56. Stand up for me! No kneeling allowed!
"I'm counting the last three numbers, and then I can shoot!"
The little girl Carol jumped with excitement and shouted at the top of her lungs, "Eight... Nine...!"
"—Ten! Time's up!"
Usopp finally conquered the fear gripping his heart and prepared to spin around and fire.
Boom! Boom!
Two consecutive gunshots reignited the restless crowd.
The duel was over.
"You lost, Usopp," Daddy said in a cold voice.
Usopp slowly sank to his knees, cold sweat streaming down his forehead!
Yes.
He had lost.
The current Usopp was still far from being a match for Daddy.
In a mere half-second, Daddy had fired two shots!
One bullet knocked the weapon right out of Usopp's hand, while the other grazed past the brim of his hat.
It was no exaggeration to say that just now, Usopp had walked through the gates of hell!
Had that bullet drifted even half a centimeter closer, Usopp would already be a corpse!
Kneeling on the ground, Usopp's lips trembled, his eyes filled with tears of lingering dread.
He asked with a quivering voice, "Wh—Why didn't you kill me?!"
As a future master sniper, Usopp could actually sense that Daddy had intentionally missed with that shot.
Otherwise, he would be a dead man right now.
"Whether I kill you or not is my freedom; it has nothing to do with you."
Daddy instinctively glanced in the direction of Chu Bawang.
A cold chuckle echoed in his heart: " brat, if it weren't for Bawang's offhand remark, you probably would have become a ghost under my gun long ago! You don't even know who saved you, yet you're still demanding to know why I didn't kill you. What a foolish brat! Nothing like that bastard Yasopp!"
Daddy had indeed held back during the fight.
Because he couldn't be certain what kind of relationship existed between Usopp and Chu Bawang!
If he had taken the risk to kill Usopp—a coward without even a bounty—it very well might have brought utter disaster upon himself and his daughter!
Daddy didn't dare to take that risk.
He played it safe even against the Fish-man Arlong, whose bounty was over twenty million berries; how much more so against Chu Bawang, who carried a massive bounty of ninety million berries?!
Besides,
Usopp was Yasopp's son!
During his service in the Marine elite forces, he had once suffered defeat at Yasopp's gun.
Yet Yasopp had spared his life, and naturally, Daddy would not stoop to the sickening act of returning kindness with malice.
"I... I lost. Luffy! Zoro! I lost this duel!"
Overwhelmed by deep depression, Usopp lowered his head, not daring to look at Luffy and Zoro.
In truth, he had always struggled with a deep sense of inferiority.
He felt that his usefulness on the ship was beneath everyone else's!
Kaya was essentially there for a vacation; she just needed to look pretty like a flower vase, so she could be ignored.
Luffy and Zoro were monsters among monsters, always stepping up to take on the enemy's strongest fighters in every battle.
Sanji and Nami each possessed unique talents—one excelled at cooking culinary masterpieces, while the other mastered navigation and helm command.
As for Chu Bawang, needless to say, every single action of his radiated the aura of someone "exceptional," "invincible," "overbearingly domineering," and "the most dazzling guy in the entire village"...
Meeting Chu Bawang, let alone someone like him, even Zoro and Sanji would feel a pang of inferiority.
Aboard the Going Merry, he was the only one who couldn't do anything right yet ranked first in running his mouth, trembling with cowardice at the first sign of trouble.
If not for his ability to handle odd jobs like repairing the cabin and occasionally livening up the mood, Usopp would have long since lost the face to stay on the Going Merry...
Today, he had finally mustered the courage to fight Daddy to the death!
Yet he never expected to lose so thoroughly, completely disgracing the Straw Hat Pirates!
If there were a crack in the ground right now, Usopp would have dived straight into it, never daring to show his face again.
Usopp had an awakening.
He finally realized how foolish and laughable his "petty rivalry" with Chu Bawang truly was.
He was just an ordinary person; what qualifications did he have to compete with a man blessed by the heavens?!
Never bite off more than you can chew.
The more Usopp pondered this, the more despondent he felt, inevitably spiraling into a vicious cycle.
He roared at the surrounding crowd and Daddy:
"You can laugh at me now, because I've always been a person full of inferiority."
"I finally scraped together the courage to fight a father-warrior to the death, only to lose in such a miserable fashion, putting on a comical clown show for all of you."
"Come on! Laugh at me! I'm a loser!"
After pouring every ounce of his strength into that desperate roar,
Usopp felt his knees turn to jelly, and he collapsed heavily onto the ground.
He braced his hands against the earth as giant tears rolled down his cheeks.
In his heart, Usopp felt a mix of intense remorse and boiling anger.
Enraged by his own weakness, filled with regret over his own pettiness.
Hearing Usopp's frantic, screaming internal monologue, the onlookers of Loguetown were completely stunned.
The sarcastic remarks they had prepared to hurl couldn't form a single word.
"Usopp..."
Luffy and Zoro exchanged a glance and approached Usopp from opposite sides.
Luffy spoke with absolute firmness, his voice deep: "You're a crewmate I acknowledge, and I will never laugh at my own crewmate in this lifetime."
A wave of applause suddenly erupted from the crowd, accompanied by spontaneous, heartfelt praise:
"Even though this kid didn't beat Daddy, he's still remarkable! Out of all the challengers, he's the only one who dueled Daddy and managed to survive!"
"That's right! A mayfly shaking a giant tree, a mantis trying to stop a chariot—admirable even if beyond one's depth!"
"Why are you using all those fancy literary terms? I don't understand a word of it."
"I really admire this kid's courage. Knowing full well he was no match for Daddy, he still managed to conquer the fear in his heart. For that alone, I'm giving him this gesture!! Thumbs_Up.JPG"
......
What is happening?
Shouldn't everyone be laughing at my arrogance?
Why is everyone praising me?
The string of praises left Usopp frozen in a prolonged daze.
"Hey! Usopp!"
Chu Bawang flashed forward, appearing right in front of Usopp.
"A real man has gold under his knees; he kneels neither to the heavens nor to the earth, only to his parents and his master."
Chu Bawang shouted loudly: "Now! Right now! Immediately! Get up off your ass for me, no kneeling allowed!"
That reprimand rang like a giant bell, echoing across the beach for a long time and sending a profound shock through Usopp's soul.
The onlookers were dumbfounded, staring blankly at Chu Bawang as if lost in a trance.
They were utterly shaken by this wildly arrogant display!
Kneeling to neither heaven nor earth! Kneeling only to parents and master!
Isn't this just too overpowering?!
"Thank goodness I didn't strike a fatal blow! This kid Usopp really does have an extraordinary relationship with Bawang."
"This supreme aura of 'I alone am supreme in heaven and earth' is simply terrifying! Even the former Red-Haired Shanks seems incomparable to him!"
"Are those Marines just freeloading idiots?! Such a massively powerful and extremely vicious criminal, and they only put a ninety-million-berry bounty on him?!"
Daddy kept his gaze locked tightly onto Chu Bawang, finally letting out a quiet sigh of relief.