Argentus spun his spear with casual mastery, the iron shaft whistling through the air before he slammed the butt decisively into the stone ground with a heavy thud.
He looked down at the tip of his weapon, examining it in the fading golden light.
There wasn't a scratch on it. Not a single nick or imperfection. The blade that had just severed two steel swords was pristine, as if it had cut through air instead of metal.
"I didn't cut steel," Argentus corrected, a satisfied smirk playing on his lips as he looked up at Zoro. "Not really. I just felt where it wanted to break. Where the grain was weakest. Where the breath was interrupted."
He planted the spear firmly beside him.
"Steel isn't one solid piece. It's millions of crystals pressed together. Find the spaces between them, and you don't need overwhelming force. You just need understanding."
Koushiro stood up from the porch with fluid grace, his expression unreadable behind those ever-present glasses. But a hint of pride—genuine, paternal pride—shone clearly in his eyes for anyone observant enough to see it.
He walked slowly across the courtyard, his wooden sandals making soft clack-clack sounds against the stone, until he stood before his two students.
"You have learned all I can teach you, Argentus-kun," the master said softly, his voice carrying the weight of finality. "The fundamentals are yours now. The philosophy has taken root."
He placed a hand briefly on Argentus's shoulder—a rare physical gesture from the usually reserved teacher.
"The rest... you must learn from the sea itself. From experience. From failure and triumph. From the crucible of real combat where hesitation means death."
Koushiro's hand dropped.
"Go and forge your own path, young spearman. Show the world what happens when the piercing thrust meets the severing edge."
The Next Morning
The sun was just beginning its slow ascent, burning off the morning mist that clung to Shimotsuki Village's harbor like a silk blanket. The air smelled of salt, seaweed, and fresh possibilities.
Argentus stood on the weathered wooden dock, making final preparations to cast off. Sylvia bobbed gently in the calm water, her hull stocked with fresh supplies—dried fish, rice, water barrels, medical supplies, and the remaining gold from the cannibal island stored securely in the locked cabin.
He was coiling the mooring rope with practiced efficiency when a familiar voice cut through the morning quiet.
"Leaving without a goodbye? Rude."
Argentus didn't turn around. His smirk was audible in his voice as he continued working. "I figured you'd be too busy holding a funeral for your swords, Zoro."
Roronoa Zoro walked down the dock with his characteristic confident slouch, his hands shoved in his pockets. The Wado Ichimonji—his precious inherited blade, the only survivor of yesterday's spar—rested at his hip, its white hilt catching the early morning light.
"Those were cheap, worn-out blades anyway," Zoro scoffed, though his tone carried a newfound respect that hadn't been there a month ago. "Practice swords. I only kept them because Master Koushiro gave them to me when I was eight."
He stopped at the edge of the dock, looking down at Argentus on the deck of Sylvia.
"Next time we meet, I'll have swords that won't break. Real blades. And I'll be the one cutting you in half."
Zoro's eyes burned with competitive fire.
"I will defeat you before I become the World's Greatest Swordsman. Consider it a promise."
"We'll see," Argentus said, hopping lightly onto Sylvia's deck. He moved to the mast and began raising the sail with smooth, controlled pulls. "Might want to work on your navigation skills first though, moss-head. Can't become the greatest if you get lost on the way to your own execution."
"Get lost, spear-freak!" Zoro shot back, but there was no real heat in it. Just the comfortable ribbing of two warriors who'd beaten the hell out of each other daily for a month and come out the other side as something resembling friends.
As the wind caught the canvas and Sylvia began pulling away from the dock, cutting a clean line through the harbor water, Zoro suddenly cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted.
"Hey, Argentus! Wait!"
Argentus looked back over his shoulder, one hand on the tiller, his silver hair whipping in the wind.
"What's your goal?!" Zoro called out, his voice carrying across the widening gap. "Your real goal! You never actually said! You talked about being rich and powerful, but what does that mean to you?!"
Argentus stood at the stern of Sylvia, the morning sun behind him casting his face in shadow. His coat—worn but well-maintained—flapped dramatically in the wind like a hero's cape.
For a moment, he was silent, considering the question.
Then he spread his arms wide, encompassing the ocean, the sky, the entire visible world.
"Everything!" Argentus shouted back, his voice carrying over the waves with absolute conviction. "I'm going to take everything the world has to offer! Every berry! Every treasure! Every inch of power and influence!"
His grin was visible even at this distance—sharp, predatory, unshakable.
"When I'm done, the whole world will know the name Argentus D. Drake! Not as a pirate or a marine or a revolutionary—but as the man who owns it all!"
Zoro stood on the dock, watching Sylvia grow smaller on the horizon.
A slow grin spread across his face.
"Everything, huh?" he muttered to himself. "Guess that means you'll need to own the title of World's Greatest Swordsman too eventually."
He placed a hand on the Wado Ichimonji's hilt.
"Not happening, spear-freak. That one's mine."
He turned and walked back toward the dojo, already planning his next training regimen.
Two Days Out
The open sea was a deceptive canvas.
From a distance, it looked peaceful—a vast expanse of blue stretching endlessly to the horizon, broken only by the occasional white cap of a wave or the distant silhouette of seabirds hunting for fish.
But for a lone sloop like Sylvia, it was filled with dangers both obvious and hidden.
Two days out from Shimotsuki Village, during the lazy heat of mid-afternoon, a shadow fell across Argentus's deck.
He looked up from the navigation chart he'd been studying, squinting against the sun.
