"You want me to join the World Government?"
Zoro lay face-down on the chair. Blood seeped from the wound on his back, dripping slowly through the gaps in the chair onto the deck, but his voice remained unusually clear.
He wasn't stupid. He could hear the meaning hidden beneath Carina's words.
If he wanted to catch up to those two, he had to walk the right path.
And clearly, joining the World Government was the most direct one.
"That's up to you," Carina shrugged openly, "I'm just delivering an invitation on behalf of Princess Shirahoshi. She thinks you have good potential. Of course, the most important reason is that Kuina personally asked her for a favor."
"Kuina... asked Princess Shirahoshi for a favor?"
Zoro tightened his grip on his sword until his knuckles trembled.
The person he had always been chasing had ended up helping him in this way.
To a swordsman's pride, it was almost cruel.
"Haa..."
He took a deep breath and slowly let it out.
Then he raised his eyes and focused on the battle in the distance. The two seemed to have slowed down compared to when they first started.
Even so, he could still only barely make out one silver and one black sword shadow crossing through the air.
There was no burst of Haki.
No exaggerated waves of sword energy.
The two of them were simply crossing blades in the most straightforward way possible, colliding with nothing held back except their understanding and comprehension of the sword.
"I don't hate the World Government," he said quietly, his voice low but steady, "But I won't join them for now."
"If you don't join now, you won't get the same offer later."
Carina looked at him in surprise, but couldn't help trying to persuade him once more.
Given the current situation, opposing the World Government in this world was no different from suicide.
Though Zoro's attitude couldn't really be called opposing them.
But with such a broad road laid out before him, why refuse to take it?
Pride? Without strength to back it up, pride wasn't worth a single coin.
Only with strength and status would others truly respect you.
Without strength, no matter how stubborn you are, you'll only become a joke people will laugh about in passing.
"I don't need it."
Without turning around, Zoro kept his eyes fixed on the distant battlefield.
"I have my own road to walk. Until I reach its end, I won't lower my head. That's my choice as a swordsman."
As he spoke, he kicked the dagger lodged between the deck planks beside him.
It spun half a circle through the air before landing steadily in his hand.
If Mihawk could reach that height, there was no reason he couldn't.
.
.
.
[Half an Hour Later]
"Kuina. That's your name, right?"
The sea that had churned for the past thirty minutes gradually calmed.
Mihawk drifted back onto the deck from atop the waves, casually returning the enormous black cross sword to his back.
There wasn't a trace of blood on his clothes.
Only a few extremely fine cuts marked his chest and sleeves.
His breathing remained steady, though a few strands of black hair at his temples had been dampened by sweat and clung to his face.
"You're very good."
He looked calmly at Kuina as she landed on the deck as well, "When I was your age, I was nowhere near your level."
"Thank you for going easy on me," Kuina nodded slightly and bowed to Mihawk.
Her clothes also bore several faint cuts, but she had no real injuries.
Only the back of the hand holding her sword showed an extremely shallow red mark.
She smiled slightly.
"Senior Mihawk, fighting you has taught me a great deal."
If not for Zoro's interruption, and if they had simply compared swordsmanship, she might not have lost to Mihawk.
In terms of overall strength, she really was inferior to him.
But purely in swordsmanship, one had learned from Gion, while the other had been humbled by Gion's blade and spent his entire life chasing after her back.
Their understanding of the sword wasn't actually that far apart.
It was just that after meeting Zoro, Mihawk seemed to have figured something out.
His sword now carried an additional trace of unwavering resolve.
Kuina accepted her defeat calmly.
She was still young.
She could afford to lose.
If anything, every defeat became nourishment for her growth.
"Senior Mihawk, I'll take you to meet my teacher."
"Good," Mihawk nodded slightly, "Thank you."
His hawk-like golden eyes slowly narrowed.
At last, the moment had finally come.
Crossing blades with Gion again had been his only obsession for over ten years.
And now...
He was finally about to fulfill it.
———
The events at the sea restaurant ended with Mihawk defeating everyone.
The Straw Hat Pirates didn't leave empty-handed, either. After Luffy invited him, Sanji naturally joined the crew.
