Marineford Era history spanning fifteen hundred years was indeed long enough when compared to a single person. Yet, measured against humanity as a whole, it was hardly that ancient. Even so, those fifteen hundred years of history were riddled with gaps and inconsistencies.
Ancient civilizations vanished, science and technology regressed... The road humanity traveled was full of twists and thorns.
But what was most helpless of all was that ancient civilizations could disappear and science and technology could go backward, yet the art of killing had been passed down from antiquity to the present day.
Strangling.
It was a form of killing.
Its origins were uncertain, but one thing was clear: the art of strangling remained active on battlefields and execution grounds, tirelessly stripping one human after another of their lives. The Strangling Ghost, Farug, was a Great Pirate with a bounty of 114 million Berries. This man, who had entered the Grand Line from South Blue, was a master of strangling.
From South Blue to the New World of the Grand Line, countless bones had laid the foundation for his fearsome reputation as the "Strangling Ghost."
Though the notorious Strangling Ghost had tasted his first defeat after arriving in the New World, a hellishly difficult new territory teeming with powerful figures, that hadn't sent him spiraling into an irredeemable abyss. He had still stubbornly survived in the New World.
Even if he had to become someone's dog,
he had survived.
Unfortunately—
Splurt!
A dark yellow flash streaked past.
Three more wounds, deep enough to expose bone, appeared on his right shoulder. Feeling the fresh pain there, Farug's expression grew grim.
Just as he'd expected, this battle was proving extremely difficult. But it wasn't because Zoan users had tough, durable bodies that could take a beating. It was because... his opponent was so fast that he couldn't keep up. Every time he reached out, all he managed to grab was a few leopard hairs. Five minutes into the fight, he still hadn't accomplished anything.
He was the only one taking a beating.
Dick, transformed into a giant leopard, toyed with him using speed far greater than his own. Like an elusive breeze, Dick circled him, blowing past him again and again.
Each time that breeze brushed his body, it left a long, deep gash. As his wounds multiplied and widened, it wasn't only blood that flowed from him—his strength drained away with it.
No matter what tactics he tried, whether pretending to be outmatched or deliberately leaving an opening... none of it worked.
"Damn it, who are you? Someone as powerful as you can't possibly be unknown in these seas!" Farug roared furiously. He felt as if he were being toyed with. The New World might have been full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers, with powerful figures as numerous as carp crossing a river.
But
there were still only so many powerful figures. Except in a few extremely isolated countries like Wano Country, any time a strong fighter emerged, the New World's various forces would learn about them immediately.
After all,
the strong had to test themselves against one another to become stronger. And once they fought, it was difficult to keep their abilities and identities hidden.
Yet no matter how hard he racked his brain, he couldn't think of anyone like Dick.
"Who am I?"
Dick's voice was as elusive as his agile form, which wound around Farug like a gale.
"Since you're so curious, I don't mind telling you. I'm Dick. I ate the Cat-Cat Fruit, Ancient Zoan: Giant Leopard. Remember my name. One day, my name will resound throughout the world alongside His Highness Aleus's."
His arrogant words fell.
Then the final blow came without warning.
Dick shifted from beast form to his hybrid form. The leopard-man, standing upright, drove his claws deep into Farug's shoulder.
The wound became grotesquely huge.
Blood gushed out like a fountain.
"I won't die. I absolutely won't die. My teacher said so—said I was the man who'd make the name of the Sallier Strangling Technique known throughout the world. I... I absolutely won't die..." Farug collapsed onto the ground, half his face pressed against the hard, rough pebbles. He forced his eyes wide open and stared straight at Dick, standing before him in his leopard-man form.
He gasped,
muttering to himself, despair and unwillingness filling his eyes.
"You lost."
Dick lowered his head and looked into Farug's eyes. His golden ponytail fell beside his ear, its fine strands fluttering gently in the breeze.
"Am I... going to die?"
Farug finally faced reality.
He
had fallen once again.
And this time, there was no luck involved in his defeat. From beginning to end, he hadn't managed to seize a single chance to use his strangling techniques. He'd done nothing but take one beating after another, suffering injury after injury. His body was covered in countless wounds, and blood poured from him as if it were free. But it wasn't only his blood that flowed away—his strength drained with it.
When Dick delivered that final blow, he'd finally been unable to hold on any longer.
Even his iron will couldn't fight off the dizziness of blood loss.
"Do you want to die?"
Hearing Farug's faint voice, Dick blinked and asked.
The eyes that had already dimmed lit up again. Farug squeezed out the last of his strength, laboriously raised his head, and looked at Dick. "Can I still live?"
"I can give you a chance. But whether you survive in the end will depend on your luck."
"...Thank you!"
After managing to utter his thanks, Farug finally ran out of strength and passed out from excessive blood loss.
"Ah! Is this guy really going to die just like that?"
Looking at Farug, covered in blood, Dick scratched his head, troubled.
Fighting was a blast, but cleaning up afterward was such a pain. Especially since he'd promised to give Farug a chance. He couldn't let the guy die just like this, or wouldn't that make him a liar?
With a sigh, he crouched down, took out the first-aid supplies he carried with him, and began trying to stop Farug's bleeding.
"Dick, what are you doing?"
The voice came from behind him. It was Eschbach.
"Stopping the bleeding! Can't you tell?"
Dick's first-aid skills were clearly crude. Compared to his combat ability, his technique for stopping bleeding was downright dreadful.
"Are you sure you're stopping the bleeding and not making him bleed more?"
Looking at Dick's shoddy work, Eschbach simply couldn't stand by while this so-called rescue turned into a murder. He kicked Dick aside. "Get out of the way! Keep this up, and I guarantee he'll be dead in ten minutes... You're wasting perfectly good hemostatic medicine."
Rough on the outside, careful within—that was Eschbach.
He looked clumsy and ungainly, but his fingers, thick as iron pillars, were nimble enough to thread a needle.
Dick didn't get angry when he was kicked aside. After all, Eschbach had beaten him plenty of times during their sparring sessions—really pummeling him to within an inch of his life. According to His Highness Aleus, as long as someone still had a breath left in them, you could beat them as hard as you liked. Compared to those miserable times, what was a light kick like this?
"By the way, Eschbach, what happened to that guy called Black Beast?"
Watching Eschbach stop Farug's bleeding, Dick looked for something to relieve his boredom.
"He's in that pit over there! Go look if you want."
Eschbach answered without looking back, wholly focused on the emergency treatment.