Koby was dead.
Yet his death did nothing to end the confrontation. If anything, it only pulled the tension tighter.
Aramaki raised his head and watched the figure wrapped in blue flames darting through the sky.
He let out a heavy sigh.
Marco had remained airborne the entire time.
If Aramaki took the fight into the sky, Marco's speed and maneuverability would far exceed his own.
The slightest mistake could give the phoenix an opening to escape.
He needed to lock the battlefield to the ground.
"Malevolent Forest—"
In an instant, the earth beneath Aramaki shook violently.
Massive trees burst from the ground, their roots spreading wildly through the soil.
Dark brown wooden patterns crawled across his skin as his body expanded section by section, transforming him into a towering, grotesque wooden giant from the waist up.
One enormous arm swept through the air.
Every tree and vine within a hundred meters suddenly came alive. They twisted and surged toward Marco from every direction.
Branches linked together and continued extending, weaving an enormous net across the sky before rapidly tightening around him.
Aramaki clearly intended to trap Marco inside the cage until there was nowhere left to run.
"Tch."
Marco twisted past a vine lashing toward his face. His eyes swept over the withered branches, and he immediately noticed something was wrong.
An ominous aura of death clung to the dry, gray wood.
Aramaki had mixed the viruses he extracted from Koby into the plants.
Even so, Marco showed no panic.
The phoenix moved freely through the gaps between the vines. At times, he returned to human form to narrow his body and slip through the entangling branches.
At others, he spread his wings, gained altitude, and fired bursts of blue flame.
After only a few exchanges, he had already identified the technique's limits and weaknesses.
The next moment, his Flames of Regeneration erupted across his entire body, driving his temperature sharply upward.
Marco began spinning at high speed like a drill and tore straight through the net of vines, allowing the toxins to pierce his body in the process.
Once free, he spread his wings and climbed higher.
While still in the air, he tore away and discarded the flesh infected by the poison. Then he changed direction and flew rapidly toward the distant horizon.
He simply left.
Quickly, decisively, without the slightest hesitation.
At that moment, Aramaki's lower body was rooted deep in the sand like the base of an enormous tree, completely fused with the land.
Marco had clearly noticed that weakness.
While maneuvering through the vines, he had used several feints and changes of direction to confirm it beyond doubt.
Aramaki could not move from that position.
There was no reason to continue fighting.
Marco had never intended to battle Aramaki to the death in the first place. He had come to Wano for one purpose only.
To find Garp.
"You bastard! You actually cut away your own flesh and fled despite being poisoned!"
Aramaki roared furiously as Marco disappeared into the distance.
He pulled himself free from the wooden giant.
The towering construct collapsed behind him, breaking apart into countless wood chips before sinking back into the earth.
Aramaki was about to chase after Marco when a ship on the nearby sea suddenly caught his attention.
It belonged to the Beasts Pirates.
More specifically, it was Queen the Plague's ship.
Queen had already learned from Kaido that Garp had disappeared.
If that was true, everything Queen had done earlier had been pointless.
He now had to personally retrieve Koby.
If the viruses carried inside him spread uncontrollably throughout Wano, even Queen could not bear the consequences.
Aramaki stared at the ship.
The moment he noticed the obvious black flag of the Beasts Pirates flying from its mast, most of the anger boiling inside him immediately vanished.
He suddenly remembered the low-ranking Beasts Pirate he had casually killed earlier.
'Damn it.'
This was absolutely not the time to antagonize Kaido.
That monster was still in Wano. Even if someone gave Aramaki ten times his current courage, he would not casually provoke him.
If Fleet Admiral Sakazuki had not issued a direct order to drag Garp back, Aramaki would never have set foot in this damned country.
He snorted and forcibly suppressed the urge to chase Marco, then shot away in another direction.
Far in the distance, Marco's blue-flamed figure had already shrunk into a tiny point of light.
"You got lucky this time."
After leaving behind that threat, Aramaki disappeared into Wano's forests.
When he first entered the country, his Observation Haki had detected no major battle within range. He still had no idea where Garp was.
He needed to investigate quickly and find out where that troublesome old bastard had gone.
And so, Marine Hero Garp, Marine recruit Aramaki, Marco of the Whitebeard Pirates, and Yasopp of the Red Hair Pirates each began their own separate tour of Wano.
…
Let us return to Cain and Uta.
Shanks' special training was still underway.
"Hey, Dadan. Is this really necessary?"
Cain turned his head and stared at the iron pot strapped over his backside, his entire face twisting with embarrassment.
Its polished bottom gleamed beneath the midday sun.
