10 Chapter 10 - Breaking Gates! Chew and Kuroobi Powerless!

"Come on, I don't want to see anyone wasting my time!"

Arrogantly standing on a small hill, a navy captain watched his soldiers constantly destroying an mikan orchard. It was Nezumi, who was there with a rotten smile on his face.

After almost a week of searching, they were finally digging up the place that Arlong had pointed out to them. So as not to arouse suspicion from Nami, he conducted careful investigations while no one was watching and finally found the possible location for the hidden treasure. It was the grove that had her beloved plantation.

"You are taking too long, hurry up! Justice must be done in this place!" With a crude smile, Nezumi was already thinking about how much of that money he would put in his own pocket.

The sailors were ripping out the trees, essentially killing them, even after having found the main location where the treasure was. And seeing as they also wore rotten smiles on their faces, it was possible to see that a captain is always the greatest influence on his subordinates.

"Hey, what are you doing!?" A voice sounded behind them, and soon they saw that it was the town sheriff, Genzo, accompanied by Nami and Nojiko.

"Why are you destroying the orchard?" Nami asked with a calm and composed expression. But it was possible to see that behind this there was a fury that could get out of control at any moment.

"We were informed that this is the hideout of a thief. And as you can clearly see, we found his belongings. By any chance do you know who it could be?" Nezumi smiled like a rat, a face so fake it seemed to corrupt any goodness.

"You-" Nami took a step forward, wanting to hit this bastard. She couldn't stand seeing the place her mother cared so much about being destroyed in such a brutal and unnecessary way.

But someone grabbed her arm.

"We don't know. This is also a shock to us..." Nojiko stopped Nami from continuing when she spoke over her. Swallowing hard, she held back the tears as she watched all the trees getting hurt, and the orchard she had taken care of for so long being destroyed like this.

"It's a shame then. Oh..." Nezumi saw that the last treasure chest was removed and smiled back at them, "Since there's nothing left here, the 16th Branch Base thanks everyone for their collaboration. We will always be watching and bringing justice!"

Watching them go away like that, not caring about anything they did, Nami and Nojiko were for the first time in their lives feeling intense hatred for such "justice", tears falling from their eyes while their faces showed clear anger. The fury was so intense that they did not know if they would be able to control themselves if they had any weapon with them.

But then, as if it was something automatic, the image of Noah appeared in their minds. His tireless effort to be able to tear Arlong's hands off the village. So that he could free them from this suffering.

'If I had the slightest opportunity to have this strength...' Unbeknownst to them, this thought was going through their minds at the same time. And they knew there was only one way to opportunity. And only one person could make them strong too.

"Where is Noah?" Giving them time, Genzo asked as soon as he saw them regain their composure. He hadn't seen him since morning and was worried that something had happened.

As soon as they heard his name, the two women returned to reality and looked in the direction of the east coast. And soon after, they looked at each other and had a tacit agreement.

"Let's go!"

°°°

Walking calmly down the path that led to Arlong Park, Noah always had a calm and relaxed expression.

Dressed in black clothes that seemed to match the occasion, he had his sword at his waist. The only slightly messy thing about him was his hair, which he never bothered to keep tidy.

'So you're ready to kill someone and your heart doesn't even skip a beat?' Speaking to himself, Noah found it strange how much he seemed accustomed to this feeling.

He could feel the pressure of the impending battle, the tension that lingered and penetrated his bones with each step. But even so, it was not as if it affected him in the slightest. He knew he would not hesitate for a second before drawing his blade, even if he didn't like the idea of being a killer.

'Maybe, engaging in life-or-death battles every day has indeed helped me with this. Who would have thought that being torn apart by blades of wind, and electrocuted to death, would have such effects?' Noah thought shortly before he found the answer to his calmness.

He was feeling everything one should feel, only it wasn't affecting him as it does everyone else.

While he was lost in his own thoughts, a group of fish-men were watching him straight from the wall of Arlong Park. And seeing as he was carrying a sword and coming straight towards them, they decided to take some action.

"Arlong, it looks like there's an intruder. And from the description Nezumi sent us, it seems to be the man who was near Cocoyase Village. Shall we attack?" Chew looked at Arlong, who was sitting in a beach chair.

"Take Pisaro and Take with you. The three of you should be enough to take care of a mere human, right?" Arlong took off his sunglasses and looked at his fish-man brothers, who were scattered around the place doing different things.

"This human doesn't look like any other from the island. He seems to be strong too." Chew looked again at Noah and noticed that in addition to being taller than most of the humans he had seen, he also had a muscular body.

"And what's with this nervousness? Do you think you can't handle a mere human?" Kuroobi, who was not far away practicing martial arts, looked at Chew with a depreciative smile.

"Take Shioyake with you too." Arlong did not care and just casually waved his hand. He only intended to relax in the early part of the morning.

"Yes, sir. Take, Pisaro, Shioyake, we are going out to capture the human-"

And then what they didn't expect happened.

BAAANNG!

The metal gates that gave way to Arlong Park suddenly flew off, interrupting Chew's speech. The bang and the force of the exploding gate caused dust to be thrown into the air.

