In the darkness, Robin's voice came through. "That guy's body is built very strangely. My ability had no effect at all."
Robin's ability worked by sprouting arms at key points on an opponent's body, then bending their joints backward or breaking their bones. Against an ordinary person, it was a lethal move, yet it had no effect on this "wraith"...
It seemed they still couldn't afford to underestimate the enemy before them. Buggy tensed, waiting for its next move.
The eerie green light was like ghost fire in a graveyard. It suddenly flared brighter, then became a streak of green light that rushed toward them.
Buggy's pupils contracted. The green light vanished in an instant, then abruptly appeared right before his eyes. A series of sharp cracks rang through the air, like the whip-crack of a horsewhip's tip.
He felt countless solid whips, like wooden rods, rain down on his head. In a panic, he hurriedly raised both hands to protect it, but blows from all directions struck his face through the gaps between his arms.
It didn't hurt as much as he'd expected. No, wait...
As if he'd realized something, Buggy suddenly spread his arms wide. The Chop-Chop Fruit activated, and his arms and legs detached, wrapping tightly around the shadow surrounding the green light. The slippery creature was trapped in his grasp.
"Ka-chew!" The green light made a strange sound. Then something splattered from its body, and a spray of salty, fishy liquid hit Buggy in the face. His vision went black, and he couldn't even see the last two streaks of green light. It felt as though his face had been coated in glue, which was deeply unpleasant.
"Ka-chew, ka-chew, ka-chew, ka-chew—"
Like the satisfying sound of a combo in an arcade game, the creature before him unleashed one slash of cutting air after another at Buggy. The attacks passed right through him, while the trees behind him were cut down in swathes.
Unable to see a thing, Buggy swung his fist and smashed it into the creature with the most direct, brutal approach possible.
The dark clouds on the horizon gradually scattered in the wind, and the full moon and scattered stars returned to the sky. Their light filtered through the mottled shadows of the trees, faintly illuminating the forest.
With his face covered in black ink and his strength nearly spent, Buggy finally pinned the creature in front of him to the ground. If its slashes had worked on him, he would probably have met his end here today.
"An octopus?" He wiped the ink off his face, then stared in disbelief at the creature he had subdued. What stood before him was... some kind of octopus!
The captain of the mighty Buggy Pirates had ended up in a fight like this with an octopus. If word got out, he might as well give up his reputation as a great pirate of the East Blue.
Robin lit another oil lamp, driving away the darkness. She studied the octopus with great interest. Its green tentacles looked like vines, while the two even thicker ones underneath, shaped like legs, were more exaggerated still. They looked more like human feet than tentacles. Its face had mouthparts that extended outward, and its eyes reflected the lamplight with a green gleam.
Robin examined it again and again before delivering her verdict. "This should be a Land-Walking Octopus. Legend has it that this kind of octopus originally lived in the deep sea, but after being driven off and hunted by sea beasts, it broke through the constraints of its biology, came ashore, and survived there. I've heard it lives even longer than sea turtles. This is my first time seeing one in person."
"Who cares if it's a Land-Walking Octopus or a Sea-Dwelling Octopus? I, Buggy, am eating raw octopus slices today!" Buggy pulled a dagger from his sleeve.
"Wait, Red Nose." Robin stopped him. "Land-Walking Octopuses shouldn't have such powerful attacks or be able to move so fast. Could their strength and speed be connected to these ruins? I don't think we should kill it rashly."
At Robin's words, Buggy rubbed the blade of his dagger against itself, producing a faint, unsettling rasp. He grinned, his teeth all the whiter against his ink-smeared face. "My octopus buddy, would you like to find out how octopus slices taste?"
"Ka-chew..." Still unable to break free of Buggy's grip, the Big Octopus stared in terror at the dagger in his hand and hurriedly shook its head in a very humanlike fashion.
"You really don't want to?" Buggy pressed the cold dagger into the mud beside the Big Octopus's head. "But they're delicious..."
"Ka-chew!!!"
The Big Octopus broke into a great sweat, its expression almost human. Once it realized its attacks had no effect on Buggy, it lost all fighting spirit. Its green tentacles desperately clawed at the ground in an attempt to escape Buggy's grasp, and its earlier arrogance vanished completely.
"So you're just a bully who picks on the weak." Buggy held tightly to one of the Big Octopus's tentacles. It wasn't nearly as strong as he had expected. Even if it was a mutated species, at the end of the day it was still just an unusually strange octopus.
In any case, the truth of the matter had become clear. The animals had kept their distance because they were wary of crossing into another creature's territory, while Robin's Flower-Flower Fruit had failed because this creature was a soft-bodied animal.
So it wasn't Chris and the bandits who were behind this. The so-called wraith was actually this creature, whose two eyes glowed green in the dark.
"Stop scaring it." Robin approached the Big Octopus with a smile, trying her best to look harmless. "Mr. Octopus, how about we settle this peacefully?"
"Ka-chew!" Startled, the Big Octopus sprayed a great cloud of ink from its mouth at Robin. Three pairs of arms instantly sprouted from her body, their hands crossing in front of her to block the spray with the backs of their palms.
Her arms dissolved into petals that scattered through the air. Still smiling, she said, "Hehehe~ Are we having octopus slices later?"
More than ten minutes later, Buggy and Robin had finally subdued the Big Octopus. It was a complete coward who feared for its life. Faced with Buggy and Robin taking turns to threaten and intimidate it, it had obediently given in.
The Big Octopus walked on two sturdy tentacles shaped like legs, while several of its other tentacles curled protectively around them. A rope like a dog leash was tied around its head, and Buggy held the other end.
Robin carried the oil lamp as she read the parchment. Then she glanced at the Big Octopus. "Lead us properly, Mr. Octopus. I don't really like eating octopus slices."
"Ka-chew." The Big Octopus let out a dejected sound, resigned to its fate.
Led by the Big Octopus, the two set off. They walked for an unknown amount of time before finally seeing a cluster of lights ahead.
A huge, circular altar stood in the forest. At its center was a broken stone statue. In the moonlight, they could just make out its shape.
Only the statue's lower half remained. The break above the waist was uneven, and below it were the carved folds of a cloth skirt and a pair of strong, thick thighs. It seemed to have been a man, but the statue's upper half was nowhere nearby.
Buggy surveyed the area. The altar covered less than a hundred square meters, and he could see from one end to the other. The ground was paved with stone, and there wasn't a single glittering treasure nearby. Was this the Ancestral Ruins?
Robin ran her hand over the statue, looking surprised. "This statue must be several hundred years old, yet it's still in such good condition..."
Buggy stepped forward and nodded in agreement. "Aside from the missing upper half, there are no signs of erosion on this statue. The carvings are clear. If it really is several hundred years old, then the preservation techniques must have been incredible."
Buggy grabbed the Big Octopus. "Octopus Slice, do you know what's going on here?"
"Ka-chew, ka-chew."
He had no idea what it was saying...
Buggy turned to Robin and asked, "There should be some kind of mechanism here, right, Miss Robin?"
Robin looked up at the full moon and calmly replied, "Yes. We arrived at just the right time."
Before you continue