Very Perky, Very Bouncy
"Sig, you've already... so quickly..."
"What? That's fast? You fatso! Stop bragging!"
Sig's barrage of questions, culminating in a final "personal attack," left Lucky Roo completely bewildered.
"I said why you said goodbye so quickly... What bragging? Who are you calling a fatso? Want to fight? Newbie!" Lucky Roo said, clenching his fist.
Sig:...
As for what Sig is thinking? Anyway, he's got a really perky and bouncy figure.
"Ahem, Fatty, I meant to compliment you on how amazing you are," Sig quickly corrected himself.
On the pirate ship, Sig remained in his Fish-Man form. Judging from his appearance and physique alone, he was definitely the center of the Red-Hair Pirates. At this time, Beckman and Lucky Roo were just ordinary-looking and excessively obese.
Red-Hair usually has a weak and submissive demeanor...
"Are we really leaving? Your girlfriend isn't here... did you two have a fight?" Shanks asked Sig to confirm.
Yasopp then interjected, "Is it a breakup? Well, that's fine... The skull and crossbones flag is calling us!"
"No arguing... The Navigator is ready! Captain!" Sig said decisively.
Beckman glanced at Sig, his "favorability" towards him slightly improved—he still felt that bringing Sig on board was a bit hasty, especially as an important "Navigator." However, Sig's current performance was quite "professional." Although he was usually carefree, he didn't "command" the Captain to set sail.
"Then let's... set sail and embark!" Shanks announced.
The sails were hoisted high, and the pirate flag was raised.
The Red-Hair Pirates' flag features a skull with three red marks around its left eye and two crossed swords on its back.
The Red-Hair Pirates' ship is called the Red Force, and it's not very big, since the entire crew only has about thirty people.
In the original Paramount War, although it was the smallest of the Four Emperors' forces, it still had at least a hundred people, and the ships were larger.
However, Sig estimated that it was probably a "refurbishment of an old ship," because the two ships had the same prow feature—a Monster head with bull horns.
Based on Sig's common sense about this world, this Monster with two bull horns should be in the style of the Giant Race.
In addition...
Sig patted the mast, then turned to Shanks and asked, "Captain, is the Red Force made of some special kind of wood?"
"Hmm? How did you figure that out? Did you 'hear' something?" Shanks asked with great interest.
"No, it just feels a bit like the Eve Tree from the Sea Bass..." Sig said truthfully.
"That's right, it was made by the Adam Tree! When we go to the New World, we must go back to Giant Island and find an even bigger Adam Tree to expand the Red Force!" Shanks said with great anticipation.
Sig then realized that the Red-Hair's ship was also made from the Adam Tree, and that this meant the Adam Tree's true form should be in the Giant Kingdom?
Sig looked around but didn't find any Devil Fruit sounds.
Since Shanks still had his left arm, Sig initially thought there should be Rubber Fruit on the ship.
Judging by the timeline, the Red-Hair Pirates' trip to the East Blue should be the same one where Shanks met Luffy, unless the Red-Hair Pirates have made several trips to the East Blue in the past year or two...
If not... could it be that the Rubber Fruit was stolen from the East Blue?
Of course, even if he really had the Rubber Fruit, Sig would only "learn" it temporarily to enhance his resistance to impact damage.
After the "Sun Path" reaches Sequence 7, Sig can absorb one more Devil Fruit ability, or rather... the number of Devil he can "accommodate" increases by 1.
However, Sig could sense that this was not due to the upgrade from Sequence 8 to Sequence 7, but rather the upgrade from Low Sequence to Mid-Sequence —if nothing unexpected happened, the next "capacity" upgrade would be when he became Sequence 4 "Unshadowed".
Therefore, Sig was very selective in choosing his second Devil Fruit ability; it had to be either an extremely powerful Devil Fruit ability or one that held special significance for him.
The former includes some overpowered abilities from Logia, Mythical Zoan, and Paramecia types, while the latter includes things like the Shadow-Shadow Fruit and the Encouragement Fruit.
The Rubber Fruit clearly did not meet Sig's expectations.
Just as the ship was gradually leaving the harbor, Sig suddenly noticed something and looked towards the shore, where he saw Bellemere running towards him.
"Sig! You bastard!" Bellemere roared from the shore, carrying a bag in her hand, which she then swung and threw at Sig.
Seeing Sig catch it, Bellemere, her eyes red, roared, "You'd better die on the sea! Bastard, idiot, fool, pirate..."
Sig looked at Bellemere helplessly, then waved his hand and said, "Then remember to read my news so you'll be the first to know!"
Even though Bellemere's figure was already very small, thanks to his special Observation Haki, Sig could still sense that she was not being sincere.
As for the bag thrown over, it contained the two million Beli left behind by Sig – the remaining bounty from the smallpox.
But just as Bellemere's voice was fading from ear to ear, Sig suddenly felt something soft inside the bag.
Upon opening it, Sig discovered that mixed in with the Beli were some freshly picked oranges...
After Sig finished eating one, Shanks handed him the nautical chart and told Sig that the next stop was "Egret Island"—after which Sig, as the Navigator, would give him navigation advice and help him determine the direction.
This is the East China Sea, and for Sig, even for himself before advancing to Sequence 7, this is hardly a test.
Over the course of two days, Sig got to know most of the crew members—after all, there were only about thirty of them.
Through the Prison Demon's senses, Sig also identified the Devil Fruit ability among them.
Although there were rumors before Sig's time travel that the Red-Hair Pirates and the Roger Pirates had no Devil Fruits, these were ultimately just speculations, or even baseless speculations. In fact, even until Sig's time travel, the fighting styles of most of the main members of the Red-Hair Pirates and the Roger Pirates were still a mystery. The way to prove that they had no Devil Fruits was mainly through argumentative, "As we all know, the Red-Hair Pirates don't have Devil Fruit Devil Fruit ability, so none of them have eaten Devil Fruit," a kind of "hearing your words is like hearing a wise man speak" kind of dialectical reasoning.
The claim that "traditional pirates reject Devil Fruit" is actually unfounded, since when Buggy pretended to eat a fruit, Roger's crew cheered him on...
The only thing that surprised Sig was that Shanks himself was Devil Fruit ability.
This did make Sig understand why he lost an arm to the "legendary King of the Sea," but it also puzzled Sig about how he saved Luffy.
Two uneventful days passed. On the third day, Yasopp, the sniper and lookout, shouted from the observation tower, "A warship to the southeast! Hahaha, judging by its size, it seems to be transporting some important goods... Could we have just stumbled upon Celestial Gold?"
Like most pirate crews, the Red-Hair Pirates enjoy robbing easy targets, but in their eyes, the only ones who qualify as easy targets are the World Government...