wall he had glimpsed.

Suddenly, a rough hand grabbed him. Someone seemed to shout something at him through the storm, then dragged him behind the broken wall and pulled him into a building for shelter.

"Close the door, close it!" The man who had pulled Ruidio inside was a slightly plump middle-aged man, dressed for the desert, his face weathered and weary. He shouted urgently as he rushed in.

There was also a young man with short brown hair and a scar over his left eye in the room. He had been waiting by the door and pushed it shut as soon as the two entered. But the wind and sand pouring in were too fierce. He gritted his teeth and strained, the muscles in his arms trembling, only to be knocked flying by the gale with a bang.

Ruidio caught him out of the air with one hand, pressed the other against the door, and gently closed it.

The howling sandstorm was immediately shut out. Sand rattled against the outside of the door. The plump middle-aged man and the scarred young man Ruidio had casually caught both stared in astonishment.

"Young man, you're strong," the plump man exclaimed. "Judging by your clothes, are you from out of town? It's far too dangerous to be outside in a sandstorm like this."

The scarred young man said, "I've never seen him. He isn't a traveler visiting the town." The plump man ventured, "Maybe the storm blew him here? Haha." The scarred young man said, "How could that be..." But when they thought of Ruidio's inhuman strength, both fell silent.

Ruidio kept one hand against the door and smiled. "I'm just passing through. I came here to find someone."

"Uh, my name's Doto," the plump man said. "Is the person you're looking for a local?"

"No."

"Then I'm sorry," the scarred young man beside him said. "It hasn't rained once these past few months, and the sandstorms are getting worse. This oasis town used to sit at a crossroads, but lately hardly any travelers pass through."

An oasis town?

Ruidio asked, "Where is this?"

You came here looking for someone without knowing where you are?

"My name's Koza. This town is called Yuba," the scarred young man said. He glanced at Ruidio's feet and thought in surprise, The storm outside is so strong, yet he's standing upright and holding the door with one hand, and his feet haven't budged at all!

Come on. Sure, I still can't fully use my physical strength, but that's only compared to the ideal state I have in mind. Even so, my arm strength right now is easily in the two- or three-ton range.

Ruidio noticed the looks exchanged by the father and son but paid them little mind. The town's name, however, reminded him that Koza, the scarred young man before him, was Princess Vivi's childhood friend and the future leader of Alabasta's rebel army.

It was all because of Crocodile's plan. He used the power of his Sand-Sand Fruit to create sandstorms everywhere and plotted to bring years of drought to the regions outside Alabasta's royal capital. He would pin the blame on the king, incite the people to rebel, and finally play the hero himself as one of the Shichibukai.

The roar of the sandstorm outside gradually died down.

Ruidio let go and opened the door. Everything outside was yellow with sand, and dust swirled through the extremely dry air... Thick layers of sand had piled up on the roofs, walls, windowsills, and streets of the town. Residents had already come out with scarves wrapped around their heads to shovel it away. Doto, the plump middle-aged man, also grabbed a shovel and rushed out to help.

"What does the person you're looking for look like?" Koza asked before leaving.

Ruidio said, "Hmm... She probably wears a cowboy hat, and as for clothes... not much. But she might not be dressed that way! Her skin... I think it's fair, but she might also be deeply tanned."

Koza said, "..." Do you even know the person you're looking for?

Ruidio smiled. "Anyway, she's a gorgeous woman in her twenties!"

She was the famous Devil Child, Nico Robin, a wanted criminal with a bounty of 79 million since she was eight. He didn't say so for fear of scaring Koza to death and attracting World Government agents.

"There's no one like that in this town." Koza shook his head, hoisted his shovel onto his shoulder, and went out to help.

Ruidio could only wander around by himself and see if he could find any trace of Robin.

The system radar's location for a task's client had a margin of error.

The farther away the client was, the wider the indicated area.

For an extremely distant task like Robin's, the teleportation could have landed him several hundred meters off.

But in other words, Robin herself should be nearby right now.