As for Sanji joining, everyone else on the ship was speechless.
Speechless enough that they almost wanted to laugh.
Aside from Luffy, practically everyone aboard had ties to the World Government.
And yet, according to Shanks, Luffy would one day become the one who opposed the World Government.
Nami couldn't figure out what exactly this crew was supposed to use to oppose them.
After leaving the sea restaurant, Nami followed Carina's plan and told the others about Arlong.
With everyone's agreement, the Straw Hat Pirates set out to defeat Arlong.
That stretch of the journey could be summed up in four words: everything went smoothly.
According to the script, Arlong's appearance in the East Blue had been arranged by the World Government from the very beginning as a stepping stone.
If Luffy and the others were going to fight enemies and grow stronger along the way, they needed an opponent of the right caliber.
He couldn't be too weak, or the world wouldn't see the Straw Hats' rise.
Nor could he be too strong, or it would be too unreasonable and uninteresting.
Arlong's strength happened to be right in that sweet spot.
Having Luffy's group defeat him was perfect.
So along the way, aside from Luffy enthusiastically helping Nami deal with Arlong, everyone else was basically just going through the motions while watching the show.
Zoro practiced his swordsmanship.
Usopp treated it like a vacation.
Sanji practiced cooking.
As for Nami, she had already cursed Carina and the others a thousand times in her heart.
———
Fighting all the way, they finally reached Cocoyasi Village and arrived at the entrance of the newly built Arlong Park.
Up to this point, everything was still within the script's planned range.
The journey even left Nami in a daze.
It was too similar.
Other than the villagers not actually being abused, the current Arlong Park was almost identical to the one Shirahoshi had casually erased years ago.
It almost made her lose herself in the memories.
But this was where the script took a small turn.
At the center of Arlong Park, Arlong sat in his chair, his saw-like teeth gleaming coldly in the sunlight.
When he saw Luffy and the others arrive, he didn't burst into mocking laughter as the script called for.
Nor did he put on the arrogant superiority of a fish-man.
He simply sat there quietly, looking down at the humans who had entered with a complicated expression.
Or rather... at the orange-haired girl standing at the front.
"Arlong!"
Nami's fists clenched so tightly that her nails dug into her palms without her noticing.
Eight years. It had been eight years since Arlong had been casually disposed of by the World Government, while Nojiko and her adoptive mother had joined the World Government.
For those eight years, she had imagined this moment countless times.
She had imagined how she would feel if she ever met him again.
But now that the moment had actually come, only one simple question remained stuck in her throat.
"Why did you come to the East Blue back then? Why did you bully people who couldn't even defend themselves?", Her voice trembled.
Not from fear. From anger.
The anger she had buried for eight years had finally found somewhere to erupt.
Back then, she had been too young to have any say.
Everything had been decided by Nojiko and her adoptive mother.
She'd had no choice.
Now that the opportunity was in front of her, she only wanted to settle what had happened back then.
So many of her friends had died.
Even her adoptive mother had almost died.
Arlong didn't answer immediately.
His rough fists slowly tightened on his knees.
As he squeezed harder, veins bulged across the backs of his hands one after another.
"Heh..."
"Hehehe..."
"HAHAHAHAHA!"
Suddenly, Arlong threw back his head and laughed.
There wasn't a trace of joy in that laughter.
It sounded more like the final howl of a beast driven into a corner.
"Why?"
He lowered his head, his blood-red eyes fixed on Nami.
"You're asking me why?"
"You think I wanted to come to the East Blue and bully insects like you?"
"You think I, Arlong, had nothing better to do than break out of prison just to build some Arlong Park in this godforsaken place?"
Arlong suddenly rose from his chair.
His massive fish-man body radiated intense killing intent.
Yet none of it was directed at the people before him.
He wasn't answering Nami's question at all.
He was simply lost in his own madness over reality.
Or rather, in his eyes, there had never been anything wrong with coming to this little village and killing people in the first place.
"Brother Jinbe and Brother Tiger, they risked being hunted down by the World Government to break me out of prison."
His voice slowed, every word forced through clenched teeth.
