Chapter 295: Cocoyasi
The parchment document bore the crest of the local royal family and the kingdom's official administrative seal. If one wanted to pursue maximum formality, these documents ought to be notarized and filed with the World Government.
When kingdoms traded with one another, they were usually happy to let the World Government act as a mediator. At the very least, in situations like this, the World Government was still considered trustworthy in the eyes of most.
However, the World Government was fundamentally just a makeshift organization formed because Imu couldn't be bothered to handle too many administrative affairs, and its efficiency was abysmally low.
When Noland applied to enter the Grand Line, the approval process was stalled for years. Because of this, kingdoms often chose to settle such matters privately.
As long as the Heavenly Tribute was paid in full, the World Government didn't care what the people below were doing.
"Fifty years?"
Jack stood by the ship's railing. The flask of strong liquor he had brought from the Sabaody Archipelago was already bottoming out. He didn't seem to understand the significance of the number fifty.
Fourteen or fifteen-year-old citizens of Fish-Man Island were still just children in the eyes of most people, but in reality, these kids were practically indistinguishable from adults. Teenagers like Shyarly and Jack were already undertaking the same duties as full-grown adults.
This applied to habits, too—like Shyarly's bubble pipe smoking, which she had picked up at some unknown point.
Although Jack didn't smoke, he had quite a strong fondness for hard liquor. Arlong didn't mind him drinking, but he kept a close eye on the boy to ensure he didn't overindulge.
It wasn't for any noble reason; Arlong was simply terrified of the catastrophic damage a drunk, rampaging Jack could cause.
"Fifty years is more than enough. Who knows what this place will look like in half a century? Our people can leave when the lease expires, but by then, we need to make sure the locals miss us and can't bear to see us go. Though... I'll probably be retired by then."
Jack didn't reply, simply staring out at the rolling waves.
The oceanic environment of the Four Blues was entirely different from the Grand Line. It lacked that primal, violent ferocity. Even on a windy day, these seas felt incredibly tranquil to the Fish-Men.
Compared to the apocalyptic tsunamis that routinely threatened to destroy everything in the New World, these little waves were nothing more than child's play.
Having confirmed their destination and finished resupplying, they set a course for their target. After some time, they arrived at the specific coordinates circled on their nautical chart.
"Nyu, Arlong-aniki, that village... it doesn't look very wealthy," Hatchan noted.
In the distance, the faint silhouette of curling chimney smoke gradually came into view. A small village appeared before them.
Cocoyasi Village, a rural settlement with a tropical climate.
Prosperous port towns weren't so easily manipulated. Even with heavy bribery, it was difficult to secure total control. But an isolated little village like Cocoyasi was a completely different story.
In fact, Arlong had specifically chosen this place.
In this context, poverty was actually an advantage. Poverty meant loose order and a weak grip from the ruling kingdom. The tax collectors would only show up once a year.
The residents' concept of their own kingdom would be incredibly vague, nowhere near the absolute authority and loyalty Nereus commanded over the Ryugu Kingdom.
What Arlong needed wasn't the immediate, direct income of a bustling port. He needed a piece of land that was barren enough, marginalized enough, yet conveniently connected to the main maritime routes.
As the ship docked, the ambient noise on the pier noticeably dropped several octaves.
It wasn't the typical panic of seeing pirates; rather, the bizarre, alien appearance of the crew members terrified the locals.
Drying fishing nets still dripped with water, and mooring ropes lay scattered across the docks. A few dockworkers in coarse linen shirts stared in horror at the figures descending from the ship.
It couldn't be helped. Fish-Men who possessed almost entirely human-like features—like Nereus and Jack—were an extreme minority in their race. Those with highly distinct, prominent aquatic features like Arlong and Hatchan were the overwhelming majority.
But Arlong paid no mind to their stares. Appearances didn't dictate everything. Their very purpose here was to dissolve the fear born of the unknown.
Unlike the Arlong of the original timeline—who sought only to flaunt his racial superiority and derive sick satisfaction from brutalizing the weak—the current Arlong arrived with peaceful intentions.
"Don't be afraid, everyone. We're going to be spending a lot of time together from now on," Arlong called out. "My name is Arlong, from the Ryugu Kingdom in the Grand Line."
At that moment, a man wearing a brown uniform, a windmill sticking out of his hat, and a flintlock pistol at his waist stepped forward.
"Who are you people, and what are you doing here?!"
