Kujaku: "That historian Robin can push a template this far on the first day? Is she actually a genius?!"
Doll: "To trigger fusion mode her very first time using a template… if she's given enough time, just how far is she going to grow?"
Hina: "Ever since Robin ran into Arton, he's mentioned her in his diary a lot. That's more than enough for her to rack up a ton of points."
Domino: "If Robin dumps all those points into training, as long as she doesn't slack off, she should get stronger really fast."
Sadi: "Even before she got a template, that woman Robin was doing everything she could to seduce Arton just to get more page time in his diary. Now that she's got a template, who knows—maybe she'll really cut loose and go all-out on seducing him."
Mikita: "Miss All Sunday… don't tell me she's going to treat Arton the same way she does in those stories he draws of her?"
Paula: "I really want to see what kind of 'works' Robin has in her diary copy, and how they differ from the ones in mine."
Kalifa: "Once I track down Robin, maybe I should take lessons from her. If you don't loosen up, you don't get chances. Hmph! Even that Ain managed it—there's no way I can't."
Out on the sea, a massive pirate ship was charging forward along its route at top speed.
At the very front of that ship, an extremely tall beauty stood gazing off into the distance.
Any pirate from the New World would instantly recognize her—one of the Big Mom Pirates' Sweet Commanders, Smoothie.
"Signora's template… and now Robin has already taken hold of both ice and fire." In the future, she'll probably become one of the strongest people at Arton's side." Smoothie murmured to herself as she looked at her diary copy.
"Big Sis, you rate Robin that highly?" Smoothie's younger sister, Cinnamon, walked up behind her curiously as she asked.
"Mhm." Smoothie nodded and said. "You saw it earlier too. Arton's diary said that, for the sake of power, Robin used every bit of charm she had, using her own body to tempt him."
"To make herself appear in Arton's diary as much as possible, she's done a lot. I even think that in the parts we don't see—where Arton isn't writing anything down—she's probably already crossed the line."
"Crossed the line?!" Cinnamon repeated in shock.
As Smoothie's younger sister, she naturally understood what this "line" her sister mentioned meant.
In Arton's works, once the distance between the male lead and the heroine goes negative—when things progress that far—that's what they called crossing the line.
"Robin's really that bold?" Cinnamon muttered under her breath.
"Don't underestimate people who've lived in the underworld, Cinnamon," Smoothie said with a shake of her head.
"Someone like Robin—when it's time to show resolve, she will show resolve. She's been searching for the Poneglyphs for a very long time."
"But she hasn't gotten much in the way of results. Arton, on the other hand, knows the locations of many Poneglyphs thanks to his… special circumstances."
"If I were Robin, I might go even further than she has."
At that point, Smoothie couldn't help licking her lips a little, a faint blush creeping onto her face.
She was thinking about all those works Arton had left behind in her diary copy. She had never imagined that a man would depict her in that kind of way.
Things like the peace sign pose—if it were the old her, she'd probably never even imagine herself doing that.
That said, Smoothie was rather interested to see whether Arton really had what it took to make her flash a peace sign.
Chapter 436 – Throwing Away Your Charm for Nothing Is Not a Good Thing
"Si… Sis, you're not thinking about those scenes from his works right now, are you?" Cinnamon saw her own big sister with flushed cheeks and ragged breathing, and couldn't help asking.
"Hehe, well, the artistic value in that man's works is pretty high." Smoothie said. "It's only natural that I think of them from time to time, isn't it?"
Hearing that, Cinnamon's mouth twitched hard.
Artistic value is pretty high? What a joke. Where in the world was there any artistic value in those works?
If you had to say they had something going for them, then it was probably just that the creator paid an extreme amount of attention to detail.
But Cinnamon would much rather Arton not be that focused on detail.
Because Arton's illustrations paid too much attention to detail, there were times when Cinnamon felt a strange sense of disorientation.
As if she had really once faced Arton in person and fought him the way the version of her in those works did.
Thinking of this, Cinnamon suddenly felt her body temperature start to rise. Without meaning to, her legs began to twist around restlessly.
"Hehe, don't you also think back to those scenes from his works, Cinnamon?" Smoothie said to her little sister with a big smile on her face.
"I… I… ahh…" Cinnamon let out a long sigh.
"Hehe." Smoothie patted Cinnamon on the shoulder and said, "Anyway, since we've already put out to sea, we should be prepared the way Robin is."
"In fact, we should aim to do even better than Robin. Only that way will we have the chance to get a template from Arton."
"And then, we might be able to make Arton join Mama's pirate crew. Just so happens, as members of the Longleg Tribe we can do a lot of things that ordinary humans can't."
"Even though I don't know what the works in Robin, Nami, and Uta's diary copies are like… I think Arton should really enjoy spending time with women who are one size bigger than he is."
"After all, there are things that ordinary humans simply can't do, but we can."
"Mm… let me picture it. Something like this—lifting Arton up like this, and then he's just hanging there in midair…"
Cinnamon stared wide-eyed at her sister and hurriedly cut her off.
"Si… Sis, please don't say any more." Cinnamon said, her face bright red. "Anyway, I'll be mentally prepared."
"That's the spirit." Smoothie nodded in satisfaction. "You have to know, I'm really looking forward to you working with me—hoisting Arton up into the air together, then wrapping him up in our arms."
"Alright, alright, don't make that face. I won't say any more."
Watching her sister turn back around to face the sea ahead, Cinnamon finally breathed a sigh of relief.
If she kept talking like that, Cinnamon felt like in a little while she'd have to go to the bathroom and take a nice long bath.
"Come to think of it, Mama has always really wanted Robin, who can read the Poneglyphs, to join the Big Mom Pirates."
"If she knew what kind of potential Robin has now, she'd definitely want to get her even more."
Looking at the video of Ace and Robin confronting each other in the diary copy, Smoothie muttered under her breath.
"If we want Robin to join our pirate crew, there's no way we can do it without Arton's consent." Cinnamon said. "Even if she really were willing to come over to our side, once she betrayed the Flameblade Pirates, Arton would definitely take back the power he gave her, right?"
Granted, up to now, Arton had never once taken back a character template from any of his crew.
But Cinnamon felt that was only because no one had truly betrayed Arton yet.
If someone really did betray Arton after getting a template from him, Arton would, with high probability, reclaim that template.
That was one of the reasons Cinnamon felt conflicted about this trip. If it was about sacrificing a bit of her own charm to seduce Arton, that wasn't impossible.
After all, since Smoothie had already made that kind of decision, as the little sister she ought to keep in step with her.
What she was afraid of was this: she would sacrifice her own purity, get a template from Arton… but then Arton would still refuse to join the Big Mom Pirates, and in the end Arton would take the template back.
Wouldn't that mean the purity she sacrificed had all been wasted?
....
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