Cocoyasi Village had once been a peaceful, quiet place.
The villagers were simple and warm-hearted, neighbors living in harmony with one another.
But ever since the Arlong pirates invaded, life under the brutal rule of these fish-men had become a constant threat. Every hour, every moment, the villagers lived in fear.
And while the Arlong pirates were the obvious cause of it all, the villagers placed the greater blame on someone else: the marines, who were supposed to protect these waters.
Right now.
At the gates of Arlong Park.
The villagers of Cocoyasi had been herded together by force.
Their eyes told the whole story. The fear in them ran bone-deep, impossible to erase. Ten years of brutal occupation had long since crushed whatever will to resist they once had.
Hundreds of villagers, men and women, young and old, stood in silence under the watch of a single fish-man, one ugly and towering in equal measure. That was all it took to keep them in line.
This was the scene that greeted Lius and the others when they arrived.
"Everyone! Are you alright?"
Still some distance away, Nami waved at the crowd, her face lit with emotion. Her eyes swept through the crowd, searching for the man in the pinwheel hat.
"Ah, it's Nami! And Nojiko too!"
"Wait, weren't we supposed to keep Nojiko hidden? Why is she here?"
Confusion rippled across the villagers' faces. Nami's sudden appearance brought no relief. If anything, unease settled over them.
"Where's Genzo? I don't see him anywhere."
Nami smiled, though the effort showed, and scanned the crowd again. No one answered. The villagers all looked away, heads dropping one by one.
"Ahaha, Nami, you're back! Better go report to captain Arlong right away!"
The fish-man guarding the crowd had spotted her now. He broke into loud laughter, though every bit of it was loaded with mockery. "As for that old geezer, did he actually think handing over ten million beli would let the villagers off from paying taxes? What a joke."
"This is tribute paid to us fish-men. You think we'd ever let treasure leave our hands just because some lowly humans asked nicely?"
He hadn't paid a single bit of attention to Nami's reaction the entire time. Maybe he just didn't care.
"So. What happened to Genzo?"
Nami's head was down, her bangs falling across her face, hiding her expression completely.
Lius, standing just beside her, glanced over. The corner of his mouth slowly curved up into something cold and hungry.
"Aha! He's inside the park right now, getting the water torture from the boss. Who knows if the old man's even still alive!"
The fish-man raised a hand and pointed back at the gates behind him, snickering as he spoke.
"….I will kill you all!"
The words had barely left his mouth when Nami snapped her head up.
That bright, youthful face was consumed by fury. Her eyes, so rarely like this, blazed with killing intent.
She moved.
The next instant, she exploded forward like an enraged tigress, her whole body blurring into a streak of motion.
That small fist of hers packed hundreds of units of power.
It hit the towering fish-man like a cannonball. The force detonated on impact, sending him flying straight into the gates of Arlong Park. The doors, solid stone and built to last, cracked all over in an instant.
Then, as the villagers and Nojiko watched in disbelief, the gates gave way with a sharp crack, crumbling apart into rubble. The fish-man crashed down with them in a thunderous collapse, and the inside of the park was exposed to the open air.
The laughter died immediately.
Fish-men who had been fooling around just seconds ago all turned toward the gates at once.
In the rubble, the one who had been watching the humans lay flat on his back. Blood poured from every opening on his face. A fist-shaped indent had caved in his chest. He was completely still.
Nami stood at the entrance, fists clenched tight, glaring at them.
"What... just happened?"
Arlong, who had been stretched out on a beach chair in a casual beach outfit, stood up slowly, his expression shifting from disbelief to something colder and harder as his eyes landed on Nami.
"Hey, little Nami. Don't tell me you brought help."
"Have you thought through what it means to go against us fish-men?"
As he spoke, that flat, indifferent gaze of his swept across the people standing behind Nami. Every villager it landed on felt the instinct hit them before conscious thought could, heads dipping under the weight of ingrained fear. Nojiko was no different.
Everyone, except for one.
A black-haired boy Arlong didn't recognize. He looked right back, perfectly still.
"Where is Genzo?"
Nami ignored Arlong's threat entirely.
"She's here for that old man!"
Hachi, the six-armed fish-man, put it together right away and shot a glance out toward the sea beyond the park entrance.
Nami swept one last withering look over the fish-men, then turned her back on all of them and walked in that direction without a second glance.
"Hmm?"
Arlong's brow tightened. A heavy, murderous intent flickered behind his eyes.
"I'll go teach her a lesson myself. Just because she's got some ability doesn't mean she gets to act like our equal."
Sensing Arlong's anger, Kuroobi stepped forward without hesitation and said offhand to the crew around him, "Take care of that human kid. Anyone who kills one of our own doesn't get to walk away."
Then he turned to leave.
Whatever had happened to Nami, anyone who dared to harm a fish-man would pay a terrible price. Nami was too useful to the crew to be killed outright, but punishment was certain, and it would extend to every last villager in Cocoyasi. That was how the fish-men had kept her in line all these years.
That was how it used to work, anyway.
Just as the fishmen moved to chase Nami, the black-haired boy they'd been ignoring walked right through the gate of his own accord.
"You fishmen really have gone too far."
Lius swept his gaze across the fishmen and spoke with obvious irritation. "Nami is my navigator now. If she cries because of you, don't expect to leave here in one piece."
It was meant to be a threat.
But for some reason, hearing it from this black-haired boy stirred absolutely nothing in the fishmen's hearts. If anything, some of them felt like laughing.
Arlong looked at Lius like he was staring at an idiot and scoffed. "Just another brat who doesn't know his place."
"But if he managed to beat Arno, he must have some skill!"
Hearing that, Hatchan immediately volunteered. He stepped forward with six long blades in hand, blocking Lius's path.
"Kid, you've offended Big Bro Arlong. So tell me, how do you want to die?"
The moment the words left his mouth, Hatchan stepped within three meters of Lius and felt it. A pressure like a mountain crashing down on him. It was as if the person standing before him wasn't some human boy, but a supreme being whose very presence was as heavy and terrifying as a mountain.
Bang!
His knees smashed into the ground. He knelt there, straight-backed and frozen, right in front of Lius.
Every fishman in the park sucked in a sharp breath at the same time.
What... what just happened?