"You!"
Cedric's horrified words were forever lodged in his throat.
The bullet from the muzzle pierced straight through his brow.
Crimson blood mixed with white matter burst from the back of his head, spraying across the pristine execution platform behind him and blooming into a glaring flower of blood.
His body swayed twice, and disbelief remained frozen in his still-open eyes.
Then he toppled straight backward.
With a dull thud.
He fell silent forever.
Dead silence.
The entire square sank into a deathly hush.
Everyone stared blankly at the fallen corpse and the pool of blood spreading beneath it, their minds completely blank.
A Mermaid had died.
A sheriff had been shot dead in public by a Fish-Man.
At that moment, everyone present—Mermaids, Fish-Men, spectators, and prisoners alike—clearly realized one thing.
Today, things had completely blown up.
So badly that there was no way to contain them anymore.
After that brief dead silence, the crowd suddenly erupted.
The Mermaid spectators merely thought they were witnessing an even more exciting spectacle. They whispered among themselves, chattering animatedly, with even a hint of morbid excitement on their faces.
But the Fish-Man spectators completely exploded.
"Jinbe! Have you lost your mind?"
"What are you doing? You killed a sheriff in public! Are you trying to get every Fish-Man killed?"
"Our lives have finally been getting better bit by bit! Why do you have to pull this kind of stunt? Do you think we aren't dying fast enough?"
"Get back into your sewers! Stop dragging us down with you!"
Furious questions and curses crashed down like a tide from the Fish-Man crowd, striking Jinbe and his comrades head-on.
Those were not insults from enemies.
They were accusations from their own kind.
And that was more chilling than any insult could ever be.
"Shut up!