While Rorschach, Jonathan, and the others were urgently preparing for the upcoming battle…
Two hundred li (about 100 kilometers) from Queen of Spring City, in the Gourmet City of Puki…
Normally already bustling with visitors, the gourmet city had, over the past few days, seen an overwhelming influx of guests.
Ship after ship filled with pirates converged from various sea routes, gathering at Puki's port.
Hundreds of pirate ships, both large and small, nearly filled the sea outside the harbor to capacity.
From all corners of Paradise, nearly 20,000 pirates had crowded into the famed gourmet capital, packing the city to the brim and terrifying the local residents into living in constant fear and anxiety.
Fortunately, the pirates had shown some degree of restraint—at least on the surface—out of respect for their organizer, Gleif. They hadn't run completely wild in the city.
Even so, over the past few days, Puki had seen a surge in criminal activity.
Fistfights and brawls were the least of it.
Kidnappings, looting, arson, and murder—none were rare among the pirates.
There were simply too many of them. Even if Gleif wanted to maintain order, he didn't have the means to do it effectively.
Queen of Spring City, Gourmet City, City of Entertainment—these prosperous cities in the same region were all territories Gleif planned to control in the future.
He didn't want these places ruined by unruly pirates.
But compared to these trivial matters, what Gleif cared more about… was Jonathan's treasure vault.
And also—
"Wagner hasn't sent back any word at all. Something's definitely gone wrong! That brainless fool—good for nothing but messing things up. What the hell was he doing going there alone? Did he really think he could take down Jonathan by himself? If it were that easy, I'd have done it myself long ago!"
Aboard a large ship anchored in the port, the giant-like Gleif sat on the railing with a grim expression, venting his rage.
On the deck in front of him sat a dozen burly men, all with cold faces, though some were visibly excited.
One of them—a stern-faced, bald man—used a finger that had transformed into a sharp blade to scrape his chin stubble. In a low, deep voice, he said, "Your men didn't return, and even your reinforcements from the New World ran into trouble. Chairman Gleif, don't you have anything to say for yourself?"
Gleif looked down at the unflinching bald man and gave a cold, mocking smile. His booming voice echoed from deep within his chest:
"And what do you want me to say, Daz Bones? If you don't want to take part, if you don't care about the hundreds of millions of berries in reward money and a share of the Assassin Guild's future profits, then by all means—don't. Take a look around. Does it look like I'm short on manpower?"
As he spoke, Gleif snorted heavily and swept his cold gaze across the faces of the others, one by one, increasing the pressure in the air.
"Same goes for the rest of you. Anyone who wants out—leave now!"
Daz Bones stared back coldly but said nothing.
"Chairman Gleif," said another man—Absalom, with a lion's mouth—grinning menacingly and licking his sharp fangs, "since we're here, we're not going back empty-handed. I just want to know—when do we move? Now that the alarm's been raised, we should strike fast, before the bastards at the Hunter Guild flee."
This time, Absalom had brought with him two thousand undead zombie warriors to join the fight.
Absalom was confident that, if they could break into the interior of Queen of Spring City's island, his zombie legion would be the strongest force among the 20,000 pirates.
After all, the zombie soldiers were immortal and indestructible.
Unless the shadows inside them were forcibly removed, no one could truly eliminate them.
To be honest, Absalom couldn't quite understand why Moria had suddenly ordered him to come assist Gleif.
Though, to be fair, a few years ago Gleif had indeed visited Thriller Bark.
But during that visit, there had apparently been no small amount of conflict between him and Moria.
Even so, while Absalom didn't know the specific reasons, he still came without hesitation.
He was absolutely loyal to Lord Moria and would never disobey his orders.
Still, Absalom felt a bit of regret.
If only Lord Moria could obtain a stronger shadow, he would be able to revive the demon giant Oars, who was still frozen on Thriller Bark.
If that happened, they would gain another powerful asset aboard their ship.
This time, Absalom's target was none other than the King of Hunters—Jonathan.
He intended to capture the King of Hunters and bring him back so that Lord Moria could cut off his shadow and use it to resurrect Oars.
As Absalom spoke, the dozen or so pirate captains sitting nearby all chimed in:
"That's right, Chairman Gleif. Now that we've been exposed, we might as well launch the attack directly—delay could lead to trouble."
"We've got twenty thousand men. How many could the Hunter Guild have? A thousand at most? With a twenty-to-one advantage, why are we even hesitating? Just storm them already!"
Gleif quietly listened to the clamor of pirates eagerly requesting to fight, all while scoffing inwardly.
He had never held these profit-hungry pirates in high regard.
Twenty thousand?All trash. Worthless.
The quality of pirates in Paradise was abysmal.
Among these 20,000 pirates, not a single one knew how to use Haki.
In the New World, they wouldn't even qualify as cannon fodder.
The only reason he had gathered so many worthless pirates to assault the Hunter Guild headquarters was to create a diversion, so he could slip in during the chaos and plant explosive rock charges in the Guild's base—and blow open Jonathan's treasure vault to obtain the trillions in wealth hidden inside.
That cunning old bastard Jonathan—who knows how he managed to dig out such a deeply hidden underground vault?
Moreover, the vault walls were constructed with concrete infused with a large amount of seastone ore, capable of repelling Devil Fruit users.
Otherwise, Gleif would have already infiltrated the vault, emptied its vast fortune, and returned to the New World.
He'd been stuck in this hellhole of Paradise for seventeen years—more than enough.
Fighting day after day with a bunch of ignorant frogs at the bottom of the well—Gleif had long grown tired of it.
As the noise aboard the ship grew louder, Gleif, who had remained silent until now, suddenly stood up and turned his gaze toward the distant sea.
Out there, a series of small black dots were rapidly growing larger, quickly approaching.
"Ships are closing in! And there's a lot of them!"
The pirates aboard the ship also noticed what was happening and jumped to their feet.
"Are they enemies… or reinforcements?" Absalom wondered aloud.
Their confusion was quickly resolved.
As the black dots sped closer across the sea, a formation of menacing black pirate ships approached—escorting a twin-masted vessel at the center in an arrowhead formation, slicing through the water.
Upon seeing the tiger-head ram at the prow of the enemy ships, and the pointed skull insignia on their sails, the pirates' faces all turned pale.
Especially when they saw the massive figure—over five meters tall—of a bald, white-bearded old man standing on the lead ship's bow.
Every pirate's eyes widened in shock.
"That's the Happo Navy of the Flower Country in the West Blue—and the legendary pirate, Don Chinjao!"
"A legendary pirate with a bounty exceeding 500 million berries!"
"No way… a man that strong is going to fight alongside us?"
Chinjao ignored the pirates' chatter, his eyes fixed solely on the giant-like Gleif.
"Where's the Celestial Trident? Take me to it! I'm here to help you eliminate that Marine!"
(End of Chapter)
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