One Piece: A Guide for Ordinary Players

Robert targeted the food supplies for two reasons. First, he initially wanted to take over the Sky Island, and food supplies were the Sky Island's weakest point of attack.

Secondly, because the original storyline included a plot where the Revolutionary Army blocked food supplies to Mary Geoise, causing the Celestial Dragons to starve to death, he wanted to plan ahead and replicate the Revolutionary Army's tactics.

But Robert had always wanted to go all out. He couldn't just rely on such crude methods as attacking supply ships at sea to cut off Mary Geoise's food supply. This was the world of pirates, and raiding supply ships was simply ridiculous.

Firstly, with the existence of Devil Fruits possessing diverse abilities, the supply routes should theoretically be impossible to block, as someone will always find a way to transport the food to Mary Geoise.

Take Bruno's Door-Door Fruit, for example. He himself knows it's a strategic-level fruit. How could the World Government, which has controlled the CP organization for hundreds of years, not know that?

Once Mary Geoise's food supply is cut off, if Robert were in command, the first thing he would do is send Bruno to transport the food. Once the portal is opened, the Revolutionary Army would have no choice but to either raid the food source or directly attack Mary Geoise to stop the food transport.

But if the Revolutionary Army had that ability, would they still need to rely on cutting off supplies? Why not just kill all the Five Elders, steal Im and bring her back to be Luffy's stepmother?

So when Robert decided to learn the Revolutionary Army's tactic of cutting off supplies, he used even more extreme methods.

First, there's the Door-Door Fruit. Although Robert could keep using the leaves of Paton to copy and use the fruit's abilities, when the time came to two years later, the first thing he did was to take the Door-Door Fruit into his hands.

Then there's the economic hijacking of grain routes. This kind of hijacking is far more ruthless than the revolutionary army's robbery of grain transport ships. It allows them to directly manipulate grain prices, preventing grain from leaving its place of origin.

All Robert needs to do is inflate grain prices, and the people will spontaneously hoard grain at home, breaking it down into smaller amounts to enrich themselves. Even if the world government were to consolidate power, would it still be able to rob grain from house to house?

It's not that they're incapable of doing such a thing, but the cost would be far too high, only pushing grain prices even higher and ultimately destroying themselves.

But Robert thought he was only targeting the Celestial Dragons of Mary Geoise, forgetting that there was another place in the world where food was paramount—Whole Citadel.

Even if Mary Geoise were to run out of food, the slaves and commoners would be the first to starve to death. The impact on the Celestial Dragons would only be noticeable after the battle lines were stretched out for a long time.

But the Kingdom of Tales is different. Their strength comes from Charlotte Linlin, their bond of unity comes from Charlotte Linlin, and their greatest danger also comes from Charlotte Linlin!

Charlotte Linlin has a strange illness called food craving disorder. Once it flares up, she completely loses her mind and becomes a demon who only knows how to stuff food into her mouth.

In this state, the middle-aged woman's fighting power soars. She becomes ruthless and only cares about eating, even grabbing her own family and children without hesitation and stuffing them into her mouth.

The symptoms can only be relieved by consuming large amounts of sweets, and cannot be cured at their root.

With this disease present, it's like a sword of Damocles is hanging over everyone in the Big Mom Pirates' heads, and they never know when it will fall.

That's why Tales of Hollows is filled with sweet elements, with each island brimming with various desserts, so that when Charlotte Linlin goes mad, eating some buildings or something can help her regain her sanity as quickly as possible.

However, all desserts are made from grains. The main ingredient in bread and cakes is flour, and the raw materials for various syrups are also plant extracts.

In order to block the Celestial Dragons' path, Robert even had the Indians use staple food as a base to slowly erode the livestock industry, such as meat, eggs, and dairy.

Whether this will threaten the Celestial Dragons remains to be seen, but it will certainly offend the Big Mom Pirates to the core.

If Robert were to decide to take action against them one day, he could cut off their food supply without even deploying a single soldier, and Charlotte Linlin would go mad and kill all her men within two months.

As a veteran member of the Four Emperors' crew, how could they possibly sit idly by and watch their lives and fortunes be in the hands of an outsider?

Robert asked himself, if it were him, he would have wiped out Dressrosa six months ago when he first saw some signs of trouble, and wouldn't have waited until today!

Seeing Robert lost in thought, Capone Becky finally smiled, took a deep drag on his cigar, and said:

"So, have you figured it out?"

Robert stood up: "I have to go back to the tea party first. When do you plan to make your move?"

