Chapter 60: Suzaku's Teachings!
Three days later. The Grand Line. Jaya Island.
Mock Town.
This was a place that reeked of freedom in its ugliest form. The air was thick with the stench of cheap rum, unwashed bodies, gunpowder, and the salty tang of the sea. It was a lawless paradise where dreams came to die and violence was the only currency that mattered.
The wooden buildings were scarred with bullet holes and knife marks. Drunks lay in the gutters, and the laughter that echoed from the bars was harsh and mocking. It was a town of vultures.
However, on this particular afternoon, the grim routine of Mock Town was interrupted by a sight so incongruous it made hardened killers stop and stare.
Walking down the main mud-caked street was a group that looked like they had stepped out of a royal painting.
"Heave... ho..."
"Lord Suzaku, please walk faster. The ice cream is melting."
Suzaku, the Captain of this illustrious crew, was currently buried under a mountain of shopping bags. He looked less like a pirate lord and more like a pack mule.
"I told you guys we didn't need five barrels of high-grade olive oil!" Suzaku grumbled, his voice muffled by a stack of silk fabric boxes balancing precariously on his head.
"But it was on sale, Suzaku-sama!" Albedo chirped happily. She was walking beside him, her hands empty except for a small, elegant parasol she used to shade herself from the sun. "And these dresses... I must look my best for our nights together!"
On his left, Rem and Ram walked in perfect synchronization. The twin maids were also carrying towering stacks of supplies—crates of fresh vegetables, rare spices, and premium meat—but they handled the weight with effortless grace, not a drop of sweat on their brows.
Nami walked at the front, checking a long receipt with a pained expression. "We spent 50 million Berries in three hours... 50 million! My heart hurts..."
The group was a moving spectacle of wealth and beauty. And in Mock Town, displaying wealth without visible weapons was like bleeding in shark-infested waters.
Sure enough, they hadn't walked far before the shadows of the alleyways began to move.
"Hey, little ladies!"
A rough, gravelly voice broke the noise of the street.
The group stopped. Suzaku sighed, the pile of boxes on his head swaying slightly.
Blocking the center of the road was a wall of flesh. A fat man with a greasy, bald head stood there, resting a giant iron hammer on his shoulder. Behind him, a dozen fierce-looking crew members grinned, revealing yellowed, broken teeth.
"You seem lost," the fat man sneered, his eyes raking over Albedo and the twins with open lust. "Seeing as you bought so many good things, you must have a lot of Berries on you, right?"
He stepped forward, the ground shaking slightly. "How about... handing over all the Berries you have, and maybe leaving the pretty maids behind to 'entertain' us brothers?"
"Hey! Fat-ass!"
Before Suzaku could even respond, another voice cut in from behind.
A tall, skinny man with a jagged scar running down his face led another group of pirates to surround them from the rear. He spun a pistol on his finger.
"Don't you know the rules of Mock Town?" the skinny pirate spat. "We, the 'Wild Wolf Pirates,' spotted these fat sheep first! Back off before I put a hole in your gut!"
"Bullshit!" The fat man roared, slamming his hammer onto the ground, cracking the cobblestones. "No one dares to steal what our 'Iron Hammer Pirates' have set their eyes on! Finders keepers!"
The two groups were instantly at loggerheads. Their fierce gazes clashed in the air, ignoring the "prey" entirely as they argued over who got the right to rob them.
"I saw them at the clothing store!"
"I saw them at the butcher!"
Spit flew everywhere. Hands reached for swords and guns.
In the middle of this chaotic sandwich, Nami rolled a massive set of eyes. She slapped her hand onto her forehead with a loud smack.
"Unbelievable," she groaned. "How are there still such idiots in the Grand Line? Do they not read the newspaper?"
She turned her head and shouted toward the walking mountain of boxes that was her Captain.
"Hey, Suzaku! What is this situation? Is the name of our Suzaku Pirates not famous enough yet? Didn't those pirates we met yesterday immediately faint as soon as they heard your name?"
