Decisive Kill

Humans were the most complicated creatures in the world. No outsider could truly see the heart hidden beneath the skin, and some people had never even understood their own.

There was a saying that made a lot of sense: only two things in the world could not be looked at directly—the sun and the human heart.

Rubick was one of those people. A streak of darkness lurked inside him, born of his unusually active imagination in his previous life.

When he was young, writing a story based on a picture had been a major part of Chinese class.

Most people wrote three to five sentences. Better students could manage a short story. A real expert could casually churn out an eight-hundred-word essay.

Rubick, though, could imagine an entire story on the spot, complete with scenes playing in his head like a movie.

Since it was all fantasy, Rubick could play the hero or the villain. Fortunately, he had grown up with a strong sense of right and wrong, so the villains in his imagination never made it into reality.

Thanks to his self-restraint, those dark ideas stayed in his head. The real world had laws, and he had never possessed the power to ignore them.

But in the world of pirates, the darkness deep inside him seemed to be taking root. With his abilities, he could do whatever he pleased.

Luckily, just as he was about to lose himself, Todd's bucket of seawater brought him back to his senses.

The seawater had temporarily stripped him of his Devil Fruit powers and pulled him out of the darkness. But the shock was like pouring cold water straight onto an overheated machine. Rubick was lucky his mind had held together; he could thank his newfound mental resilience for that.

"Old man, are you okay?"

Zoro stood beside Rubick and cut down two pirates with a backhand swing. Seeing that seawater worked on Rubick, the pirates had actually sent some men to fetch more, while the rest kept Zoro busy.

Rubick shook his head. The daze felt like the hollow exhaustion of returning to his dorm after spending an entire college weekend at an internet café with his roommates.

Seeing that Rubick was himself again, Zoro cursed. "Old man, you nearly lost your mind back there!"

Rubick got to his feet, clutching his forehead. "I couldn't help it. My last life was too stifling. Mortgage payments, being single past a certain age, everyone pressuring me to get married... If I hadn't played games every day, I would've fallen apart."

Zoro stared blankly. Mortgage payments? Single past a certain age? Pressure to get married?

He ventured, "Old man, you're getting on in years. How about a trip to the red-light district when we get back? I won't tell Nami."

Zoro wasn't stupid. After years in the East Blue, how could he not know what the establishments beside every dock were for? Marines, pirates, bounty hunters—spend enough time at sea, and sooner or later the strain got to them.

If they didn't find somewhere to unwind, they might end up turning on one another aboard ship.

Rubick still had his hang-ups about that sort of thing. He wasn't keen on visiting a brothel; he'd rather take care of himself.

"We'll talk about it later. First, let's deal with these people and find out where the villagers went."

Rubick looked at the pirates around them and said quietly, "I'm no saint, but now that I've stumbled into this, I have to see it through."

Zoro chuckled. Rubick was an interesting man.

With his wits back, Rubick wasn't about to let anyone douse him again. The Smoke-Smoke Fruit's power swept through the pirates.

Within minutes, the pirates surrendered, though most had already fled.

With Zoro's sword pressing down on him, Todd knelt on the ground with his hands over his head.

"I saw you standing behind Red the Blood Blade earlier. You're his second-in-command, aren't you?"

Rubick asked, "So where are this village's people?"

"Uh, another pirate crew took them north. I don't know exactly where."

Zoro was stunned. Pirate crews working together? He and Rubick exchanged a look. There was more to this than met the eye.

"Why are you doing this?"

Rubick lowered his voice. In his previous life, he'd heard that the lower your voice, the more intimidating you sounded. Of course, you couldn't leave your vocal cords at home.

Todd froze for a moment. Rubick pressed him again. "Why are you doing this? Pirates usually loot a village and leave immediately. You didn't run. You even pretended to be villagers and waited here for someone to show up."

Rubick rested his cutlass on Todd's shoulder. "Talk, or I'll take off an arm."

"I'll talk! I'll talk!"

Todd stopped hiding anything and spilled it all.

The Blood Blade Pirates and the Iron Fist Pirates had both been hired by a noble from the Goa Kingdom. Their job was to capture commoners and deliver them to an island in the north.

"The island doesn't have a name. We call it the Red House because there's a bloody prison there holding a lot of people. We don't know where they go after that."

Todd was nearly in tears. Rubick's cutlass had already broken his skin. "I heard they send them to mines to dig ore! It's true! That's all I know!"

At the mention of mines, Rubick's anger surged again. This time, Zoro immediately shouted, snapping him out of it.

"Old man, what's wrong now?"

Rubick said slowly, "Right after I left my hometown, pirates captured me and forced me to work in a mine. If the Marines hadn't happened to rescue me, I'd be dead."

"But this won't be easy to deal with."

Zoro kept a level head. Nobles were involved now, and the two of them weren't nearly strong enough to settle a matter like this.

The Goa Kingdom was a member kingdom recognized by the World Government. If it put a bounty on their heads, they would have no choice but to become pirates. That was exactly what Zoro didn't want.

He hadn't decided to become a pirate.

Rubick lost his nerve too. If pirates alone had taken the villagers, he could have tried to rescue them with his Smoke-Smoke Fruit powers. But if a noble was behind it, he genuinely didn't dare.

"Then let's take Red's body. We can leave these small fry to fend for themselves."

With no villagers left in Withered Leaf Village, letting the pirates go would do little harm. Besides, Todd had said they'd already killed a small Marine patrol. If there was no word from the patrol by tomorrow, a larger force would come to investigate. The pirates wouldn't escape then.

Zoro killed Todd with a single slash and said, "I think we should destroy their ships before we head back to Hammer Town."