Pirates

For example, even if a mortal was a mass murderer, their killing intent could only become so dense before their body was no longer capable of handling it.

If his killing intent became stronger than his body, it would start polluting his mind, eventually turning him into a monster that only knew how to kill.

That same went for any emotion. If the emotion overpowered the person's body, they would be consumed by it, acting only in pursuit of fulfilling that emotion.

Of course, it's usually impossible for a normal person to reach that point, no matter what happens to them. Typically one has to be polluted by an outside source of strong enough power before their emotions can reach such a level.

Meanwhile, if someone has a dense emotional aura, but they still seem relatively sane, it means they likely have the strength to control the emotion in question, rather than be controlled by it.

But while emotions can be stronger than a person, they can also be much weaker. For example, some people don't feel much anger, hence even when angered, their aura would seem relatively weak, maybe even weaker than a mortal.

This all meant that while Minos could use someone's aura to judge their strength, it was never a reliable means of knowing definitely.

Given his circumstances now, however, he naturally didn't have the luxury to find another method to gauge his opponents strength. He could only rely on his emotion sensing and hope that he wasn't far from the truth.

Having decided to act, Minos wasted no time. He was never the gazelle, rather he was the lion that hunted.

Slapping a levitation talisman onto his chest, Minos squatted down, powering up his leg muscles, before releasing with full force, taking to the sky like a bird.

The pirates were shocked as they saw Minos take flight. They were originally planning on shooting down his boat with their cannons, but there was no point now.

"Captain, what should we do? The boy seemed to have just turned into a bird and began flying?"

"You saw it too? I thought I was going crazy."

The pirates quickly began yammering as they each came up with different ideas. The captain's face went red in anger as he watched his men completely lose their cool, making him feel like he had done a poor job training them.

"Shut up you little bastards. Stop with the stupid ideas and just listen to me. What goes up must come down, just keep your eyes on the sky and get your musket's ready. Once that little brat comes down, you'll all fire and tear him to shreds."

"Ayy ayy captain!" The pirates said in unison.

The captain smiled as a smug sense of satisfaction filled him. He must admit, having stupid men had its benefits, it made him feel like a genius! He couldn't help but begin laughing as if Minos had already been reduced to dust by his mens fire.

Of course, imagination and reality never seem to sync up, and while the captain had his plan, Minos also had a plan of his own.

Unfortunately for the captain, Minos's plan was better. Minos pulled out a thick sheet of fireball talismans out from his spatial ring as he activated them all at once.

The pirates were still waiting down below in ignorance, ready to blow Minos to bits. The clouds soon dispersed as something broke through them.

At the same moment the pirates were about to fire, they noticed that what came out from the clouds wasn't the boy that went up, rather it was a flurry of large fireballs.

Screams soon filled the boat as a dense array of fireballs impacted from above. Like a storm sent down by an angry god, the boat was filled with the sounds of explosions as the fireballs tore large chunks of it to pieces, leaving behind swathes of fire that spread fiercely across the entire ship.

"Quick, use buckets to douse the flames!" The captain began shouting in panic. Unfortunately the stupidness of his men that he once praised immediately bit him in the behind.

The pirates ran around in panic, losing all sense of cooperation. Some even began diving overboard to escape the flames, causing the others to panic even more.

"Stop running around you bastards, quickly, listen to my command!" Despite screaming with all his power, his men continued to ignore him as more jumped overboard.

Some of the smarter pirates actually listened and attempted to use buckets of water to reduce the flames, unfortunately there simply weren't enough men on the task, and the fire had spread too much by this point.

The captain couldn't help but begin sweating as reality began to set in. Eventually, he redirected all his anger and anxiety towards Minos, who was slowly falling from the sky.

"You little bastard, I'll kill you!" He shouted as he used his tremendous strength to leap into the sky and towards Minos.

Minos watched as the massive brute rocketed towards him, and let out a slight laugh as he spoke. "Didn't you know, the highground is superior?" Minos said with a smirk.

"And haven't you heard, the strongest is the most superior!" The captain returned as he swung his large cutlass towards Minos.

"It's a shame you're not the strongest." Minos said as he used a dagger to parry the attack. While he had yet to look into the 12 Basic Sword Movements in depth, he had skimmed the first few pages, including the parry.

