Chapter 163 — Calamity in Wano, Shimotsuki's Hire

When Nami was about to take the money and go to Arlong, the considerate System offered a crucial hint.

"Host, you don't really believe Arlong will keep his word, do you?"

The voice sounded at her ear, and Nami froze.

Her feet felt leaden, glued to the ground, every step an effort.

She took a few habitual steps, then stopped dead.

Her lips were stiff as a statue's—she could feel them, but could not control them, and could only let out meaningless moans.

Clever as Nami was, how could she fail to see through such a simple trick?

Arlong had never been a man of his word.

Even if she did scrape together a hundred million berries, ten to one he would still come out with the same line: "Humans who defy fish-men defy the laws of nature."

He would break his promise and grow fat on it, and on top of that lock her in a lightless room to draw nautical charts until she died.

Nami, who had seen too much of the world's darkness, could read the human heart better than any of her peers.

Before, she had no choice but to lie to herself.

Now, she had another way.

A true way to take revenge on Arlong!

Nami had not forgotten into whose hands her adoptive mother Bellemere had fallen.

In this world anyone could be forgiven—anyone but Arlong!

A long while later, Nami recovered from her trance and possession.

"Mr. System, thank you!"

"I simply don't want to go looking for a second host in this world. Too much trouble."

However cold the answer, Nami remained grateful.

She did not know that she was merely a diversion.

Even if she knew, she would not feel ashamed or angry for it.

This being's arrival had changed her life.

...

While Wang Xu was training Nami in how to become a qualified big spender, a tragedy of unparalleled horror was unfolding in Wano Country on the Grand Line.

Never in Wano's history had there been a plague so persistent, so violent.

The afflicted oozed thick blood from every pore of their bodies; the blood clogged their pores and dyed their faces the crimson of the Red Skull.

To look at them was to see a mask of gore.

They did not die at once.

From onset to death took a full half month.

Their life force ebbed away, their reason collapsed, and they began to attack the sane like madmen.

No one could say for certain how the disease spread.

Air, water, bodily fluids?

Or all of them?

The people of Wano summoned the finest doctors of the Grand Line, yet not one could do anything about this new disease.

Within three months, fewer than one in ten of Wano's inhabitants remained.

The dead included the daimyo of Wano, Kozuki Oden.

The only two survivors of the Kozuki clan were the young lord Momonosuke and his loyal retainer, Foxfire Kin'emon.

The calamity that befell Wano came to be called "the greatest and most evil plague in history."

Kano Country, upon receiving the news, did not gloat but instead expressed profound mourning.

Standing atop the ice-breaking rock, Peter Parker overlooked the ravaged land, his eyes sinister.

"This godforsaken place!"

"Don't any of these people speak Mandarin?"

"We could have talked this out, helped each other..."

"Everything that's happening now, you brought on yourselves."

It was Peter Parker who had drenched all of Wano in blood.

The story was simple enough.

Newly arrived in the Pirate World without the temporary "Language Proficiency" buff, he had accidentally knocked over a little bald brat in a pink outfit and wooden clogs on the street.

It should have been a trifle, but the brat's hangers-on were instantly aroused, cursing Peter Parker up hill and down dale, and even laying hands on him.

Who was Peter Parker?

He had been a hero and a villain; in the late Marvel era he had even become the Overlord of the Wasteland, ruling countless vaults.

Did they really think he had no temper?

Those few tactless curs had their necks twisted in an instant and died on the spot.

Often, disaster springs from a trifling thing.

To Peter Parker, killing a few scum was nothing worth mentioning.

But the little bald one, who looked no more than a few years old, struck a nauseating pose of righteous indignation and jabbered a torrent of incomprehensible words at him, even trying to spit on him.

Disgusting Jia Mingyuan.

Peter Parker was in no mood to indulge him.

Faced with the little bald brat's furious barking, Peter Parker said not a word and simply kicked him.

In the wasteland, there is no law protecting underage brats.

Experience changes a man.

Peter Parker had long since lost the habit of wasting words before he struck.

There was, however, one tiny problem...

He seemed to have underestimated this world's fighting strength.

Without the Venom symbiote's boost, he had fallen into a siege of sword-wielding samurai and taken no small hurt.

An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.

Wounded, Peter Parker hardened his heart, sought out a veteran reincarnator nearby, and borrowed a batch of reward points and biochemical reagents.

And so...

The catastrophe was wrought.

"This isn't over!"

Under the long-term influence of Venom, Peter Parker's temperament had shifted in subtle ways.

His eyes were somewhat sinister, his teeth grinding audibly.

"Momonosuke, you're a dead man."

Having learned his lesson about the language barrier, he promptly exchanged for a Japanese Language Mastery skill orb.

Now he knew the name of that little brat.

The son of Wano's daimyo.

What gave him some trouble were the powers called "Haki" and "Devil Fruits."

As a reincarnator, he always had more tricks than troubles.

...

East Blue, Shimotsuki Village.

The Isshin Dojo received a girl with short orange hair.

Beside her stood two tall women with bows in hand, apparently bodyguards.

Their arrival brought a little life to the quiet dojo.

"Welcome. It is an honor."

Koushirou, the master of the dojo, led a group of young students to line up and welcome them.

His gaze fell on the two guard girls, and behind his glasses his eyes narrowed slightly.

Armament Haki.

They must be huntresses from Kuja Island.

And the orange-haired girl, the one they served—what manner of being was she?

Koushirou studied Nami closely, and no matter how he sensed her, she seemed a weak, ordinary person.

Zoro, even a few years ago, could have defeated her with ease.

Unlike the cautious Koshiro, Nami gave a playful wink and came straight to the point: "I hear you're a real master. I'd like to hire you to take out an enemy for me."

Koshiro rejected her offer without a moment's hesitation: "My skills are quite ordinary, and I'm not taking on any work at present."

"Twenty million berries!"

The girl named her figure with the casual generosity of the wealthy.

Koshiro pushed up his glasses, looking troubled: "It's not a question of money. I—"

"Forty million berries!"

The orange-haired girl doubled the price the instant she opened her mouth, lavish beyond all measure.

"I'm telling you, it truly isn't about the money. It's a matter of principle—"

"Eighty million berries!"

Nami lifted her chin slightly, her tone earnest: "The man I want you to kill, Jia Mingyuan, is the captain of the Dragon Pirates."

"Add his own twenty-million bounty, and on the black market he's already worth as much as a Devil Fruit..."

At that, Koshiro fell silent.

He was tempted.

Not for himself, but for his comrades in the Revolutionary Army.

As the master of the Isshin Dojo, he had no need of much money, nor any longing for a life of luxury.

But his comrades in the Revolutionary Army needed vast sums—for equipment, for provisions, for propaganda, and for greasing the right palms.