Inside the underground meeting room of the casino "Rain Banquet."
Upon hearing the words of this intruder who had suddenly barged in, Crocodile couldn't help but feel a surge of anger, even though he suspected the other party was deliberately provoking him.
Those words instantly triggered memories of his past, humiliating defeat.
He slowly rose to his feet, biting down so hard on his cigar that it snapped in half. With veins bulging on his forehead, he growled in a low, menacing tone:
"Who do you think I am?!"
"You arrogant little brat, it seems you don't take me seriously at all!"
"With just those words, I'll make you realize that sometimes death is a luxury!"
But just as Crocodile finished speaking and raised his hand to summon grains of sand, his eyes caught sight of Robin emerging from the nearby staircase.
Already seething with rage, he raised an eyebrow and sneered with sudden realization:
"No wonder someone managed to break in here. So, it was you who brought him, wasn't it?"
"As expected of the 'Devil Child,' you've always been quick to betray others."
Despite the venom in his words, Robin remained unfazed. Having prepared herself mentally in advance, she responded with a calm smile:
"Honestly, I didn't want to bring him here, but unfortunately, I didn't have a choice."
"Hm?" Crocodile's gaze sharpened as he finally turned his attention to the man's face.
When he got a clear look at the intruder's features, his pupils constricted sharply.
But Will paid no heed to their conversation.
He had already strolled casually into the lavishly decorated meeting room, his eyes scanning the surroundings thoughtfully.
"'Madman' Will… Why the hell is this troublesome guy showing up at my place?" Crocodile muttered to himself, his emotions settling into a wary calm as he recognized the man.
Yet, his right hand, hanging at his side, was still secretly gathering sand in his palm.
After all, judging by what Will had said upon entering, it was clear he hadn't come with friendly intentions.
As Will leisurely approached the floor-to-ceiling window, his gaze fixed on the lake outside, Crocodile's brow furrowed. He snapped coldly:
"What's that? You came all the way here just to admire my pet crocodiles?!"
Will didn't respond immediately. Instead, he turned his head, a curious glint in his eyes as he said:
"Crocodile, if I'm not mistaken, you're a Devil Fruit user, aren't you?"
"So what…" Crocodile's eye twitched, baffled by the sudden, seemingly foolish question.
By now, Will had reached the window. He lightly tapped the glass with his hand, a faint smirk curling at the corner of his mouth:
"Then why would you stay in a place like this?"
"You do realize there's water all around you out there, right?"
"If I were to smash this window right now and let all that water flood in…"
He paused, turning to face Crocodile, whose expression had darkened instantly, and grinned:
"As a Devil Fruit user, do you think you'd make it out of here alive?"
Will genuinely couldn't fathom what was going through Crocodile's head. How could someone be foolish enough to surround their secret base with water? Had he forgotten he'd eaten a Devil Fruit—the Sand-Sand Fruit, no less, which made him especially vulnerable to water? Or was he so obsessed with raising his crocodiles that he was willing to risk his own life for it?
At that moment, Crocodile's composure was utterly shattered by Will's words.
He had only wanted to keep his crocodiles close for observation, never considering this glaring flaw.
Now that he thought about it, he realized he'd done something incredibly stupid.
Building a secret base like this for a Devil Fruit user was tantamount to constructing his own underwater grave…
For someone who prided himself on his intelligence, this was unbearable.
But before he could respond, Will, under Crocodile's horrified gaze, suddenly threw a punch at the floor-to-ceiling window.
BOOM!
With a deafening crash, the window—designed to withstand immense water pressure—shattered under the force of his fist.
In the next instant, a torrent of water surged through the breach, flooding the room!
"What the hell?!"
Caught off guard and standing too close to the window, Crocodile had no time to evade. The rushing water instantly soaked his legs.
As a user of the Sand-Sand Fruit, water was his greatest weakness. His legs, now submerged, were stripped of their powers, unable to transform into sand.
Even if he could elementalize the rest of his body to float, his waterlogged legs anchored him down.
Will's actions had completely blindsided him, leaving him frozen in place, unable to make a swift decision.
Meanwhile, Will stood calmly by the window, unfazed as the water roared past him. He remained rooted in place, immovable.
Looking at Crocodile's panicked expression, Will found it almost amusing.
It seemed Crocodile had poured all his cunning into scheming to seize the Alabasta Kingdom, leaving little room for common sense. No wonder he'd delegated so much of Baroque Works' operations to Robin.
By now, the water had fully submerged Crocodile's feet. His composure was gone, replaced by a furious roar:
"You damned bastard!"
"Have you forgotten?! Robin, who brought you here, is a Devil Fruit user too!"
"If you do this, she'll—"
But before he could finish, Will raised a hand and pointed toward the entrance.
Crocodile instinctively turned to look, and his face flushed with rage.
Robin, who had been standing near the staircase, was now waving lightly at them with a smile before turning and walking away.
"Damn it…!!"
Crocodile's expression darkened to a terrifying degree.
Will's unexpected move had thrown him into complete disarray.
He'd even forgotten that Robin had been standing by the staircase, far enough to avoid being immediately swept away by the flood.
At that moment, Crocodile felt like a clown in a circus.
As if his nose had turned red!
The clown was me all along?!
His grand plans to steal Alabasta, his Operation Utopia, his search for the Ancient Weapons—all of it was nonsense!
Before he could even execute the final step of his Utopia plan, he had been defeated in the very underground base he'd so meticulously designed.
Defeated by the lake he'd deliberately filled to feed his crocodiles!
What a laughably absurd end.
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