"Milady, are you all right?"
"Kaya, why are you here…!"
Kaya slumped backward and emerged from the bushes just as her butler Mary came dashing out.
As Mary wrapped an arm around Kaya's shoulders, Usopp on the opposite side saw them and pushed himself up.
"Looks like you heard everything, Milady Kaya—along with Mary and Usopp, no less."
"This is bad, Captain."
Cro and Jango, who had also leaped out of the bushes, looked up at Kaya, Mary, and Usopp and spoke.
"So you heard it all, Usopp?"
"Wh-what do you mean?! We just got here and haven't said a word…!"
"Don't try feeding me that rubbish, Sop."
"Lu-Luffy…!"
As Usopp spoke, Luffy stood up with Nami and said,
"Nami, why'd you stand up? You could've stayed hidden."
"Uh…something felt like it had to happen…?"
"…You really can be offbeat sometimes."
"R-really?"
"The more people you have to protect, the more dangerous it gets…"
"Hey, you guys!"
The moment Luffy said that, Jango shouted and everyone on the cliff looked down at him.
He shook the rope tied to a ring with a hole in the middle from side to side and continued,
"Watch this ring closely. When I say 'One, Two, Jango,' you'll all fall asleep."
"Th-that thing…is going to shoot a beam from that ring?!"
"Sop, where did you get the idea I'd make you fall asleep? Sounds like I'm using hypnosis."
As Jango shouted to the sky, his eyes met Luffy's.
What the hell is with that guy's eyes…why are they glowing?
"One! Two! Jang…!"
In that instant, a beam of light fired from both of Luffy's eyes, enveloping Jango's ring and face.
CRACK
"Jango…?"
Cro looked down at the fallen Jango and muttered softly.
Shattered sunglasses and shards of the ring were embedded in his mangled face, and his body lay motionless.
"It, it really was a beam from his eyes!!!"
"Shut it, Usopp! My ears are ringing!"
It was startling that Kaya and Mary showed up here out of the blue, but now it's fine.
With the most annoying hypnotist out of the way, there's no way I'll lose.
"Ma-Mary! What's wrong?"
"Mary!"
"…!"
At Kaya's shout, Usopp called for Mary and dashed past her.
Seeing that, Luffy and Nami quickly turned their heads toward where Mary lay.
"Guhhh…kuul…"
"She's asleep!"
"Only did One, Two, and she's out—guess the butler must be weak to hypnosis."
"Oh, is that so?"
"Thank goodness…!"
Right after Nami and Luffy said that, Usopp and Kaya answered.
While the three of them, except Luffy, dragged Mary and leaned her against a nearby tree, Luffy walked the path between the cliffs toward Cro.
Seeing Luffy, Cro strapped on claws—five one-meter blades connected to the backs of his hands—and spoke.
"Why are you butting in when you're not even from this village?"
"Because I can't just watch them all die, especially one guy."
"Is that a reason to risk your life?"
"Of course, but hey, if I don't die, it's no big deal, right?"
"Even right before death…"
He bent his torso forward and spread his arms, claws ready.
"You think that makes sense?"
At that moment, his body vanished.
SWISH
Before anyone could react, he reappeared diagonally across from Luffy.
Luffy rested his elbow at his side and said,
"Done already?"
"You cut my arm but didn't even draw blood…so you were counting on my body being tough, huh?"
"That's not all… I can do something similar to you."
"Don't you know how screwed you are yet?"
"Stop messing around!"
Cro took the same stance again.
He vanished instantly and reappeared from another direction.
"I couldn't sense slicing—where did you go…?"
"Behind you."
"…!"
SWISH
Cro swung his claw at Luffy, who had been standing behind him.
"How did you…catch my harpoon?!"
"Harpoon, is that what you call it?"
As he spoke, Luffy's body vanished, reappearing about ten meters from Cro.
"How do you know how to catch a harpoon?!"
"I call it a 'cheek,' one of the 'meat-eating' moves."
"Shut up!"
There was no one this fast in East Blue.
Time to stretch the body after a long time.
The two of them vanished simultaneously.
They reappeared and vanished again immediately.
They repeated this vanish-and-appear routine, and from afar, Nami spoke up.
"I can't see them moving…is it some kind of teleportation?"
"…No."
"Usopp?"
"I can see it…they push off the ground in an instant, moving so fast it looks like teleportation!"
"Is that even possible…?"
"But Luffy is faster."