As Nami's voice rang out, clear and annoyed, the arguing stopped.
The mountain of boxes shifted. Suzaku finally poked his head out from a gap between a crate of apples and a box of lingerie. He blinked, shaking his hair out of his eyes. He still had a trace of sleepiness on his face; shopping with four high-maintenance women was truly more exhausting than fighting Giants.
"Huh?" Suzaku yawned. "Are we done shopping? Can I put this down?"
The moment he uttered that sound of confusion, it was as if a mute button had been pressed on the entire street.
The skinny pirate froze. The fat pirate choked on his own spit.
"Su... Suzaku?" the skinny man whispered, his voice trembling. "Did she just say... Suzaku?"
The pirates, who had been ready to kill each other moments ago, instantly fell silent. Their eyes, wide with dawning horror, began to scan the group they had surrounded.
Suddenly, a monkey-faced fellow from the Iron Hammer Pirates pointed a shaking finger at Ram. His face turned the color of old milk.
"B-B-Boss! Look! That maid! The pink-haired one!" he stammered, retreating step by step. "It's... it's the 'Battle Maid' Ram! Her bounty is listed as... as a subordinate of the Suzaku Pirates!"
A comrade next to him violently tugged his sleeve, nearly ripping it. "Idiot! You got it wrong! That's the new one! Look at the blue-haired one next to her! That's the 'Demon Maid' Rem! Bounty: 360 Million Berries!"
"360... Million?!"
The number hit the crowd like a physical blow.
As soon as this was said, the eyes of both pirate groups swept back and forth between Rem and Ram, realizing they were twins. This recognition seemed to open Pandora's Box of terror.
"There's no mistake..." another pirate whispered, dropping his knife. "The orange-haired woman... that's 'Cat Burglar' Nami! Bounty: 80 Million!"
"And look at that one... the woman with the black wings!" A pirate fell to his knees, pointing at Albedo. "It's the 'Blackwing Demon' Albedo! She fought Admiral Kizaru! Her bounty is a staggering 720 Million Berries!"
Finally, all eyes turned to the man carrying the boxes.
The fat captain swallowed hard, his throat dry as sandpaper. "The... the man at the very back... carrying the luggage..."
"Captain... 'Suzaku' Suzaku... Bounty: 830 Million Berries!!"
With every name and astronomical bounty announced, the pirates' faces grew paler and paler, draining of blood until they looked like corpses.
When that terrifying total sum—approaching two billion Berries—echoed in the silent air of Mock Town, reality crashed down on them.
Clang.
The fat man's iron hammer slipped from his sweaty palms and hit the ground, crushing his own toe, but he didn't even feel the pain. The tall, skinny man's legs gave out, and he collapsed into a sitting position in the mud.
The street was suffocatingly silent. The only sound was the clack-clack-clack of teeth chattering violently.
For pirates accustomed to running rampant in the first half of the Grand Line, a bounty of 50 million was considered "Super Rookie" status. A bounty of 100 million was a legend.
But 800 million? That wasn't a pirate. That was a natural disaster. That was a monster capable of conquering the New World.
And they had just tried to rob him.
Suzaku sighed.
"You guys are ruining the mood."
He shrugged his shoulders. The mountain of boxes and crates floated into the air, suspended by a gentle application of telekinesis (or perhaps just Albedo catching them invisibly fast), before settling gently onto the ground.
Suzaku slowly strolled out from between Rem and Ram. He cracked his neck.
Every slight step he took made the group of pirates shudder, as if he were stepping directly on their hearts.
He scanned the disorganized rabble before him. They were shaking so hard they couldn't even run.
He smiled. It was a dazzling, charismatic smile that didn't reach his eyes.
"Rem. Ram. Nami."
With every name he spoke, the person called looked at him quizzically.
Seeing that only she had not been called, Albedo immediately frowned. Her exquisite face filled with grievance, and she looked over with piteous, puppy-dog eyes. "Suzaku-sama? Am I not needed? I can crush them in a second!"
