"Ahhhhh!! M-Monster—!!"
The "Carpenter" finally snapped out of it, screaming as he staggered backward in panic. While retreating, he frantically shouted at the remaining puppet dolls, "Stop him! Kill him! Hurry, kill him!!"
Monster?
Was he… talking about me?
It was the first time Shano had ever been called that.
He didn't think it sounded very nice.
But when he thought about it carefully, somewhere deep down, he realized—he kind of liked it.
"Call me whatever you want, then!"
He grinned wickedly and charged forward. Bang bang bang—a flurry of punches blasted away the puppets coming to stop him, sending them flying one after another.
The one that came at him head-on with a sword met an even worse fate—Shano caught its neck between his elbow and side, then used the strength in his waist and abdomen to slam his knee up, finally grabbing both arms and ripping it in half.
Wood chips scattered in all directions. Through the mess, the Carpenter's face grew paler and more terrified.
Crack! Shano leapt high off the stage and landed directly in front of the main entrance, cutting off the Carpenter's escape.
Now, the only ones left by the man's side were the town's sheriff and that Marine base lieutenant, Major Tomte.
"Outta the way!"
Boom! Another two punches, and the pair were sent flying with groans, crashing to the ground and passing out.
Shano had intentionally held back—those two hadn't been fully turned into puppets yet. Maybe, just maybe, if he took care of the Carpenter, they could still go back to being normal people.
Click.
Shano reached out. Moving faster than any normal human, he caught the Carpenter by the throat, lifting him like a chick in one hand.
The Carpenter struggled with all his might, but the boy's grip was like a pair of iron tongs. He couldn't move at all.
"Guh… khh… I—I can't breathe! Let go! Let me go!"
Shano didn't loosen his grip. He looked at the man, disappointment in his eyes.
"You're really weak, huh."
"You're supposed to be a Devil Fruit user. I thought maybe you'd give me a little fun. But it turns out you're just a coward, hiding in the back and barking orders."
"Once you lost your puppets, you had nothing left."
"With someone this pathetic, how'd you even manage to take control of all eight dojo masters in the first place?"
"What kind of stupid question is that?! Don't look down on me!" the Carpenter snarled, gnashing his teeth. "Sure, I couldn't beat 'em head-on, but who says I couldn't sneak around?! If it weren't for running into a freak like you, no one on Sakura Island could've stopped me…"
"Boss Shano!!"
Junichi suddenly stepped forward—no one had noticed when he approached. He wiped tears from his eyes, bloodshot and trembling, clutching a sword he'd picked up from the ground. "Please! Please let me do it! Let me be the one to kill him!"
"Not yet."
Shano raised his hand to stop him. Then he turned back to look at the middle-aged man in that flashy coat, squinting. "I've still got a few questions I don't get. I need some answers first."
"You're mocking me, aren't you?!"
The Carpenter yelled, both embarrassed and angry. "Who'd answer your damn questions?! Just finish me already! And how am I supposed to answer when I can't breathe?!"
"See, that's one of the things I'm suspicious about."
When Shano wasn't fighting, it was like the energy from his muscles flowed back into his brain.
He looked at his still-clenched right hand. "I've been choking you for this long, and yet… can you really not breathe?"
"…!"
The Carpenter froze. He suddenly looked down—only now realizing that he was still breathing just fine. That suffocating feeling from earlier… was it just an illusion?
What… what's going on?
How could this be?
"Have you ever noticed how so many of the things you say and do don't make sense?"
Shano narrowed his eyes and kept going. "Let me ask you—why'd you come here today and expose your identity and those of your ten puppets so completely? What was the point?"
"You've been racking your brain trying to make money all this time, right? You spent years building everything up on Sakura Island. So why throw it all away now, like you're self-destructing? Planning to run and start over somewhere else?"
Yeah… why did I?
The Carpenter's mind was spinning. He didn't understand either.
He remembered—this wasn't the first time he'd felt this way.
—Every time he got close to figuring something out, it was like some invisible film in his brain blocked the thought. The moment he touched it, his thinking would get hazy and disoriented.