"What the hell! Who the hell did this?" Arlong rose from the beach chair and stood up, taking off his sunglasses. Seeing that the gate stopped a few meters from him, with a punch mark on the front, he inadvertently swallowed hard.

As the dust settled, to Chew's great shock, he began to recognize the shadow of the figure. And his shock was because the man he was about to attack, being almost 300 meters away, suddenly blew up his gate!

"Hey, hey. Isn't anyone going to greet me? I knocked on the door." Noah lightly shook his hands and all the dust was swept away by the wind in an instant.

°°°

In Arlong Park, silence followed the wind after the gates were suddenly destroyed. In that huge white square, the sea waters invaded the pool and caused a noise that filled the environment. Wherever they were, all the fish-men of the Arlong Pirates were gathered, staring at the invader.

With everyone's attention on him, Noah finally got the opportunity to firsthand experience the strangeness of the One Piece world. It wasn't that he was prejudiced, but anyone would react unusually when meeting a fish-man as tall as a pole for the first time in their life.

"Are you Arlong?" Even knowing that it was him, Noah looked at the largest fish-man there, and the only one with the strange nose.

"Yes, it's me. And who are you?" Arlong was not in the mood to smile at the moment. With a finger signal, he looked at Chew, giving his command.

"I'm Noah D. Avery. Strange name, but easy to remember."

Smiling at them, he easily saw the signals that Arlong was sending and looked at the big blue-skinned fish-man next to him. And with a top-to-bottom glance, he spoke to him.

"I wouldn't move if I were you."

"Bastard!" Chew suddenly lunged forward, his fists already armed and his position aligned to punch Noah right in the face.

Thud!

And, with a slight noise of hitting the cushion, Chew's fist was suddenly stopped as soon as it hit Noah's palm. Other than the wind that followed, there was no other reaction. None of the ordinary noise of bones breaking and followed by the bang he always heard.

"What-" Chew wondered what had happened when he suddenly felt something hitting his chest.

Bang!

And he was sent flying towards the beach chairs, an extraordinary pain overwhelming his senses!

Bang! Bang! Bang! BANG!

Breaking all the chairs on the way, Chew eventually stopped when he hit one of the mansion's pillars, causing a crack that spread throughout the pillar. And before he could complain about the back pain, he looked down and saw that his blood was being splattered from where his arm should be.

"AAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!! MY ARM!!!" Screaming with all his strength, Chew held himself from fainting while holding his shoulder and pressing hard there.

"I may not seem sincere, but sorry about that. I didn't know you guys were so weak." Noah was being apologetic as he tossed the giant arm in his hand away. And despite his indifferent face, he really isn't the guy who likes to hurt brutally unnecessarily.

"Arlong?" Kuroobi walked up to Arlong and stood next to him. Taking a look at the agonizing Chew, he directed his anger towards the enemy in front of him.

"Kill that human!"

Arlong gave the order as soon as he could. Despite his torture of humans, he cared above all for his fish-men brothers and would not let this pass, under any circumstances.

"Human, perhaps this is the time to ask for forgiveness. I will not have mercy when I lay my hands on you." Kuroobi cracked his fingers as he slowly approached Noah.

All the other fish-men were also slowly circling Noah, closing his way out of the place. Of all the members, only Hatchan was not there. And with the absence of Momoo, it was possible that he was feeding the big cow now.

"For someone who was once part of a major pirate group, your threats are quite ridiculous." Noah teased him back with a smile, not caring at all that the others were "blocking his exit".

"You!" Caught off guard by this, Kuroobi, like all the other fish-men, looked at Noah angrily for provoking their past, "You know nothing about our past. And I'm going to make you swallow your taunts right here and right now!"

With just a movement of his body, Kuroobi suddenly disappeared from where he was, executing a Fish-Man Karate move as soon as he was near Noah.

"Hundred Brick Fist!"

Shing!

"Wind Thrust!"

But with the noise of unsheathing a sword, Kuroobi stopped in his tracks when he felt an intense heat coming from his chest.

Feeling nothing more than that, he kept looking at Noah, who was standing still as he sheathed his sword back. And finally, out of curiosity, he looked down and saw that there was a small hole there, giving access to his heart.

"How-" Without having the chance to say anything else, Kuroobi knelt on the ground as a large amount of blood came out of his mouth. And after a second, his body fell to the ground.

"Kuroobi!!" Chew shouted as soon as he saw the body of his friend falling to the ground. He thought he was imagining things, but he just saw a air bullet carrying his brother's blood through his back…

Noah looked indifferently at the body fallen in front of him and his eyes fixated on Arlong, who seemed to want to tear him apart at that very moment.

"So you also know how to feel anger when one of yours is murdered in cold blood, huh." Stepping over Kuroobi's body, Noah only raised his hand before quickly lowering it. And then...

SWOOOSHH!

A wave of wind suddenly surged around his body, the wind accelerating with a force much greater than everyone was expecting. And with just one impact, all the fish-men around were thrown away.

"I think it's time for the reckoning."