That sparring session taught Nico Robin a great deal. She became keenly aware of many of her weaknesses, and her progress was obvious.
She was deeply grateful to Hashirama Senju for patiently guiding her.
Hashirama, for his part, greatly admired Robin's fighting style. The advantage of having so many arms was enormous. If she kept going down this path, then someday she might even be able to rival him and Madara.
That was exactly why he was willing to teach her.
She was worth cultivating.
"Have you two eaten breakfast yet?" After the training match ended, Rowan walked up and asked.
Robin shook her head. "Not yet."
Rowan handed over the buns in his hands. "Eat these for now. At noon, we'll find a good restaurant and have a proper meal."
Robin asked, "Are we leaving?"
Rowan knew what she meant and nodded. "Yeah. There's not much point staying here any longer."
Robin had no objection. She took the buns, ate as she steered, and created a few clones to help sail the ship.
The sailboat gradually left Cocoyasi Village behind and returned to the open sea.
"So where are we going next?" Robin asked.
Rowan said, "First, back to the Baratie for another meal. After that, we'll head to Loguetown and take a look at the Pirate King's execution platform."
The food at the Baratie really had been that good. Rowan genuinely wanted a second round.
As for Gol D. Roger's execution platform, it was really just a wooden scaffold. There wasn't much to see.
But as the saying goes… since they were already here, they might as well take a look.
Robin gave a soft hum of acknowledgment and steered the ship back toward the Baratie.
"Miss Tsunade, we meet again. What fate."
The moment the group stepped into the restaurant, the shameless Sanji came rushing over again, offering a rose to Robin, his eyes practically beating with heart shapes.
Rowan was speechless. "You really don't learn, do you?"
"What's it to you?" Sanji had absolutely no good impression of Rowan. He hadn't forgotten that beating from before.
Rowan hadn't been the one who actually hit him, sure, but the whole thing had started because of him.
"So what if I tell you," Rowan said, "that the beautiful Miss Tsunade in your eyes is actually a woman in her fifties?"
"Huh?"
Sanji stared at Robin in shock.
Robin smiled faintly. While she herself was still in her twenties, the Tsunade she was impersonating really was a woman in her fifties.
When Robin didn't deny it, Sanji felt as though the sky had collapsed.
A woman in her fifties.
A woman in her fifties.
A woman in her fifties…
"No!!!"
Sanji dropped to his knees and howled at the sky. The news had hit him out of nowhere. He couldn't take it.
"You're too loud, you damn brat."
In the next second, a foot came flying in and kicked the howling Sanji straight across the room.
It was Zeff.
"Welcome back to the Baratie, the Sea Restaurant. Good to see the three of you again."
Rowan nodded. "Good to see you again too, Zeff. This time, give us a few signature dishes. Also, could you cook them yourself? I want to try the owner's own handiwork."
They'd already had the seafood risotto last time. This time, Rowan wanted to try something different.
Zeff nodded and said no problem. He handed the group over to another chef to be seated, then turned and walked into the kitchen himself.
Before long, several of the Baratie's signature dishes were served.
The first was fresh fish sashimi with dipping sauce. It was delicious, sweet and tangy, and a perfect appetizer.
The second was charcoal-grilled giant crab, which was just as outstanding. And the ingredients Baratie used were several times bigger than king crab.
The crab leg was thicker than Rowan's arm. Compared to it, king crab looked like an underdeveloped child.
The third dish was fried cutlassfish, and it was excellent too. Even the bones had been fried until they were crisp.
The fourth was caviar. This was Rowan's first time ever trying it. In his own world, he'd only heard of it, never actually tasted it.
But here in the One Piece world, he finally got to try caviar for real.
The taste really was unforgettable.
The dishes that followed were equally impressive.
Especially the final seafood chowder. Rowan drank bowl after bowl of it until he physically couldn't drink any more.
After tasting all these dishes, he couldn't help feeling that they were noticeably better than Sanji's cooking.
Rowan had to admit it—experience really did matter.
Before Sanji joined the Straw Hats, traveled the world, and improved both his strength and his cooking, there was still a clear gap between his skills and Zeff's.
After eating and drinking their fill, Rowan's group paid, said goodbye to Zeff, and left the Baratie, heading for Loguetown.
As for Sanji, after learning that "Tsunade" was actually a woman in her fifties, he had completely shut down.
Even by the time Rowan's group left, he was still crouched in a corner drawing circles on the floor.
It looked like he wouldn't be recovering anytime soon.
What a useless man. So what if she was in her fifties?
In Rowan's opinion, as long as she was young and beautiful, what real difference was there between fifty and five hundred?
Sanji shut down over a few decades of age. Useless. Truly useless.
After mercilessly judging Sanji in his head, Rowan felt refreshed for the rest of the day and kept smiling at everything he saw.
A day later, they reached Loguetown.
In the story, it lay at the junction between the East Blue and the Grand Line, and was known as the Town of the Beginning and the End because the Pirate King, Gol D. Roger, had been born there and publicly executed there.
At the harbor stood a triangular archway, and on both sides stretched all kinds of shops. The covered walkways in front of them weren't just busy—they were packed shoulder to shoulder.
The crowds were unbelievably dense.
When Rowan read the manga, he already knew the place was busy, but only after coming here in person did he realize just how prosperous it really was.
It really did live up to its title as the town of beginnings and endings.
There were just so many people.
The last time Rowan had seen crowds like this was either while traveling or during some major shopping mall event back in his own world.
But when you thought about it, it made perfect sense. Loguetown was world-famous as the place where the Pirate King had been executed. It was basically a top-tier tourist attraction.
Of course it had this kind of foot traffic.
The group followed the flow of the crowd and soon reached Loguetown's central square.
At the center of the square stood a tall execution platform.
The very place where Roger had been put to death.
The platform itself wasn't grand at all. If anything, it was plain—almost shabby. If it were somewhere else, no one would give it a second glance.
But because the Pirate King had been executed there, it had become a major attraction.
Every day, people from all over the world came to see it for themselves—to lay eyes on the execution platform where the Pirate King had met his end.
~~~
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