Ever since the village-wide announcement, practically everyone knew Cain had injured his butt.
Even Dadan had come down from the mountains specifically to see him. The moment she arrived, she tried to apply medicine to the injury.
Cain had barely managed to stop her.
Unfortunately, he could not prevent her from fastening the protective iron pot over him.
"Stop moving."
Dadan slapped the rim of the pot twice to make sure it was secure.
"I spent half a day searching through the mountains for this. I used it for Ace back in the day too. It's sturdy."
She circled behind Cain, crouched down, and examined it carefully.
"The size is a little too large, but once you transform into that… what was it again? Perverted animal?"
"Right, animal form. Then it should fit perfectly."
"The edges might dig into you, though. I'll add some cloth padding later…"
Cain's face went completely blank.
Of course it was sturdy.
It was a cooking pot.
He was about to respond when he noticed Uta suddenly turning away in the distance, her shoulders trembling.
"Uta?"
She did not look back. She merely raised one hand and waved to indicate she was fine.
But her shaking shoulders betrayed her.
Cain narrowed his eyes.
"Are you laughing?"
"I'm not."
Uta's muffled voice made it obvious she was covering her mouth.
"You are."
"I'm not."
She finally turned around.
Her expression had been composed perfectly, but a trace of laughter still lingered in the corners of her eyes.
"I'm just… moved on your behalf. Dadan really cares about you."
Then she immediately turned away again.
Cain opened his mouth, but no words came out.
Bella floated over from beside Uta and gathered her courage.
"Papa, it's okay…"
"Even like this, Papa still looks very handsome!"
Bella raised her face toward him. Her eyes clearly said do your best, though if one looked closely, there was also a faint hint of avoidance.
Cain stared down at her.
"Bella, you think this is embarrassing too, don't you?"
Bella immediately shook her head.
She shook it so quickly that it only made her look guiltier.
Her gaze dropped as she slowly spun in the air. Then she secretly glanced at the pot covering Cain's backside before instantly looking away.
Cain sighed.
Forget it.
He looked toward Uta again.
She had finally finished laughing and was now giving him a thumbs-up, her eyes curved like crescent moons.
Bella raised her head as well and began cheering him on.
Cain took a deep breath.
Embarrassing or not, this was still Dadan's way of showing she cared.
He steeled himself, turned toward Shanks a hundred meters away, and raised his weapon.
"I'm coming!"
Everyone nearby immediately covered their ears.
A second later—Boom!
Another mountain collapsed.
Cain was embedded in the bottom of a crater, his backside wedged firmly into its deepest point.
The iron pot remained dutifully strapped over him and was still mostly intact.
Naturally, Cain had protected it with Armament Haki.
"Am I protecting the pot, or is the pot supposed to be protecting me?!"
Cain lay spread-eagled on his back like an overturned turtle, staring lifelessly at the clouds overhead.
How many times had this happened already?
Every exchange ended the same way.
He was sent flying.
Worse still, his Conqueror's Haki did not seem to be improving at all.
Cain crawled from the crater, dusting himself off while grumbling,
"Seriously… how many days has it been?"
"I'm starting to think Shanks isn't training my Conqueror's Haki at all. He's just using it as an excuse to beat me up."
The moment Cain finished speaking, a voice came from above.
"Conqueror's Haki isn't something you can directly strengthen through ordinary training."
Shanks had arrived at the edge of the crater.
"All I can teach you is how to apply and control it, along with some of my personal understanding and experience."
"To truly become stronger, you need to rely on your own state of mind, your understanding of Haki, and most importantly…"
"Resolve."
He paused and tapped one finger against his temple.
"Most people treat Conqueror's Haki as nothing more than a weapon."
"They never consider where it comes from, why it exists, or why it appears in only a tiny number of people."
"Try this."
"Think back to the first time you released Conqueror's Haki. What did you feel?"
"Find that emotion again. That sensation."
"The first time?"
Cain paused and frowned as he searched his memories.
"I remember I was with Luffy, Ace, and Sabo—"
Shanks tilted his head.
"What do they have to do with it?"
"What are you talking about?"
Cain stared at him in equal confusion.
Still, for the sake of continuing the training, Cain explained what happened after Shanks and the others left Windmill Village.
He told him how he met Ace and Sabo, encountered a group of pirates, and released Conqueror's Haki in desperation.
After hearing the story, Shanks frowned.
"No."
He shook his head with absolute certainty.
"That was Conqueror's Haki, yes."
"But the first time you used it should have been much earlier."
"Earlier?"
Cain tilted his head and stared at Shanks in confusion.
How could Shanks know something even Cain himself did not?