The pirates who charged in were struck down instantly by the lightning, flipping through the air before crashing to the ground, unconscious.
How could mere flesh and blood hope to contend with thunder and lightning?
The remaining pirates stood frozen, dumbfounded. Some—like Mochi and his lion Richie—immediately retreated to the back of the crowd in fear.
Wasn't Kurosawa Raion supposed to be the weakest and most useless guy on the ship? Where had this terrifying power come from?
Who was he?
While everyone stood in stunned silence, Raion stepped forward and said calmly, "Anyone else dissatisfied? I'm right here."
At his words, not a single pirate dared to take a step forward.
Even Bucky and Kabaji—the strongest on the ship—had been taken out effortlessly. The rest of the crew didn't want to get themselves killed.
They were cowards who preyed on the weak and feared the strong. It was easy to loot and burn towns, but now, faced with Raion's crackling lightning aura, they all knew better than to try their luck.
None of them made a sound. They silently backed away, giving Raion a wide berth.
Don't mock a sickly child—he might be a sleeping tiger.Don't bully the young when they're down.And never provoke a lion before it roars.
As the pirates stood motionless, Kurosawa Raion calmly walked toward Bucky's ship.
He climbed aboard, pulled up the sails, and sailed off into the open sea.
Not one pirate tried to stop him. They simply watched in silence as he took the ship and left them behind.
Raion had been a prisoner aboard that vessel. He had no fondness for the Bucky Pirates after everything they had done. He was more than happy to leave them in the dust.
Of course, it wasn't that he didn't want to wipe out the Bucky Pirates just now—he simply didn't have enough chakra left.
When he hit Kabaji with chakra-enhanced fists, it cost him 10 chakra points. The next move, Chidori Style, consumed another 80 points.
He was now down to 10/100 chakra.
In other words, if the pirates had all rushed him at once, he might've been in real danger.
But Raion's confidence and boldness had saved him. He'd bluffed his way out, intimidating the bullies into backing off.
He had to get stronger.
That was all there was to it.
And so, Kurosawa Raion set off on his own adventure. As the ship glided over the waves, he looked out across the vast blue ocean, his heart pounding with excitement.
He made a silent vow:
"I'll become the strongest, and the freest, man on the sea."
The first thing he did was take down that ridiculous clown pirate flag.
He wasn't a Bucky Pirate anymore. He wasn't even a pirate.
Raion then sat down and seriously thought about his future.
What would his role in this world be?Pirate? Marine? Pirate hunter? Revolutionary? Adventurer?
The answer came quickly.
Pirate hunter.
At this stage, if he wanted to grow stronger, he needed money—to draw cards, unlock jutsu, and increase his chakra reserves.
And with his current strength, hunting pirates and collecting bounties was clearly the best path forward.
Just as he came to that conclusion, the system chimed in with a prompt:
"Friendly reminder: You can increase your chakra limit through training and by creating your own jutsu."
That single line lit a fire in Raion's mind.
He slapped his forehead.
"Of course! I have chakra now. That makes me a ninja in a sense. And if that's true, I can train just like ninjas do in Naruto."
Raion thought back to the explanation from the original Naruto series: Chakra is the mixture of the body's physical energy—drawn from the 130 trillion cells in the human body—and spiritual energy built through training and experience. In some advanced forms, natural energy is also added.
Right now, Raion had zero money. He couldn't extract new ninjutsu from the system, so self-training was his only path forward.
Just like when he had infused chakra into his punch to knock out Kabaji—that was the simplest form of chakra combat.
Now, he had an idea.
He remembered an iconic S-rank jutsu: the White Fang Flash, used by the legendary captain of Konoha's Black Ops, Hatake Sakumo.
Hatake Sakumo was the father of Hatake Kakashi, known as "Konoha's White Fang." Even the famed Sannin held deep respect for him.
His technique, the White Fang Flash, involved channeling lightning chakra into a short sword to unleash attacks at a speed nearly rivaling the Flying Thunder God Technique. It was what earned him the title "White Fang."
Raion wasn't trying to replicate the move exactly—he wanted to use it as inspiration to create his own ninjutsu.
He found a wooden board, focused chakra into the index and middle fingers of his right hand, and slashed at it. A thin line appeared on the wood—like it had been cut with a blade.
It wasn't perfect, not even close to Sakumo's legendary strike.
"Still too dull… Maybe it would work better with a blade," Raion muttered, scratching his head.
He kept practicing, repeating the motion again and again, refining the technique as best he could.
After several hours of training, his body was drenched in sweat, and his chakra had dropped to 2/100—on the verge of depletion.
He had to refuel.
Raion searched the ship's cabin for supplies and found meat, fruits, and vegetables stored in the cold room—leftovers from when the crew hunted sea beasts. He cooked them up and devoured a delicious meal.
As a lowly shiphand, he'd never even dreamed of meals like this. He used to go hungry most days.
But now?
He was in charge.
Everything he had now—his freedom, his ship, his food—was earned through strength.
He ate. He slept. He trained.
And two days later, his ship drifted toward a new destination.
An island—uninhabited and overgrown, covered in dense green vegetation like a miniature forest.
In the One Piece world, these small islands were everywhere. Adventurers often used them to rest and regroup.
Raion figured it was a perfect place to continue his training. The ship was cramped, but here, the air was fresh, and who knew what he might find?
Without hesitation, he disembarked and found a spot beneath a massive tree to train again.
He'd practiced his improvised version of the White Fang Technique over the past two days and felt he had reached the limit of what his current chakra reserves could handle.
It was time to move on.
His next target?
Rasengan.