"Chasing down Teach? Of course." Ace nodded as he spoke.
He had sailed all the way from the New World to the Grand Line just to capture Blackbeard, the man who had killed his crewmate and friend Sam.
Even though a lot had happened since then, none of it changed his resolve to keep pursuing Blackbeard Teach.
"Then you'd better be careful." Arton said.
"Why do you say that?" When Ace heard Arton's words, confusion showed on his face.
"Just think about it. Your flames were frozen by my ice and Robin's ice." Arton shrugged as he spoke. "So when you're facing Blackbeard, shouldn't you at least consider whether your flames will be swallowed up by Blackbeard's darkness?"
"No way. There's no way my flames could be swallowed by that guy's darkness." Ace shook his head and denied it. "Arton, don't joke about stuff like that."
"Hehe, is that really the case?" Arton's lips curled up as he spoke with a meaningful tone.
Kujaku: "Why would Arton specifically bring that up to Ace?"
Smoothie: "It sounds like Arton's pointing out the gap in strength between Ace and Blackbeard."
Stussy: "Ace is strong, but compared to Blackbeard, who managed to escape from Arton earlier, there's probably still a difference."
Ulti: "So Arton is deliberately trying to warn Ace?"
Sadi: "But why would Arton do that? Does he want to help Ace?"
Domino: "Is it because of that indirect connection between Ace and Uta?"
Gion: "Or is it just that Arton doesn't want Blackbeard to get as smug as in the future Arton once talked about?"
Gion muttered to herself, and that thought slowly solidified in her heart.
Arton had just clashed with the Blackbeard Pirates not long ago. Both sides had gone at each other with the intent to kill. Given that, Arton wanting to make trouble for Blackbeard was practically a given.
To spite Blackbeard, it was entirely possible Arton would go out of his way to give Ace a little heads-up.
…
"Arton, are you implying that Ace isn't a match for Blackbeard?"
At this moment, Morgans flew down from the sky and landed beside Arton and Ace.
He knew very clearly that Arton had only recently fought Blackbeard's group. If anyone understood Blackbeard's current strength best right now, it was probably Arton.
And just before this, Arton had also overpowered Ace with sheer strength. So at this point, Arton likely had a pretty clear feel for Ace's power as well.
In other words, Arton was probably able to directly judge the outcome of a fight between Ace and Blackbeard.
"Hehe, if I come right out and say it, Ace probably won't like that." Arton smiled at Morgans, then turned his head to look at Ace as he spoke.
Ace's brows furrowed deeply. After giving Arton a long, searching look, he continued, "So what you mean is, I'm not Teach's match?"
Ace was still a smart guy. After seeing the back-and-forth between Arton and Morgans, he more or less understood what Arton was getting at.
"So you do think I'm not his opponent." After a moment of silence, Ace looked at Arton with a serious expression and asked. "You've fought him already. Is his strength really that overwhelming?"
"At the very least, if that Flame Emperor of yours just now was already your maximum output… Then you're not Teach's opponent."
"Of course, you could hope that Nojiko's and my powers have weakened him a bit."
"And also that you manage to find him before he fully recovers from his injuries." Arton said with a laugh. "If that happens, your flames might be able to overpower his darkness."
Arton had never liked Blackbeard as a person, and they'd just clashed not long ago, so he really didn't mind giving Ace a slight warning and sending a bit of trouble Blackbeard's way.
Chapter 450 – The Underestimated Ace Is Kinda Struggling to Hold It Together
Since the Flameblade Pirates had already clashed with the Blackbeard Pirates, Arton felt there was no longer any possibility of reconciliation between the two sides.
At least in Arton's heart, he had absolutely no intention of ever making peace with Blackbeard.
A guy who could betray the old man who'd looked after him for so many years… A guy who could stab a friend in the back for a bit of profit…
Arton just couldn't think of any reason to reconcile with someone like that.
Given that, Arton naturally didn't mind causing Blackbeard some trouble—even if that trouble wasn't personally delivered by him.
With that mindset, Arton carefully explained Blackbeard's abilities to Ace, including the fact that he'd already injured Blackbeard earlier.
"…Oh, right. Besides everything I mentioned just now about Teach's abilities, he's also got a pretty nasty escape move. He can swallow himself and his crewmates into a black hole and then teleport over an extremely long distance."
"It's exactly thanks to this ability that he managed to escape from me." As he said this, a regretful look appeared on Arton's face. "In short, if you want to capture Blackbeard, make sure you don't let him use that teleportation power."
"Of course, that's only if you can actually push him to the point where he has to use that escape move."
When Ace heard the first half of what Arton said, he was still propping his chin up with one hand, nodding along.
But after he heard the second half, he kinda couldn't keep a straight face anymore. "Come on, can't you at least have a little faith in me?"
"Are you really that not optimistic about my duel with that bastard Teach?" Ace's mouth twitched as he spoke, feeling more than a little awkward.
"Can't be helped." Arton spread his hands and said, "I've gotten a full look at both your abilities and Teach's."
"To be honest, when you compare your strength to his, you don't have any real advantage. Even now that you know about Teach's Dark-Dark Fruit and have a bit of an intel edge, what good does it really do?"
"That guy stayed with the Whitebeard Pirates for so many years. He didn't exactly spend little time around you."
"You really think he doesn't understand your abilities? Even if he doesn't know every last thing you can do, you're not exactly winning big on the intel front either, are you?"
Hearing this, Ace fell silent.
He wanted to refute Arton, but he couldn't think of anything to say back.
"Besides, that Teach still has crewmates by his side. Yeah, I did beat up a few of them but just his luck—his ship doctor's still perfectly fine."
"So he might actually have a way of patching up the Blackbeard Pirates."
"And you…" At this point, Arton looked at Ace and shook his head.
"W-what? Why are you looking at me like that?" Ace asked, his brows tightly knitted.
"Because it's just you. You're going in alone." Arton said. "At least they've got people backing them up. In terms of numbers, you're not exactly on the winning side either."
Ace opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but in the end he just closed it again.
It was a long while before he could finally speak to Arton once more:
"Anyway… thanks for telling me all that intel on Teach. And thanks for the meal too. I'm going to head out and keep looking for that guy Teach now."
"I don't know exactly where he is at the moment, but if I search with this place as the center, I should still have a chance to find him."
Hearing this, Arton shrugged and said, "So you're set on leaving, huh. Alright, I won't try to keep you."
"I hope you really can take care of that guy. That way I won't have to go out of my way later just to track him down and beat him up."
Ace nodded, turned around, and walked to the edge of the ship.
Then, in front of everyone, he leapt off, landing on his custom flight board over the sea's surface.
Flames blasted out from behind the board, and the powerful thrust instantly sent Ace shooting far, far into the distance.
In the blink of an eye, Ace's figure had already vanished from everyone's sight.
....
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