She had surely already joined Crocodile's organization. While working for her boss Crocodile, she was pursuing her own business, searching everywhere for information on the ancient Poneglyphs...

Robin had been wanted by the World Government for seventeen years without being caught, so her skill at hiding her tracks was easy to imagine.

Ruidio walked from one end of Yuba to the other and back again, circling the town several times without seeing so much as a hair of Robin's. Instead, he got several rounds of dirty looks for wandering around and getting in the way of people cleaning the streets.

If he couldn't find Robin, he couldn't accept the radar task...

Ruidio had found nothing, but he had been prepared for that, so he wasn't too disappointed.

The Devil Child really wasn't so easy to catch.

Ruidio made his way back around and sat atop a wall, watching the local residents work together to clear sand from the canal. They discussed how, if things continued like this with no rain and frequent sandstorms, the canal would probably dry up sooner or later...

"Everyone here looks rather unhealthy and thin," Ruidio said with a smile. "Why don't you eat more and drink more water?"

"Heh, heh, heh..." Doto awkwardly wiped away his sweat. The others were already glaring at Ruidio.

Koza was carrying a heavy basketful of silt dug from the canal. Without looking up, he said, "You don't look that stupid. Why say something like that?"

"What if I can get food and water?"

Koza, Doto, and the people who had just been glaring at Ruidio all looked at him, sitting leisurely atop the wall and watching them as he had been.

Ruidio said, "Don't just look at me. Answer the question. Do you need my help? I can get you food and water, as much as you want, as long as you can store it properly."

Thud!

The plump man dropped to his knees, knocked his head on the ground, and pleaded with Ruidio, "If that's true... then please, we beg you..."

Ruidio smiled faintly, opened the system's three-in-one interface, put a few points of essence into an empty slot, and selected food.

By the system's reckoning, food and water were practically worthless.

As a result, synthesizing food with essence was calculated by the number of uses, not the quantity.

Even with just one point of essence, if he only requested clean water, it would be practically endless as long as Ruidio didn't tell it to stop—though Ruidio had never done anything so immoral as wasting water like that.

So when Ruidio held out his hand and produced a continuous jet of water from thin air, becoming a human water truck that watered the ground throughout the dry, sand-covered town and even raised the water level of the half-dried canal... everyone in town was moved to tears. Wherever Ruidio went, the residents spontaneously offered him their sincere thanks.

Ruidio couldn't remember how many tons of easily stored food, fresh water, and even ice he had made. In any case, residents could come and collect a whole lot, and he had heard so many thanks that his ears were practically callused.

"You don't have to thank me," he said. "I'm just doing a task."

Koza helped distribute food and water nearby and said sincerely, "Thank you."

I said you don't have to thank me. Are you deaf?

Ruidio said calmly, "This only treats the symptoms, not the cause. As long as the drought and sandstorms continue, this food and water will run out someday."

Koza asked, "Then do you have a solution?"

Of course he did: take out Crocodile. As long as that guy stopped causing trouble, it would soon rain when it should, and the oasis would still be an oasis.

"Koza!" Doto was sweating from all the work and had been in high spirits, but hearing his son say that, he interrupted in displeasure. "What nonsense! How can you say something like that? Of course it'll rain. How could the drought go on forever? Our benefactor has already helped us so much..."

[Koza has commissioned you with a task: Long-Awaited Rain]

[Estimated difficulty: ★★★★]

Ruidio said, "..."

I'm still leveling up in the newbie village, and I'm already going after Crocodile? Am I badass or what?

Chapter 8: Logia

East Blue, banquet hall of Buggy's former pirate ship—

The transparent prism Nami had spotted earlier, rotating clockwise, suddenly vanished, and Ruidio appeared out of thin air in its place. He brought with him a wave of heat and dry air from the desert.

[Task in progress: Long-Awaited Rain]

[Task requirement: resolve the drought in Yuba and bring natural rainfall.]

[Client: Koza]

[Distance: extremely far (teleportation available)]

[Estimated difficulty: ★★★★]