Violet: Let Me Take a Peek~

When the dancer finished her dance, the crowd dispersed.

Wude walked toward the arena together with the pirate he had been chatting with.

Rounding a small alley where there was no one around, Wude threw a punch straight into the pirate's abdomen.

"You—" Caught completely off-guard, the pirate dropped to his knees, a gun barrel pressed right against his forehead.

Wude beckoned to the lackeys trailing behind in the distance. "A few tens of millions of Berries—not a bad haul. Lock him up first."

"Understood." The lackeys tied the pirate up tightly and carried him off.

At the corner of the alley, a small head poked out. She looked at the "human trafficking" scene in panic, terrified to the extreme.

Wude glanced at the little one hiding behind the wall, not caring in the least.

Young Violet discovered that the human trafficker was looking at her, and she let out a frightened screech.

As he drew closer, she waved her hands in panic and backed away. "I-I'm not worth much! Don't traffic me!"

"Little one, are you under some sort of misunderstanding about me?" Wude was simply passing by; this path led to the arena.

"Didn't you just catch someone?" Violet said in a small voice.

"He's a pirate," Wude chuckled, then walked right past the little girl and headed toward the arena.

"Eh?" Violet tilted her small head and quickly followed. Wude looked at the little one in bewilderment.

She pressed the tips of her index fingers and thumbs together, making an OK-like gesture, flipped her hands over, and placed them in front of her eyes to observe Wude.

"Ah, the big brother isn't lying!" Violet said.

"Violet?" Wude harbored suspicions in his heart regarding the identity of this little girl.

When he first saw a little girl of around ten years old, he hadn't recognized who she was.

His deepest impression of Violet was of the dancer performing passionate dances many years later.

Yet the powers of the Glint-Glint Fruit allowed him to recognize her.

Just like Scarlet, she was a princess of Dressrosa and the daughter of King Riku, though she was younger than Scarlet.

"Does big brother like catching pirates for money?" Violet trotted around Wude's side, pattering along as she asked with curious-baby inquisitiveness.

Realizing he was not a bad person, she was no longer scared.

After all, she could tell whether people were lying and even read what was "currently" on their minds.

"That's right." Wude nodded, arriving at the arena to buy tickets.

Violet continued to use her ability, looking at Wude.

Kuroh stood in front of Wude, blocking her view.

"Huh? Something's blocking it. I can't see big brother's thoughts anymore." Violet lowered her hands in surprise and patted the air in front of her in confusion.

Kuroh dodged aside.

She raised her hands once more, attempting to peek at the big brother's current thoughts again.

Kuroh blocked her again, and it was gone.

Violet's tender face was filled with perplexity; she kept seeing an aura of ominous death, devoid of thought and extremely chaotic in spirit.

"Did you see anything?" Wude smiled as he watched her. He, too, wanted to know what Kuroh's mental state was like.

Logically speaking, it ought to be a storage vessel for some of his memories, yet at times it would lose control and do strange things.

Kyros's duel... I want to watch. Kuroh stared inside the duelling arena, repeating what Wude had once said.

"I saw it!" Violet gave a small, happy hop. She saw that enveloped in the black, ominous aura of death was a cluster of fragmented memories.

[Wude stood on an island, gazing into the distance. He looked at Kyros's figure in the newspaper, speaking of going to watch Kyros's duel.]

When IBMs dueled one another, colliding heads produced the effect of exchanging fragmented memories.

Wude was indeed very interested in how outsiders could view an IBM's memories.

As for how Violet came to view Kuroh's memories, he discovered there were two conditions: first, Violet had inadvertently seen Kuroh's head earlier; second, Kuroh had unintentionally repeated Wude's words at that moment, precisely meeting the condition where the Glint-Glint Fruit could only see what the target was "currently" thinking.

Fortunately, Violet's ability wasn't that legendary true mind-reading; it couldn't read memories.

Violet continued to look, but when Kuroh didn't speak, she couldn't see anything at all.

She was utterly full of curiosity about this big brother who had caused her ability to fail repeatedly.

Wude arrived at the spectator seats of the arena and watched the competitors' match in the middle of the field.

Before long, young Violet came running over with two packs of snacks in her arms. She sat down next to Wude and handed over a pack of snacks.

"Please have this, big brother."

Wude took the snacks. He suddenly realized something: he was actually quite popular with children along this journey.

Down in the arena, two competitors fiercely crossed swords.

In the stands, numerous spectators waved their hands and cheered.

Wude watched for a short while before losing interest; he was here to watch Kyros's match.

Wude looked around, while little Violet had no interest in the competitors either. She grabbed a snack in one hand and propped her chin in the other as she looked at the mysterious big brother.

"Aren't you curious, big brother, about why I can see what's on people's minds?" Violet dangled her little legs, swinging them back and forth.

"I am curious. Care to tell me why?" Wude lowered his head with a smile, then looked back toward the contestants' entrance.

"You're so perfunctory," Violet complained as she chewed on a snack. "I'm a Glint-Glint Fruit user, you know. What kind of ability user are you, big brother?"

"I'm not an ability user." Wude flicked his fingers, his eyes lighting up as he saw Kyros enter the arena.

Instead of looking at that Kyros, Violet used her ability to look at Wude.

Pity that Kuroh was squatting right between their seats, blocking her line of sight with its backside.

Violet clutched her little head; she had bumped right into Kuroh.

Find the area of little Violet's psychological trauma.

"There's something blocking big brother." This time, Violet finally understood why her ability worked sometimes and failed at other times.

She reached out with her small hands to shove Kuroh aside, but since she couldn't see it, she could only grope around blindly. Kuroh kept dodging, and she kept searching.

Wude paid no mind to the "hide-and-seek" game between the little girl and Kuroh, keeping his eyes on Kyros in the arena.

"Spectators and friends, this is Kyros's 2,800th match! I wonder if he can secure his 2,800th victory? Let's all wait and see!"

No sooner had the host finished speaking than a large group of people hurled trash down into the arena, cursing Kyros as a murderer.

"That murderer is definitely going to be killed by his opponent today!"

"Why don't you just go die, Kyros? Hahaha!"

Among the crowd were people whose family or friends had been murdered, angrily cursing Kyros. Of course, there were also a few who backed Kyros and worshipped the strong.

Yet strangely enough, the people supporting Kyros were very few.

"I heard that a friend of Kyros's was killed, and he was avenging them, right?" Wude asked Violet.

"That's right," Violet replied.

Was Kyros really cursed by so many people just because he killed someone? Are you sure it wasn't for injuring King Riku?

Wude smiled.