Below the Four Emperors, I am invincible.
Against an Admiral or an Emperor, I can still trade one for one.
Of course, this was only Ares's beautiful fantasy for the future "Ship-Crashing King" Jack. In this world, after all, the gap between top-tier monsters like Admirals and Emperors and fighters such as the Three Calamities, the Sweet Commanders, or most of the Seven Warlords was enormous. Vast. Nearly impossible to cross.
Still, it was not impossible.
Katakuri had pushed his Observation Haki so far that he reached the level of seeing the future.
Garp and Aokiji had also trained by pounding Marine battleships with their bare fists.
Then there was Douglas Bullet, who never stopped training even while imprisoned in Impel Down.
All of that told Ares one thing. If he wanted to become truly powerful, then training had to go hand in hand with battle. Only by combining both could he continue improving.
And naturally, a systematic training structure would make that growth more efficient.
That was one of the reasons he intended to build swordsmanship dojos and establish ninja schools in Wano.
He believed that with those systems in place, people like King the Wildfire, Kuma, and all the gifted young talents who would later join him could rise to even greater heights.
Back to the present.
Everyone looked at him with surprise. Until now, they had all assumed he was simply the captain of the War God Pirates.
None of them had imagined that Ares was also the Shogun of Wano, the ruler of a great nation.
That was completely different from being the captain of a pirate crew.
This was not yet the era in which the future Four Emperors ruled the New World. A pirate becoming the ruler of an entire country, and a nation like Wano at that, was naturally shocking.
Ares devoured several half-cooked dinosaurs with savage efficiency, not even leaving behind bone fragments. Then he turned to Brogy and Dorry with a grin.
"Hey, we've got a deal now. If there are any young giants who want to temper themselves, they can come to Wano anytime."
"There are plenty of gifted people under me, and every one of them is stronger than the last."
"Hold it, hold it. Since when did we make a deal?" Brogy's expression changed at once.
Dorry, however, seemed to catch on to Ares's true intention and did not call it out. They had no right to interfere with another person's will. If some young giant truly wanted to join the War God Pirates, they could not stop him anyway.
Still, Dorry asked, "Isn't Wano a closed-off country?"
Ares smiled. "Don't you want to see the samurai of Wano for yourselves? As for the isolation policy, once the time is right, I'll naturally put an end to it."
"Open the country?" Brogy looked a little surprised. With the life span of giants, Wano's centuries of isolation amounted to only two or three generations to them.
Their race lived three times longer than humans. Even reaching three hundred years old was nothing unusual.
Then Brogy laughed openly.
"Well now, that would be something rare indeed. Once Wano opens its borders, the two of us will definitely come visit. And when we do, you'd better welcome us with good wine."
Elbaf, the land of the giants, lay to the east of Wano and was not all that far away.
And the giants were known as the strongest nation in the world.
"No problem." Ares laughed, pleased. Building a good relationship with the giants was naturally a good thing.
He wanted more and more strong people under his banner. Only then would he have the power and standing to confront the World Government.
After all, Rocks, Big Mom, Kong, Sengoku, Garp and the rest were only enemies of the moment.
Only the World Government was the final target.
Once he had eaten his fill, Ares bid Dorry and Brogy farewell.
"If the chance comes, we'll meet again in the New World."
"Gabababababa! Ares, see you in the New World. Next time, we'll have a real fight," Brogy laughed loudly. This time, Ares had deliberately taken the attack head-on, so the battle had not felt satisfying enough.
Dorry grinned. "Gyagyagyagyagya! Next time we meet, we'll be even stronger. And if you pull the same stunt as before, don't blame us if you die."
"Then it's a promise."
Ares left with Crocus and Dr. Kureha. To him, this had only been a small detour along the voyage.
But the harvest had been enormous.
On top of Laboon's head, Olvia finally let out a breath of relief, only to flare up in irritation again.
"Why does that idiot never treat his own life seriously?!"
She did not want Ares dying before she had even seen a single scattered Poneglyph, before they had even reached their destination.
Would that not make this whole trip pointless?
On the shore, Ares washed the blood from his body with seawater. His smooth, shining skin gleamed as though it had been gilded in gold, and there was not the slightest trace of the wounds he had suffered earlier.
His entire body looked like a bodybuilder coated in oil or bronze polish.
Crocus and Dr. Kureha climbed back onto Laboon's head, and now the way they looked at Olvia was completely different from before.
From Ares, they had learned that Olvia was someone he intended to entrust with major responsibilities, an important administrative figure. Her status was clearly not low.
Olvia asked, "Crocus, Dr. Kureha, is Ares really all right?"
"That brat is full of life. Does he look like someone in trouble?" Crocus shot Ares a glance while rolling his eyes.
Dr. Kureha complained bitterly, "That boy's life force is monstrous. We should never have worried about him. We got worked to the bone for nothing..."
Only then did Olvia truly relax.
Ares quickly finished washing the blood off himself, then leaped lightly back onto Laboon's head.
He frowned and patted himself down.
"Damn. Looks like the Log Pose got destroyed earlier..."
Thankfully, because of his training, the Paramecia-type Munch-Munch Fruit was currently with Olvia.
He had relied on the Log Pose to get to Little Garden, but the moment he saw Dorry and Brogy he had gotten too excited, casually kept it on himself, and forgotten all about it.
As a result, it had been destroyed in the battle.
"..."
"..."
"..."
The other three all stared at him in speechless silence.
Ares's eyes flashed with faint embarrassment. Then he gave an awkward laugh and asked, "Does anyone here know navigation?"
"Don't look at me. I don't," Crocus said at once.
Dr. Kureha spread her hands helplessly. "That's what you get for being careless. I don't know how either."
Then everyone turned to Olvia.
She answered with little confidence, "I know a bit, but only from books. I've never actually practiced it. And..."
"Our top priority right now is getting a new Log Pose. A permanent one would be even better."
Ares said, "It doesn't matter. We do not have many stops left on this route anyway. After that, we can head straight for the New World. I'm much more familiar with that place."
"Then we keep sailing forward. As long as we find an inhabited island, that's enough."
His next destination was naturally Sky Island. He had been aiming for the gold there from the very beginning.
But beyond that, he had another goal as well.
Now that he had obtained the Paramecia-type Munch-Munch Fruit, Ares could not help fantasizing that maybe, just maybe, he could also get his hands on the Logia-type Rumble-Rumble Fruit in the sky.