A dual-masted pirate ship—a proper galleon, easily fifty meters long—was pulling alongside Sylvia with predatory intent. It flew a black flag bearing a white skull crushing an hourglass in its jaws. Even from this distance, Argentus could see the deck was crowded with armed men.
Pirates, he thought, entirely unsurprised. Of course.
"OI! LITTLE BOAT!"
A man's voice boomed across the water, amplified by a speaking trumpet.
Standing at the galleon's rail was the captain—a scarred, weather-beaten man with a jagged hook where his right hand should have been. He wore the typical pirate garb: bandana, long coat, boots, and an excess of weapons.
"Prepare to be boarded!" the captain shouted, his hook-hand gleaming in the sunlight. "Lower your sails, heave to, and hand over all your gold! Do it quickly and maybe—maybe—we'll only break your legs instead of feeding you to the fish!"
His crew erupted in laughter—thirty or forty voices joining in cruel amusement.
Argentus didn't even look up from his map.
He was sitting cross-legged on the cabin roof—his favorite spot for navigation work—calmly adjusting his course calculations with a pencil.
"You're blocking my sun," Argentus said, his voice carrying clearly across the water despite not being particularly loud. "Move."
The pirate crew's laughter doubled in volume.
"Did you hear him?!" one pirate wheezed, slapping his thigh. "The kid thinks he's tough!"
"Maybe he's deaf!" another suggested. "DEAF AND STUPID!"
The captain's face split into a cruel grin, revealing several missing teeth. He raised his hook-hand high.
"Fire the port cannons!" he commanded. "Turn that floating toothpick into splinters! Show this brat what happens when you disrespect Captain Razorclaw!"
BOOM. BOOM.
Two puffs of black smoke erupted from the galleon's gun ports.
Two iron cannonballs—each weighing at least twenty pounds—whistled through the air with deadly intent, arcing in perfect trajectories straight for Sylvia's hull. One aimed at the waterline, one at the mast.
Direct hits would obliterate the small sloop instantly.
Argentus sighed—a long, patient exhale that spoke of mild annoyance rather than fear.
He carefully folded his navigation chart, creasing it with precise movements, and set it aside where the wind wouldn't catch it.
To the old me, he thought, standing up and brushing dust off his pants, this would have been a panic moment. Dive overboard, hope they miss, pray to survive.
But to the me who trained under Garp the Fist and learned the Breath of All Things...
He reached over his shoulder and pulled his spear free from its bindings.
...this is slow.
Argentus gripped the spear loosely in one hand.
He didn't plant his feet or brace for impact. He simply flicked his wrist—a casual, almost dismissive gesture, like shooing away an annoying insect.
The spear moved so fast it became invisible to the naked eye, just a blur of black and gold.
CLANG. CLANG.
The sound of metal striking metal rang out like a bell.
The two cannonballs weren't stopped or caught. They were deflected—their trajectories altered by precise strikes that redirected their momentum rather than opposing it directly.
Both projectiles slammed into the ocean on either side of Sylvia, sending massive plumes of water shooting high into the air. The spray rained down on the deck, soaking Argentus's coat.
The laughter on the pirate ship died instantly.
Complete, shocked silence descended over the galleon's deck.
"He..." one pirate stammered, his eyes bulging. "He batted them away? Like... like they were baseballs?"
"What the hell is that kid?!" another whispered.
"That's not normal," a third agreed, his hand trembling on his cutlass. "That ain't human."
Argentus spun the spear.
"Now," he said, his voice dropping several degrees in temperature. His silver eyes turned cold as winter ice. "You tried to put holes in Sylvia."
He looked up at the pirate ship looming above his small sloop.
"That was a mistake."
Argentus bent his knees, coiling his muscles like compressed springs.
Then he launched.
He didn't use a rope or ladder. He simply kicked off the deck of Sylvia with explosive force that left cracks in the wood. His body shot upward and forward, propelled by pure physical power enhanced by months of inhuman training.
He soared across the fifteen-meter gap between vessels in a graceful arc, his coat billowing behind him.
He landed silently on the galleon's rail, balanced perfectly despite the ship's rocking motion, Regulus held loosely in one hand.
For a moment, he simply stood there, looking at the assembled pirates with an expression of mild disappointment.
"Kill him!" Captain Razorclaw screamed, his voice cracking with panic. "All hands! Swords! Guns! Axes! GET HIM!"
Thirty pirates charged.
It was chaos—a disorganized mob of desperate men wielding cutlasses, clubs, pistols, and improvised weapons, all converging on the silver-haired boy standing on their railing.
Argentus stepped forward to meet them.
He swung the spear in a wide horizontal arc—not trying to cut flesh, just applying the principles Koushiro had taught him.
Snap. Snap. Shatter.
Cutlasses broke upon contact with the black spear, the steel severing along grain lines as if made of cheap tin. Pistols were sliced cleanly in half before their wielders could pull the triggers, gunpowder spilling onto the deck. Clubs shattered into splinters.
Men who tried to grapple him were sent flying by casual strikes from the spear's butt—heavy, bone-breaking impacts that launched grown pirates into the ocean like skipping stones.
Argentus walked through the chaos with the calm efficiency of a farmer harvesting wheat, his movements economical and precise. No wasted motion. No unnecessary violence beyond what was required to disable.
Within sixty seconds, the deck was clear.
Half the crew was in the ocean, treading water and screaming. The other half was unconscious or clutching broken limbs.
Argentus walked calmly across the debris-strewn deck until he reached the main mast—a massive wooden pillar easily a meter in diameter, reinforced with iron bands.
He placed the tip of spear against the thick wood, right at the base where it met the deck.
"Your journey ends here," Argentus muttered.
(END OF CHAPTER)
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