Chapter 394: There's Something Going On Between Those Two
Ryū had no real opinion on which world the group event ended up in — meaning, functionally, he didn't care where the group event took place.
As long as the event ran smoothly, that was good enough for him. Destination-wise, it made no difference.
So when it came time to vote, he just picked something at random. And how exactly did that random pick work?
Eeny, meeny, miny — and it landed on Battle Through the Heavens. A clean, effortless vote, cast without a second thought. Perfect.
Honestly, probably only the Admin of this entire chat group could get away with treating a group vote this casually.
The voting window didn't run long, since Yukari's earlier all-members ping had already pulled everyone into the poll. It wrapped up in about ten minutes.
Eternally Seventeen: @Everyone, the poll's closed! Results are in! Sword Art Online pulled 8 votes, Arknights pulled 4, and Battle Through the Heavens pulled a full 10!
Eternally Seventeen: Which means Battle Through the Heavens wins it — that's our world for the New Year's Eve/Lunar New Year Grand Event!
Eternally Seventeen: @RawrSoFierce, Admin-sama, go ahead and confirm the event world — only your permissions can lock it in.
RawrSoFierce: No problem, already confirmed. Just three days to wait now, and we're good.
Terrible Tornado:Battle Through the Heavens, huh. Admin-sama's quick rundown gave me a rough sense of what it's like — genuinely looking forward to it.
Edward Newgate: Gurararara, a solid chunk of the group's own members are original characters — picking a fresh world makes sense every now and then.
Admiral Kizaru: Well~ guess it's time to go beg Fleet Admiral Kong for another ten days off.
Kaguya-sama: Poor World Government Grand Marshal — I bet Kizaru-ojisan's constant leave requests have him ready to cough up blood at this point.
Kaguya-sama: Not sure why, but I'm getting a distinct sense of secondhand schadenfreude here.
RawrSoFierce: Enjoying someone else's misery, huh. Though, come to think of it, Kong really does seem to have it rough lately, stuck between the Five Elders and Marine HQ.
RawrSoFierce: Though judging by how things are going, he's clearly still on the Marines' side deep down — otherwise he wouldn't keep letting Sengoku and Kizaru take leave nonstop like this.
Senbei Is So Tasty: True enough. Kong's always looked out for me pretty well — he's actually the one who recommended me for Fleet Admiral back in the day.
Admiral Kizaru: Wasn't that just because Marine HQ didn't have a better candidate at the time? Garp-san didn't want the promotion, and Tsuru-sensei doesn't kill pirates.
Senbei Is So Tasty: ...Nobody mistakes you for mute when you're not talking.
Edward Newgate: Gurararara, let's keep this one between us, hm? Gurararara, watching old Sengoku eat that one really makes me want to laugh for a solid few minutes.
Kaguya-sama: I've noticed Sengoku-ojii-sama and Whitebeard-ojii-sama have really taken to bickering with each other lately — kind of like Admin-sama and Yukari-nee used to, back in the day.
Kaguya-sama: And considering how that turned out... ooh, that's actually a little unsettling to think about.
Eternally Seventeen: Little Kaguya, ever the logician — impeccable analysis, as always.
Admiral Kizaru: Now that's genuinely alarming. No wonder Whitebeard-ojii-sama keeps adopting so many "sons" — turns out he's had a whole thing going on this whole time.
Edward Newgate: ???
Edward Newgate: Excuse me?! Old Whitebeard here wouldn't end up with Sengoku even if the alternative was a pig. And Kizaru, boy, are you looking for a beating?
Senbei Is So Tasty: Borsalino, I think you've earned yourself an extra month of overtime once this event wraps up.
Admiral Kizaru: Eh?? Wait... hold on, that's not fair, Kaguya's the one who brought this whole thing up — why am I the one getting punished for just watching from the sidelines?
Edward Newgate: Because you're ugly!
Senbei Is So Tasty: Because you're ugly!
RawrSoFierce: Pfft hahaha, critical hit, dealing 9,999 true damage straight to Kizaru.
Admiral Kizaru: That's brutal, being ugly isn't even my fault — and honestly, I think I look pretty decent?
Senbei Is So Tasty: Ugly's forgivable. Zero self-awareness on top of it? That's beyond saving. Bury him.
Kaguya-sama: Today's duel goes to Kizaru-ojisan, our resident loser, lol...
Street-Corner Illustrator: Poor Kizaru-ojisan, an extra month of overtime's waiting for you!
Admiral Kizaru: ...This is too much. This world doesn't deserve me. sob
Wandering Little Planet: Picturing Kizaru-ojisan actually crying right now — the mental image is way too vivid, can't bear to look.