In the end, he always did things totally opposite from his original plans—but somehow, it all still felt normal.
"No! No, wait!!"
The Carpenter shouted suddenly, as if waking up. "You almost had me fooled, brat! I never exposed anything! That bastard Sakuraba Itsuki did it himself! He spilled everything and got himself killed!"
"But when you came in, he hadn't said anything about the other seven dojo masters being turned into puppets yet!"
Shano raised his voice sharply. "You brought the sheriff and that Marine major with you, didn't you? You could've controlled them the moment you walked in, stopped him from talking! You had a thousand ways to make the crowd believe he was the fake! So why didn't you?!"
Why?
The Carpenter's thoughts were in chaos. Yeah—why?
He had plenty of options. He could've covered it up and kept raking in money. Why blow his cover?
Suddenly, another strange thought rose in his mind.
Of all his puppets, Sakuraba Itsuki had always been the hardest to control—he would often act on his own or show independent thought.
And yet… the Carpenter had never tried to fully puppetize him. In fact, he'd kept him close, always giving him the most secret, most important jobs.
"Here."
Shano reached out and grabbed the man's right hand.
"What are you doing?"
"Try controlling me," Shano said coldly. "Eight of your puppets are gone. That means you've got fingers to spare, right? Use your power. Try to control me."
"B-But people with strong willpower aren't easy to control… You're even stronger than Sakuraba Itsuki was, there's no way—"
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The Carpenter stammered, but before he could finish, Shano suddenly pulled Junichi over. "Then try it on him!"
"Huh? Boss Shano?!"
Junichi, who'd been listening intently, was just starting to notice all the oddities. But now that he was shoved into the Carpenter's grip, he froze up.
"…"
The Carpenter reached out with trembling hands and grabbed Junichi's arm—but soon stood there, confused again.
Plant the puppet strings. Control others… He knew how the Devil Fruit power was supposed to work.
But… how did he actually do it?
"You see?" Shano said flatly, pulling Junichi back up by the collar. "All you could ever do was control those few puppets. That was your limit."
He stared at the man in luxurious clothing.
"Now… do you still think you're really the 'Carpenter' who makes puppets?"
With that, he suddenly smacked the man in the chest.
Thunk! A short, sharp sound—like hitting a hollow bamboo tube.
The Carpenter knew exactly what that meant.
Shano finally released his grip, letting the middle-aged man crumple to the floor like a rag doll.
"I… I'm not the Carpenter…"
His expression was blank, his voice dry, his whole body shaking.
"I… I'm just a puppet too…?"
…
"So the real 'Carpenter' is someone else entirely?"
Junichi's brain was overloading. "Then… who is it? Who'd go this far? What grudge do they have against my father?!"
Shano looked at Junichi with pity, then sighed.
"Whoever set this whole circus in motion today… that's who the Carpenter is."
He suddenly threw a punch that smashed the middle-aged man's chest in—then turned his eyes toward the corpse on the stage, and spoke in a low voice:
"Am I right… Mr. Sakuraba Itsuki?"
No one answered.
The wall clock ticked loudly in the silence. Second by second, the needle moved. In that pin-drop silence, over ten seconds passed…
Click. Click.
A harsh creaking echoed in the room. Joints made of wood bent and snapped, and the corpse on the stage suddenly stood—arms and legs twisted into impossible angles, lifting its torso with movements that defied human anatomy.
Clack clack clack. With those eerie sounds of wooden parts shifting, the body remained facing away—but the head slowly rotated a full one-eighty degrees.
That gaunt, sorrowful face came into view—neither fully crying nor expressionless. Just quietly grieving.
Junichi was frozen.
His hands and feet turned ice cold. A chill unlike anything he'd ever felt shot up his spine, straight to the top of his skull.
"…Why…"
That face finally spoke, voice thick with grief. The sound was like a warped cassette tape from an old phonograph—human voice twisted together with the trembling of wooden parts.
"…Why did it have to come to this…"
"Why did you have to notice? Why did you have to say it?"
"Why couldn't you just let this identity of Sakuraba Itsuki… have a graceful ending? Let me leave in peace?"