The moment Kurogane Ren saw Shanks and Benn Beckman appear, his heart jolted.
He hadn't recognized a single one of the pirates from earlier.
Only now did it hit him.
The One Piece world he knew so well was still more than ten years away.
Shanks's future crew probably hadn't fully taken shape yet, so it was only natural that there were members of the Red-Haired Pirates Ren didn't recognize.
The second Ren called out his name, Shanks's eyes sharpened.
Though he'd already made a name for himself on the seas, compared to the true legends of the age, his current reputation still didn't amount to much.
Yet the man in front of him knew exactly who he was.
That alone was enough to put Shanks on guard.
Still, after staring at Ren for a few seconds, Shanks scratched his head and said, "Beckman, I feel like I've seen this guy somewhere before."
Beckman calmly reminded him, "Not long ago, you were talking about recruiting him."
"Ah!" Shanks slapped his forehead. "I remember now. Isn't he that pirate with the… what was it again?"
Benn Beckman answered flatly, "A bounty of fifty thousand beli."
"Oh, right, right. He's that what-was-it-called again… Bad Luck something?"
"Lucky Ren."
"Oh, yeah, that's the one."
Ren stared at him in silence.
This wasn't recognizing him.
This was barely having the faintest impression.
Then Shanks grinned and said, "Alright, enough talk. You beat up my crew, so now I'm going to take your treasure. If you know what's good for you, hand it over."
Ren had no intention of cooperating.
If Shanks were already the future Emperor of the Sea he would one day become, Ren would hand over the treasure without even blinking.
But now?
Shanks was still more than ten years away from becoming one of the Four Emperors. Both his arms were still intact too.
And Ren really wanted to see just how far he currently stood against him.
So he said, "No money. No life. And definitely no girls."
Shanks looked at him and said, "I don't think you understand the gap between us."
"No," Ren replied. "I understand it very well. Red-Haired Shanks. Former apprentice on the Pirate King Roger's ship. Not an official crew member, but already highly accomplished with all three types of Haki—especially Conqueror's Haki. On top of that, your swordsmanship is exceptional. So yes, I know exactly how strong you are."
That only made Shanks more curious.
He hadn't expected this man to know so much about him.
"If you know all that," Shanks asked, "then why do you still want to fight me?"
"Because I want to see how strong I really am."
The moment the words fell, Ren stamped the ground and shot forward with explosive force.
At the same time, both flip-flops in his hands came down in a rapid barrage.
Seeing Ren charge straight at him with a pair of flip-flops, Shanks drew Gryphon and swept it up horizontally to block.
In his mind, the exchange should have gone one way.
The flip-flops should have snapped in half.
His blade should have stopped neatly at Ren's throat.
But what actually happened caught him off guard.
Ren's flip-flops blocked Gryphon.
Not only that—they weren't damaged at all.
That finally made Shanks show a hint of surprise.
Right then, Ren pressed down with his right hand while his left swept around in an arc, trying to strike from the side.
Naturally, that attack couldn't escape Shanks's Observation Haki.
He shot out his right hand and grabbed Ren's left wrist.
At the same time, his left hand drove Gryphon down in a clean slash.
This time, the blade turned black.
Shanks had coated it in Armament Haki.
The moment Ren saw Gryphon darken, he understood instantly.
Armament.
But he trusted his transcendent flip-flops.
So instead of retreating, he brought his right flip-flop up head-on to meet the strike.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Their weapons collided in a storm of impacts.
The longer they fought, the more astonished Shanks became.
By now, he had already used swordsmanship, Observation Haki, and Armament Haki.
He still hadn't used his greatest trump card—Conqueror's Haki—but even without it, the fact that Ren could still keep up with him was enough to shock him.
This wasn't the monster-infested New World.
This was Paradise—the first half of the Grand Line.
In a place where even Haki was barely understood, this man had managed to fight him to this extent.
Watching Ren and Shanks locked in a fierce deadlock, Benn Beckman slowly lowered a hand toward the gun at his waist.
