Konoha Style Fish-Man Karate

"Nyuu!!"

Hachi let out a shout in midair.

He instantly shot forward like a cannonball, crashing into the wall.

Boom!!

With an explosive crash, large sections of the walls surrounding Arlong Park collapsed, sending dust and rubble flying everywhere.

Hachi's figure was already buried beneath it all.

Watching Hachi get sent flying, Li Mingyuan did not hesitate after landing his blow. Hearing the sharp whistling sound rushing toward his back, he suddenly exerted force through his legs and stomped the ground two or three times.

Li Mingyuan sprang into the air.

His body spun halfway around in midair, lightly evading Arlong's water bullet.

Seeing the still-stunned Arlong not far away, Li Mingyuan borrowed the explosive force of his legs to shift his body along with the motion. His entire arm seemed to turn into a whip, cracking through the air as he flung his hand toward Arlong at high speed.

If Arlong could use a Fish-Man's wrist strength to flick water droplets like bullets, why couldn't he?

"Returning courtesy for courtesy. Consider these pebbles a gift in return for earlier."

Pfft! Pfft! Pfft!

After a series of sharp detonations, several bullet-like wounds immediately appeared on Arlong's body. Even his casual clothes were blown to shreds by the pebbles. Arlong gave a muffled grunt, clutching his chest as he dropped to one knee.

Only then did Li Mingyuan drift gently to the ground, as light as a swallow.

He raised his eyes to look ahead again and softly exhaled a breath of stale air.

"How was it? Getting ambushed in return?"

Li Mingyuan raised a brow.

"Ugh...!"

Arlong slowly lifted his head. Sweat had already appeared at his temples, but his expression grew even more savage.

"It barely hurt."

He rose from the ground again and bared his teeth. "Compared to the suffering of my brethren, what does this amount to?"

"You actually dodged that move. Those movements were nothing like a human's. No wonder you defeated so many Fish-Men here. Human, you don't seem like the trash from before. You really do have some skill."

"But."

Arlong's expression changed, his eyes filling with bloodshot veins. "What did you do to Kuroobi and the others?"

"Oh? You caught on pretty quickly."

Li Mingyuan chuckled softly.

"Fish-Man Karate isn't something a human like you should be able to use."

"I don't know how you managed to imitate it, but even if it's Fish-Man Karate, Kuroobi is a master of forty-dan Fish-Man Karate. Some of his habits make his Fish-Man Karate fundamentally different from everyone else's! As his fellow countryman for all these years, I could tell at a glance. What you used was Kuroobi's Fish-Man Karate."

Arlong split his mouth into a vicious grin, sharklike fangs filling his mouth as he stared at Li Mingyuan with a terrifying expression. "Could it be that you..."

"Why ask? You should have already guessed, seeing all these Fish-Man corpses on the ground."

Li Mingyuan said indifferently, "There was never any reason for me to spare them."

"Damn it... damn it!"

Arlong clenched his teeth and roared, "A mere inferior race dared to harm my brethren!!"

"You alone, I will never forgive—"

As he spoke, Arlong suddenly turned and looked toward Arlong Park's main building.

Without caring that his back was exposed to Li Mingyuan, he charged straight toward one section of the main building's wall and slammed his hand forward. The wall was like tofu, instantly punched through with a huge hole.

"Ha!!"

Arlong gave a fierce shout and abruptly pulled his hand back.

In his hand was a huge serrated cleaver, pulled from some room beyond the wall.

The great sawblade, Peak Cutter.

Other than the tough body innate to a Fish-Man, it was Arlong's only weapon.

At that very moment, when Arlong had just turned around, Li Mingyuan's ear twitched slightly.

He heard the heavy sound of rubble being pushed aside behind him.

So, without stopping Arlong, Li Mingyuan focused his attention on Hachi instead.

"Nyuu! My chest hurts so much, it feels like my heart was almost stopped by that punch!"

With a clear fistprint on his chest, Hachi staggered to his feet. He barely supported himself with his six swords, facing Li Mingyuan again with a grin. "What? Did you think you could defeat me just like that?"

"...You can still stand?"

"If I were you, staying down and not getting back up would be the wiser choice."

Li Mingyuan said solemnly.

To guard against the usual One Piece sit-up comeback, he had deliberately combined Chakra taijutsu with Fish-Man Karate's Thousand Brick Fist. Using the Sharingan to observe the acupoints, he had struck directly at Hachi's heart. With the combined force of two different power systems, it would not have been strange for an ordinary person's chest to burst apart on the spot. Yet even so, he still could not kill Hachi with one punch.

It seemed that at the level of a Fish-Man officer, just like the situation on the cargo ship before, their physical toughness had clearly risen to another level. They were no longer opponents whose chests he could casually punch through.

"What's with your eye? It suddenly turned red."

At that moment, Hachi seemed to notice something. He rubbed his eyes with his tentacle-like hands and looked at Li Mingyuan in surprise. "Did one of my swords cut it?"

"Hm? This?"

Li Mingyuan was rather surprised. "I can't believe you noticed."

"So far, you're the first person to notice the change."

"But it's a secret."

Li Mingyuan smiled. "I'll tell you after you die."

"Nyuu! What a big mouth!"

Anger flashed through Hachi's eyes. He raised all six swords and shouted, "Don't think you've won just because of that! You only caught me with a surprise attack. Using Fish-Man Karate was too underhanded! Now I'll show you what true Six-Sword Style is!"

"Six-Sword Style, Octopus Jar Technique..."

Hachi brought all six blades together, their tips aimed at Li Mingyuan.

Then, as Carina and Nami watched the scene tensely while holding their breath, Hachi's mouth suddenly opened without warning.

"Actually, it's Octopus Hachi's Inky Black!"

Facing Li Mingyuan, Hachi suddenly sprayed out a huge mass of black ink.

Caught completely off guard, Carina, who was closest to Li Mingyuan, was sprayed directly. Everything around her was turned pitch-black as well.

"Hahaha! You completely fell for it!"

Seeing this, Hachi smugly curved his eyes and could not help laughing. "Nyuu! That's what you get for underestimating me!"

Hachi had barely finished speaking.

The next second, another voice sounded behind him.

"So your so-called Six-Sword Style is just spraying ink."

"What a disappointment."

Hachi shuddered and abruptly turned around, instinctively preparing to swing his six swords again.