Chapter 16

Markus and Arlong stared at each other across the short distance between them. Markus had lost nearly three hundred hit points so far while Arlong had lost nearly seven hundred. Markus might not hit as hard as the fish, but he landed more blows! He'd always heard and read that speed was king in a fight, now he was experiencing it first hand and he had to agree. Soon enough he would be one of the two fastest men in the world. Once he had the Goro Goro no Mi in his hands only Admiral Kizaru with his Pika Pika no Mi would be faster than him!

Before that though, he needed to defeat Arlong and put an end to his terror over Cocoyashi and the neighboring villages on the island! He had a quest to complete and a storyline to fix! He stared at Arlong as he walked out of the building with the huge saw-toothed sword in his hand. Markus took a deep breath to calm his nerves. His Observation Haki wasn't perfect yet and that sword was scary as hell to look at. It was taller than Arlong and covered in huge wedges of razor-sharp metal. One hit might not kill him, but it would drain a ton of his hit points.

Markus looked around and came up with a plan, he just needed to get inside of Arlong Park. His eyes flickered around before focusing on Arlong, he had a plan now. Arlong charged at Markus while raising his sword to slash at him. Markus swiftly maneuvered around the slash and got behind Arlong. His fists shot out slamming into Arlong's lower back for a one-two combo. Markus deliberately stood still as Arlong let out a roar and backhanded Markus. He was sent flying into Arlong Park, crashing through a wall and landing inside of one of the rooms. Perfect!

While still laying on the ground, he pulled out multiple health potions and began downing them rapidly. He drank six of them in as many seconds and began recovering three hundred health. He didn't have any injuries to heal but the recovery was pushing him a lot further away from death than he had been a moment ago. He still had nineteen potions left, Arlong didn't stand a chance. Now that he was quickly recovering, Markus hopped to his feet and watched Arlong stomp into the building.

Markus used his speed to dodge Arlong's attacks while leading him around the interior of the building. Every one of Arlong's slashes damaged the building further, even slicing clean through supporting pillars of the building. Eventually, Markus led Arlong back outside when the building started to become too unstable. Arlong was so lost in his primal rage that he hadn't registered what Markus had done.

With the fight back out in the open, Markus went back on the offensive. He vanished from sight leaving Arlong looking around for where Markus would appear. During his 'invisibility', Markus downed several Willpower Potions to recover his quickly draining resource. He took full advantage of his extreme speed and landed blows on Arlong's body and face. The lower he whittled Arlong's health, the more bloodshot his eyes became. Unlike Luffy and Zoro, Markus didn't have any powerful moves to knock Arlong out quickly. Point by point he pushed Arlong toward defeat.

Yet another blow from Markus pushed Arlong's health down to just under a hundred. Most enemies were easy to knock unconscious when their health dropped below fifty percent, clearly, that did not apply to a pissed off Arlong. With Arlong so weakened two, maybe three more blows would actually kill him. Arlong turned to face Markus. He was gasping for breath, bleeding from multiple small wounds and his mouth, and covered in bruises from Markus's fists. Arlong glared at Markus, "You insect. I will kill you. I will kill all of you. Then I will go and kill all the people of Cocoyashi! Nami will never be free! She is mine and always will be!"

Markus straightened his body and stood tall. His face hardened as he narrowed his stormy eyes at Arlong, "Nami doesn't belong to you. She belongs to no one!"

Markus charged at Arlong using his fastest speed. In the blink of an eye, Markus appeared beneath Arlong. His whole body curled before releasing like a spring. He launched himself into the air with the full force and weight of his body. With a thunderous crack, his fist slammed into the bottom of Arlong's jaw snapping his head back and launched him up into the air. Arlong seemed to fly in slow motion until he violently landed on his back.

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You have defeated Arlong, +25,000 experience.

Arlong

Class: Pirate Captain

Level: 27

Hit Points: 12/1,470

Unconscious

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Markus looked down at Arlong and let out a long sigh. He turned his back on the fishman and walked over to the rest of his group. He locked eyes with Luffy before pointing at the creaking Arlong Park building, "To free Nami we need to destroy her prison."

Luffy's eyes hardened as he looked at the building. Markus turned to Nami and smiled, "Watch closely."

Nami turned to look at Luffy as he walked over to the building. When he got close he kicked his leg up into the air. It stretched and stretched until it was taller than the massive building, "Gomu Gomu AXE!"

He brought his leg down in an axe kick with a massive amount of force. His foot slammed into the roof and carved through the entire building from top to bottom. The whole building shuddered violently and began to collapse in on itself. A huge amount of noise and dust filled the air as the building broke into uncountable pieces of rubble.

Markus held his hand out to Nami, "You're our friend, no matter what."

As Nami reached for his hand a sinister laugh came from not too far away, "Chichichi, What a lucky day for me! Who would ever guess that a bunch of no-names would beat Arlong."