Suzaku's eyes deepened with amusement at her jealousy. "Albedo, you stay put. If you attack, you'll destroy the whole town, and we haven't finished buying spices yet."
He turned back to the shivering pirates.
"I'm going to teach you a principle. Listen closely."
He cleared his throat and raised a finger, adopting the tone of a wise scholar.
"There's an old saying in my hometown that goes: 'It is better to resolve enmity than to let it grow.' I strongly agree with this statement! It is a beautiful philosophy, don't you think?"
Nami blinked, puzzled. She lowered her Clima-Tact. "Huh? The meaning of that saying... does it mean we should let them go? To avoid creating bad blood over a small misunderstanding?"
As soon as she said this, the formerly silent pirates grasped at this interpretation like a drowning man catching a life raft. Hope flared in their eyes.
"Yes! Yes!" The fat captain nodded desperately, his chins wobbling. "We were blind! We didn't know! Let us go, and we will never appear before you again!"
"We apologize!" The skinny pirate kowtowed, banging his head on the mud. "Please, great Lord Suzaku! We will leave!"
They looked at Suzaku with pleading eyes, waiting for his mercy.
However, Suzaku merely smiled slightly at Nami. His expression was gentle, but his eyes were cold voids.
"Of course that's not what it means, silly Nami."
His tone was relaxed, conversational even. But the content of his words instantly made the temperature on the street drop to absolute zero.
"The correct interpretation of 'resolving enmity' is simple: If someone provokes you, you do not let that enmity grow into a future problem."
He paused, his smile widening.
"You resolve it... by eliminating the source. If the enemy is dead, the enmity is resolved. Permanently."
"Eh?" The pirates froze.
"I see!" Nami slammed her fist into her palm, enlightened. "That makes total sense! Efficient!"
"Ram," Suzaku turned his head to the pink-haired maid. "I'll leave these trash to you. Your body has just recovered from the summoning sickness, so this is a good chance to stretch your legs. Don't leave a mess."
"Ram understands, Suzaku-sama!"
The pink-haired maid nodded calmly. She elegantly set down a crate of oranges, dusting off her pristine white apron.
The moment Suzaku offered that "explanation," the smarter pirates realized things were going terribly, fatally wrong.
"RUN!"
"HE'S A DEMON!"
"MAMA!"
Someone shouted, and the dozens of pirates instantly scattered like ants from a disturbed nest. They threw down their weapons, crying out as they desperately fled in every direction—toward the alleys, the sea, the sewers.
Ram didn't chase. She didn't even move her feet.
She simply raised her right hand elegantly, her fingers splayed like a conductor facing an orchestra.
Her red eyes were completely calm, boring into the backs of the fleeing men.
"Trying to run now..." she murmured softly.
Mana gathered at her fingertips, invisible to the naked eye but felt as a sharp drop in air pressure.
"Wind Magic: Al Huma."
She swiped her hand horizontally.
SHING.
Instantly, the air of the entire street became a weapon. Countless invisible, razor-sharp wind blades materialized from thin air. They emitted a subtle, chilling hiss as they sliced through the space.
They were faster than bullets.
The wind blades caught up to every fleeing pirate with mathematical precision. The fat captain raised his arm to block—his arm and head were severed in the same instant. The skinny pirate running toward the alley simply fell apart mid-stride.
There were no screams. The cuts were so fast and clean that the nerves didn't even register the pain before consciousness ceased.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
One by one, the bodies hit the floor. The dusty street of Mock Town was painted red in a single breath.
Ram lowered her hand. She smoothed a wrinkle on her skirt.
"It is already too late," she finished her sentence.
"Amazing!" Rem clapped her hands. "Sister's control is as perfect as ever! Not a single drop of blood got on the groceries!"
Suzaku nodded, picking up his boxes again. "Good work. Now, let's get back to the ship. I'm starving."
The Suzaku Pirates continued their walk down the street, stepping over the corpses as if they were mere puddles, leaving the terrified survivors of Mock Town to whisper about the day the demons came shopping.
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