At the same time he heard the shout, Mousse felt his heart tighten. Within the range of his Observation Haki, a presence far stronger than the Vajra girl seemed to suddenly emerge from nothing.
"As expected of the Flower Kingdom, the 'Country of Fist Arts.' Although it has declined and currently lacks any truly heavyweight expert to hold the fort, it has quite a few strange martial arts left behind from history. It can even fool Observation Haki—this secret technique for concealing one's strength is more sophisticated than CP0's!"
While becoming secretly wary, Mousse was also pleasantly surprised. That secret art which had suddenly boosted her strength had already interested him greatly, and he had not expected to encounter another highly valuable one so soon.
As Mousse pondered this, the person who had shouted darted swiftly through the bamboo and trees like an incomparably agile ape, arriving before him in the blink of an eye.
Mousse took a closer look and found that the newcomer was around fifty or sixty years old. He wore a scholar's robe, yet he was broad-shouldered, thick-waisted, and fierce-looking, without the slightest trace of a scholar's temperament. The idiom "a monkey wearing a hat" naturally came to Mousse's mind. This man was presumably the Vajra girl's elder.
As the saying went, ask for the sky when bargaining. With a hostage in hand, Mousse immediately pointed at the still-bound Vajra girl and curled his lip without the slightest politeness.
"Relying on a bit of strength to attack an adorable child like me is simply an outrage against both gods and men. As the victim, it wouldn't be excessive for me to dig a hole and bury her, would it?"
This time, the Vajra girl did not act lovestruck. Before her own elder could speak, she hurriedly