Hyogoro froze in place.
After witnessing that overwhelming, mountain-crushing strike just moments ago, he no longer dared harbor even the slightest hostility toward Luo Yu.
But then he recalled the one time, decades ago, when he had the misfortune of meeting Kozuki Momonosuke.
Remembering the brat's lecherous expression when he ogled Hyogoro's maid, Hyogoro patted Nekomamushi and Inuarashi on the shoulders and said:
"You've worked hard. If one day your sense of honor can't hold you back anymore, give him a few extra hits—for me."
Meanwhile, Luo Yu had already appeared several li away from Udon. As his Observation Haki spread outward, he locked onto a new direction.
With a flicker, he vanished from sight.
At this speed, it took him only minutes to reach a location over ten li away.
When he saw several figures rushing through the terrain, he smiled.
"Jackpot. Walking bounties."
BOOM!
A pitch-black arrow shot down from the sky, targeting a stumbling figure ahead.
The fleeing silhouette's face changed. She rolled to the ground just in time, narrowly dodging the incoming arrow.
BANG!
The heavy stone ground was pierced clean through.
A moment later, the arrow embedded in the rock exploded, blasting a half-meter-wide crater into the earth.
Had it struck her directly, it would've torn a bloody hole through her.
"Heh… Young Master Yamato, I suggest you stop struggling," sneered a bat-like man in the sky, half his body wrapped in bandages.
"Kaido-sama gave strict orders before he left—don't let you cause trouble."
"But honestly, we prefer it when you fight back. That's the only way we get to kill you."
"Kaido said if you disobeyed and escaped Onigashima, we're authorized to kill you."
"Haha, Bat, don't make Kaido-sama sound so cruel," said a gazelle-man from a nearby slope, followed by a rat-man.
"Yamato is still his son, after all. At most, we'd just… accidentally kill him."
They were all too familiar with Yamato—the so-called "filial son" who constantly tried to kill his own father.
Over the past twenty years on Onigashima, they had seen Kaido try to kill Yamato more than once.
To Kaido, Yamato was just an accident.
If he hadn't eaten the Mythical Zoan fruit Kaido had worked so hard to obtain, Kaido wouldn't have cared about him at all.
From that moment on, Kaido had repeatedly left Yamato to fend for himself.
If he survived, fine.
If not—well, then he died. That was that.
In Kaido's world of survival of the fittest, even living was a luxury for the weak.
"You bastards! I'm Kozuki Oden—not Yamato! If you've got the guts, take off these seastone cuffs and I'll show you what despair really means!"
Yamato struggled to her feet, silver hair matted with blood and dust.
She glared at the three Gifters who had been chasing her, eyes filled with fury.
If she hadn't already grown used to the seastone's suppression—and if the cuffs weren't made of diluted seastone—she knew she wouldn't have made it this far.
"Young Master Yamato, you're hilarious," the bat-man cackled.
"But your struggling really does make this more fun."
"Since you won't come quietly, don't blame us for killing you. Out here, no one's coming to save you—scream all you want."
"Attack!"
At his command, the gazelle-man burst forward with explosive speed.
The ground cracked beneath his hooves as he crossed a hundred meters in a flash, appearing right in front of Yamato.
"So fast!" Yamato's face changed.
With the seastone cuffs draining her strength, she was barely operating at a fraction of her power.
She barely had the strength to run—let alone fight three Gifters at once.
All she could do was raise her spiked club to block.
BANG!
She was kicked flying, slamming into a boulder behind her.
The seastone's suppression left her body weak and trembling.
Her face turned pale as she roared:
"You three bastards—don't let me live, or I swear I'll make you pay!"
In her mind, Kaido might have wanted her dead many times…
But he wouldn't actually kill her. Right?
Just as that thought crossed her mind, a sharp whistling sound tore through the air.
A pitch-black arrow, coated in Armament Haki, streaked toward her.
She froze.
Was this really it? Were they actually going to kill her?
This wasn't how she imagined things would go.
But with her strength drained and the attack already upon her, she couldn't react in time.
The bat-man's face lit up with glee.
Then—his pupils shrank in horror.
CRACK!
The arrow stopped inches from Yamato's face.
A hand had caught it mid-flight—and with a sudden squeeze, the arrow shattered like paper.
The sudden turn stunned the gazelle-man and rat-man.
They were the best trackers among the Gifters.
Every time they moved, they could sense disturbances within a kilometer.
That's why Kaido had entrusted them with watching Yamato.
And yet, someone had just appeared—right under their noses—without a trace.
It shattered their confidence.
"Sorry to interrupt your little death threat," Luo Yu said, sipping from his gourd with a smile.
"But this one's worth twenty million to me. You're not killing her."
"Worth twenty million?"
Yamato finally snapped out of it.
"Wait—are you saying Kaido really gave them permission to kill me?"
"That's impossible! He still wants me to be shogun of Wano! He wouldn't kill me!"
"He wouldn't kill you?"
Luo Yu took another sip and chuckled.
"Why not? Beastly father, rebellious child—it's practically tradition at this point."