r18novel Should we continue with Chapter 70?
Should we continue with Chapter 70?
Should we continue with Chapter 70?
Crocodile got up, washed, and changed his clothes. Everything was the same as usual, but he was noticeably faster than usual.
He sat at the table eating breakfast: a fried egg, toast, and fruit. But he only ate a few bites before putting down his knife and fork.
When Crocodile looked up at the clock on the wall for the third time, Robin said softly, "It's already nine o'clock in the morning, President."
"I know!"
Crocodile slammed his napkin on the table and paced around the dining room. He walked from the window to the door, then back again, then across. Deep footprints were left on the carpet.
Suddenly, Crocodile grabbed the fur coat hanging on the hanger.
Robin smiled: "Do you need me to accompany you?"
"No need! You stay at the casino! Handle the day-to-day affairs! We'll talk when I get back!" Crocodile said.
He strode out of the restaurant and downstairs. Early risers were already playing in the casino lobby, but they all lowered their heads, avoiding his gaze. He crossed the lobby and left the Rain Banquet Hall; a waiter at the door had already prepared a camel.
Crocodile mounted the camel, yanked the reins hard, and the camel bellowed in displeasure, but began to run, heading towards the northern desert.
Robin stood at the window on the second floor of the Rain Banquet, watching his figure disappear at the end of the street. The morning sunlight painted the street gold, and camels kicked up clouds of dust as they ran by.
"I did go after all," she murmured to herself, a smile playing on her lips.
North of the rain-covered land lies the desert.
The nearest oasis is ten kilometers away. As far as the eye can see, there are only endless golden sand dunes, like solidified giant waves, stretching all the way to the horizon.
The coolness of the night lingered on the shady sides of the dunes, but the sunny sides were scorching hot from the morning sun. The air distorted in the heat, and the distant horizon shimmered like a reflection in the water.
A figure was on top of the tallest sand dune.
Norton sat there cross-legged. His wolf-fur coat was covered in dust, which looked gray in the sunlight. His silver hair was ruffled by the wind, with a few strands sticking to his forehead. His face and hands were covered with a layer of fine sand, and his lips were slightly cracked from thirst.
But Norton sat very upright, his back straight, his head slightly tilted back, his eyes looking into the distance, and a smile on his face.
He has barely moved since last night. The only evidence that he is alive is the slight rise and fall of his chest when he breathes.
The desert mornings are quiet, with only the whistling of the wind through the dunes and the soft rustling of the sand as it rolls. Occasionally, a desert lizard scurries across, leaving a trail of tiny footprints, which are quickly smoothed over by the wind.
Suddenly, a sound came from afar.
First came the faint sound of hooves, then the braying of camels. The sounds grew closer and closer.
Norton's eyes flickered, and he slowly turned his head to look in the direction of the sound.
Below the dunes, a man appeared riding a camel. The rider wore a black fur coat and had a metal hook in his right hand. The rider stopped at the bottom of the dune and jumped off the camel. The camel automatically walked to the side and began to graze on the sparse, drought-resistant grass on the sand.
The rider then walked up the sand, and five minutes later, he reached the top of the dune and stopped five meters in front of Norton.
"You really came," Norton said.
"You idiot, are you bored out of your mind?" Crocodile said.
Norton slowly stood up, brushed the sand off his clothes, and the sand fell from his coat, piling up in a small heap at his feet.
"Now that you're here," Norton said, cracking his wrists and neck, his joints making a slight clicking sound, "let's get started without further ado."
"I will make you," Norton said, looking into Crocodile's eyes, enunciating each word clearly, "willingly submit to me!"
"Arrogant rookie!" Crocodile roared, thrusting his right arm's metal poison hook forward, the tip barely touching the air!
Tens of thousands of grains of sand rose from the ground, gathering, swirling, and compressing in mid-air. They didn't slowly condense; they took shape instantly! A spiral-shaped sand spike appeared out of nowhere in 0.3 seconds, its tip gleaming coldly, each grain of sand compressed to be as hard as steel.
"Scorpion venom sting!"
The moment he finished speaking, the sand spike was already in front of Norton, aimed straight for his forehead.
Norton didn't dodge. He raised his right hand, fingers spread, and reached for the sand spikes.
This movement seemed too slow in the face of the speed of the sand spikes.
Just as the sand spike was about to pierce his palm, it was caught. Norton's palm was still two centimeters away from the tip of the sand spike, but the sand spike just hovered there, spinning wildly and emitting a piercing shriek, unable to go any further.
