"Anyway, trust me, Uncle Gart! Fire first. Force the creature's entire body above the surface. With it thrashing up and down like this, I can't aim."
Seeing Gart hesitate, Xia Nuo added in a low voice.
Ignoring the other man's reaction, Xia Nuo turned back and stared at the Sea King's battered abdomen.
A few minutes earlier.
After realizing what this creature, which resembled the King of the Near Sea, was doing, a bold idea had surfaced in his mind.
The reason it was acting so berserk was ultimately because of the unbearable pain in its stomach. What if he could help remove the source of that pain?
Sea Kings were intelligent life-forms, and highly intelligent ones at that.
After doing it such a huge favor, he wasn't asking for anything in return. But surely it wouldn't keep treating them like food, would it?
With his current strength, defeating this Sea King head-on was pure fantasy. If he didn't want to end up in its belly, this was his only way out.
Regardless of how likely success was, at a moment of life or death, how could he not give it a try?
"...All right. We'll do as you say." Gart returned his saber to its sheath and finally made his decision.
"Captain..." A veteran sailor hesitated.
"Don't say it. Do we have any other options?"
Gart cut him off directly. Once his attitude was settled, he became extremely decisive. "Starboard gunners, load the shells immediately and await my command!"
"Ready?" He looked at Xia Nuo.
"Mm."
The boy kept his eyes fixed on the sea and nodded slightly.
"Good." Gart drew a deep breath, then suddenly waved his hand and gave the order. "Aim at the Sea King's abdomen. Three, two, one—fire!"
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!!!
The eight cannons on the starboard side roared simultaneously. Orange-red flames burst from their muzzles, illuminating the tense muscles in Xia Nuo's legs.
The cannonballs' trajectories tore across the night sky in his pupils. After a brief instant of silence, a burst of flame suddenly erupted from the Sea King's abdomen.
ROAR!!!!
The shrill bellow shook the entire sea. The shadow beneath the surface suddenly churned violently, making everyone's hearts nearly stop.
In the next instant, an iron-gray scaled body burst through the waves. Its savage head flung up a monstrous wave, and as it lowered itself, its long, vertical pupils—like those of a viper—fixed coldly on the sailors aboard the deck.
Now!
Every muscle in Xia Nuo's body tensed. He drove off the deck with the balls of his feet and leaped over the railing. At that instant, the Sea King's abdominal muscles, curled up from the pain, formed slanted, slope-like folds.
Smack!
The boy landed firmly on one of those folds. His right fist, already charged with all the strength he had stored throughout his body, shot upward beneath the bulging area.
Huh?
The Sea King froze in confusion. Before it could lower its head to see what had happened, the membranes in its throat began to tremble violently, unable to contain the pressure. It gagged and vomited up a small amount of dark-green mucus, which stretched through the air in web-like strands.
At the same time.
Xia Nuo's left fist plunged with all its might along the folds of the esophagus. The impact sent a tremor through the creature's throat, causing its scales to flare open like a pinecone. The foreign object separated from them by a layer of abdominal skin shifted upward several more meters.
It worked!
A flash of delight crossed Xia Nuo's eyes, instantly turning vicious. One last punch!
Drawing on the twisting force of his waist and abdomen, he suddenly followed up with one final hook. The spinning power technique he had honed day after day and night after night in the orange grove sent the shockwave straight through the intestines toward the crown of the creature's head!
"Urgh—!!!"
The violent urge to vomit finally reached its limit. Huge clumps of mucus mixed with mud and seaweed were spewed out, splattering down with wet smacks. A small portion splashed onto the deck, corroding straight through the planks in an instant and sending up wisps of green smoke.
Most of the rest fell onto the sea in a torrent, like a downpour.
Thrown aside by the Sea King's struggles, Xia Nuo immediately swam toward the spot as fast as he could. After rummaging around several times, he suddenly fixed his gaze on a certain place.
Floating there was unmistakably an arm.
A human arm.
Just as I thought!
Xia Nuo snatched up the severed arm, his eyes filled with delight.
I was right!
This Sea King was the King of the Near Sea!
And this severed arm was the culprit that had caused it unbearable pain, driving it to search everywhere for ways to squeeze and scrape its abdomen!
How long had it been there?
Xia Nuo didn't know. He only knew that on that day, even Higgs, the Bandit King who had killed fifty-six of the Four Emperors, had been unable to withstand the corrosive power of the King of the Near Sea's stomach acid and bile. He had long since been digested and expelled as feces.
Only this arm had been impossible to digest. The Sea King couldn't vomit it up on its own, so it had remained lodged in its stomach all this time.
He looked up and confirmed that the hull blocked his position and that the people on the deck above couldn't see him at all. Without further hesitation, he activated the sacrifice.
The severed arm in his hand vanished into thin air, and the system simultaneously issued a successful-sacrifice notification.
[Offering: Shanks's severed arm] [Quality: Legendary] [Value: 10,000 points] [Appraisal: The severed arm of Saint Shanks, son of the Supreme Commander of the Knights of God and a Celestial Dragon. It was swallowed by the King of the Near Sea while saving Luffy, the Straw Hat. The world line underwent drastic changes from this point onward. The future emperor of the sea clearly left this arm in the East Blue, yet firmly believed that he had gambled on the New Era.]
Legendary quality!
Ten thousand points!
Xia Nuo's eyes widened. After confirming that he hadn't miscounted and that there were indeed four zeroes, uncontrollable delight surged through him all at once.
Beneath the pitch-black night sky, he couldn't help throwing his head back and laughing loudly.
Before making his move, he had worried whether he could succeed. He had feared being swallowed before he could even reach the King of the Near Sea. Even at the moment he found the arm, he had wondered whether the thing could actually be sacrificed.
Now that the sacrifice had succeeded and he had obtained a huge number of points unlike anything he had ever possessed before, all his worries and hesitation vanished. Xia Nuo felt so wonderfully refreshed that it was as if he wasn't floating on the sea at all, but drifting through the clouds.
"Hey! Are you all right, Xia Nuo!"
Gart's urgent shout suddenly came from above, bringing him back to reality. The man had failed to see the boy for some time and had begun to worry.
"I'm fine, Uncle! Please lower the rope ladder!"
He shouted back with a laugh.
Once the rope ladder was lowered along the hull, the boy had climbed halfway up when he suddenly felt a surge of waves roiling behind his head. A strong salty, fishy smell immediately flooded his nostrils.
Hiss—!!!
It was the voice of the King of the Near Sea, close enough to touch.
From this hiss, completely different from its earlier cries, Xia Nuo heard satisfaction and joy. He raised his head and happened to meet the King of the Near Sea's blood-red eyes.
"How is it, big guy?"
Xia Nuo grinned at the creature without a trace of fear on his face. "Was the digestive-tract surgery I performed on you effective?"
The King of the Near Sea narrowed its eyes at Xia Nuo as well. Drool dripped between its fangs, but it remained motionless for a long time.
Gart and the others watching from above instantly felt their hearts tighten.
After more than ten seconds.
The King of the Near Sea suddenly extended its tongue and gently licked Xia Nuo's back. Then it raised its head and let out a roar powerful enough to tear through the night.
Finally, it flipped backward and plunged into the sea with a tremendous splash, gradually disappearing without a trace.