Is He Saving the Fish-Man?

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Corvin had no idea who kept firing afterward and giving him assists.

It did not seem especially important.

Listening to the fighting grow fiercer, he could easily imagine how bloody the scene had become.

As the person who had started the mess, Corvin felt no real remorse.

People who lived this kind of life had to pay eventually.

He felt no guilt toward pirates. After circling halfway around the surrounding buildings, he reached the other side and climbed onto a nearby roof.

Once he reached the rooftop, Corvin was startled to find that, at some point, many people had gathered on the surrounding buildings.

At a glance, some were even holding food and bottles of liquor.

Now that he was closer, he could hear them cheering.

Corvin looked at them and thought for a moment.

Making a move on them did not seem like a bad choice either.

But right now, there was a better option. He gave up on that thought.

Silently, Corvin looked away and turned his attention to the battlefield in front of the auction house.

His gaze focused mostly on the blood-soaked fish-man slave.

The pirates he had glanced over, however, suddenly felt an unexplained chill. They assumed the night air had turned cold and quickly took several more swallows of liquor to warm themselves.

Below, the brawl gradually reached a fever pitch.

Some people sensed the danger and withdrew from the fight in time.

More, however, stayed because their companions had been hurt and their captains were still inside the auction house.

When the explosions first came from inside, those followers had wanted to rush in and check on their bosses. The auction house guards stopped them at the entrance.

From the auction house's position, if so many people charged in after an accident, the situation inside would only grow worse. It could also threaten all the goods that had already been sold to the guests that night.

The guards' explanation had been reasonable enough that the followers had reluctantly trusted the auction house's strength.

That became the point of conflict.

Once the whole situation collapsed into chaos, they stopped holding back. They began killing in groups and pressed toward the entrance.

Under those circumstances, in less than a few minutes, more than a hundred corpses lay on the ground.

At least a third of them had been killed by the fish-man.

From the moment he escaped the auction house until now, cutting down anyone in his path, the fish-man was actually still confused.

He did not know where the explosion inside the auction hall had come from.

He did not know who had opened the cage that held him.

He did not know why people had started fighting inside the auction house.

He only knew that a chance at freedom had appeared in front of him.

So he clung to that thin hope and ran for his life through most of the hall.

What he could not understand was that the humans inside, including the human who had paid a huge amount of money to buy him, had not stopped him. They had let him rush out of the hall unharmed.

What the fish-man slave did not know was that the guests attending the auction had only regarded him as a marked and priced item, something that could be purchased with money.

If something could be bought with money, what right did it have to make them risk their lives?

That was why even Kazt, who had been determined to win him at auction, would never risk himself to stop the fish-man from fleeing at a time like this.

It was only an item that could be traded for money.

If something went wrong, the auction house could answer for it.

How could the fleeing fish-man understand a view so cold and so deeply rooted?

He had finally escaped the auction hall, only to fall into another desperate situation.

Just as despair began closing in around him, another scene he could not understand unfolded.

The humans suddenly began slaughtering one another.

That gave him hope.

'Arlong was right. Humans are ugly creatures. They have no reason to exist.'

With the pressure on him reduced, the fish-man attacked like a madman.

He no longer cared about the blades coming from behind him. He cared only about breaking through faster.

That reckless choice left him with several wounds in only a few seconds, blood pouring from each one.

The result was obvious as well. He finally reached the edge of the encirclement.

What blocked him now was no longer a suffocating crowd, but a thin wall of people he could break with one swing of his arms.

"Move!"

The fish-man roared again and crashed straight through the final, weak human wall.

After breaking free, his blood-soaked body ran wildly down the long street.

As long as he reached the sea.

As long as he reached the sea.

At that moment, that was the only thought left in him.

The pirates watching from nearby were startled when they saw him break out.

Several immediately pulled out pistols. They treated him like a moving target for entertainment and raised their barrels.

Bang, bang.

Gunshots tore through the night. Lead balls flew toward the fleeing fish-man.

Their aim was terrible. Most bullets missed, but a few grazed his arms and side.

Blood sprayed through the air.

The fish-man gritted through the pain and did not slow.

"Ha!"

The pirates laughed wildly.

Another round of gunfire followed.

The hail of bullets came at him like a storm, leaving the fish-man as fragile as a boat tossing in open water.

At the mouth of an alley not far from the street, Clara watched the escaped fish-man run for his life through the gunfire. Around her, all she could hear were shots and the pirates' piercing laughter.

Her brows drew tight. Her fingers tightened unconsciously around the important map in her hand, crumpling a large section of it.

It was not pure pity for him.

More than that, she hated the atmosphere in front of her.

Because of her childhood, she understood one truth deeply.

There were good and bad fish-men.

Humans were the same.

Good and evil had nothing to do with race.

Bang, bang.

More gunshots thundered.

This time, two pirates screamed as they died.

Two shots from an unknown direction killed the pirates who had been enjoying the shooting the most.

Clara froze. With her excellent hearing, she picked out those two fleeting shots amid the noise.

Following the sound, she saw a masked figure moving quickly across a rooftop.

"That is...?"

Clara's eyes widened.

The figure put away the flintlock pistols, then drew a long smoothbore musket from his back with one hand. He swept the barrel sideways and pulled the trigger almost without aiming.

As the gunshot sounded, Clara shifted her gaze just in time to see a pirate aiming a rifled gun at the fish-man drop dead.

"Is that person... saving the fish-man?"

Clara looked back at the figure, her eyes full of disbelief.

Who was he?

A Marine?

A bounty hunter?

Surely not a pirate.

And he could not be a fish-man.

She stared at the figure as he moved away, thoughts churning.

In a place this filthy, she could not imagine who would step in to save a fish-man.

The shooter was Corvin, who had been watching the fight from the beginning.

When he saw the fish-man break free, joy rose in him and he immediately followed.

Then he saw the pirates who had come out of taverns and casinos on both sides of the street treating him like a living target.

'You dare touch my prey?'

Corvin did not hesitate. He drew his guns and killed the three pirates having the most fun.

That was the scene Clara found so impossible to understand.

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