"Hey, hey, hey, that's incredibly rude of you. Didn't I just introduce myself?" Arlong sighed.
"My name is Genzo, the sheriff of Cocoyasi Village."
Genzo finally registered Arlong's stated purpose. As the sheriff, he essentially functioned as the village chief and was the highest-ranking official this small settlement had to offer.
"Perfect. If you're the sheriff, you should recognize this."
Arlong stepped forward and presented the signed lease agreement to Genzo.
Seeing the kingdom's official administrative seal and the signature of a high-ranking royal minister on the document, Genzo was in sheer disbelief.
"This..."
"If you think it's a forgery, you are more than welcome to verify it. But this is an unalterable, established fact. Starting today, this village and the surrounding region are officially under our jurisdiction."
With that, Arlong pulled a coin from his pocket. It wasn't an ordinary Berry coin, but a highly pure gold coin.
Flicking it into the sunlight, the gold coin traced an arc through the air before landing flawlessly in Genzo's breast pocket.
"A small greeting gift. I don't want any unpleasant misunderstandings, so it would be best if you cooperated with us. Please inform everyone in the village; otherwise, things will get difficult for everyone.
"We won't enter the village today. You have all afternoon and the entire night to make sure the whole village understands the situation. However, the docks belong to us for now."
Arlong waved his hand, leading Hatchan and the others back to the ship to start unloading supplies and setting up camp on the pier. For Fish-Men, camping right by the water was the ideal environment.
Staring at the copy of the document Arlong had handed him, Genzo felt incredibly conflicted. As a rural sheriff, he had virtually zero political connections and no way to immediately contact high-ranking officials.
(If this were the original timeline, Genzo wouldn't have even been able to find a channel to report Arlong, forcing the village to live under his tyranny.)
The most he could do was call his direct superiors, and he had no idea when they would actually respond.
However, even as a low-level official, Genzo knew how to identify official kingdom documents. Based on his experience, the lease was ninety-nine percent authentic.
After pinning a notice explaining the situation to the village bulletin board and instructing a few villagers to spread the word, Genzo headed toward the outskirts of the village.
Behind a modest house lay a sprawling tangerine orchard. A woman with pink hair was hard at work among the trees. As Genzo rounded the third row of trees, he heard the sharp snip of shears cutting away a diseased branch.
"Bell-mère."
The woman didn't turn around, simply tossing the clipped branch into a bamboo basket at her feet. The basket was full of yellowing leaves, giving off a bitter, sappy scent.
"What are you doing here in the middle of the day?"
"Something happened in the village, so I came to tell you. A... Fish-Man calling himself Arlong showed up with official documents. The kingdom has leased this entire village and the neighboring towns to them."
Genzo pulled the gold coin from his pocket. It even had a faint indent from where he had seemingly bitten it to test it.
"They gave me this. It seems to be real gold."
"Why would they give you that?"
"He said it was a 'greeting gift.' Maybe because... I'm the sheriff?"
Bell-mère took the coin, rubbing her thumb over its surface before giving it a test squeeze. The weight and color confirmed it was indeed pure gold.
"How generous..."
Violently threatening ordinary citizens for protection money versus casually handing out solid gold coins as a greeting were two vastly different approaches. The average monthly income in Cocoyasi Village was around 150,000 Berries. A solid gold coin was an incredibly rare treasure here.
In the original timeline, the protection money Arlong extorted pushed the villagers to their absolute limits—leaving them with just barely enough to survive, where even the slightest accident would lead to irreversible tragedy.
"What do you make of it?" Genzo asked.
"I don't know. This is my first time dealing with Fish-Men. But if the documents look real, and the gold is real..."
"Fish-Men... I heard stories about them back when I was in the Marines," Bell-mère murmured.
Bell-mère used to be a Marine. When the villagers first found out she joined, they were incredibly proud; for a tiny village to produce a Marine was a huge deal. Plus, she had been notoriously known as the village delinquent, so it was a surprising turn of events.
She had served for nearly five years. Five years ago, during a brutally fierce battle between the Oykot Kingdom and pirates in the East Blue, both sides suffered catastrophic casualties.
A heavily wounded, dying Bell-mère had stumbled upon Nojiko carrying a baby Nami. Dragging her battered body, she brought the two orphans back to her hometown of Cocoyasi, retired from the Marines, and took on the role of their adoptive mother.
"Do you know anything about them?" Genzo asked.
