Chapter 295: Freestyle swimming

Hawkins is now 28 years old, but he hasn’t been a Pirate for a long time. As a Devil Fruit User, he emerged only after getting his powers.

But now, his Pirate Group has become a force that can not be underestimated in the North Blue, as well as Trafalgar Law and X·Drake. These three pirates are now competing with each other in the North. It seems that they want to see who is this Blue’s strongest group.

As for the Grand Line, these three pirates are looking forward to going there. That part of the world is a paradise for adventurers and a place to test their power. All kinds of Legends in the Grand Line are attracting newcomers for challenges…

Hawkins knows very well that not only him, even the heart and Drake pirates, everyone is planning to set foot there just after they feel that they are ready…

In fact, when he heard the term “Calm Belt”, Hawkins felt that he was ready to enter the Grand Line.

However, the results of his divination just gave him a warning sign.

The 50% chance of death is following him and his crew. In other words, it is very possible that his entire pirate group may collapse within a day.

Such a powerful enemy and this huge threat should not be caused by the other two pirate groups…

Just as he was thinking about it, the watchman on the mast suddenly shouted, “Captain! There seems to be something ahead!”

Hawkins raised his head, glanced at the watchman, then turned his head and looked at the direction of his hand, at that moment, he got shocked, because the direction the watchman was pointing happened to be south.

The Calm Belt!

This direction immediately attracted the attention of all the Hawkins Pirates. They stopped their work and came to the side of the ship, then they placed their hands on their foreheads to block sunlight and narrowed their eyes to see what’s ahead.

The distance was a bit far away, so they still couldn’t see anything on the sea surface!

However, just when everyone thought that the watchman might have been mistaken, suddenly a huge splash of water was raised in the distant sea!

A very large sea king, looks like a snake, suddenly sprang up from below the surface of the sea, and then blasted straight down from a high altitude towards the water.

This Sea King looked like it was on the hunt. Although they didn’t know what he’s hunting, the sea surface ahead was shaking because of its appearance.

The members of Hawkins pirates were shocked and stunned after seeing this scene. It’s not that they haven’t seen a sea king before, but it’s really the first time to see such a huge one.

“Captain!” A pirate came back to his senses, and said anxiously: “That must be a high-class Sea King of the Calm Belt. I don’t know why it came all this way to our North Blue! We must get out of the way quickly!”

Hawkins nodded and yelled: “Turn the rudder, let’s get out of here! I hope that guy doesn’t stay in the North Sea after finishing his hunt.”

At that moment, Hawkins thought that the fate of his group was linked to this large Sea King. At the idea of the so-called decision of life and death, Hawkins immediately ordered them to escape.

However, when his pirate ship had just completed the turn, a loud wailing sound suddenly came, and the members of Hawkins pirates turned their heads in horror and found the large Sea King, which had just been rampant on the sea, was falling towards the sea surface, sliced into two halves!

This sea king was beheaded by something!

Boom! The weight of the body that fell down was at least more than ten tons, which cause huge waves all around.

Witnessing the killing of the large sea king, all the members of the Hawkins Pirate Group couldn’t get back to their senses for a while, staring blankly at the area where the Sea King was slain.

After a minute, the sea surface finally calmed down. Until this time, everyone could see clearly that there seemed to be a small wave line on the sea, slowly moving towards their side.

“It’s a person!” The watchman screamed in horror: “There’s a man swimming in the sea!”

After hearing this, the whole crew shivered together. Looking around the nearby waters, there wasn’t any ship. Where did the swimmer come from? Could it be that this person was hunted by the giant sea snake?

“Captain? Are we still leaving?” one member asked Hawkins.

“…” Hawkins wasn’t able to answer anything now.

There is no doubt that the Sea King was slain by this swimmer. If this person is the enemy in his prophecy, it is normal for Hawkins to choose leaving the place immediately.

But here is the problem. The so-called decisive choice can be explained in either way. Who knows whether the decision to leave is right or wrong?

If the swimming man was looking for a rescuing boat, and they leave the area and ignore him, will it cause them a disaster?

“Stay…!” Hawkins thought about it and finally made such a decision.

So the others stopped talking, and stared at the waterline that was getting closer and closer…

When the waterline got closer, everyone discovered that it was really a person, and his swimming speed was quite fast.

It seems that because he saw Hawkins’s boat was right in front of him, the swimmer speeded up a bit and rushed towards the ship.

