This brief standoff felt as though all the air had been sucked out of the manor's backyard.
The sunlight was still bright, spilling over Kaya's carefully tended garden. The blooming roses and lilies remained vivid and beautiful.
Yet a nauseating stench of blood hung in the air—
Seeping from the corner of Kuro's mouth, mingling with the dust kicked up when he'd kicked Usopp earlier.
Kuro's hands, clad in his "cat claw" gloves, hung loosely at his sides. Ten razor-sharp blades reflected cold, fragmented flashes of light in the sun.
All traces of restraint and civility had vanished from his face, replaced by a sick, barely contained madness on the verge of eruption.
Cunning gleamed in his eyes. In his mind, he could already see the bodies before him sprawled in pools of blood.
"Just a little more… just a little more and my plan would've been perfect…"
He muttered softly, half to himself, half as a declaration to the world of his so-called genius.
"Since you're all so eager to know, I'll tell you."
"After killing every last one of you, tomorrow, as planned, my loyal 'Black Cat Pirates' will 'attack' this village."
His voice rose, tinged with twisted excitement.
"And I—this devoted butler—will 'fight to the death,' and in the end, 'heroically' slaughter all the pirates!"
"That way, I'll prove my innocence. I'll become the village's hero—the poor man who lost his beloved young lady!"
He spread his arms wide, ten blades pointing toward the sky, as if embracing his warped future.
"And then, everything will fall into my hands, naturally. I don't intend to leave a single person alive who knows that I'm still 'alive.'"
Ronan casually swung the pitiful half-broken stick in his hand, the tip tracing a weak arc through the air.
He interrupted Kuro's delusions.
"Oh? Sounds like you're dead set on killing us all."
"But the people standing in front of you aren't ones you can deal with so easily."
To Kuro, Ronan's calm demeanor was nothing but laughable ignorance.
Ignoring the scornful look, Ronan turned his head toward Nami and Usopp—who had just struggled to his feet, his face smeared with blood.
"Nami, Usopp. Go upstairs and check on Kaya. Leave this to us."
"Got it!" Nami replied without hesitation.
She knew full well that the killing intent pouring off a sixteen-million-beli pirate wasn't something she could handle.
Usopp, hearing Kaya's name, immediately thought of her collapsing moments earlier.
His rage toward Kuro was overtaken by worry for Kaya. Gritting his teeth, he ran into the mansion alongside Nami.
Watching their backs disappear through the doorway, Zoro grinned slightly.
"This isn't a fight they can take part in."
He turned, sharp eyes sweeping over Ronan—and over the ridiculous "weapon" in Ronan's hand, barely better than a firewood stick.
"Hey, Ronan. Without a proper weapon, are you really staying?"
It was a swordsman's final check of a comrade's resolve.
Ronan laughed.
He glanced at the wooden stick that had accompanied him for days, then casually tossed it onto the lawn at his feet.
Thud.
A soft sound—yet it felt like the opening of a ritual.
Ronan rolled his wrist, his joints cracking sharply.
Meeting Zoro's gaze, he smiled faintly.
"I don't only use spears. Underestimate me, and you'll regret it."
At that moment, the calm, grounded presence of a traditional martial artist rose from him like a mountain, standing immovable in the garden.
"So who's going first?"
Luffy was already itching for action, hopping in place with excitement. To him, this deadly confrontation felt more like an entertaining game.
"H-hey, now…"
Kuro's face darkened to the extreme.
The three brats he thought he had firmly under control weren't taking him seriously at all—actually discussing who should fight first.
A rage even stronger than the frustration of his ruined plan boiled up from deep inside him.
"There's a limit to how much you can look down on someone, you little brats!!"
Kuro shrieked, his eyes locking onto Ronan—the first to expose him.
"You'll be first!!"
The instant the words left his mouth, Kuro moved.
No—he didn't move.
He vanished.
"Whoosh—!"
His figure turned into a blur, then disappeared entirely.
No running motion. No visible acceleration. It was as if he'd been erased from the air itself.
This was Kuro's signature technique—
Silent Step.
At a speed completely beyond the naked eye, he charged straight for Ronan!
The air in the garden seemed to freeze.
The grin vanished from Luffy's face, replaced by pure shock.
"Huh? Where'd he go?!"
Zoro's pupils shrank to pinpoints.
As a swordsman, his sensitivity to speed far surpassed that of ordinary people—yet even he could only catch the faintest afterimage, barely worth mentioning.
He couldn't lock onto Kuro's true position at all.
All he felt was a lethal killing intent, like a venomous snake lunging straight at Ronan.
"Ronan, watch out!!"
Zoro shouted his sharpest warning, his hand already gripping Wado Ichimonji—but his body was far too slow to provide any support.
"Ronan!!" Luffy shouted in panic as well.
But in the blink of an eye—
Before their voices had even fully left their throats—
Kuro's figure appeared at Ronan's right side, as if he had teleported.
There he was.
Kuro leaned forward slightly, a cruel, triumphant grin spreading across his face.
The five blades on each hand slashed through the air, carving ten silver arcs of death—like a net from hell—swinging straight toward Ronan's neck and ribs!
This strike carried all of his strength.
He intended to tear apart this brat—the one who exposed him first and dared to look down on him—into pieces in an instant!
He could already imagine the spray of blood, the satisfying sensation of flesh being shredded beneath his claws.
But Ronan had been ready.
From the very beginning, he knew everything about Kuro.
He knew that with his current speed—twelve points at most—trying to compete with Silent Step was suicide.
So he never tried to track Kuro with his eyes.
The moment Kuro vanished, Ronan's eyes gently closed, his mind sinking into a state as still as an ancient well.
All of his awareness turned inward—to his own body.
At the thousandth of a second when Kuro appeared at his right side, Ronan's sixth sense screamed a piercing warning.
Every pore on the right side of his body shrank violently. A freezing chill shot up his spine straight to his scalp.
—Now!
At the exact instant Kuro's sinister eyes were certain of victory, convinced he was about to carve Ronan apart—
Ronan moved.
He didn't retreat.
He didn't dodge.
Planting his right foot as the axis, his waist twisted violently!
This was the most fundamental—and most ferocious—stance of Xingyi Quan:
Beng Fist.
The right fist he had prepared in advance, power fully coiled, shot forward without the slightest flourish.
Like a cannonball, it carried the force of his entire body, smashing straight into Kuro!
This was prediction taken to its extreme.
Kuro was too fast—so fast that even he couldn't precisely change direction mid-strike.
His only option was to drive those ten blades into Ronan's body.
And Ronan's choice—
Was to send him flying before that could happen.
"BOOM—!!"
A shockingly heavy explosion tore through the garden.