Using what he remembered, Minos mimicked the movement in the book with his dagger, causing the cutlass to lose course, barely avoiding Minos's head.

A single strand of hair fell down from the sky as the cutlass cut beside Minos's face. A thin wound appeared across Minos's cheek soon after, causing a drop of blood to slide down his face.

"Close, but not close enough." Minos laughed as he propelled his dagger forward, aiming for the pirate captain's throat.

The pirate captain had participated in his fair share of life and death battles, so while Minos's skilled maneuvering caught him slightly off guard, he still managed to use his empty hand to guard his throat.

The dagger stabbed deeply into his palm, but fortunately the thick flesh managed to stop the blade from reaching his throat.

"You little rat, this is the worst I've been injured in a long time. You've succeeded in making me angry." The pirate captain uttered between gritted teeth.

Minos didn't reply, instead he slightly leaned back as he gripped tightly onto the dagger. Pulling his feet up, he proceeded to kick forward with both feet onto the pirate captain's chest.

The pirate captain had yet to recover from Minos's earlier attack, so he failed to block this assault. Both Minos's feet smacked onto his chest with tremendous force, causing his chest to slightly cave in.

The pirate captain coughed out a thick jet of blood as the two were separated by the tremendous force. The dagger naturally being ripped out from his gaping palm, causing the wound to worsen.

The two flew out in opposite directions as they continued to fall towards the vast oceans. Minos used a few high powered kicks to push him towards the pirate ship.

The captain attempted the same thing, but his injuries were quite bad, and by the time he managed to regather himself, he was already too close to the ocean to change anything.

While Minos landed softly on the pirate ship, the pirate captain instead plummeted towards the ocean, causing a large burst of water to shoot out from the area he landed.

Minos ignored the pirate captain, instead refocusing his attention on the few pirates left on the ship. Their captain couldn't even deal with Minos, much less them, they could only watch in fear and despair as Minos cut through them like a grim reaper coming to claim lives.

It didn't take much time for all the pirates left on the boat to collapse to the floor with slit throats. Grabbing the last pirate by the shirt as his lifeless body was about to hit the floor, he tugged hard, ripping off a piece of cloth from his shirt.

Using it, he wiped his bloody dagger patiently as he waited for the pirate captain to make his way back onto the ship.

The pirate captain used the last bit of his strength to lug his exhausted body back onto the ship, but rather than being greeted by his own men, he saw Minos standing over him, dagger still in hand.

He tried to muster his power to stand up, but he could only collapse helplessly as he repeatedly spat out large clots of blood. The kick from earlier had caused his chest to collapse, severely wounding him.

His mind filled with despair as he raised his weary head, looking at Minos with eyes filled with pleading.

"Please, spare me. I never even planned on killing you, I just wanted to rob you…" The pirate captain begged in a final attempt to save his life. If Minos couldn't sense emotions, he might have believed him, unfortunately he was blessed with this tremendous ability that instead guaranteed the pirate captain's death.

"Don't beg me, your pleas will only fall on empty ears." Minos said as he wielded his dagger with no remorse, sealing the pirate captain's throat, as well as his life.

The flames that were still burning on the ship caused Minos's shadow to elongate. The smell of smoldering flesh filled the air, as if to remind Minos what just happened here.

With a strong kick, Minos sent the pirate captain's corpse into the ocean. He watched as the body slowly sunk downwards, another life permanently lost to the savageness of the world.

Not allowing the fire to spread anymore, Minos pulled out a few water bullet talismans. Using them, he quickly put out the flames that the pirates struggled so much with.

Once the flames were dealt with, Minos proceeded to throw the charred corpses into the ocean. The boat was soon cleaned up, but the thick stench of burning flesh was still rooted deeply into the ship's wooden flooring, filling the air with a deep sense of death.

Minos ignored the stink as he looked out towards the sea, watching as a few of the escaped pirates boarded his small abandoned ship in an attempt to escape.

Minos couldn't help but slightly laugh as the absurdity of life slightly set in. Just a moment ago he was at the end of a cannon, on the verge of being blown to bits, and now the tides had completely turned. With a smile still on his face, he aimed a cannon towards the small boat, and ignited the fuse. After a few seconds of burning, the fuse ignited the explosive material, causing the cannonball to smash straight towards Minos small hand made boat, reducing it to pieces.