Arlong Pirates

Cocoyasi Village

This was a peaceful, tranquil little village inhabited by a group of simple, honest villagers.

Knowing they were a burden to Nami, they deliberately hurled harsh words and cold remarks at her, hoping she would abandon them and set out on the road to freedom. They had never wanted to become a burden to a little girl.

They only hoped that the gentle, kind girl in their hearts could obtain true freedom and be treated with tenderness.

They were all lovely people. They could not resist the Arlong Pirates' oppression, nor could they change stubborn Nami, so they could only use this method to make Nami give up on them and leave this place without any guilt.

Nami piloted the boat and came ashore with a small bag in hand. Rodney did not come with her, instead choosing another way to infiltrate the village.

It was mainly to avoid implicating the people in the village. That was what they had agreed on.

In the sea, Rodney circulated Chakra and darted through the water like a cannonball.

Wave Riding Strike!

To allow its user to remain underwater for a long time, Wave Riding Strike came with a special breathing method that greatly extended the time one could hold one's breath underwater.

It extended the time from several minutes to half an hour, but strenuous movement would drastically shorten it.

The scenery in the shallow waters was quite beautiful. Sunlight pierced through the seawater, making the view pleasant.

Schools of fish were startled by him and scattered, but soon they swam past him again in a mad rush.

Rodney: ??

Could there be a predator behind me?

He glanced back and was startled. A Sea King with a cow's head was staring at him with huge eyes. It wore a nose ring, and its enormous body was considerably larger than that of an ordinary Sea King, nearly a hundred meters long.

It gazed at him with a vacant, adorable expression.

It doesn't seem very threatening...

Just as he thought that, the cow-headed Sea King opened its mouth wide. Its bloody maw, packed with fangs, lunged toward him.

Rodney: "..."

Damn it, I take it back!

He hurriedly sped up. In water, both Taijutsu and ninjutsu were greatly weakened, and Water Release was completely useless, so he accelerated toward the surface.

Whoosh!

He burst out of the water like a dolphin and sprinted across the surface. The cow-headed Sea King also broke through the water, using its buoyancy to rise upright. Its snow-white teeth were razor-sharp and interlocked as it pounced toward Rodney.

"Bastard! Do you think I'm still a weakling like I was underwater? Die!" He raised one foot and kicked the cow-headed Sea King into the air.

Boom!

The cow-headed Sea King fell back down, crashing into the sea and sending waves dozens of meters high into the air.

This was near the coast, and such a huge disturbance immediately caught the attention of people from the Arlong Pirates nearby.

Two fish-men saw the fallen Sea King and Rodney on the water. One went to report to their leader, while the other swam toward them.

The fish-man was considerably faster than Rodney using Wave Riding Strike underwater. Rodney failed to notice him and instead hurried toward the shore.

He did not bother wondering whether his infiltration had failed. If things went badly, he could simply kill everyone who knew about it. That could also count as a perfect infiltration.

After all, no one would know anything.

He moved a little faster on the surface of the sea. Suddenly, a red-skinned fish-man burst from the water and lunged at him.

Rodney hurriedly dodged to the side.

The fish-man returned to the water, then poked his head out and asked, "Intruder, who are you? Why can you walk on the surface of the water?"

"Why do you care who I am? Who are you?"

The fish-man wore a proud expression. "Listen up. This great one is Green, a member of the Arlong Pirates! You still haven't answered my question."

"Never heard of you. You must be some random extra, right?" Rodney said.

"Human, I'm a member of the Arlong Pirates! You actually don't know about such a powerful pirate crew? Oh, right. Our Arlong Empire is still under construction, so it's normal that you haven't heard of it. But since you've trespassed into the territory of the Arlong Pirates, have you paid the protection fee?" As soon as Green finished speaking, a size-forty-two foot enlarged rapidly in his vision.

Bang!

His size-fifty-eight face made intimate contact with the size-forty-two foot. The heavy blow left him with a splitting headache.

