"Mamamama, caught him so easily?" Linlin was momentarily stunned.
She had expected a massive battle, but Caesar simply raised his hand, shattered Blackbeard's dark spatial barrier and yanked him out of the alternate dimension where he was hiding!
Linlin withdrew her Soul Barrier, her face slightly pale.
Maintaining it for over half an hour, covering the entire estate, had taken a considerable toll on her soul energy.
Caesar's fingers dug deep into Blackbeard's cheek, pressing so hard that his bones creaked, and his skull nearly cracked.
"Ah! You liar, Caesar! You bastard, I'll kill you!"
"Air Tremor!"
Blackbeard screamed in agony, raising his right fist to strike Caesar.
The energy of the Tremor-Tremor Fruit formed a white aura around his fist, causing the air to fracture with visible cracks.
Crack!
Caesar casually reached out with his left hand, grabbed Blackbeard's wrist, and twisted it effortlessly.
"AAAAAH! My hand!"
Blackbeard's right arm bent backward at an unnatural angle, white bone fragments jutting out as blood sprayed wildly.
As he tried to raise his left arm, another crack echoed.
Blackbeard let out another inhuman shriek—his remaining arm was snapped just as easily as breaking a hollow vegetable stem.
"Don't worry, little Blackbeard. I won't kill you yet. Your abilities are quite useful to me."
Caesar spoke leisurely, glancing at Linlin as she approached.
He tossed Blackbeard to the ground like a ragged sack and under the terrified pirate's gaze, slapped him unconscious with a single strike.
"Planning to alter his memories?" Linlin giggled.
Caesar nodded, then looked at the sleeping Pudding.
He wiped the sweat from Linlin's cheek and smiled.
"You worked hard, Linlin."
She shot him a mock glare before he abruptly pulled her into his arms.
Her voluptuous body pressed tightly against Caesar's firm chest as she gasped.
"We're still outside... what are you—?"
Caesar gripped her chin and kissed her fiercely.
Amid her startled cry, he swept her off her feet and carried her into the estate.
...
After a while, Linlin emerged with flushed cheeks, lifting Pudding from the now-clear pool.
She stepped onto Prometheus and carried the girl back to her quarters.
Caesar walked into the courtyard, eyeing the unconscious Blackbeard on the ground.
He extended his hand.
Squelch.
His massive, meter-long fingers plunged into Blackbeard's skull.
For a moment, Caesar thought he'd grabbed a handful of brain matter—until he pulled out the slippery, writhing object.
It was a film reel, segmented into frames, seemingly divided by time.
"What a miraculous ability, the Memory-Memory Fruit. While it doesn't provide formidable combat power, it's the perfect ability for me right now! I hope my speculation is correct—that the limitations of memory alteration will decrease as the user's power increases!"
The reason Caesar kept Blackbeard, Redfield and even Kuzan around again was precisely for this day.
When he heard that Blackbeard could wield dual Devil Fruit abilities, the idea had already sprouted in Caesar's mind.
Alter the memories of the powerful foes he'd defeated, making the strong across the seas serve him, Caesar.
Not just mindless slaughter, wiping out all these troublemakers from the seas!
If the seas no longer had figures like Blackbeard or Shanks, it might benefit the Beast God Pirates' development, but it would be utterly useless against Caesar's grand scheme—to oppose the World Government, the Revolutionary Army, the Celestial Dragons, Im and Uranus.
A lion leading a flock of sheep could never defeat a pack of wolves.
What he needed was to gather all these top-tier fighters under his control, forging an unprecedented force!
Caesar knew that even if he recruited Blackbeard and Shanks into the Beast God Pirates now, they still couldn't match the power of Uranus.
The pirate forces needed time to grow, needed more powerful figures to emerge!
The Fishman Army of Fishman Island needed to be established sooner.
The matter of Poseidon (Shirahoshi) had to be dealt with urgently.
Shanks was a Celestial Dragon—his memories couldn't be tampered with yet, or Im might notice.
Blackbeard's memories could be altered first, turning him into another chess piece for the Beast God Pirates in the New World, developing both overtly and covertly.
On the surface, they'd be locked in brutal conflict, clashing fiercely across the seas.
In the shadows, they'd be one family.
The act had to be convincing—no room for the Marines to grow suspicious of them.
Caesar even considered altering Redfield's memories before releasing him back to the seas to rally more pirates and claim one of the Four Emperor seats.
"Blackbeard, let me take a look at your memories first!"
Caesar turned his gaze to the memory reel of Blackbeard and began rapidly scanning through it.
....
On Banana Island, Blackbeard unleashed an Air Tremor, stirring a monstrous tsunami.
"Zehahaha! With the Dark-Dark Fruit in one hand and the Tremor-Tremor Fruit in the other, I, Marshall D. Teach, am the true king of these seas! Beast God Caesar, Patrick Redfield—they can all die!"
....
On Hachinosu, Blackbeard expertly extracted the abilities of recently deceased Devil Fruit users and implanted them into his loyal subordinates.
In a shadowy hall, Blackbeard summoned several petite young women for an open-ended party...
....
Caesar shook his head in disapproval. "Teach, don't you know that adversity breeds strength, while comfort leads to ruin? You're not even invincible yet, and already you're drowning in debauchery. See? This is the consequence of indulging in lust."
As Caesar continued browsing Blackbeard's memories, he discovered two highly capable armies within the Blackbeard Pirates.
One was the Prisoner Army, primarily composed of notorious pirates and criminals Blackbeard had freed from Level 6 of Impel Down using his Dark-Dark Fruit powers.
Though slightly weaker than Pizarro and Vasco, most were prisoners with bounties exceeding hundreds of millions of berries.
One is the Devil Fruit Army, carefully selected by Blackbeard, where the stolen abilities were transferred to these individuals, creating a powerful force.
Both armies consist of a standard ten thousand soldiers, with elite leaders numbering one hundred each.
The forces Blackbeard operates on Hachinosu also include a vast number of subordinate pirate fighters, totaling seventy to eighty thousand.
Most of these are hardened veterans of the New World, drawn to Blackbeard's sudden rise to fame and joining his ranks.
Organ trafficking, slave-catching gangs, pleasure districts, arms deals, war mercenaries, and pillaging crews—any business that could turn a quick profit, Blackbeard's subordinates were involved in.
"Borororo, who would've thought? In terms of sheer numbers, the combined forces under Linlin and Kaido don't even come close to Teach's. This guy really knows how to build an empire."