"I thought... I was finally free."
"I thought I could finally return to the Sun Pirates and follow my brothers again."
"But..."
He paused.
For the first time, a broken expression appeared in those blood-red eyes.
"I had barely escaped."
"I hadn't even reached Fish-Man Island."
"Shirahoshi, that damned World Government lapdog, that traitor to the merfolk, captured me."
"After she caught me, she didn't send me back to prison."
"She told me the whole truth."
Arlong slammed his fist into the glass pillar beside him.
Bang!
The pillar shattered, fragments scattering everywhere.
"The World Government has never treated us fish-men as people!"
"To them, we're just tools they can use however they want!"
"Brother Jinbe rescued me because he treated me as family."
"But the World Government let Jinbe rescue me because they needed me!"
"What did they need me for?"
"They needed me to come to the East Blue and build this Arlong Park."
Arlong turned toward the boy wearing the straw hat.
"They needed me to wait here..."
"To wait for that brat named Monkey D. Luffy to come with his companions and defeat me!"
Luffy's pupils contracted instantly.
He opened his mouth, instinctively wanting to say something.
But the words caught in his throat.
He looked up at Arlong.
The fish-man's entire body was trembling.
Not with anger.
With a sorrow that was almost despair.
"I didn't want to come."
Arlong's voice suddenly dropped until it was almost inaudible.
"I was sent here too."
"Driven onto this worthless little island by those people sitting high above, just to perform a play whose ending had already been written."
"Nami. That's your name, right?"
Arlong looked at the girl standing at the front, "If you hate me, that's fine."
"If you want to kill me, that's fine too."
"In their eyes, I, Arlong, was disposable from the very beginning."
"But I want you to know..."
"Whether I live or die was never something you or I got to decide."
"If they don't want me dead, you can't kill me."
"If they want me dead, only then will I die by your hands."
Arlong Park fell silent.
Sunlight filtered through the cracks in the shattered glass pillar, falling across Arlong's scarred face.
It was the face of someone whose fate had toyed with him beyond recognition.
Luffy stood there with his arms hanging at his sides.
For the first time, those eyes that were usually so bright held an emotion even he couldn't understand.
He didn't really understand what it meant to act.
Nor did he understand what a game of chess was.
He only felt... the fish-man before him wasn't quite the villain he had imagined.
Behind him stood Zoro, Nami, Usopp, and Sanji.
The four of them stood in a row.
None of them spoke.
None of them looked surprised.
Because they had already known.
Everyone on this ship, except Luffy, was an actor.
They had accompanied him here.
They had accompanied him as he defeated enemies and grew stronger along the way.
They hadn't read the script.
But they had all roughly guessed Arlong's part of the story.
It was just that, the script hadn't said Arlong would reveal the whole truth at the very end.
But this performance, watched by Rosse, had always allowed the actors to improvise.
Or rather, from Rosse's perspective, this kind of improvisation was exactly what he wanted to see.
"Heh..."
Zoro turned and glanced at Usopp, grinning slightly.
Usopp shrugged without saying a word.
Sanji lit a cigarette and slowly exhaled smoke into the sky.
Nami closed her eyes and took a deep breath.
She had known all along that Arlong had been released on purpose.
But she hadn't known that Arlong himself knew.
Nor had she expected him to tell Luffy the truth at this very moment.
Actors becoming dissatisfied was only natural.
After all, who wanted to be treated as a chess piece?
Who wanted to know they were destined to be defeated by this boy, yet still smile and offer up their own neck?
It wasn't that Arlong didn't want to resist.
His resistance had simply been meaningless.
If resisting could have changed anything, he wouldn't be standing here now.
Before being defeated, he only wanted the one audience member below the stage who still didn't know the truth... to understand just how absurd this play really was.
As for what that audience member would do after hearing it, that was no longer something Arlong could control.
After all, almost everyone here was an actor.
The difference was that they were all willing to keep acting.
Arlong was the only one in this play who wasn't.
[🙇🏻 You Can Support the Story Through P@tr3on—AmbitiousTranslator. It also has 40+ Chapters of all the novels and fanfics. Thanks for reading~]