"Kid…"
Rabiz stared at Raifeng without blinking, his gaze locked as if he feared looking away for even a second. His face was tight with wariness and dread, fists clenched so hard his knuckles whitened—panic leaking through every strained breath.
He didn't know Raifeng's true strength.
But one thing was undeniable.
This child had just done something absurd—something that shouldn't have been possible.
In the blink of an eye, more than three hundred men had dropped.
Not wounded.
Not driven back.
Simply… erased from the fight.
That alone was enough to make one conclusion painfully clear:
This kid was anything but ordinary.
And then there was the bigger problem.
The Marines had no reason to send a single person to die.
Only now did Rabiz understand the trap.
They hadn't sent someone to be killed.
They had sent someone to do the killing.
Even with the situation laid bare in his mind, Rabiz still couldn't accept it—couldn't make it fit reality—that a child barely six or seven years old could wield a power that terrifying.
It was beyond reason.
He drew in a deep breath, forcing the tremor out of his lungs.
"…That just now. Was that you?"
Raifeng smiled.
"They were too noisy. I helped you make them quiet for a while." His eyes curved with faint amusement. "I assume you don't have any… objections."
He took a step forward, calm as a breeze.
"Besides, this made things convenient. Just like I guessed—I found you right away."
Raifeng's voice stayed light, almost casual, as he spoke the name like reading a bounty poster aloud.
"Captain of the White Bear Pirates. Rabiz. A pirate worth 110,000,000 Berries"
The method had worked perfectly.
In one sweep, the irritating fodder had collapsed—
And in the same instant, it became obvious who the leader was.
Only a few seconds had passed.
Conqueror's Haki really is something else.
Rabiz's expression tightened further.
"So it really was you…"
His heart pounded so violently it felt like it might crack his ribs.
A child. Six or seven.
Yet what he'd done was so clean, so unnatural, so incomprehensibly efficient that Rabiz's instincts screamed at him to treat this "kid" like a monster.
If he approached this with normal caution…
He'd die.
The Marines truly were vile.
To think they would throw a weapon like this onto his deck.
Rabiz's men—what few were still standing—stared at Raifeng in shaking disbelief.
"T-Then what did you do?!" one pirate blurted, voice cracking.
Their heads still rang, as if something had slammed through their skulls and rattled their brains loose.
What had happened?
They couldn't even describe it.
Couldn't even understand it.
What kind of power could drop hundreds in an instant?
It was too exaggerated. Too absurd.
Their limited experience showed itself plainly—no matter how hard they tried, they—
Couldn't imagine the cause.
Raifeng's smile didn't change.
"Relax. They're just taking a nap."
His gaze drifted over them, unhurried.
"But it's funny… you still have time to worry about other people."
His tone sharpened slightly—not aggressive, not loud.
Just final.
"Right now, the ones you should be worried about…"
He lifted his eyes.
"…are yourselves."
Rabiz swallowed hard.
"All of you—be careful," he warned, voice heavy. "This kid… is dangerous."
Even as a pirate with a bounty over a hundred million, Rabiz couldn't ignore what had just happened.
Not for a second.
Raifeng exhaled once—like he was done talking.
"Alright."
He reached to his waist.
"And now it's time to send you on your way."
A slow metallic whisper slid into the air as he drew his katana.
Sunlight spilled across the blade, turning its edge into a thin line of blinding gold.
Then—
Raifeng moved.
The speed was so sudden it didn't feel like motion.
It felt like he had simply stopped being there.
Dust exploded from the deck where he'd stood.
BOOM!
Rabiz's eyes snapped wide.
"So fast—!"
"He disappeared?!"
His pupils whipped left and right, desperate to catch a trace.
The next instant—
SHK!
A burst of blood sprayed into the air.
A pirate's head rolled across the deck, spinning and thumping before coming to a halt.
The body followed a heartbeat later—collapsing in a wet, boneless drop.
Blood splattered across Rabiz's back.
Every hair on his arms rose.
Fear, pure and suffocating, flooded his body.
One pirate was down.
Not wounded.
Decapitated.
The remaining pirates froze, faces bleaching white.
"D-Dead…?"
They hadn't even seen the strike.
They hadn't even seen the attacker.
Only when the corpse fell did their minds register the truth:
Someone had died.
It was too fast.
Too clean.
Too impossible.
One of them began to shake uncontrollably.
"T-This thing… this guy's a monster…"
They were breaking—mentally collapsing under the pressure.
How could they fight something they couldn't even see?
The gap between them wasn't a gap.
It was a cliff.
Rabiz clenched his fists until his nails bit into his palms.
"W-Where is he?!"
His face twitched, jaw spasming.
This was the first time in his life he'd faced an opponent who made him feel this helpless.
And the worst part—
The opponent was a child.
A child.
In his mind, Rabiz screamed.
A six or seven-year-old… with strength like this?
How the hell did the Marines raise something like that?
He's only seven!
SHK!
Another spray of blood.
Another pirate dropped.
A severed head arced through the air in a clean parabola—passing right through Rabiz's line of sight—before bouncing into the corner near the railing and rolling several times before finally stopping.
The stench of blood thickened the air.
Rabiz's throat tightened.
"I… I can't even tell where he is!"
The realization hit like a hammer.
Fear rooted itself in his chest—then multiplied, swelling and spreading until it threatened to swallow everything else.
It was like standing alone in a pitch-black pit—unable to see the walls, unable to see the ceiling—
Unable to see the thing hunting you.
In a place like that…
The moment fear is born, it doesn't stop growing.
SHK!
SHK!
Two more bodies fell in rapid succession.
The White Bear Pirates' ship—so crowded moments ago—became an empty slaughterhouse.
Within less than ten seconds, the four pirates who had still been conscious after the Conqueror's Haki wave were all dead.
No resistance.
No counterattack.
They couldn't even spot Raifeng's shadow before their heads left their shoulders.
Now—
Only Rabiz remained standing.
Rabiz snapped.
"Kid! Get out here!"
He swung his fists wildly at the air around him, as if punching the emptiness could drive the terror away—like a desperate man trying to convince himself he still had control.
Then a voice answered him—calm, almost amused.
"For someone with a bounty over a hundred million…"
Rabiz froze.
"…your nerves are pretty weak."
Raifeng appeared.
Not behind him.
Not above him.
Just… there.
Less than five meters away.
He held his katana loosely at his side.
The blade was drenched in red, as if it had just been lifted from a pool of blood.
Drip.
A bead of blood slid off the edge and tapped onto the deck.
Drip.
Another followed.
The smell of iron and death drifted on the wind and settled over the ship.
Raifeng—only seven years old—
Stood in front of Rabiz, the infamous pirate captain worth over a hundred million—
And yet Rabiz felt pressure like a mountain was descending on his chest.
He couldn't breathe.
He couldn't move.
And for the first time since becoming a pirate—
Rabiz understood, with complete clarity:
He was standing before something far beyond him.
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