"Insolent? I'm not just being insolent—I want to beat you old bastards!" With that, I activated my psychic powers.
A surge of telekinetic force, even stronger than during the battle with the giant statue, filled the entire hall.
That immense pressure from my telekinesis instantly pinned every underwater person in the room to the ground.
"What's going on? What is this invisible force?"
"It's you! What did you do?"
The prime minister and the old guys were struggling hard against it, pressed flat.
Especially the prime minister and those old geezers who'd been yelling to execute us—I made sure to focus extra on them.
"What are you trying to do?" The prime minister was panicking now. He hadn't expected us land-dwellers to fight back.
The old guys, seeing themselves controlled by this invisible force, were scared too. They'd worked hard to get to their positions; dying like this would be such a waste!
"You said you were gonna execute us—what do you think I'm gonna do?" My eyes flashed with menace.
I really wanted to just finish off these old bastards. I could handle the Atlantis myself afterward.
But just as I was about to go for it, El, ignoring the pressure, struggled and grabbed my pant leg.
I frowned at him. Sure, he was an underwater person, but he'd spoken up for us before.
"Nobita, don't do this!" El pleaded from the ground, struggling.
"I know we've treated you unfairly, but please don't hurt anyone. Stay calm!"
"Believe me, justice won't be absent. I'll fight for fairness for you." His blond hair was all messed up from the pressure, but he was still trying to talk me down.
I thought, this guy's a real saint? At a time like this, you want me to stay calm?
"Nobita! What do we do now?" Doraemon facepalmed, looking at the situation. How did cursing turn into fighting?
Things escalated so fast, even he couldn't keep up.
The others looked at me, totally confused.
"Everyone, these underwater people said they were gonna execute us. If we don't fight back, are we just gonna let them hurt us?" Saotome Seiko stepped up first to defend me.
"Yeah, Nobita didn't do anything wrong. We should resist injustice!" Shizuka said, all fired up.
"Nobita's my true bro— that temper's just like mine!" Giant laughed heartily.
"Yeah! Nobita's right!" Suneo nodded in agreement.
"Hey, hey! Who said Nobita was wrong? I just wanted to know what we do next! You guys don't trust me?" Doraemon rolled his eyes at everyone jumping in.
"You should've said that earlier! We thought you were against Nobita!" Saotome Seiko sighed in relief.
But while we were discussing our plan, a bunch of underwater soldiers suddenly rushed in from outside.
They first shielded the prime minister and the other high-ups.
The prime minister, seeing his guards, relaxed.
"Arrest them now!"
He regained his initial composure.
"Execute them! Put these vile land-dwellers to the ultimate punishment!"
The old guys started yelling again, even though they'd been shaking in fear when I first fought back.
But while those old geezers were ranting at us, the prime minister whispered to the soldier helping him up: "Get me out of here first. Report back after you've arrested these thugs."
The prime minister wasn't as dumb as those old guys. He was arrogant, but he wouldn't risk his life for trash talk.
These land-dwellers were different from the helpless ones before—they might be real vicious thugs.
If things got intense, he didn't want to stick around and get caught in the crossfire or held hostage.
Even if not, stray attacks could hurt him, and that was unforgivable.
Losing him would be a huge blow to the Mu Federation.
His noble self couldn't be compared to these peasants.
The soldiers, pushing against my telekinetic pressure, carried their prime minister away.
The still-ranting old guys had no idea.
I was helpless—how did my little show of force turn into some power-fantasy hero treatment?
The consequence of not finishing them off was letting the villain escape.
Especially discussing in front of the villains—big no-no.
Now the hall was surrounded three layers deep by underwater soldiers, and I couldn't stop them from taking the prime minister away.
Doraemon sighed helplessly. Looks like we'd have to fight. We'd come back to the Mu Federation with El hoping for a peaceful talk.
We wanted to communicate nicely and leave, but these Mu Federation higher-ups were full of disdain and hatred for land-dwellers.
They wouldn't let us go from the start, wanting to imprison us here forever, and now they even wanted to execute us.
Now it was turning into a brawl.
If only we'd used the Anywhere Door to leave earlier, none of this crap would've happened.
But thinking about that now was pointless!
If we had to fight, then let's fight!
Doraemon didn't hesitate anymore. He pulled props from his four-dimensional pocket and handed them out.
Giant got the Super Gloves, Suneo got the Shock Gun, Shizuka got the Small Light, and for Saotome Seiko, he gave her a simple Rebounding Cloak—just point it at attacks to reflect them.
Then Doraemon tossed me the Denkomaru and put on his own Easy Fishing Rod.
With the underwater soldiers closing in, our group of five finished equipping our props.
We were ready.
"Don't do this, everyone! Let's sit down and talk!"
"Talk it out, don't fight!" El was still trying to mediate, hoping both sides would stop.
But at this point, no one was listening.
Facing the encircling underwater soldiers, I grinned fiercely.
"Foolish underwater people, are you ready to face the consequences of angering us?"