"Baa!!"
The goat head spit out Buggy, and its massive fangs opened wide as it reared up and roared. Its lower body emerged from the sea, revealing its full appearance.
The creature was about ten meters long, with the upper body of a goat and the lower body of a fishtail, a typical Sea Beast.
The distinction between a Sea King and a Sea Beast is quite clear.
Sea Kings generally resemble non-mammalian creatures like fish, reptiles, amphibians, and birds, with all sorts of chaotic features.
Sea Beasts are more uniform, with the upper body being a mammal, and the lower body having fish-like characteristics.
The sea is indeed wondrous; even Sage, although aware of the existence of Sea Beasts and Sea Kings, was quite shocked upon first encountering them.
The goat-headed Sea Beast leapt out from the sea and lunged toward Sage with its fangs bared.
"Sage!!"
Lily exclaimed not far away, drawing her rapier like a swimming dragon, swiftly darting through the water.
No matter what, this was the captain she had just acknowledged; nothing could happen to him!
"No need."
Sage stopped Lily directly, his body exploding out of the sea in a spray of water, leaping up as the goat head charged at him. He stepped on air, using Moon Step to sidestep the attack of the goat-headed Sea Beast.
Bang!!
The massive splash erupted below him, and Sage ascended into the sky, crossing sides like climbing a staircase, while amidst the spray the goat-headed Sea Beast re-emerged, mouth open wide for a bite.
Its speed was quite fast, emerging from the sea at a pace that barely allowed anyone to react, but as its sharp teeth reached Sage's foot sole, it suddenly halted.
Not high enough...
Sage looked down at the rapidly attacking goat-headed Sea Beast and gave a cold smile.
With a size like this, comparable to a ship, but on the great sea...
"It's just a small Sea Beast!"
Facing the sharp teeth, Sage's feet flashed in a series of afterimages, flecking azure slashes down like a rain curtain.
"Rankyaku: Riot!"
Even the North Star Divine Fist has methods of defeating such Sea Beasts. Through years of training, he discovered not only human-specific Secret Hole points; everything has them. For non-humans, if patient enough, one can detect these Secret Hole points.
But with Six Styles now, why bother with such intricacies?
Sch-sch-sch!!
"Baa!!"
The azure slashes tore open the goat-headed Sea Beast's body, exposing deep gashes with blood spraying everywhere, causing it to howl in agony, its stretched body slapping heavily onto the sea, floating.
With that, Sage descended and stood on the Sea Beast's body, calling to Lily, "Come on up, Lily."
Lily swam over, climbed onto the Sea Beast's body, with seawater soaking her, making her blonde hair cling to her neck, and her wide skirt clung to her body, outlining her slender, straight legs and resilient curvature, not to mention the grand narrative of her upper body swaying with her movements.
True · Blonde · Big · Waves.
A sixteen-year-old girl...
Sage glanced at her then quickly averted his eyes, saying, "Lily, cut off some meat, let's have some seafood."
Sea creatures are naturally considered seafood, even such Sea Beasts with goat-like upper bodies can be eaten raw.
Lily's sword was indeed a fine piece, exceptionally sharp, gleaming coldly in the light. As she jabbed down, Sage instructed, "Skip the upper body, just slice the waist and belly, where beast meets fish, it's tender and elastic with good flavor."
Following his advice, Lily lowered her sword and cut open the Sea Beast's skin, selecting a piece of meat, and tossed it to Sage.
Sage caught it with a raised hand, took a bite and chewed twice before swallowing, remarking with satisfaction, "Mm! Delicious!"
Lily picked out another chunk with her sword blade; instead of using her hand like Sage, she gently bit it using the blade, widened her eyes and started eating quickly.
It was elastic yet not hard to chew, full of tenderness.
Lily rapidly consumed the meat chunks from the sword blade, picked up another piece for Sage, then continued feasting.
Until half of the Sea Beast's waist and belly was excavated, Lily stopped, observing Sage who was still eating, "Sage...I don't quite understand."
"Hm?"
Sage sat cross-legged on the Sea Beast, taking big bites of meat, "Don't understand what?"
In this world, people generally had significant appetites, even Lily ate half of the amount, with Sage finishing the rest.
Ever since training in North Star Divine Fist, from childhood onwards, his appetite steadily grew.
"You're so strong, why be so fixated on that dream? If you're a pirate, shouldn't you be moving toward One Piece?"
"Because the housing prices back home are too high." Sage sighed.
"Ah?" Lily didn't quite grasp that.
Sage shook his head with a smile.
How to explain, folks back home innately have an obsession with land; who wouldn't want to own a vast piece of land, a large house? Upon arriving here, he held onto that dream even more deeply, becoming an obsession.
Why...
Misfortune!
If he had those things from the start, maybe there wouldn't be such an obsession, but due to never having them, the obsession deepened, almost becoming warped.
"No conflict!"
Sage swallowed the meat, clenched his fist, "Being a pirate, fully committed, no one said the Pirate King can't have real estate! I want to be a landlord and also become the Pirate King!"
Young people's choice is to have everything, but adults realize it's overwhelming, yet...
Men stay boys 'til they die!
"Let's go, find an island to rest."
After eating and resting a bit, Sage rose from the Sea Beast corpse, saying, "If we don't leave, the blood scent will draw more Sea Beasts."
He couldn't dare linger here; the Sea Beast's corpse would eventually be shredded by other Sea Beasts, so it's best to find an island for respite first.
Grabbing Lily by the back of her collar, Sage activated Moon Step, stepping on air towards the direction pointed out by Buggy.
He didn't trust his luck but he trusted Buggy.
Just because Buggy helped him catch a fish, he definitely would trust him.
And this time, his trust was not misplaced.
As night fell, with bright stars dotting the sky, he really did spot an outline of an island, making Sage light up with delight, speeding up as he bounced in the night sky, nearing the island.
Finally, a place to rest tonight!
As they drew closer, Lily suddenly paused, pointed to a landing spot on the island, saying, "Sage, there's a ship."
A ship?
Following her direction, Sage indeed saw a ship on the landing area.
A small boat, similar to the little wooden boat Lily once sailed, perhaps bigger, since onboard there's a small cabin for one person to rest, beside which hung a black sail painted with a white skull flanked by hourglasses.
Pirate ship!
Instinctively, Sage looked towards the island, even from this distance, he could see firelight from the center of the island.
"Well!"
He laughed, "Looks like not only will we not sleep out in the open tonight, but we might also have some warm food and drinks."