"I've never met one personally. But when I first enlisted, my commanding Ensign used to be a navigator for a fleet in the Grand Line. He had a deep, visceral... terror of the Fish-Man race."
"Why? Because of how they look?"
"I'm not sure, he never went into details. But once, when he was heavily drunk, he mentioned that a Fish-Man named Nereus had slaughtered everyone on his entire warship. He was the only survivor and suffered from severe PTSD. After that, he transferred back to the East Blue to be a drill instructor for recruits."
Marines in the Grand Line were privy to certain classified truths, but aside from a tiny fraction of elites, Marines in the Four Blues didn't even qualify as cannon fodder, so they naturally knew very little about such matters.
"So... do you think this is a bad thing?"
"I don't know," Bell-mère shrugged. "But... if they were just here to pillage, they wouldn't be handing out gold coins, would they?"
Arlong wasn't incapable of handling matters diplomatically; it simply depended on his ultimate goal. By handing out that single gold coin, he had already subtly opened a door.
And that was only the first step.
"Hello! Is anyone here?! Are these tangerines for sale?!"
Before Bell-mère and Genzo could reach a conclusion, a loud, energetic female voice suddenly called out from the front of the house.
Hearing someone wanted to buy her tangerines, Bell-mère instantly ignored Genzo, wiped her hands on her apron, and hurried out front.
"Selling! Of course I'm selling! Just a minute!"
Raising two orphaned girls on her own in Cocoyasi Village was no easy task. Her family wasn't wealthy by any means, and the meager income from selling tangerines was their most vital source of livelihood.
However, when she stepped outside, Bell-mère saw a female Fish-Man with fins on her shoulders and webbed fingers.
Arlong had a few soldiers like her on his crew. Their primary duty was to initiate initial contact with humans. Compared to the terrifying visages of Arlong or Hatchan, Fish-Men with more human-like appearances were much easier for locals to accept, which was exactly why Arlong sent them out to purchase supplies.
"You're..."
"I'm a soldier of the Neptune Army," the female Fish-Man smiled warmly. "Could you please fill this entire cart for me?"
"Of course!"
Seeing the thick wad of Berries in the woman's hand, Bell-mère had absolutely no reason to refuse. She immediately started plucking fresh tangerines from the trees, and Genzo—who had come to discuss the village's crisis—ended up being drafted as a farmhand.
This village wasn't wealthy; their economy relied entirely on agriculture and livestock. Arlong's strategy was simple: play the role of the "Generous Benefactor" and massively inject cash into the local economy to build a positive reputation.
Combining his own ideas with Shyarly's divination, Arlong firmly believed that paving the way with money was the absolute optimal solution.
And judging by Bell-mère's reaction, it was incredibly effective.
Similar scenes were playing out all over the village. Arlong's subordinates were aggressively purchasing massive quantities of fresh vegetables, fruits, and meat at slightly above-market prices, preparing for a massive banquet by the docks.
Hatchan had already set up his massive takoyaki stand. With all six arms moving in perfect unison, he was grilling various meats and enthusiastically inviting the villagers to come over and eat. Most of them were still hesitating, too scared to approach, but the ice was slowly breaking.
"Arlong-aniki, so what exactly is your grand plan here?" Hatchan asked.
"My plan? I'm going to build the most luxurious, massive amusement park in the entire East Blue right here! I'm going to turn this place into the ultimate entertainment holy land that every kid in the East Blue dreams of visiting!"
"Sure enough, Arlong-aniki's head is still completely full of amusement parks..." Hatchan sweatdropped.
"I told you I saw him hanging around Sabaody Park, but you didn't believe me..." Kuroobi muttered to another crewmate.
Arlong's declaration prompted a wave of whispers among the crew. It was completely in character for him.
However, theoretically speaking, building a Ryugu Kingdom-themed amusement park here could actually be a highly effective diplomatic and economic bridge.
"Arlong-aniki, you aren't expecting us to build it, are you...?" Hatchan asked nervously.
While they had plenty of funding from the Ryugu Kingdom, given their small crew size, it would take them years to finish construction.
"Of course not! The average wage here is incredibly low. There are plenty of laborers in the surrounding areas we can hire to build it. Does anyone else have any suggestions?" Arlong asked casually.
Jack suddenly stood up.
"I firmly believe we must construct a massive, towering statue of His Majesty Nereus right in the center of the park. That way, when this village becomes prosperous, they will all know exactly who it was that changed their lives."
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