Interfering in his captain's fight would make Shanks unhappy.
But protecting his captain came first.
He hadn't forgotten that the enemy still had one more fighter who hadn't entered the battle.
Just as Beckman's hand touched the grip of his gun, he sensed something.
He turned his head and looked toward the ship.
There, one person was aiming a rifle at him.
And with her other hand, she gave a small waving motion, a clear signal telling him not to interfere.
Bang!
The two fighters who had been clashing moments ago kicked each other at the same time and sprang apart.
Shanks now had several clear flip-flop marks on his body, though apart from some dirt on his clothes, he looked fine.
Ren was a different story.
That lightning-fast exchange had already left him breathing hard.
More importantly, because he didn't have Armament Haki, he hadn't dared take Shanks's attacks head-on. He could only keep dodging and redirecting.
As a result, several cuts had opened across his body.
They weren't serious, but anyone with eyes could tell he'd been the one at a disadvantage.
The two men stared at each other for a moment.
Then, suddenly, both of them burst out laughing.
"Hahaha!"
Shanks slid Gryphon back into its sheath.
Ren tucked his flip-flops back into his storage bag.
During the fight, Shanks's crew had already managed to regroup. Ren hadn't hit them hard to begin with.
The reason they'd stayed down earlier was because Martha had pinned them in place with liquid metal. But once she saw the level of Ren and Shanks's battle, she immediately recalled the metal and prepared to back Ren up at any moment.
Then Shanks suddenly shouted,
"Alright, boys! Time for a feast!"
Beckman immediately said, "Captain, we don't have any food left."
"Uh…"
Shanks froze on the spot like someone had pressed pause on him.
Ren took that moment to pull food and alcohol out of his storage bag.
"Then let's throw a feast together."
The moment Shanks saw the food and drink, he lit up.
"Boys! The feast is back on!"
"OHHH!"
Without the slightest hesitation, he rushed over and started grabbing Ren's food and alcohol like they already belonged to him.
Ren didn't mind.
After all, the food had all been looted from the abandoned town, so it hadn't cost him a single coin.
And most of the alcohol came from old lottery rewards anyway.
So just like that, the two groups who had been fighting moments earlier abruptly started partying together—
though on Ren's side, he was the only one actually joining in.
"WHOOOA—AHHH!"
Shanks's mouth flew open after just one sip of the liquor.
"Hahahaha!"
One of his crew members laughed. "Captain, that's pathetic!"
Then he grabbed the same bottle Shanks had been drinking from.
Naturally, the next second, he made exactly the same face.
Watching them, Ren couldn't help marveling at how insane these people were.
The drink they had just swallowed was ninety-six-proof Spirytus vodka.
Ren usually treated that stuff like a Molotov ingredient.
Even for the absurd monsters of the One Piece world, it was not something most people could handle easily.
But very quickly, Ren realized they had learned absolutely nothing.
Instead, they turned drinking Spirytus into a challenge.
Whoever reacted the least after drinking it won.
Whoever reacted the most had to perform a talent for everyone else.
Of course, you couldn't expect real talent from a bunch of pirates.
Most of the time, it was the kind of "talent" where someone stuck chopsticks up their nose like Luffy would.
Ren covered his face.
He genuinely could not understand these people.
At that moment, Beckman walked over and stood beside him.
"No need to mind them," he said. "They're always like this."
Ren shrugged. "It's fine. I've seen even weirder."
Beckman's expression turned serious.
"Do you know what happened on this island?"
"Yes."
Then Ren explained everything that had happened on the island in detail.
After hearing it all, Beckman nodded slowly.
"So that's what it was."
Then he extended a hand in a straightforward, almost formal gesture.
"Red-Haired Pirates. First mate. Benn Beckman."
Ren was briefly caught off guard.
Then he quickly came back to himself and clasped Beckman's hand.
"Myriad Worlds Pirates. Captain. Kurogane Ren."
Ren understood perfectly well what that handshake meant.
Beckman had only chosen to show goodwill after confirming that what happened on the island had nothing to do with Ren.