He simply raised his right hand. Armament Haki wrapped around it, then he swung forward.
Three jet black blades of compressed air shot from his fingertips, meeting the cannonballs with perfect precision.
The air blades sliced cleanly through the shells, scattering the gunpowder inside. The cannonballs turned into duds and splashed uselessly into the sea.
The one-eyed brute's pupils shrank.
Before he could even react, Bullet was already moving.
He leaped from the speedboat, crossing the thirty meters of sea in a single bound, landing lightly on the enemy deck as if he weighed nothing at all.
"A m... monster..."
Some pirate muttered under his breath.
Bullet swept his gaze across the deck and locked onto the three strongest presences:
the one-eyed brute, a lanky gunner, and a burly man hefting a massive battle-axe.
"Come together."
He said,
"It will save time."
The three exchanged a glance, then attacked simultaneously.
The one-eyed brute crossed his twin blades in a vicious slash, the edges faintly coated in Armament Haki.
The lanky gunner fired from the side, his bullets also wrapped in Haki.
The axe wielder brought his giant weapon down from the front, the strongest in raw power, but clearly the slowest.
A textbook pincer attack.
To Bullet, it was far too slow.
Within the analytical field of his Observation Haki, their movements were broken down into countless frozen frames.
The order of muscle contraction, the paths along which Haki flowed, the minute deviations in their angles of attack...
All of it was calculated in an instant.
He turned his body slightly, letting the twin blades pass by.
He lifted his hand and caught the incoming bullet between two fingers.
Armament Haki on his fingers met the Armament Haki on the bullet, producing a soft metallic chime.
Then he stepped forward.
Bullet's shoulder slammed into the chest of the axe wielder.
Crack.
The sound of ribs breaking.
The big man spat blood and was sent flying, smashing through the railing and plunging into the sea.
The one-eyed brute's face drained of color. He tried to change his stance.
But Bullet's left hand was already pressing down on the back of his blade.
Devour activated.
Not to devour life force this time, but the weapon itself.
The steel of the curved sword began to "rust" at a speed visible to the naked eye.
Within two seconds, the blade had turned into a handful of iron dust that slipped from the one-eyed brute's hand and scattered to the deck.
[Devour: Refined steel × 1.2 kg]
[Conversion: Basic material energy × 3 units]
[Efficiency extremely low, halting process]
As expected, ordinary metal was not worth devouring.
The one-eyed brute stared dumbly at his empty hands.
The lanky gunner was still firing in panic, but Bullet batted each bullet aside with casual swipes.
The fight ended in under five seconds.
When Bullet turned his gaze on the remaining pirates, their will to fight had already collapsed.
They looked at the corpses of their first mate, their gunner, and the fallen axe wielder.
"Run... run for it!"
Someone screamed, and the pirates scattered in terror, some even jumping straight into the sea.
Bullet did not chase.
He walked up to a burly man who had fallen on his backside and could not even stand.
"I ask, you answer."
He said,
"Answer well, you live.
Answer poorly, you die."
The man bobbed his head frantically.
"The Blood Hook Pirates," Bullet asked, "which seas do you mainly operate in?"
"T... the border between South Blue and Paradise..." the man stammered,
"Sometimes we come into the first half of the Grand Line too..."
"Have you heard of the Oliventa family?"
The man froze, a flicker of fear flashing through his eyes.
"I... I have... a family of scholars in South Blue. Three years ago they were... they were 'cleaned up'."
"'Cleaned up'?"
Bullet narrowed his eyes.
"By who?"
"I... I do not know..." The man's voice trembled. "All I heard was that in a single night, the whole family was gone.
Some people said they saw men in white suits..."
The World Government's CP agents.
Bullet confirmed it in his mind.
"Any news of survivors from the Oliventa family?"
"N... none... who would dare go asking about something like that..."
The man swallowed hard.
"But... I did hear that there have been strange things happening in South Blue lately."
"What kind of strange?"
"On some islands... people are just disappearing."
"Not killed, not captured, just... gone."
"No traces left behind at all, like they never existed."
"Some people say... it is the work of the 'Ghost Shadow'."
Ghost Shadow...
Bullet filed away the name.
He stood up, ready to leave.
The man let out a shaky sigh of relief, but Bullet added one more line.
"This ship is mine now."
"W... what?"
Bullet said,
"I do not like repeating myself."
The man did not dare argue. He hurriedly shouted at the remaining crew to lower the lifeboats.
Two minutes later, the survivors of the Blood Hook Pirates were paddling away in small boats, fleeing into the distance, while the two-masted ship became Bullet's spoils.
He inspected the vessel.
It was a bit old, but far larger than his speedboat, and not slow at all.
More importantly, it had enough space to store ample supplies... and to one day house a future crew.