Admiral Kizaru: Is it really that bad to look at? I feel like it's... fine? Probably?
Senbei Is So Tasty: And there it is — zero self-awareness confirmed once and for all.
"..."
Naturally, someone as thick-skinned as Kizaru wasn't about to take real psychological damage over a few "hard truths" from Sengoku — he genuinely didn't think his own face was all that ugly.
At least, back in his own One Piece world, his particular look counted as fairly ordinary. Plenty of people out there looked considerably worse than him.
No helping that, really — One Piece's art style meant genuinely handsome or beautiful people were something of a rarity to begin with.
Back at Marine HQ, in his own office as Admiral — "Borsalino," as Sengoku liked to call him — Kizaru naturally had a dedicated workspace of his own.
Well, of course he did — what kind of budget-strapped organization would Marine HQ be if an Admiral didn't even rate his own office?
His office ran somewhere around seventy or eighty square meters, easily large enough to function as an actual residence — the kind a small family of three could comfortably live in.
Trimming his nails one-handed while chatting away in the group with the other, Kizaru's undeniably shifty-looking face settled into an equally shifty expression.
...Whether Kizaru was laughing, crying, angry, or sad, that particular face somehow always came out looking shifty regardless.
Maybe the shiftiness was simply innate, and paired with that specific face, the two just amplified each other perfectly.
Still clipping away at his nails, Kizaru muttered under his breath, "Won't actually make me do a whole extra month, will he? That'd be genuinely rough."
For all his complaining, though, Kizaru wasn't actually worried in the slightest. Whatever policy came down from above, he'd always find some workaround.
He'd simply slack off during the "overtime" the same way he always did — did overtime really count as overtime if you spent it slacking off the whole time?
Aside from getting home a little later, it'd be functionally indistinguishable from any other regular day off.
Right now, Kizaru was mostly preoccupied with figuring out what excuse to give Kong when he went to request his leave later.
Nothing especially convincing was coming to mind. Maybe he'd just go with "my wife's about to give birth" again?
No — already used that one twice. A third time, and Kong might actually kick him straight out of the office.
Maybe he'd just claim he was dating someone new, and his girlfriend wanted him around for a while?
Hm, not exactly airtight either, but a lot more believable than another fake pregnancy.
At his age, finally landing a "girlfriend" — Kong would probably just let that slide without much pushback, right?
Worst case, he'd just switch excuses again. If there was one thing Kizaru genuinely never ran short of, it was excuses for requesting time off.
"Battle Through the Heavens, huh. Not super familiar with how that world actually works, but if most of the group voted for it, guess I'll just prepare accordingly. Admin-sama mentioned it leans heavily into Eastern fantasy elements, apparently."
Honestly, Kizaru had no real idea what "Eastern fantasy" was even supposed to mean.
Not that it dampened his genuine curiosity about an unfamiliar world in the slightest. Who wouldn't enjoy a free ten-day trip somewhere new?
And on top of that free trip, there'd still be an event gift box waiting at the end of it all — lovely.
Meanwhile, back in Konoha, having just confirmed the event world, Ryū sank into thought.
Sure, Battle Through the Heavens never depicted anyone actually blowing up a star — even the final Douhuang battle at the story's climax had barely managed to crack open a single continent.
But he had no idea how large that continent actually was. Maybe it was equivalent to a dozen-plus Earths stacked together?
If it really was that massive, cracking it open like that would still represent genuine planet-busting-level firepower.
Not that it mattered much either way, honestly — the group was going there purely to enjoy the trip, not to tangle with whatever late-story bosses that world had to offer. And even if they did, it wouldn't be much of a concern — by the story's own ending, there were only two Douhuang-tier fighters total, one of them being the protagonist himself.
Against that, the chat group alone had six or seven members capable of blowing up an entire planet outright. Six or seven against one felt like decent enough odds.
With that settled, Ryū put the thought aside and shifted focus to preparing for the crossover.
Two or three days still remained before the event officially kicked off — plenty of time to get ready.
Just as he sank into quiet thought, a sudden knock at his door pulled him out of it.
Observation Haki flared on instinct, sweeping the area, and Ryū blinked, mildly surprised — the person knocking turned out to be someone he actually knew.
And, unfortunately, someone whose presence tended to give him a bit of a headache. Not Guy, this time.
It was Anko — the young Chūnin who'd taken to visiting him fairly regularly since their earlier acquaintance, and who genuinely seemed to have grown attached to him in the process.
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