CHAPTER 40: CHAPTER 40: FRENZIED HUNT—SWORDMASTER KARL

"Thanks for teaching me the flying slash, ’Great Swordsman.’ See you!"

Swoosh—boom!

On one of the Sabaody Archipelago’s outlaw islands, a one-sided battle raged.

In a T-shirt and shorts, Karl looked nothing like a man out for a stroll. Gripping an utterly ordinary knight’s sword, he faced the long-blade user whose expression had just shifted in shock and sent out a blue slash that blasted him away.

With a single look, Karl learned the "Cutting Steel" that the longsword user had taken more than twenty years to comprehend, and cleanly unleashed the flying slash that only a master of "Cutting Steel" can perform.

Karl’s flying slash was stronger than the longsword user’s.

Struck in body and spirit, the man staggered back to his companion lying not far away and collapsed beside him, unconscious.

"Karl’s evolved again..."

Watching Karl loose that flying slash with the bearing of a kingdom’s champion knight, Carina, Nami, and Perona—observing from a distance—had stars in their eyes.

Perona in particular itched to spend her stash to commission Karl a brand-new suit of armor.

He was practically the knight of her dreams.

Compared to that, Kumashi didn’t matter anymore.

News of this quickly reached the ever-watchful Shakky and Rayleigh.

"I just witnessed a monster’s rise," Rayleigh murmured.

Compared to learning Armament Haki’s "Emission" and "Internal Destruction," Karl picking up the flying slash wasn’t much at all.

But it proved again that he could learn others’ skills at a glance.

Rayleigh was certain Karl’s earlier black slash wasn’t a swordsman’s "Cutting Steel"; he’d merely warped the air with brute force and poured in tremendous Armament Haki.

There’d been none of a swordsman’s keen edge on Karl then.

But now, not only had he mastered "Cutting Steel," he’d unleashed a flying slash stronger than the longsword user who’d taught him.

In that moment, Rayleigh seemed to see the future: Karl entering the New World, challenging masters across every discipline, stealing their craft to strengthen himself, step by step becoming a super-power who stands at the world’s summit.

"Thankfully no Conqueror’s Haki... or, rather, thank goodness it hasn’t awakened—and he didn’t use its highest application right in front of me."

Shakky took a drag and sighed. "Otherwise, before he even reached the New World, that kid might already be a presence that makes countless pirates despair."

"Extreme power and speed plus top-tier dual Haki—right now he’s a nightmare for ’Paradise’ pirates," Rayleigh judged.

After learning "Cutting Steel," Karl took a shine to swordplay.

In the hunts that followed, he used the knight’s sword against wanted pirates.

He practiced his sword while trying to steal techniques off them.

Unfortunately, aside from that longsword user’s "Cutting Steel," the rest were either ability-users Karl couldn’t learn from, or so trash he disdained to copy their forms.

This year is Sea Circle Calendar 1517—the year Portgas D. Ace, son of the Pirate King, put to sea.

In Ace’s year of sweeping victories, it was as if all the luck had gathered on one man...

From intel Carina pulled out of outlaw-zone bounty hunters like Nhatbao and the slavers, there weren’t any Supernova pirates on Sabaody just now.

Either those billion-berry rookies hadn’t reached the end of the first half yet, or this class of pirate newcomers was just that weak.

But Karl’s rampant hunting of eight-figure bounty pirates in Sabaody’s outlaw zone drew eyes from several sides.

One was the local bounty hunters and slavers.

Those mangy dogs who’d eyed Little White now knew a monster was on the islands.

Another was the Marine base garrisoned at Sabaody.

Since the Great Pirate Era began, flashy pirate rookies and Supernovas have never been in short supply...

But the seas had long lacked a standout bounty hunter.

A civilian ace suddenly appearing in the first half of the Grand Line—especially a crew boasting a top-tier Paramecia Barrier-Barrier Fruit user—not only drew the garrison’s attention, it also lit up Naval HQ intelligence across the bay.

When Karl cashed in bounties, the Marine colonel assigned to Sabaody invited him more than once, on HQ’s behalf, to join the Marines.

Karl refused every time.

His dream is to roam the world, tasting local foods while challenging masters across the seas, and to save up for a mobile island-ship of his own.

That kind of man can’t stand the Marines’ rules and restraints.

The last group focused on Karl’s crew were the reporters stationed on Sabaody.

Why is Sabaody one of the world’s most famous islands?

Simple.

It’s the world’s largest, most unusual archipelago; the Celestial Dragons’ back garden; the end where the seven routing lines of the first half converge; the place where failures rearm and set out again toward the strongest sea...

So Sabaody is never short on topics.

In fact, it’s one of the world’s star-making isles.

Do the pirates arriving from different routes like to scrap?

Not only do they despise each other, they fight here to steal the reputation the other side built by clearing their line.

Because countless reporters lurk here, anyone who shines on Sabaody can climb tabloids’ live buzz charts—and might even make the World Economy News.

For newsmongers, nothing beats a ’topic’ that sells papers.

Right now, Karl is a topic that prints money.

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