Crocodile's pupils contracted.
Norton reached forward slightly and grasped the sand spike. The moment his fingers closed, the spiraling sand spike broke in the middle; he held the front half in his hand, while the back half turned into quicksand and fell away.
Norton looked at the half-sand spike in his hand for half a second, then casually flicked it away.
"call out-
'
The sand spikes shot back, twice as fast as they had come, their trajectory as straight as if measured with a ruler, aimed directly at Crocodile's chest.
Crocodile didn't dodge. He stood still, letting the sand spikes pierce through his chest.
The sand spikes struck, but Crocodile's body instantly turned into sand, and the sand spikes passed through his sand-covered body, flying into the distance.
The sand and dust swirled and reformed in the air, and three seconds later, Crocodile reappeared unharmed, not even his clothes were ruffled.
"Useless." Crocodile's voice carried a dry, desert-like mockery. "I'm a sandman who ate the Sand-Sand Fruit. Elementalization is my basic ability. I don't possess Haki, nor do I have a Seastone weapon—that Jitte was destroyed by Kizaru, wasn't it?"
After a pause, Crocodile's gaze fell on Norton's empty hands: "Without Seastone, what will you use to fight against Logia-types?"
'
"So what?" Norton said. "I can beat you with my fists!"
Before he finished speaking, Norton moved. The ten-meter distance seemed to shrink to a single step beneath his feet! Norton threw a straight right punch, the simplest straight punch, without any fancy moves.
But the instant the punch was thrown, Crocodile heard the air scream... It was the sound of air being violently compressed and then forcefully "pushed" apart by the fist!
Too fast! So fast that there was no time to think!
Crocodile only had time to do one thing: become an elemental.
"Bang!"
The fist struck Crocodile's face, not through it, but smashed right in! Crocodile's head exploded under the fist, instantly disintegrating into billions of grains of sand, which were then ejected backward by the force of the punch.
The headless body flew backward, completely disintegrating in mid-air and turning into a cloud of sand.
Sand clouds churned in the air, slowly gathering.
A few seconds later, Crocodile reappeared, his face paler than before.
He touched his face—it was completely unharmed, but the "feel" of that punch still lingered in his consciousness. If he hadn't instantly transformed into elemental form, that punch would have shattered his skull!
"It's fast!" Crocodile admitted, his voice a little hoarse. "But speed alone isn't enough. In the desert, I have an unlimited number of chances to start over!"
After saying that, Crocodile raised his left hand, palm down, and pressed it onto the sand.
"Desert sunflower!"
Centered on Crocodile's palm, the sand within a radius of twenty meters began to flow, forming a vortex in the center of the slurry, with the sand grains at the edges swirling upwards.
The sand beneath Norton's feet collapsed. Norton plummeted downwards, but mid-fall, he landed on a shifting sand wall!
The sand wall was trampled into a deep pit, and Norton shot upwards, leaping out of the vortex like a cannonball.
Crocodile did not pursue, but brought his hands together in front of his chest, palms facing each other, and began to spin.
The surrounding sand grains were drawn in, gathering, compressing, and spinning between his hands, forming an ever-growing sand ball. The sand ball spun faster and faster, emitting a deep hum, like the flapping of wings of millions of locusts!
"Sandstorm!"
Crocodile thrust his hands forward. The sand sphere detached from his palms, and in the instant it expanded in the air, a sandstorm with a diameter of over ten meters took shape, spinning as it hurtled towards Norton, who had just landed.
This is not a natural sandstorm, but a desert catastrophe imbued with will! Wherever it passes, deep trenches are carved into the sand, and fine sand is swept up dozens of meters into the air.
Norton watched the sandstorm rushing towards him, took a half step back with his right foot, and pulled his right fist back to its limit. His back muscles tensed, and his spine curved into a fully drawn bow.
Then, throw a punch!
The moment the fist was thrown, a visible "fault" appeared in the air in front of it—a fan-shaped shockwave spread forward.
The shockwave collided head-on with the sandstorm!
"boom-!!!"
With a deafening roar from the collision of the two immense forces, the sandstorm was torn apart in two! The spinning sand grains lost control and scattered to both sides!
Crocodile stared wide-eyed, almost unable to believe what he was seeing.
But then he realized something was wrong, gritted his teeth, and raised his right poisoned hook high above his head. The poisoned hook began to "grow," with grains of sand rising from the ground, attaching to the hook tip, and constantly compressing and extending.
