This Way Is Blocked

Miming ignored their stares, rushed into the palaces along the way, and devoured everything in sight. After wiping his mouth, he continued running toward the sea.

Cairns had ordered a huge tableful of food prepared in advance—a standard Celestial Dragon banquet, enough for twenty people. In the past, only a bite or two would be taken from each dish, but this time, Miming wolfed down every last dish on the table.

The passing Celestial Dragons stared in disbelief. What a vulgar way to eat!

"Put on your bubble helmets!" Every Celestial Dragon felt endangered. Saint Jalmack's Son had broken his bubble helmet when he descended to the lower world, and he had even come into close contact with Marines during his rescue. Was that why he had become like this? He had gone completely mad! It was an infectious disease—definitely an infectious disease!

Miming raced all the way toward the sea. When he reached the final platform, he found that the Marines had built an incredibly imposing base there, filled with bunkers and artillery emplacements. The port five nautical miles away was the gateway to the West Blue. Each of the four great roads leading down from above was guarded by such a Marine base, along with a massive port capable of accommodating fleets from the Four Blues.

Standing at the edge of a hundred-meter cliff, Miming looked up and found that the sky seemed to be split in two. One half had clouds, while the other did not. The cloudless side stretched beneath a clear blue sky without a single wisp of cloud, and even the sea below was as calm as a mirror. The cloudy side had terrible weather, as though a storm were about to break, with fierce winds and surging clouds. The contrast was so stark that it looked as if a blade reaching from heaven to earth had cleaved the sky in half.

"Fifty nautical miles in that direction is the Calm Belt." Seeing Miming's interest, Cairns hurriedly offered his knowledge. "Mary Geoise is the center of the world. There is a Calm Belt on each side of it, each about five percent of a latitude wide—roughly eight hundred kilometers. The Grand Line lies between the two Calm Belts, while the Four Blues lie beyond them."

"The Vasa Port leading to the West Blue, which we are facing now, is close to the Calm Belt. That is why we can see such a wondrous sight."

But what Miming was calculating in his heart was something else entirely.

Mary Geoise covered an enormous area. The residential and defense zones outside Pangaea Castle alone were more than two hundred kilometers across, while the wilderness forest around Mary Geoise was as wide as the Grand Line. That meant it was nearly two thousand kilometers wide. With Calm Belts on both sides, one had to cross a Calm Belt to enter the Four Blues.

In other words, if someone wanted to free a slave in Mary Geoise, they would need to set fires throughout a vast capital spanning over ten thousand square kilometers. Then, after their shackles were unlocked, the slaves would have to run dozens of kilometers to leave the residential zone, then another thousand kilometers to leave the forest, then another eight hundred kilometers to cross the Calm Belt... Along the way, they would have to cross walls even giants could not scale, fight through countless Marine bases, and finally reach a port. For the overwhelming majority of slaves, only by reaching the Four Blues could they return home.

Impossible! This route would not work!

Miming reached that conclusion almost instantly. Even if they were given a hundred carriages, there was no way they could escape from the Holy Land of Mary Geoise!

The powerful Fish-Man hero Fisher Tiger could climb an eight-thousand-meter cliff with his bare hands, but ordinary people could not! Simply smashing open the cages and letting them escape on their own was utterly impossible—!

And what about the slave collars? They would explode once someone left the Holy Land, and they would still explode if forcibly removed! They would blow a person's neck right off. To escape, the slave collars had to be removed first.

A bolt of thunder crashed down, and raindrops the size of beans fell from the sky as the sea began to churn and roar. Yet the turmoil in Miming's heart was even more violent. What he had known in his previous life had been nothing more than a story, but what stood before him now was a bloody reality. Reality was not only heavy—it could also be changed!

But this future had to become reality. Because if Boa Hancock could not escape during the slave liberation incident started by Fisher Tiger, then she would never become the Pirate Empress. She would remain a slave forever!

What should he do? Secretly send the three sisters away, or wait and watch for Fisher Tiger's escape?

Under Cairns's astonished gaze, Miming leaped from the cliff top and plunged into the raging sea!

For an ordinary person who had yet to master even a single move, that was far too dangerous! Worse still, as a Devil Fruit user, Cairns could not jump into the sea to save him!

But Cairns immediately calmed down. He could sense that Saint Jalmack's Son's heart had originally been unsettled, yet as he struggled amid the raging waves, it gradually became calm.

A huge wave crashed over him, and Miming sank beneath the sea. Yet Cairns did not panic. This was his ability. As a Dog-Dog Fruit user, he could sense his master's emotions and even every change in his body. Miming had sunk to the seabed, but he was neither struggling nor unconscious. He had deliberately done this. As the depth increased, the rolling waves gradually became calm. Miming floated in the water, and as his mind settled, the energy within his body began to slowly merge.

Cairns did not know the exact details of the Empowerment Ritual, but he knew that Saint Jalmack's Son possessed a great deal of energy within his body. He had to transform that energy into his own physical capabilities in order to possess that power permanently.

Who knew how long had passed before a massive Sea King appeared some distance away, perhaps merely by chance. But Cairns, who had been waiting at the cliff top the entire time, let out a roar and chopped the crown off a large tree with one palm. Using it as a sharp spear, he hurled it down with all his strength! The trunk tore through the air like a cannonball, sparking flames as it flew. With a soft hiss, it pierced the sea and struck its target precisely. The Sea King, dozens of meters long, was swimming through the water without even knowing what had happened when its head was pierced clean through!

Miming, immersed in his own world, was startled awake. He opened his eyes in the pitch-black seawater, immediately felt suffocated, and swam desperately toward the surface. He emerged and gulped down fresh air.

At some point, the storm had dispersed. The sea on the West Blue side was also beneath clear skies.

Miming finally felt exhausted and swam toward the shore. Cairns leaped down from the cliff top, stepped through the air several times as though walking down stairs, then crossed the distance in a few strides and landed on a nearby reef. He dragged Miming from the sea.

"Congratulations, Saint Sanming!" Cairns could sense that the volcanic energy within Miming's body had finally subsided.

"Cairns, how long has it been?" Miming asked, gasping for breath.

"Five days," Cairns said.

Miming was startled. He had stayed underwater for five days without breathing?

Life Return was truly that formidable. As long as there was still strength within the body, one could directly transform energy into whatever the body needed, mobilizing every cell and absorbing energy directly.

The problem now was that the energy injected by the Twelve Gods during the Empowerment Ritual had been used up, while the strength this body could produce remained pitifully weak.

Looking at Cairns's slightly reddened eyes, Miming suddenly realized that this capable agent had been watching over him without taking his eyes off him ever since they had fled Pangaea Castle.