Paper Arts

Kuro raised his eyes toward the darkness and frowned. "Who's talking over there... Jango, is there still some trash you haven't taken care of?!"

The Black Cat Pirates' vice-captain and hypnotist, Jango, immediately broke into a cold sweat. Looking tense and uneasy, he ordered the fighter Sam, "Sam, go see what's in there!"

"No problem, Vice-Captain Jango!"

Sam, skinny and green-haired, stuck out his tongue and licked the back of his hand. A sly glint flashed in his eyes as he quickly leaped onto the upper deck and headed for the half-open cabin door.

A full minute passed before Sam emerged from the darkness, chuckling. "Nothing's wrong. There's no one inside?"

"Sam, did you take a good look?" As soon as Jango asked that, he sensed something deeply wrong... a feeling of deception. As a hypnotist, he was most familiar with that illusion-like feeling of being deceived.

"Who are you?" Kuro adjusted his round glasses with one hand and stared coldly at the upper deck, as if he had already seen through everything.

Sam was shoved down from beside the upper railing and landed motionless on the deck. His neck was twisted grotesquely out of shape, clearly broken just moments ago. Then, a shadow shifted on the upper deck before suddenly leaping down.

Duen swept his gaze over the pirates, whose faces showed varying degrees of shock, and calmly said, "For now, you can think of me as a bounty hunter."

"You killed Sam..."

Jango awkwardly reached up to touch his black top hat. As vice-captain, he knew his subordinates' strengths well. Sam was light on his feet and agile, yet he had been killed without a sound. It was simply unbelievable... and his opponent was only a young boy!

"Yes, Hypnotist."

Duen looked at Jango with interest. The man wore a black top hat and heart-shaped glasses, had something resembling a striped mushroom growing from his chin, and held a circular saw suspended by a thin cord. Among a crowd of generic pirates, he stood out quite noticeably.

Negative emotion points from Kuro +0...

Feeling the words flicker through his mind, Duen shifted his gaze from Jango to Kuro, who stood directly ahead of him.

"Bounty hunter, bounty hunter, another bounty hunter..."

Veins bulged across Kuro's forehead. "Whether it's the Marines or bounty hunters, do you all want my head that badly?!"

As the Black Cat Pirates' reputation grew, more and more bounty hunters came to ambush Kuro, leaving him increasingly irritable.

Duen said, "Who told you to have such a valuable head?"

Negative emotion points from Kuro +10...

"This is truly irritating and unpleasant."

Kuro pushed up his round glasses with his palm. The anger on his face finally subsided under control. "Fine... whether it's one or a hundred, just kill them."

Hearing the eerie tone in Kuro's voice, the Black Cat Pirates shivered. They knew that the calmer Kuro appeared on the surface, the more likely he was to turn into a terrifying monster!

Kuro lightly flicked the black captain's cape draped over his arm and said calmly, "You lot, go kill this brat."

The surrounding pirates exchanged glances. Though they had just fought a battle against the pirates on the enemy ship, they did not dare hesitate in the slightest. Gripping their weapons, they charged Duen together.

"Damn brat, give us your life!"

"A bounty hunter isn't a job some punk like you can handle!"

"You've angered Captain Kuro, so just die obediently!"

The noisy shouts surged endlessly, enough to make anyone's head ache.

Duen drew the broad blade from his back with his right hand. Though these pirates were mere cannon fodder, they fully demonstrated the power of numbers. Once they swarmed him, their mass formed a truly oppressive black tide.

But...

The broad blade in Duen's hand was like a pouncing tiger or leopard—agile, swift, and brimming with immense power.

Within the black gleam of the blade's shadows, blood splattered. The charging pirates could not even touch Duen before losing their lives one after another.

At that moment, an enormous figure like a mountain appeared behind him. Sharp cat claws descended straight down, carrying intense killing intent!

"You bastard bounty hunter, I'll avenge Sam!!"

Duen raised his head and sensed the direction the surrounding air currents fled toward and converged upon. His body abruptly tilted at an unbelievable angle, like a thin sheet of paper floating in the air, evading the heavy blow from above.

The tremendous impact smashed a huge crater into the deck within two meters, sending wood chips flying. The pirates surrounding Duen hurriedly retreated.

When the smoke and dust dispersed, the massive figure was revealed standing unsteadily, cold sweat covering his forehead. One hand clutched the slash across his stomach as he panted heavily.

This fat-bellied, broad-hipped pirate was Buchi, one of the Nyaban Brothers and a main combatant of the Black Cat Pirates. His belly was layered with thick fat due to his obesity, which was why, after Duen dodged and slashed him in return, he had not suffered a fatal wound.

"Sam, hold him off a little longer!"

Jango's voice rang out. He then held his hypnotic tool before the nearby pirates. "One, two, Jango! Your bodies will become filled with strength!"

At that moment, Duen used Paper Arts. His body shifted in an instant, dodging Buchi's cat claws stabbing in from the side. His left elbow jerked upward and struck Buchi's jaw, sending him stumbling backward.

Buchi wiped at the nosebleed streaming down his face and shrank back, no longer daring to attack. The anger and pain in his heart had already turned into fear.

Duen stood where he was, watching Jango hypnotize the pirates with great interest. Observing the power of this hypnosis from the sidelines might... deepen his understanding of the Nightmare Fruit's abilities.

"Ahhh!"

"My body is already overflowing with power!!"

"Now no one can stop me."

After Jango finished hypnotizing them, veins bulged across the slightly swollen muscles of these pirate lackeys. The lines of their bodies became sharply defined, and they roared like mutated beasts.

"Men, kill him." Jango pressed down on his black top hat, burying his eyes in shadow.

At Jango's command, more than a dozen pirate lackeys charged Duen like madmen, as though they no longer cared about their lives.

Duen sheathed his broad blade and pulled a nimble dagger from his waist. Amid the attacks of dozens of men, his figure was like a willow catkin swaying alone in a gentle breeze, weaving past the pirates' slashes. It looked perilous, yet few of the pirates could even brush the edge of his clothes.

As his arm moved, the dagger in his hand carved streak after streak of lethal silver light through the air, as though sculpting a delicate work of art. Scalding blood sprayed everywhere, along with the pirates' courage, which rapidly vanished.

"Monster, this guy's a monster!"

"How... how can we possibly be a match for a monster like this!"

Even though their bodies had been strengthened, the pirates could not accept such a reality. As their companions fell one after another, the remaining pirates staggered back in shock. Their wounds poured red liquid like soup boiling over from a pot.

Duen flicked his wrist, making the dagger trace a silver bloom. Before the sharply contracted pupils of the pirate ahead, it shot forth as a streak of light that passed straight through and flew toward Kuro, whose cape snapped in the wind.

"They're no good. You should come instead."