“What shall we do, captain? Is he allowed to come aboard?” A crewmember asked Hawkins again.

“Help him up!” Hawkins said: “We can’t verify if this person is an enemy or a friend, if we don’t meet him.”

Soon, when the guy approached the ship, the people of Hawkins pirates lowered the rope ladder and let the man climb up.

“FCK! Finally… I encountered a ship!” As soon as the swimmer got on the boat, he sat down on the deck and gasped for breath…

Hawkins looked at the swimmer’s appearance and found that he was a young man. He was topless, with a katana around his waist, a bandage with a small bell on his right arm, and his wet hair was tied into a ponytail.

“Who are you?” Hawkins couldn’t help asking: “And did you kill that sea king?”

“Oh!… Yeah, I slayed that bastard!” the young man raised his hand and said: “That guy is too cunning… He has been quietly following me ever since I entered the Calm Belt. As a result, he attacked me when he was about to leave the area… I was about to be eaten alive!”

“Calm Belt?” A member of Hawkins’ crew couldn’t help but wonder: “Did you come all the way swimming from the Calm Belt?”

“Just half of it!” The young man said: “I lost my boat in the middle.”

“You… you are bluffing!” A pirate exclaimed: “The Calm Belt is at least 100 miles wide. Even if you start swimming halfway, it will be at least fifty miles . How could you swim this far?”

“Yeah, it’s very hard!” the guy said with a smile: “You have to swim swiftly, or you will be targeted by many Sea Kings…”

The pirates looked at each other in dismay, they didn’t believe the words of this fellow, but what the other side said always gave them the impression that he really swam here…

Hawkins spoke again at this time: “You haven’t answered me yet, what’s your name?”

The young man froze for a moment, and then said, “Ah, it’s better not to tell you my name… that’s right, you are pirates, you look quite familiar!”

Needless to say, this young man who came from the Calm Belt is naturally Ian. Although he decided to cross the Calm Belt, he still underestimated its danger.

His poor little boat was overturned when he encountered a group of giant Sea Kings in the Calm Belt! It wasn’t that these giant Sea Kings attacked him, but he was unfortunate that he and his raft had sailed on the back of a large one, and when the Sea King came out of the water all of a sudden, Ian slipped off…

Ian then fell down directly, but his boat stayed on the back of the Sea King. After a moment of his fall, the boat slid down on the smooth back of the Sea King. When it reached its tail, the Sea King gently swayed its body and smashed the raft to pieces!

Of course, Ian couldn’t ask the Sea King for compensation… xD! He was lucky that the giant Sea King’s temper was mild and didn’t notice him, so he quickly swam away.

And for the next journey, Ian really swam all the way out. Thanks to Rayleigh’s training, Ian’s swimming skills have peaked. In addition, Ian has been exercising under the gravity suppression of Fujitora for so long, so he has enough Stamina to swim this distance.

Along the way, Ian was also attacked by some other Sea Kings. They weren’t necessarily thinking about eating him, some of them might just be curious… they wanted to see what that little thing was, and that caused Ian a lot of trouble…

Those who wanted to eat him were killed, and for the curious ones, Ian could only play with them, and only after they lose interest and leave, then he goes back to swimming…

As for the last one, the huge sea snake, it has been quietly lurking in the seabed, following Ian, and when he was about to get out of the Calm Belt, it suddenly launched toward him… Ian was unprepared, and unexpectedly, he found himself caught inside a large opened mouth. Fortunately, he reacted quickly and escaped before his opponent’s mouth closed, and then started fighting the Sea King.

After killing the Sea King, Ian saw a ship in front of him, so he swam directly towards their side, but fortunately, the other side didn’t leave after witnessing what happened.

However, after boarding the ship, Ian discovered that this was a pirate ship. What surprised him, in particular, was that he actually recognized Hawkins, the future supernova!

‘Ah, yes! Hawkins is a pirate born in the North Blue, but he should leave this area and go to the Grand Line next year, becoming one of the Worst Generation…’

Ian didn’t know much about Hawkins, but at least he still knew this person, so he felt that his luck was pretty good. After reaching the North Blue, he immediately encountered an impressive fellow.

However, Ian was grateful for their rescue, but he still has an impression to make and he won’t be that polite to a pirate group, so he said to Hawkins: “Thank you very much for saving me, but I’m sorry, I’m going to take possession of your ship for a while!”