[Marine Admiral Kuzan? So it really is that guy! How did he manage to find this place? The Marines shouldn't have any way of knowing my exact coordinates, right? Did this guy just stumble on us by luck?]
[Tch, I'm not afraid of him, but fighting an Admiral is a real pain. Can't that Knock Up Stream to Skypiea hurry up already?]
Doll: "What? Admiral Kuzan has already found Arton?"
Smoothie: "A Marine Admiral, huh… that's going to be troublesome."
Whitey Bay: "And at a time like this, too. Arton shouldn't have leaked his location, right?"
Ulti: "So Kuzan found Arton just by luck? What a stupidly lucky guy."
Gion: "If we go by Kuzan's movements, can we still make it to Arton in time?"
Yamato: "If it's Arton, I really don't think a Marine Admiral can just capture him that easily."
…
"Huh?! Arton's diary just updated again! Whoa… this time it's about a Marine Admiral actually showing up."
"Does that mean Arton and his crew might really end up in Impel Down soon?"
Inside Impel Down, Sadi—still resting together with Domino—let out a shout and jumped to her feet in excitement.
With Sadi's reminder, Domino hurriedly opened her own diary copy and indeed saw the latest lines Arton had written.
"It's true. If it's Admiral Kuzan, there might be a chance he brings Arton in… or not." Domino shook her head with a sigh.
"Why not? Even if Admiral Kuzan is the youngest of the three Admirals, his strength is no joke. How could he possibly fail to capture Arton and his pirate crew?" Sadi asked, puzzled.
Domino, however, had a different view.
"Admiral Kuzan is definitely strong," she said calmly, "but judging from everything so far, Arton's no pushover either. Add in the rest of the Flameblade Pirates, and I'd say Kuzan only has about a fifty–fifty chance of actually catching him, and besides…"
She stopped there.
"Besides what? Come on, spit it out, I'm getting anxious here," Sadi urged.
"Arton mentioned in his diary that back during the Ohara incident… Kuzan let Robin go." Domino said. "This time, he might end up letting her go again,"
"That's impossible. I mean, I can kind of believe he'd let Robin slip away," Sadi replied, "but letting Arton and the entire Flameblade Pirates walk? No way I'm buying that."
"Don't forget, Arton killed a Celestial Dragon. The World Government is definitely going to lean hard on the Marines to arrest him. Under that kind of pressure, Kuzan's not going to just let Arton go, right?"
"Maybe… but I still get the feeling Kuzan won't go all out," Domino murmured. "I hope it's just my imagination."
…
"Captain, a Marine Admiral's here—what should we do?" Carina pushed open the door to the lookout room as she spoke.
She had seen the latest update in Arton's diary as well, and then rushed over here at top speed.
Fortunately, Tashigi and Uta were only half a mess inside the dream world; in the real world, their clothes were still perfectly neat.
Even so, the two of them—who had been utterly exhausted from dancing up and down in the dream—snapped back to full awareness the moment they heard Carina's words, and got to their feet with equally serious expressions.
Chapter 478: Robin, Ride Out With Me
"That man just had to show up at a time like this… what a complete mood-killer."
"Captain, should we… avoid him for now?" Uta had spotted Kuzan as well and posed the question to Arton.
"Leave?" Arton shook his head. "Forget about leaving. The Knock Up Stream is going to appear any moment now. If we back off here, I'll have to waste even more time waiting for the next one."
Carina helplessly pressed a hand to her forehead. "Do we really have to use the Knock Up Stream? With your abilities, Captain, we can reach Skypiea without relying on that current, can't we?"
At that, Arton shrugged. "You're not wrong. But riding the Knock Up Stream is my romance. If I walk away from it now, I'll regret it someday."
Even though the Knock Up Stream doesn't only appear this once, now that Kuzan had found this particular point, no one could say whether the Marines and the World Government would arrange for someone to pay special attention to this area in the future.
If they really did that, then trying to board the Knock Up Stream here again would become impossible.
So, no matter what, Arton wanted to pull it off this time and ride the Knock Up Stream successfully.
"Well, since Captain has put it like that…" Carina spread her hands with a wry smile. "Then we can only keep you company properly. So next up—are we going out to greet that Marine Admiral?" She rubbed her knuckles as she spoke.
"Yeah, we're going to go say hello," Arton said. "But there's no need for everyone to head over."
Marine Admirals are far too powerful. And as a Logia user, Kuzan is basically an AOE specialist. A casual swing of his powers is enough to devastate a massive swath of sea.
Fighters who are strong enough can shrug off that sort of area-of-effect carnage, but anyone not up to par would be in serious danger stepping onto that field.
Arton didn't want his crewmates caught in that kind of crossfire. If that happened, he'd have to split his focus protecting them.
"How about this: I'll go take a look at the situation by myself first. If we can avoid a fight, we avoid it. If it does turn into a fight, you all just watch from the sidelines for the time being," Arton said.
"Won't that be too dangerous?" Tashigi grabbed Arton's hand, worry plain on her face.
As someone who'd once been a Marine herself, Tashigi had quite the filter when it came to Marine Admirals. Out of everyone present, she was the most wary of Admiral Kuzan.
"Relax. I'm not the weakling I was when I first set out to sea anymore. I'm terrifyingly strong now," Arton said with a casual wave of his hand. "If things really start to look dicey, then you can jump in and help, depending on how it's going."
That was all well and good, but just as Arton was about to leave the lookout room and go have a talk with Kuzan, Robin reached out and caught his arm.
"What's wrong, Robin?" Arton asked.
"Can I go with you, Captain?" Robin looked up at him, eyes full of expectation.
"Come with me, huh…" Arton creased his brows slightly. After a moment of consideration, he still ended up nodding.
He didn't really have a choice; he knew about the past between Robin and Kuzan. At a time like this, there really was a need to let the two of them meet and talk things through properly.
And as for bringing Robin along, Arton was confident he could protect her.
"Thank you, Captain," Robin said softly.
"Yeah, don't mention it. You've been working hard, after all."
Thinking back on Robin's service earlier, Arton's tone carried a meaningful warmth.
"Oh, right—get ready. We might have to fuse again later, and use the witch's special flames to deal with Kuzan. I've got a feeling that fire from the Witch template will give an ice-user like Admiral Kuzan a very… special experience."
Arton grinned as he spoke.
....
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