But before making a move, Ronin noticed the faint smile that had appeared at the corner of Ging's mouth.
Could all of this have been part of Ging's calculations too?
The sound of gambling and drinking games outside disappeared. Instead, the sound of steel pipes scraping along the floor began drawing closer, as if deliberately trying to pressure the three of them.
"Planning to rob the robbers?" Ronin's unfriendly gaze fell on the man's sleazy face.
His words made the other party freeze for a moment. Then the man burst into loud laughter.
"Well said! That's right, I'm robbing you. What are you going to do about it?"
The sleazy warehouse manager was incredibly arrogant, but Ronin was not someone who could be scared so easily. He did not even wait for the people trying to intimidate them to get closer. His figure vanished from the spot.
When he reappeared, a kunai had already been stabbed straight into the man's heart.
Throughout the entire process, Ronin's focus was not on the warehouse manager, whose eyes had gone wide in disbelief that he was actually going to die, but on Ging.
Only after seeing that Ging did not care at all did Ronin relax slightly.
When forming a team, the worst thing was having teammates whose values clashed with your own. From the look of things, Ging was not some pedantic person, nor was he some self-righteous type who refused to kill.
That put Ronin at ease.
"No need to test me. I investigated all of you. I know what kind of people you are and how you handle things. If there had been anything I couldn't accept, I wouldn't have come looking for you," Ging said openly, laying everything out in the open.
"Sorry," Ronin apologized directly.
"But if you start killing indiscriminately, I won't accept that either," Ging reminded him.
"Got it. I understand." Ronin accepted it humbly.
Ging's bottom line was more or less: if others did not provoke him, he would not provoke them. That was indeed about the same as Ronin's own bottom line.
While the two were talking, the person dragging a steel pipe across the ground finally appeared in front of them.
Shizuku, however, had no intention of looking at him. She had no thoughts about the dead man either. Looking at the goods from the transaction, she simply asked, "Can I take everything now?"
That was what she asked, but Blinky had already appeared in her hand.
As long as Ronin nodded, Blinky would likely suck all the supplies in the warehouse inside.
"Damn it! You people actually dared to kill someone! You're courting death!"
The one dragging the steel pipe was a broad, muscular, shirtless man with a fierce, fleshy face.
His eyes were wide with anger, but he had no real intention of attacking.
Because the moment he saw Ronin and the others, he knew things were bad. The reason was simple: he was an ability user.
And precisely because of that, he could more clearly sense the gap in strength between himself and the other side.
Looking at the man, who was fierce on the outside but timid within, Ronin could not help smiling. He also understood why the man had grown afraid.
It was Ging.
Ging had deliberately released a powerful aura.
Ronin simply nodded to Shizuku and stopped paying attention to the warehouse guards who had rushed over.
Seeing Ronin's gesture, Ging also breathed a sigh of relief. Then he took the initiative to walk toward the guards.
Shizuku ignored all of that. After seeing Ronin nod, Blinky immediately entered tool mode.
The guards who had arrived later had not yet understood the current situation and were just about to draw their guns when they saw the goods in the warehouse flying in a bizarre manner toward the strange vacuum cleaner in the girl's hand.
Every one of the guards froze in place as if they had seen a ghost.
The burly captain also gave a bitter smile.
"Boss, don't take everything. Leave me something so I can report back."
"Don't worry," Ging said, glancing at Shizuku's targets before giving the man a reassuring gesture.
Shizuku did not take everything in the supply station. They had come this time mainly to take food that could not be stored for long periods. After collecting those items, Shizuku stopped.
Seeing that Ging and the guards had no intention of fighting, Ronin simply used the Ultra-Light-Weight Rock Technique after Shizuku had taken enough food. Right in front of the guards, he carried Shizuku and Ging into the air and flew away.
The burly captain watched the three of them fly off and could not help wiping the sweat from his forehead.
He was somewhat glad that he had a habit of applying pressure first before looking for a chance to act. If not for that habit, he might have ended up like the guy whose heart had been pierced—just another corpse on the ground.
As for whether he should report this to his superiors, the captain only thought about it briefly before giving up.
In any case, Ronin had not taken back the money and valuables from the earlier transaction. The whole incident had only resulted in the death of one warehouse manager. Useless trash like that was not in short supply at the supply station.
Under the cover of night, Ronin's group came quickly and left just as quickly.
Their ship had not been discovered. By the time Ronin landed back on it, it had already set sail and was circling around the supply station's location.
Without alerting anyone, the ship sailed into the unexplored waters. However, for the first few days, everything remained just as before, calm and peaceful.
But once small islands gradually began appearing on the sea, everything changed.
From time to time, birds of prey began appearing in the sky. They were even larger and more ferocious than the human-faced birds from Trick Tower.
After spotting the ship on the sea, they would always circle overhead before diving down, as if they had mistaken the sailing vessel for food.
Ronin no longer fished by the railing. Instead, he moved to the deck. Whenever a bird of prey dived down, he would leap from the deck and snap the attacker's neck in midair.
For some birds that looked decent, Ronin would try to see if they were edible. Some tasted quite good, while others were clearly going to taste awful the moment they were cut open.
Ging, meanwhile, turned his attention to the small islands where those birds lived.
Each island was not large, but before confirming they were safe, Ronin did not intend to bring the ship closer.
Ging, however, seemed very interested. After observing for a while, he suddenly jumped off the ship.
Ronin looked at the spot where Ging had plunged into the water with some surprise, and a thought could not help forming in his mind.
Not long after, Ging confirmed that thought.
"They're alive."
When Ging surfaced again, he brought Ronin that piece of news.
The places where those birds of prey nested were all living creatures. According to Ging's description, they were beings similar to sea turtles.
The ship continued forward through the area filled with these "island turtles." Ronin and the others had no intention of testing the island turtles at all. They simply struck hard against any birds of prey that attacked them.
Ging, on the other hand, was extremely interested in the island turtles. From time to time, he would jump into the water to record something.
Ronin could tell that Ging truly enjoyed the process of traveling to the Dark Continent.
Abaki also became quite interested in Ging's actions and slowly joined his exploration. However, the number of island turtles was not endless. Gradually, the ship sailed out of the area where the island turtles existed.
But as the island turtles disappeared, the weather also began to change.