Chapter 35 Give Me Some Face
"Aren't you going to make a move?" Lovelace looked into Shanks' hesitant eyes.
Exhaling a couple of smoke rings, Shanks squinted and teased, "If I were to intervene again, the aftershocks of the battle would probably flood all the nearby islands..."
"Let them fight somewhere else." Lovelet slowly stood up and straightened her dress.
"That's what I think too...!" Shanks straightened up, lazily exhaled, stubbed out his cigarette, and then gripped the sword at his waist.
Meanwhile, the battle between Kunen and Cliff continues.
"Roaring Eight Trigrams—!"
The spiked club, imbued with the four major attributes, was quickly stained black. Jiu Nian stepped forward with his right foot, his waist and body swung, unleashing a fatal blow amidst a roar.
"bump--!"
However, this powerful strike missed its mark. The moment the black rod struck the sea surface, the already extremely wide vacuum zone expanded even further.
A massive amount of seawater surged into the sky, and the already torrential rain became even more intense under the illumination of the stars and the moon.
"Whoosh..."
After using multiple elements in a row without hitting anyone, Jiu Nian suddenly felt a little bored. He smacked his lips and began to think of words.
His eyes darted around, and he grinned, stroking his chin: "You penniless wretch! You wouldn't even take 6 million that was given away for free for a game item?! Trying to act all high and mighty here?!"
Floating in the air, Jiu Nian, radiating golden light, shielded himself from the seawater pouring down from the sky, his platinum cloak of justice fluttering in the wind.
"Oh my, our Yonko Kaido is so scary~"
He was idly manicuring his nails, completely ignoring Jiu Nian's words.
"How lively!" A cheerful voice, carried by the rushing seawater, reached their ears.
"Um?"
Beneath long, bright red hair, a weathered face was scrutinizing the two with great interest.
His scarlet cloak billowed freely in the sea breeze, revealing his strong chest and abdomen muscles exposed to the rain.
Beneath his muscular frame was a leather belt that covered a pair of loose black and red trousers, and below that were extremely simple slippers.
He floated above the crowd with his hands in his pockets, not releasing any magic, simply letting the seawater wash over him.
Shanks?
The two turned around and then simultaneously read out the name of the person who had just arrived.
Jiu Nian stopped his verbal sparring, slung the spiked club back over his shoulder, and glared at Shanks with a hostile expression: "What are you doing here?"
"Give me some face, you two go fight somewhere else." Shanks smiled, raised his face, and spread his hands, gesturing for the two to look ahead.
...
"Holy crap!? Did Old Chen teach him to say that? How could he say something like that?"
"Old Chen has been dead for over 10 years, how can he be taught?! He has great potential! Does the concept of 'face' even exist in this world?"
"Shocking! A native actually has the power to stop two players from fighting!?"
"No matter what, he's still a disciple of Old Chen! Old Chen was a player too! Even though the grass on his grave is already two meters high..."
...
As soon as Shanks uttered those words, viewers in both livestreams couldn't hold back any longer and flooded the chat with comments saying that it was just like a familiar face.
"Heh... As expected, only natives care about human life, hehehe..." Jiu Nian laughed, covering his face with his eyes narrowed, his tone sounding somewhat comical.
Upon hearing this, Cliff simply laughed and replied, "So what if you have a few stinking coins? You're not even as well off as the natives."
He still maintained that closed-eye smile, but a strange sense of incongruity made his smile somewhat stiff.
"You guys are really funny. Aren't we all from the continent of Irestia?" Shanks reached up and smoothed his damp hair, instinctively forcing a smile.
The furrowed brows suddenly relaxed, and Jiu Nian clutched her chest, unable to suppress her laughter: "Really!? Hahaha... You NPCs are really interesting!"
"Sizzle..."
Cliff, feeling a bit bored, slowly stretched out his hand, and golden light began to gather again. He pointed at Jiu Nian.
"boom--!"
Golden beams of light shot into the sea, and the seawater that had just managed to flow back was stirred up again. Jiu Nian also charged forward, swinging his spiked club.
"null--!"
The moment Shanks unleashed his magic, he glared fiercely at the two of them. The wind and rain over the entire sea evaporated instantly, and black and red lightning immediately enveloped the entire sea centered on him.
"Oh dear...how scary..." Cliff feigned fear, shrinking his neck and slowly taking a few steps back.
Compared to Cliff's childish behavior, Jiu Nian still wore that sour face, looking disdainful: "If you were Old Chen, I might give you some face, but you're an NPC trying to teach me how to do things!?"
"roar--!"
With a roar to the sky, Jiu Nian's mouth flashed with red light, which swept towards the two of them in the next moment.
The attack swept past the two of them and soared straight into the sky. The surrounding clouds and mist began to gather, and a storm was clearly approaching.
"Boom..."
As a streak of red lightning flashed across the sky, the three engaged in a fierce battle, but it was all just a series of probing moves.
Meanwhile, on the outskirts of the Whirlpool Sea, the forces dispatched by the Maritime Alliance clashed head-on with Kurenai's Beasts Pirates...
The two sides immediately engaged in fierce fighting upon meeting. In the combined fleet of the shipping routes, a girl with long coral hair was quietly leaning against the lookout tower.
The aftershocks of the battle stirred up layers of seawater, relentlessly crashing against every ship. The dark seawater fell onto the girl's body, gently grazing the fish scales on her calves.
Pretending nothing had happened, the girl pulled her skirt to cover herself, propped her head up with one hand, and silently cursed under her breath.
A middle-aged man in armor staggered up the watchtower: "Damn... the battle ahead is fierce. Two Yonko and a Marine Admiral. It might really be as you said..."
At this point, he paused abruptly, then said in disbelief, "Magellan's team really brought back the fragments of the Dead Sea Scrolls..."
She glanced at the man out of the corner of her eye, turning her body slightly. The girl wasn't surprised by his reaction. She flicked her skirt with her fingertips, and he squinted his eyes sleepily.
"How did you know they were coming back? And the flight path and location are way too accurate!" Seeing that the girl ignored him, the middle-aged man immediately curled his lip.
With her thin lips pursed, the girl's gaze wandered across the sky ahead, seemingly looking at something. "Really? This isn't like you. You're Bushgomen's first mate."
Following the girl's gaze, the middle-aged man scratched his head in surprise. "What are you looking at? There's nothing in front of you, is there?...Isn't their fight taking place in the back?"
"Answer my question." The girl crossed her arms and forcefully changed the subject.
"I was his first mate, that's right, but it wasn't us who discovered that route back then... it was—" After sighing, the middle-aged man stroked his chin, ready to speak eloquently.
"I'm not interested in your sailing stories." The girl straightened up abruptly, keeping a distance from him with some disdain.
The middle-aged man suddenly felt something was off. He leaned against the railing and asked, "Have you ever heard of a woman named Victoria?"
"..."
"Never heard of it."
The girl's expression suddenly tightened, but after a moment of silence, she gave a perfunctory reply as if it were none of her business, and then turned and left the observation platform.
"Hey, could you please not be so cold