But for a fish-man with a tough body, a kick powerful enough to shatter an adult's skull was merely painful. Green was kicked to the bottom of the sea. Rubbing his face, he cried, "It hurts, it hurts! It hurts so much! This human is incredibly strong!"

He inhaled a mouthful of seawater. The gills on his neck filtered the air from it. Enduring the pain, he swam toward Rodney on the surface again.

The two raced one above and one below, competing across the sea's surface and depths. Green refused to believe that a fish-man like him could lose to a human.

And then... they reached the shore.

A trail of footprints crossed the soft beach and entered the jungle.

Following the footprints, Green ran after him. The moment he charged into the jungle, it seemed he had snapped something beneath his feet.

Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh!

Several kunai flew out and stabbed into his body.

"Ah!" he screamed repeatedly in pain.

Rodney, perched in a tree, seized the opportunity and immediately threw a kunai attached to an Explosive Tag. It struck Green squarely in the mouth.

"Explode!"

Explosive Tags could be controlled manually. One only needed to inject Chakra into them to control when they exploded. They could also be triggered like land mines, making them especially convenient.

With a boom, Green's head vanished. Flesh flew everywhere as his sturdy body fell, and bright-red blood gushed out, staining the ground.

Rodney used Transformation Technique to take on Green's appearance. This would let him enter the Arlong Pirates more easily without causing trouble for Nami and the others.

As for the corpse, he ignored it.

He had not gone far when he encountered an ordinary villager working in the fields. Just as he was about to ask where the Arlong Pirates were, the villager was frightened into fleeing.

To humans, fish-men were monsters—and monsters that bullied them at that. Naturally, the villager had to run.

"Tsk, I actually forgot to use the Sharingan to force him to reveal the location of the Arlong Pirates." Rodney shook his head in frustration. Just as he was about to dispel the Transformation Technique and ask for directions, he saw a fish-man approaching from a distance.

"Hey, Green, what about the human we found? You didn't capture him?" the fish-man asked.

Perfect timing—someone just handed me a pillow when I was sleepy!

Imitating Green's voice, he said, "That guy was caught by me and dragged into the sea, where he drowned. Humans really are so fragile."

Hearing this, the fish-man beamed. "Exactly, exactly! We fish-men are the race that stands above humans. How could such a weak race possibly compare with us fish-men?"

Rodney curled his lip. These guys were probably brainwashed by Arlong to the point of insanity. They don't even think about who got beaten to the point of crying for his father and mother by that bastard Kizaru. If it hadn't been the end of Kizaru's workday, that Arlong would have been finished.

But he still had to play along in public. He laughed smugly and said, "Of course. Humans are weak and frail. They were born to be ruled by us fish-men. Those fools who want to coexist peacefully with humans are simply daydreaming!"

"Hmph, hmph, naturally. Come on, Arlong is still waiting for you to report what happened. Let's go!"

The fish-man patted Rodney on the shoulder and left with him, arm in arm.

Arlong Park

The architectural style here was modeled by Arlong after the amusement parks of the Sabaody Archipelago. From this, it was clear that although he claimed to despise humans, he actually yearned for their living environment.

There was no road beneath the entrance gate. Instead, a waterway connected to the sea and extended all the way into the courtyard. Inside the courtyard were three swimming pools connected to this waterway, allowing members of the Arlong Pirates to enter the sea as quickly as possible.

After all, the entire pirate crew consisted of fish-men, so they had no need to travel by land. If traveling were not so tiring, they would not even need ships to leave this place. With enough caution, they could even enter the waters of the Calm Belt. That was how convenient it was.

He jumped into the sea with the fish-man, held his breath, passed through the gate, and entered the pool before leaping onto the land.

Sitting directly opposite them was a purple sawtooth fish-man with a serrated Long Nose. He wore a yellow Hawaiian shirt with his chest exposed. A red sun symbol representing the Sun Pirates was tattooed on the left side of his chest, while the emblem of the Arlong Pirates was tattooed on his left forearm.

Decked out in gold and silver, he looked exactly like a nouveau riche.

The leader of the Arlong Pirates—Arlong!