Markus and the rest of the group looked to the side. Standing there were a bunch of marines led by a man that looked like a mouse. Hell, the loser even had a hoodie on with small round ears and long whiskers on his cheeks. The first impression Markus had was the desire to punch him right in the face. Clearly, everyone else in the group had the same impression from the ugly looks on their faces.

The mouse-man lifted his hand, prompting all of the marines behind him to lift their rifles and point them at the group, "Thanks to you, all the riches of Arlong Park now belong to me! Throw down your arms! I, Captain Nezumi, of the 16th branch of the marines shall hereby take credit for your victory!"

Markus looked at Nezumi and grinned. Given how much he had fucked up the events that were meant to transpire here, he had half expected to not run into the mouse bastard. Not wasting a moment, Markus vanished from where he was. When he reappeared he was next to Nezumi with his left arm draped over his shoulders while his right held his flintlock pistol against the side of his head. Nezumi froze as sweat began to flow from his face like a waterfall. Markus leaned down to whisper into Nezumi's ear, "You dare to tell a member of Cipher Pol what to do?"

Hearing the name of the intelligence organization that had direct contact with the world nobles and the leaders of the marines sent a shiver down Nezumi's spine. He quickly called out to his marines, "Put your weapons down!"

The coward didn't even think to question why a member of Cipher Pol was in the East Blue, it could easily get him killed. Feeling the shudder of fear running through Nezumi and seeing the 'Fear' status with his analysis, Markus pushed further. He reached across Nezumi's body and into his 'pocket' to retrieve something. When Nezumi saw what was in Markus's hand his fear multiplied. A Den-Den Mushi! Markus only let him catch a glimpse of it before putting it away, "Everything you've said has already been transmitted back to my superiors. With what they've heard and what I've seen I would be within my full rights to kill you right here and now as a traitor. However, that would blow my cover so I will let you live on three conditions."

Nezumi nearly fainted but with a bit of hope dangled before him, he grabbed onto it with everything he had, "Anything! Just name it!"

Markus had to fight not to laugh right then and there. He'd planned this out a long time ago. The Den-Den Mushi wasn't even real. It was a toy he bought in the miscellaneous section of his system store. A simple trinket that would look nice on a shelf but to the fear-stricken Nezumi, it was as real as could be. Markus pat Nezumi on his chest with his left hand, "Good man. The first thing you are going to do is turn over every last bit of wealth you've gained from Arlong to me. It's shameful for a marine to accept bribes from a pirate. Second," Markus pointed to Luffy, "You will call headquarters to have a bounty placed on that pirate's head and inform them that he defeated Arlong. Third and final, you will confess your crimes. If you fail to do any of this I will personally see to it that you are hunted down and slowly tortured to death in the most inhumane way possible. A life in prison is a much better fate than what awaits you should you disobey my commands."

Nezumi nodded his head rapidly. Cipher Pol had a gruesome reputation for dealing with people. Nezumi was a small-time marine captain in the weakest sea, all he really knew of the CP units was hearsay and rumor. None of them good. Nezumi didn't want to go to be sent to Impel Down, but that was a far better option than dealing with what would happen to him otherwise. Markus tapped his chest, "Well? I'm getting impatient. Give the order to your men to bring all of your ill-gotten gains here now."

Nezumi immediately began issuing orders to his men for them to bring out the money in his safe on the ship. Due to the changes caused by Markus, Arlong hadn't had Nezumi rob Nami of her treasure so all Nezumi had were his bribes from Arlong. With his order, some of his men ran to his ship to do as they were told. Seeing what was happening shocked Luffy and the others. They looked at Markus weirdly. Seeing them, he grinned and winked at them causing them all to smile. Nami had a radiant smile on her face seeing Markus messing with the marines who let her village suffer.

After one of the nameless privates returned with a sack filled with money, Markus released Nezumi with some parting words, "The rest better be here before tomorrow afternoon. If not..."

He left the threat unsaid. Nezumi's imagination would fill in the blank with the most horrible tortures he could imagine. Sometimes saying nothing was the worst thing a person could do. Nezumi and his men saluted Markus before fleeing for their lives. Once they were on their ship and out of sight, Markus broke out into uproarious laughter. When he finished he turned to the others and grinned, "That was fun."

Luffy, being the ever clueless one, asked, "What did all of that mean?"

Markus joined the others to explain, "My old man used to tell me stories about a boogeyman group in the marines called Cipher Pol. Supposedly they scare even other marines! I don't know if they really exist or not and I doubt low ranking marines know for sure either. So, I used that story to scare that little rat into doing what I told him to! As for this..." He pulled the toy Den-Den Mushi out of his 'pocket' again and showed it to the others, "It's just a toy but that guy was so scared he didn't even take a proper look at it!" He turned to look at Nami, "Tomorrow he'll send someone to drop off all the money Arlong paid him, give it back to the people it belongs to." He looked at the crushed Arlong Park, "Along with everything inside of that building." His gaze turned to Luffy, "That alright with you captain?"

