The portal spat Sebas out into open air.
Blue sky. Salt air. Ocean in every direction. He was on a small, gloomy island with a gothic castle and dead trees.
"New world," Sebas said, cape settling. "Let's see what we're working with."
He walked toward the castle. Past some aggressive-looking monkeys with swords who took one look at him and decided today wasn't the day.
Then he heard something from behind the castle. Soft. Rhythmic. Like brushing.
Sebas crept around the corner.
Dracule "Hawk Eyes" Mihawk — the World's Strongest Swordsman, wielder of one of the 12 Supreme Grade Blades, a man whose name alone made pirates reroute their ships — was sitting on a rock behind his castle.
With a paintbrush.
Painting his sword black.
Yoru — the legendary Black Blade, the weapon that had clashed with Shanks and split icebergs — was propped against a tree. And Mihawk was sitting next to it with a small tin of matte black paint, carefully touching up a spot on the flat of the blade where the colour had chipped.
There was a smudge of black paint on his cheek.
Sebas stood at the corner. Mouth open. Brain processing.
The World's Strongest Swordsman paints his sword black.
"What a fraud" Sebas whispered
He pressed both hands over his mouth. His chest shook. A snort built inside him like a sneeze that wouldn't commit.
Don't laugh. He's painting a Supreme Grade Blade with a BRUSH from a hardware store. Don't—
A snort escaped.
Mihawk's hawk eyes snapped toward the corner.
The paintbrush stopped.
For one second, something crossed the World's Strongest Swordsman's face that had never been there in the history of the Grand Line.
Panic.
Then the paint tin was behind the rock. The brush was gone. Yoru was in his hand. And Mihawk was standing at full height, hat shadowing his eyes, blade ready, looking exactly like the world-class killer he was supposed to be.
"How long," Mihawk said, "have you been standing there."
"Long enough, bro," Sebas wheezed.
Mihawk swung. No warning. Yoru came forward in a horizontal arc aimed at Sebas's neck — the kind of casual slash that split galleons.
Sebas raised his fist.
The blade stopped against his knuckles.
Mihawk's eyes widened a fraction.
Mihawk pulled Yoru back. Settled.
"Chill bro," Mihawk said, his composure cracking at the edges. "Stop using haki."
"I don't know what haki is."
"Then draw a sword. I don't fight unarmed men."
Sebas looked at his fist. Then at Mihawk. Then at Yoru.
"Aight aight, say less."
He reached. Into "somewhere." And pulled out a sword.
The blade was crooked. The edge was dull. The guard was lopsided. The handle was wrapped in duct tape. There was a sticker on the flat of the blade that said "COOL SWORD" in Comic Sans.
Sebas held it up with both hands. Proudly.
Mihawk looked at the sword.
His golden eyes traced the blade. The crooked edge. The duct tape. The sticker.
His mouth twitched.
Then Dracule Mihawk — the most composed man on the Grand Line, the swordsman who had never once lost his composure in battle against any opponent — started cackling.
"THIS IS MIHAWK UPSCALE," Mihawk wheezed, pointing at the sword.
Sebas lowered the sword slightly. "Yo it's not that—"
Mihawk straightened up. Wiped one eye. Took a breath. His face went from cackling to stone cold in under a second. The switch was instantaneous. Like flipping a light off.
He raised Yoru.
One swing.
Sebas didn't see it.
He didn't see Mihawk move. Didn't see the blade. Didn't see the air split. Didn't feel the slash until he was already airborne — launched off his feet, Cool Sword shattered, cape torn, body ragdolling through three dead trees before hitting the side of Mihawk's castle hard enough to leave a Sebas-shaped dent in the stone.
He slid down the wall. Hit the ground. Face first. The "COOL SWORD" sticker fluttered down from the sky and stuck to the back of his head.
Sebas lay in the rubble. He got one-shotted. Dented into a castle wall by a single swing from a man who had gone from laughing to lethal in the time it took to blink.
Mihawk rested Yoru on his shoulder. Looked at the Sebas-shaped hole in his wall. Then at the shattered remains of the Cool Sword on the ground.
He turned around. Walked back to his rock. Sat down. Picked up the paintbrush.
And went back to painting.