Seizing the opportunity, Arlo increased his pace, his relentless thrusts against her oversensitive flesh forcing a fourth, shuddering climax from her almost immediately after.
"Fuck!" A hoarse moan tore through her throat with impressive intensity.
Spent and broken, she fell silent beneath him, her body exhausted. Her thoughts fogged at the edges, but in her brief moment of clarity, Hina scraped enough control together to force her Akuma no Mi awake; a small, trembling kage rose around her like a paper shield against a storm.
"I will not lose to you!" she rasped, claws of pride digging into every syllable. "I'm a Marine."
Arlo's smile was all cold teeth and quiet amusement. He liked the way people believed in uniforms. It made them easier to snap.
He already had the collar in place, but that wasn't all; he had another ace up his sleeve.
Besides the collar, he had brought another item from the System shop: a Memory Bubble. This item allowed him to extract and store another person's memories, which he could then show to someone else.
Yes, it was Kuma's power, but with only a single use.
"If you believe in this corrupt organization so much, then watch this," he murmured, throwing the bubble at her.
It burst against the kage, and the world folded.
Hina's eyes filled with someone else's life: bright market stalls under a tropical sun, children chasing a rolling coconut on a white-sand shore.
The Karaki island sang with ordinary noise: merchants bargaining, the clatter of pots, and children playing. Then, overnight, the sky blurred with sails.
At first, it looked like a pirate raid, but all they really did was steal some money from a handful of unlucky merchants.
In fact, they didn't even care much about the money, because someone had already paid them to raid the island.
And this someone soon came, with a prideful smile and saying he would save everyone. Yes, the "pirates" had been hired and then defeated by men in crisp Marine coats.
However, this was just the beginning.
The Marines arrived on the back of a contrived emergency and stayed under the banner of "restoring order."
Order became occupation.
What followed wasn't the tidy heroism the Marines' pamphlets promised. The so-called liberators commandeered the granaries and left families to sift through stinking husks.
They set curfews and cut the island's boats free, so the fish could feed the Marines instead of the people. A "citizen registry" replaced names with numbers; dissent disappeared into whispered detentions.
Schools closed "for security reasons." Priests and teachers who asked questions were made examples of on the docks. Every day, there would be public and humiliating executions.
The island's little economy was ground into dust, and anyone who resisted found themselves dragged into the commander's ledger: fines, quotas, forced labor.
Worse, the commander did not simply exert power; he actively wanted to make the citizens' lives as miserable as possible, so he could extract money and power from it.
As food rations were doled out only to those who "cooperated," he could turn the entire island into his personal slaves. Men were sent to shore-side worksites and never came back. Women who tried to barter for a loaf were arrested for "black-market sedition."
And, don't worry, he kept paying the pirates, so they would attack once a month, giving him a justification to remain on the island.
Then, after two years of terror, he had consolidated his power and didn't need the pretense of being a Marine anymore. He retired and simply became the Island Commander.
With his personal wealth, gotten by extorting the island's citizens, he built his own private army, and no one could challenge him anymore. The Marines would do nothing, as he wasn't a pirate, just their rightful ruler.
He was even recognized as King by the World Government.
In the next year, the situation got worse and worse. Hunger carved families open. Mothers counted coins like prayers and, in the end, sold the kids they could not feed.
The memory showed bargaining at night in dark alleys: a trembling hand, a desperate whisper, a child handed over for a few coins.
Hina saw the despair of Sasha that day, the day she was abandoned by her starving mother, who was on the brink of desperation with no food.
But Sasha was not an isolated case. Buying children became the Island Commander's most prized business.
He would buy these kids and then sell them. The ones that looked strong would be sold to Marines to become CP agents. Others would be trained as servants in his mansion and then sold as slaves.
"Delicate hands are good for fine work," the Island Commander said when he saw Sasha.
The girl looked as if a wind might blow her away. Because of that, he made the big mistake of using her just as a servant and constantly punishing her for not being good at it.
Had he given a sword into her hands, he would have gotten the most valuable asset of his life, but he never cared enough. Besides, he particularly liked punishing girls; he felt a sadistic pleasure in it.
Not a sexual one—he just liked causing pain and seeing them cry.
Then, when he got tired of dealing with the girl and feeling like he had completely broken her spirit, he sold her as a slave.
The memory blurred and slammed back into Hina's chest like a fist. The kage around her shuddered, a thin veil against a truth that had no mercy.
Her hands shook where the bubble had touched. For a long moment, she simply stared ahead, the image of Sasha, pale, small, swept into a mansion as if into a nightmare wardrobe, burned behind her eyes.
And then her eyes fell on the woman who had just barged into the room. It was Sasha, but she was not weak anymore; she looked happy.
Is it because he saved her? Hina wondered, her mind still reeling, remembering how they'd been together earlier. She looked happy as Arlo fucked her.
Arlo had bought Sasha as a slave, yet the girl had looked at him with something disturbingly close to affection.
Meanwhile, the Marines, her Marines, turned a blind eye to the slave trade that was supposed to be illegal, righteous words rotting behind polished badges.
Am I really fighting for something worth believing in?
The question echoed in her head, quiet but heavy. The memories had done more than show her corruption; they'd cracked her faith.
Then she saw Sasha and Arlo kissing passionately, as they began to have a heated interaction.