"Seven years old… and already at the level of a Marine Headquarters colonel…"
"My god…"
"This feels like a dream."
The marines watching couldn't stop talking, still drowning in shock.
Seven years old.
Colonel-level strength.
What did that mean?
Give him time…
What kind of realm would he reach?
They didn't know.
They didn't even dare imagine it.
But the impossible had happened right in front of them.
"Mr. Raifeng… is he even human?"
Koby's throat was dry as he spoke.
"I still remember the fight from two days ago."
Helmeppo's eyes were wide with disbelief.
"Two days ago, Mr. Raifeng was getting toyed with. Two days later, he's fighting Colonel Bogard evenly!"
"Can you imagine it, Koby?"
"Just a few days ago, Mr. Raifeng trained with us under Vice Admiral Garp's devil training."
"Back then, Mr. Raifeng was actually weaker than us."
Koby's eyes widened.
He remembered it too—those early days.
When Raifeng first showed up, during that hellish training…
Raifeng really did look like a newbie.
Worse than them.
But now?
Only a few days later—
Raifeng had undergone a complete rebirth.
He wasn't just ahead of them.
He was in a completely different world.
Koby and Helmeppo had personally watched Raifeng grow at a terrifying speed.
Gulp.
Koby swallowed hard, his heart pounding.
The fight was over—
but its process and result left every marine on the ship shaken.
A Marine HQ colonel, fighting a seven-year-old to a draw?
It was unbelievable.
The entire deck stayed strangely quiet.
Eyes full of reverence locked onto that small figure holding a katana at center stage.
Then—
the atmosphere exploded.
Silence turned into pure chaos.
"God—what did I just watch?!"
"Mr. Raifeng fought Colonel Bogard to a draw!"
"This is insane!"
"Raifeng is only seven!"
Voices overlapped.
Bogard sheathed his saber and rubbed his waist, looking at Raifeng with a pained expression.
"Kid, you really hit hard. Not a shred of mercy."
Even now, his waist still ached.
No bones were broken, but he'd definitely need a few days to recover.
Raifeng smiled, also putting away his katana.
"Well, you're Colonel Bogard. If I don't take it seriously, I'll get taken out at any moment."
"And besides…"
"You tried to end it fast at the start—like you wanted to one-shot me."
"That scared the life out of me."
The duel ended there.
A draw.
Raifeng, fighting with everything he had, had forced a stalemate against Marine Headquarters Colonel Bogard—
a man with superb swordsmanship and the Marines' Six Powers.
Even Raifeng found the outcome surprising.
He hadn't expected to become this strong after only two days of accumulation.
Strong enough to face an HQ colonel head-on.
That thought filled him with a bright, restless excitement.
Two days ago, the distance between them had been huge.
Two days later, Raifeng had closed it—by force.
"So my strength has reached the HQ colonel level…"
For the first time, Raifeng had a clear benchmark for himself.
Bogard wasn't some ordinary colonel.
As Garp's longtime right-hand man, Bogard ranked near the top among Marine HQ colonels.
And since Raifeng could fight him evenly—
that meant Raifeng would also rank near the top among HQ colonels.
"Without even noticing…"
"I'm not weak anymore."
"Even out on the seas, this strength is enough to protect myself."
"And all of it…"
"I built it in just five days."
"The system has only let me sign in five times."
Five sign-ins—enough to fight a Marine HQ colonel to a draw.
Raifeng's excitement only grew.
Then what about ten sign-ins?
Twenty?
A hundred?
How strong would he become?
The more he thought, the more eager he got.
"Kid!"
A loud voice cut in.
Garp.
Garp stepped up beside Raifeng, wearing a strange expression.
"I'm curious. What the hell happened to you in these two days?"
Bogard clearly wanted the answer too.
Two days of growth this absurd—what did it take?
Raifeng tilted his head.
"Is it that hard to accept my progress over two days?"
"If you take what I told you before—and actually apply it to what you just saw—this won't feel so impossible."
Garp froze.
Bogard froze too.
"…What did you say before?"
Bogard asked instinctively.
Raifeng's tone was calm—almost helpless.
"When I told the truth, you two didn't take it seriously."
"So I'll say it again."
"I, Raifeng… had never touched swordsmanship before my match with Koby."
"That was the first time I ever used a sword."
"And if you compare that to what you're seeing today…"
"You won't find it so hard to swallow."
"In short—my improvement didn't suddenly start in these two days."
"From the moment I first touched a sword, my swordsmanship has been skyrocketing."
"Back then. Today. Every day."
"It's just a shame…"
"Neither of you believed me."
With that, Raifeng carried his katana and walked away, leaving only a deep, unreadable back view behind.
On the spot—
Garp and Bogard stared at each other.
Their eyes widened, filled with shock and horror.
Their thoughts turned into a tangled mess.
Wait.
So when Raifeng fought Koby…
he really was using a sword for the first time?!
"He never lied?"
"He was telling the truth…"
"And we forced our own interpretation onto it?"
"So…"
"This kid really just started learning the sword?!"
"And it hasn't even been a week yet?!"
Garp was stunned.
If you looked at it like that…
Raifeng's growth over these two days didn't feel quite as impossible.
But then—
after thinking about it again—
Garp became even more confused.
Not even a week of sword training…
and he could already fight Bogard to a draw?
Who was he trying to fool?!
Bogard's swordsmanship was built on decades of training and refinement.
How could someone reach that level in days?
Talent?
What kind of talent could do something this monstrous?
Calling it "genius" wasn't enough.
This wasn't genius.
This was an aberration.
A freak.
A monster.
"V-Vice Admiral…"
Bogard stammered, barely able to speak.
So his decades of swordsmanship…
had been matched by someone with less than a week of experience?
Bogard's head buzzed.
He fell straight into existential doubt.
"Hold on…"
"Let me calm down first."
Garp waved a hand, rubbing his forehead, trying to organize his scrambled mind.
Fake.
Yeah.
This has to be fake.
But—
damn it—
the kid's words just now…
somehow sounded logical.
And that made Garp want to scream.
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