With Araki's ability to hear the Voice of All Things, he had discovered Hua Bing and Guren very early on. He simply saw that they were in no immediate danger, so he had not shown himself right away.
Since he had already figured out what this place was, he had more or less guessed what people they might encounter and what dangers there would be.
In Araki's view, with Hua Bing's and Guren's strength, aside from Perona, the Ghost Princess, whom they had absolutely no way of dealing with, even if they ran into Gekko Moria, it wasn't as if they couldn't put up some resistance.
At the very least, with Gekko Moria's current personality, he definitely would not go all out right from the start. Araki would still have plenty of time to step in and save them then.
As for this Absalom who had appeared for now...
Although the Clear-Clear Fruit's ability was not bad by any means, his development of the fruit was far too poor, and his own strength was very ordinary as well. He could not even properly hide the sound of his footsteps.
It might be enough to fool those careless pirates, but to fool ninjas... that was nothing but a fantasy.
In a certain sense, Araki believed the greatest difference between ninjas and pirates was not chakra versus Haki, or the differences between ninjutsu and Devil Fruits.
It was discipline.
What pirates emphasized was freedom, romance, so when they did things, they cared more about their own feelings. Because of that, they would sometimes do things that seemed utterly brainless and absurd.
That laxness had already sunk into their very bones. Even in battle, they would not become cautious.
But ninjas were different.
The original definition of a ninja was a tool for