Capone Bege said, "Luffy made his move as soon as he arrived. We need his subordinates to launch a full-scale attack on Whole Cake Island. We must first lure away all of Big Mom's sons and daughters so that we can concentrate our forces to besiege her."

Robert didn't arrogantly say things like "we don't need to surround them, just hand Charlotte Linlin over to me." He simply turned around and went back to find Karina after understanding their plan.

Even if I can't beat them, I can still escape. Your whole group is attacking me alone, isn't running away the decision any normal person would make?

Hearing the signal from Robert, Karina breathed a sigh of relief and got up to walk towards the bathroom: "Why hasn't Karina come back yet? I'll go check on her."

Smoothie intentionally or unintentionally blocked the way to the toilet. Karina paused, and when she turned around, Katakuri had already blocked her way.

Surrounded by two formidable pirates, Karina was startled, but forced a calm smile as she looked at the host of the tea party:

"Ms. Charlotte, what does this mean?"

Charlotte Linlin let out a chilling laugh: "Didn't you promise to come on stage and sing for everyone? You think you can leave without singing a song?"

Chapter 47 Scaring Yourself

Karina showed no surprise, simply smoothing her hair with a slightly seductive gesture, returning to her original appearance.

"You really can hide anything from me!"

Charlotte Linlin laughed freely: "I didn't expect that the songstress Karina would also be a Devil Fruit user, and it seems to be some kind of rare Devil Fruit. I knew it. How could Robert have a pretty but useless vase by his side?"

"However, although your shapeshifting ability is very strong, it is useless in front of me. After all, you can change your appearance but you can't change your soul, while my ability is to manipulate souls!"

Robert clapped as he walked out from a corner of the venue: "I'm a big-name pirate, after all. It's a bit embarrassing for me to have an upset stomach. I was planning to blame it on Karina, but you guys actually saw through my lie."

Katakuri sneered, "A Logia-type Devil Fruit user gets an upset stomach?"

Robert shrugged: "You Supermen can eat, drink, and poop, so why can't we Naturals?"

Robert walked over to Karina as if nothing had happened, looking impatient: "It's getting late, and I'm not feeling well. Whether the theme of today's tea party is marrying off a daughter or killing a scumbag, at least move on a bit, or I'm leaving."

Having finally managed to lure Robert to Whole Cake Island, how could the Big Mom Pirates possibly let him leave again?

Charlotte Linlin stared at Robert with a forced smile: "Miss Karina just promised to sing a song for everyone, you're not going to go back on your word now, are you?"

Karina smiled slightly and was about to walk onto the stage when Robert grabbed her arm.

“What’s the point of just singing? Today is a tea party hosted by the World, and we can’t let Karina steal the spotlight from the host. I see that Miss Smoothie has such long legs, she must know how to dance. Why don’t you go up on stage and dance for everyone? Karina can accompany you.”

Katakuri roared, "You're asking for it!"

Robert didn't even glance at Katakuri, but instead looked at Charlotte Linlin with a puzzled expression: "Linlin, why are your children so disrespectful? Is it because they didn't have a father to educate them when they were young?"

Even the most good-tempered person would explode if they were insulted like that. Katakuri had never been so humiliated, and in a fit of rage, he threw his trident at Robert.

Robert didn't even turn his head. The trident even made a loud bang when it left his hand, which startled all the guests so much that they almost jumped up. But the next second, they saw that the trident was stopped steadily about an arm's length away from Robert, as if it had been blocked by an invisible wall of energy.

"You let my female companion sing on stage, and I didn't call you a suicidal person, did I? Why is it that you can't let Smoothie dance? Do the Big Mom Pirates think I'm easy to bully?"

Before Robert could finish speaking, Katakuri's trident changed direction in mid-air and flew back at an even faster speed.

Katakuri charged toward Robert the instant his weapon left his hand, but after taking only two steps, he stopped his forward momentum and instead moved sideways in a wide arc.

Just then, Robert finished speaking and threw his trident. Katakuri's preemptive sidestep barely allowed him to dodge the trident's attack.

The trident disappeared into the horizon, its whereabouts unknown, while Katakuri's eyes were bloodshot, clearly observing the future.

But after looking at him, he didn't move again. Robert chuckled.

"Foreseeing the future is a powerful ability, but you rely on it too much."

"What, do you think you'll never make a move if you can't defeat me?"

Robert is not someone with special talent in Observation Haki training; he has not mastered anything such as mind reading, listening to the voice of all things, sensing from a great distance, or foreseeing the future.

But Robert had practiced Haki for nearly two years and had some understanding of Observation Haki, the first type of Haki he had awakened.