Luffy grinned broadly and nodded his head. Nami had tears of joy in her eyes as she listened to Markus and Luffy. With that taken care of, Markus moved through the wreckage and gathered the biggest pieces of wood he could find while searching through his system for something useful in his shop or inventory. A simple rope wouldn't hold Arlong, even heavily injured. If he had killed him it wouldn't be an issue but he didn't feel killing Arlong was worth the potential risk of causing a rift between himself and the crew. After he gathered some thick beams of wood and lashed them together tightly, he made his way over to the still unconscious and nearly dead Arlong.

Everyone watched silently as Markus chained Arlong to a cross with a few chains he found in the rubble and lifted it up onto his shoulder. He turned to Nami and grinned broadly, "I think the rest of the island deserves to know what happened here, don't you?"

Nami nodded enthusiastically and led the way to Cocoyashi while the rest of the group followed. As they got closer to the village, they could see that everyone had gathered together. The sound of Arlong Park being destroyed had terrified everyone but seeing the group walking up to them with a beaten, bruised, unconscious, and chained to a cross Arlong shocked them to their core. There was absolute silence as Markus walked to the middle of the square and planted the cross into the ground leaving Arlong hanging from it. The silence lasted for a few moments before everyone cheered!

The monster that had terrified and terrorized them for nearly a decade was now no more than a scarecrow. They immediately started to party. Everyone started eating, drinking, dancing, and celebrating their freedom. The party lasted the entire night. At some point, Nami had disappeared along with Nojiko. They had some talking to do and their mother to inform. Markus enjoyed the party and kept an eye on Arlong. He'd noticed a while back that no one regenerated their hit points as fast as he did. Their recovery rates were more realistic, taking days or longer to heal up. This left Markus to assume that their hit points were more of an accurate estimate.

The party lasted the rest of the day and most of the night. Everyone was in a great mood. Markus talked with some of them and got to know the people that Nami had grown up with. Eventually, things wound down as people had to get some sleep. Markus kept guard of Arlong for the entire night and the following morning.

Before noon rolled around, a group of marines came into the village. Nezumi wasn't among them, naturally. The private in charge set a chest filled with Belly's down and quickly turned to leave. Markus called out, "Wait."

The privates froze in fear and looked back at Markus. Markus pointed to Arlong on his cross, "You're marines, aren't you? Take the trash with you and don't forget the trash at Arlong Park."

The marines nodded and, with some effort, managed to drag Arlong away. Markus smirked as he watched them leave. He had no idea if Nezumi would actually turn himself in, but at least he was still scared enough to send over the money. Markus collected the chest and set it in the spot Arlong had occupied before opening it. The village was still sleeping off the partying from last night so no one saw him replace Arlong with an open chest filled with money. He walked away from it and found a nice spot to get a bit of sleep.

The following afternoon and evening the party continued, this time with even more fervor when they found not only the money from the marines, but all the money stored away inside of Arlong Park. Nami even gave the near one hundred million she'd saved up to everyone to help the island recover. Markus stayed out of the way and tried to let events unfold in a more natural manner. Despite that, Nami hunted him down and sat down next to him, "Everyone is looking for you. A lot of them want to thank you and more want to have a drink with you."

Markus groaned causing Nami to laugh. He didn't mind drinking even though he was only sixteen. The laws he knew from his old world had no weight in his new world. Still, he didn't enjoy the feeling of being drunk. The only bright spot was that sleeping recovered all negative statuses, including alcohol poisoning so he didn't have to deal with hangovers. Markus just smiled at Nami, "All I did was what Luffy told me to do. You should be thanking him."

Nami chuckled, "I did but I wanted to thank you as well. You didn't just free me, you freed everyone. You gave us all hope."

Markus placed his hands behind his head and leaned back to relax, "You're a member of our crew and my friend Nami. That's all that matters."

The two sat in silence for a while as the village continued to party. Eventually, it was time for the group to leave. Johnny and Yosaku planned to go back to bounty hunting as they should. The crew, minus Nami, boarded the Going Merry. Shortly after dawn, Nami appeared at one end of the town and shouted, "SET SAIL!"

The Going Merry started to sail away while Nami ran through the town and past everyone while they tried to stop her to say a proper goodbye. When she got to the end of the dock, Nami leaped through the air to land on the Going Merry. Without looking back she partially lifted up her shirt causing a waterfall of wallets to drop onto the deck of the ship. The entire village started yelling at her, though there was clear fondness in their screaming. Markus watched the events unfold and smiled to himself. He might have fucked up the events on the island, but at least the ending was the same. It could have ended so much worse for him. Thankfully, everything was a success!

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Quest Complete!