"Luffy reaches where Cro will go first and dodges his attacks!"
"You can see that?!"
Usopp described the moment they kicked off the ground.
He could faintly see their silhouettes flying through the air as they moved at incredible speed.
Luffy moved fastest, with Cro arriving second.
"Why…why does none of my hits ever land!"
"Isn't that obvious?"
As Cro continued to dodge Luffy's attacks, he shouted at him.
"It's because of the huge gap in our physical abilities."
"Besides, you can't handle my speed, so you can't even get to the target correctly."
"What I don't get is this!"
"Despite not knowing where I'll attack, you still manage to get there first and avoid me!"
"Ever heard of [Observation Haki]?"
"…What?"
"Never mind that."
[Observation Haki] is one of the three types of Haki, a power that lets you strongly sense the movements of a target you've recognized.
The higher your [Observation Haki] level, the farther you can perceive movement—even detecting Kaya and Mary here was thanks to it.
Few elite fighters train blindfolded and get beaten just to awaken it—it's even harder to master than [Armament Haki].
With that in mind, Luffy delivered a knife-hand strike that shattered the five blades on Cro's right hand,
and at the same time kicked toward Cro's left leg,
CRACK
"Gyaaaaa!!!"
Cro fell as his knee bent the wrong way.
Like splinters of wood clinging to a broken branch, his shattered leg thrashed along with his body.
But I've only been training my body and just recently awakened [Observation Haki].
[Armament Haki] can awaken like that sometimes, but you can't do it with [Observation Haki]—maybe this is thanks to my Devil Fruit?
Anyway, I was hoping for a proper sparring partner…but this is disappointing.
"The Klehas!"
As Luffy thought that and looked at Cro, Kaya yelled from the cliff above.
"It's dangerous, Kaya! Your condition isn't good…!"
"So you really came here for money from the start?"
"Milady…"
Hearing Kaya's voice, Cro propped himself up with his arms and Kaya continued shouting.
"All those three years you showed me…was it all lies?"
"If that's the case…what will you do?"
At Cro's words, Kaya drew a pistol from her waist and shouted.
"Stop this now! I'll handle Usopp's friend—leave the village!"
"…You've changed a lot over three years, haven't you? Do you remember?"
"When your father died and you refused to eat or drink, I managed to feed you."
"..."
"We went to the village together, sailed on a ship together."
"We suffered together, we rejoiced and laughed—I've been at your service all this time."
Kaya recalled Cro's words.
She imagined his current face overlaid with the face he wore as they once walked together, smiling.
"It's been a long time—three whole years."
"The Klehas…"
"All of that…was dedicated for today, to kill you!!!"
"…!"
Tears streamed down Kaya's face at Cro's words.
Cro stared at her and, with his intact claws and unbroken leg, pushed off the ground and ran up the slope between the cliffs.
Seeing Cro like that, Nami beside Kaya shouted,
"Luffy!"
"..."
"What are you doing! Why are you just standing there?!"
Even with Nami's cry, Luffy remained motionless.
Kaya, shaking all over, dropped her pistol, and Cro kept running, yelling,
"Do you know how humiliating it was for me, a pirate, to pander to some little girl like you?!"
"No!"
As Nami grabbed Kaya and pulled her down, they both hit the ground,
BANG!
"Usopp…?"
Cro stopped in front of Usopp, who was holding two pistols.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
After the four shots rang out, Cro's body fell backward.
His body rolled down the slope between the cliffs.
"Kaya…I…"
"Usopp!"
Kaya, lying on the ground with Nami, leaped toward Usopp.
Usopp fell backward with Kaya in his arms as she cried against his chest.
"Usopp…Usopp…!"
"It's, it's okay, Kaya…it's okay."
As Usopp embraced Kaya with trembling hands, Luffy looked down at Cro's body, which had rolled to a stop in front of him, and spoke,
"A pirate who's afraid of being known by name, hiding…was it really that much for you to stand up to some girl?"
"Yet you liked the infamy you gained as a pirate, did you?"
Luffy looked at the corpse bleeding from holes in its head, chest, hands, and feet and continued,
"Living alone doesn't make you human; the difference between humans and animals is having an identity beyond merely being alive."
"A pirate, a butler, unable to decide to be anything—what kind of human are you?"
Passing by Cro's corpse, Luffy walked up the path between the cliffs and said,
"Captain Cro, you are 'Disqualified as a Human.'"