When Robert first met his mentor Redfield, he spent all his time figuring out how not to let Redfield see through his thoughts.

During the time he trained with Seastone handcuffs, without the influence of the Rumble-Rumble Fruit on the magnetic field, Redfield's mind-reading ability completely exposed Robert.

At that time, Robert wondered what he would do if he encountered an enemy who could read his mind, or even someone like Katakuri or Shanks who could foresee the future.

The principle behind Haki is actually projecting one's inner spirit onto the material world. Observation Haki can read certain signals emitted by an enemy's body. Whether it's foreseeing the future or reading minds, it's a manifestation of stronger reading and analytical abilities.

The signals are all the same; whoever can decipher the other's Observation Haki will be more powerful.

Since he was a poor student and couldn't understand the signals given to him, Robert stopped obsessing over doing practice problems to accumulate experience in reading enemy body signals.

He began to explore alternative methods, attempting to send the wrong signals to the enemy.

In any case, when two people are fighting, it all comes down to who can read the other's body language to anticipate their next move and gain the upper hand.

If I can't understand your signals now, then if I can make you unable to understand mine either, wouldn't we all be back to the same starting line?

When Robert presented his research findings, even the well-informed Redfield was convinced, let alone the young Katakuri.

In his premonition, Robert was like a god, able to summon lightning with a wave of his hand that could severely injure him, and to burn his rice-like body into a charred lump with a casual punch.

Therefore, he stood still and dared not move forward at all, because in his premonition simulation, no matter how he attacked, he would be defeated by Robert in one move, and it would be a crushing defeat with serious injury or even death.

But in reality, Robert has no ability to instantly kill Katakuri. If he could really defeat Katakuri in one move, Im would already be kneeling in front of Robert with his hair tied up.

All of this was Robert feeding Katakuri information by altering the information he emitted; all the consequences stemmed from Robert's nonsensical boasting.

Katakuri was awakened by Robert's words and immediately stopped using Observation Haki. In just over ten seconds, he had used Observation Haki to foresee the course of the battle countless times, which greatly exhausted his mental energy. He was now covered in sweat.

Charlotte Linlin laughed and came to her son's rescue: "Mamamama~ Katakuri, why don't you thank Mr. Robert for his guidance? You really rely too much on Observation Haki."

"Don't forget, the future is always something that hasn't happened yet. If you're timid and hesitant just because you have a bad feeling about the outcome, wouldn't it be more convenient to just commit suicide if you encounter an enemy that you think you can't handle?"

Charlotte Linlin, after all, was a great pirate who had dominated the seas since the time of Rocks, and she could tell at a glance that her most powerful son was just being superficial.

Robert secretly left, and Charlotte Linlin originally intended to take the opportunity to cause trouble, but she didn't expect that Robert would start causing trouble on his own when he returned. Now she became a little suspicious.

The silence was broken by a distant explosion. Charlotte Linlin looked at Katakuri: "Go see what happened!"

Katakuri just happened to need a way out, and upon hearing his mother's instructions, he turned and left.

Charlotte Linlin smiled at Robert, as if the unpleasantness from before had never existed: "Didn't you say you wanted to speed up the banquet? As the host, I naturally have to meet the guests' needs."

"Bring Luo up here!"

Chapter 48 Seek kindness and get kindness

Big Mom's goal is to kill Robert, but whenever Robert tries to initiate a fight, Big Mom always backs down.

This tactic is nothing more than luring the enemy deep into your territory and then launching a drawn-out counterattack.

The prerequisite for executing this tactic is to have a certain opportunity that can ensure a fatal blow to oneself, leaving one with no way to escape even if one wants to, and this is the only thing Robert couldn't think of.

But Robert wasn't afraid, because when he realized he was the target of today's tea party, he had already sent out the signal to call for reinforcements.

Charlotte Linlin is a seasoned veteran with a knack for controlling the pace of the game; she knows exactly what to do to keep Robert occupied at this crucial moment.

A huge, transparent cell was pushed up, but Robert stood there smiling and didn't go forward to join the fun.

Karina tugged at Robert's sleeve: "It's just singing a song, why are you making such a big fuss?"

Robert looked at Karina seriously: "You can only go singing because you like to sing. They can't just use you as a performance material to get you on stage."

"Besides, I didn't organize this huge operation. They never intended for me to leave alive from the very beginning."

Karina was already satisfied when she heard the first sentence, and she tightened her grip on Robert's arm. She didn't care about his next sentence at all, as if she hadn't worried about the dangerous situation at all.