He covered his face, his voice muffled through his fingers. "I... I... Ah! This is so humiliating!"
Lowering his hand, Shanks looked grief-stricken and indignant, as if he had suffered an enormous injustice. "It was that old witch Imu! An eight-hundred-year-old fossil! Black-hearted and even more ruthless!"
Under everyone's shocked gazes, he poured it all out. "After Captain Roger disbanded the pirate crew back then, I... I did go back to Mary Geoise once... After all, it was where I was born."
He paused, finding it difficult to speak. "Then... Imu summoned me. That old witch was smiling and said something like, 'Welcome home, bloodline,' before leaving some kind of 'Abyss Mark' on my left arm. She said it was 'proof of returning to the embrace of God'!"
"Later, I couldn't stand the Celestial Dragons' ways anymore and decided to leave, to give up my identity. When I went to Imu to remove the mark, she acted especially 'straightforward.' With a wave of her hand, she said, 'The mark has been removed. Take care of yourself.'"
The more Shanks spoke, the angrier he became, until he slammed his fist into the ground. "But! It wasn't removed at all! She just buried that damned mark even deeper! Like a time bomb! Waiting to stab me in the back at a crucial moment! To make a fool of me before the whole world! Turn me into that hideous thing! I nearly hurt Miss Robin too!"
By the end, he practically wanted to beat his chest and stomp his feet, desperate to find a crack in the ground to crawl into.
Robin somehow produced an intact white porcelain teacup and elegantly took a sip.
She set down the cup, her voice gentle yet striking Shanks's heart like a heavy hammer. "Mr. Shanks, this