The next second, a five-meter-long crescent-shaped sand blade had formed at the tip of the poison hook, its sharp edges emitting a chilling light.
"The Desert Sword!"
The poison hook swung down. The five-meter-long sand blade tore through the air, its trajectory as straight as a laser, slashing towards Norton.
Norton sidestepped. The sand blade grazed his body and slashed down, cutting into the sand. The sand silently split open, creating a five-meter-long, one-meter-deep fissure, its cut surface as smooth as a mirror.
Missing his first strike, Crocodile twisted his wrist, unleashing a horizontal slash with his sand blade. Norton leaned back, the sand blade grazing just above his nose.
The third strike was a diagonal slash. Norton slid to the left, delivering a sand blade slash from where he had just been standing.
All three attacks missed.
Norton had taken advantage of the gap during the third attack to close in on Crocodile, reducing the distance from ten meters to one meter!
Crocodile tried to retreat and transform into his elemental form, but Norton was faster. His right fist struck again, this time targeting a head!
Crocodile instantly transformed into his elemental form, his head turning into sand and scattering! The fist passed right through his head, causing no damage.
Although the punch missed, the force of the blow didn't stop; it shot upwards and into the sky.
The thick sea of clouds was forcefully "pushed" open by the force of the punch, creating a crack hundreds of meters long. The morning light poured down from the crack, shining on the sand dunes. Crocodile, who had been re-coiling ten meters away, looked up at the crack in the clouds in the sky, his face ashen.
If that punch had hit a solid object—
Norton didn't pursue. He stood still, raised his left hand, and ran his right index finger across his left palm. The fingernail scratched the skin; the movement was slow.
Blood gushed out, quickly staining the entire palm red.
Norton stretched out his blood-stained hand, clenched it into a fist, and held it out to Crocodile.
The fist was only ten centimeters away from Crocodile's face, and blood dripped from between his fingers, leaving dark spots on the sand.
"Want to play again?" Norton asked.
Crocodile's pupils contracted sharply.
Blood...liquid...water!
The Sand-Sand Fruit's absolute weakness is that the parts of the body that come into contact with liquid cannot be elementalized.
The man's blood is on his hands; if he lands a punch, it will cause real damage.
At this distance and in this state, Crocodile cannot dodge this punch.
Knowing this all too well, Crocodile looked at the blood-stained fist, then at Norton's eyes.
There was no emotion in those eyes, only an almost indifferent calm—calmly declaring victory, calmly giving the choice.
The silence lasted for five seconds.
The desert wind was still blowing, stirring up fine sand. Morning light poured in through the cracks in the clouds, casting long shadows of the two people.
Crocodile finally lowered his eyes, slowly straightened up, and patted the dust off his body.
"I surrender."
The three words resonated loudly in the silent desert.
Norton withdrew his hand; the wound on his palm had stopped bleeding and was beginning to heal.
"Well then," Norton grinned, "from now on, you're my subordinate!"
Crocodile gritted his teeth but didn't refute. He glanced at the rain-soaked land in the distance, then at the desert beneath his feet, and finally his gaze returned to Norton.
"What do you want me to do?" Crocodile asked, his tone still carrying a hint of resentment, but more so of resignation.
Despite his pride, Crocodile had already accepted the bet upon arriving here. While Crocodile was capable of breaking a bet, he couldn't bring himself to do it against Norton.
Wouldn't that indirectly admit that he's far inferior to Norton?
"Let's go back to Rainfield first." Norton turned and started walking down the dunes.
For Norton, Crocodile's submission was the biggest gain from this trip to Alabasta.
While it's impossible to confirm whether Crocodile harbors any ulterior motives or is merely temporarily succumbing to overwhelming power...
However, as long as it appears to outsiders that Crocodile has been brought under Crocodile's control, that's enough. The World Government doesn't care about Crocodile's intentions; they only care about his actions.
Crocodile, one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea under the World Government, defected to "Silver-haired" Norton, who was an enemy of the World Government. This alone was enough for the World Government to remove Crocodile from the Seven Warlords.
Furthermore, the world government will absolutely do everything in its power to cover this up, although with Morgans' help, who yearns for big news, it is impossible to cover it up.
Norton had already achieved his goal by making the world government and navy lose face and prestige.
Not to mention, they have also captured a powerful fighting force!
Crocodile's strength, at this stage, can be said to surpass that of all the officers of the Norton Pirates.
...
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