**Chapter 8: The Stain of Justice**
**Shells Town, East Blue.**
Their small, unnamed cutter slid into the port of Shells Town, its timbers creaking a gentle rhythm against the silence of its occupants. They had not come for glory or plunder, but with the grim purpose of surgeons seeking a festering wound. The air, once carrying the free scent of the sea, now felt heavy and still.
Nami, her knuckles white where she gripped the gunwale, was the first to speak, her voice a low tremor. "The rumors in the last port... they were about this place. The naval commander here. A Colonel Morgan. They call him 'Axe-Hand' Morgan." She swallowed hard. "The stories aren't stories. He rules this town. Brutal. Murderous. He calls it 'Absolute Justice.'"
Luffy's order had been clear: avoid the base. First, they would diagnose the illness from its symptoms. He led them through the dusty, subdued streets of the town, his presence not that of a tourist but of a coroner. They bought fruit from fearful vendors, asked careful questions, and listened to the deafening silence that clung to the townspeople. The answers, pulled like teeth, painted a portrait of tyranny: arbitrary arrests, families ruined by invented taxes, public beatings for whispered dissent.
Coby's face, once shining with the ideal of the Marine hero, grew ashen. He watched a pair of Marines patrol by, their pristine white uniforms now seeming like a grotesque mockery. "Mr. Luffy..." his voice was a broken thing. "What... what is justice, if a man like that can wear its symbol?"
Luffy stopped and turned. His gaze was not sympathetic; it was analytical, dissecting Coby's crumbling worldview. "That is the only question that matters, Coby," he stated, his voice cool and precise. "And you must answer it for yourself *before* you ever dare to put on that coat. Not them." He jerked his chin toward the base. "Define your justice. Who does it serve? Why must it exist? The world will give you a thousand corrupt answers. Your duty is to find the true one in here." He tapped a fist over his own heart. "Let that answer be your compass. Then, you can board a Marine warship without becoming part of the sickness. Never waver. And never be a coward who hides behind orders."
The lesson was a bucket of ice water. Coby stared, tears of stark, terrifying clarity welling in his eyes, not of sadness, but of a paradigm shifting.
Their grim reconnaissance led them inevitably toward the Marine base—a fortress of oppression looming over the shabby town. Before they could formulate a plan, the sound of a child's desperate struggle reached them. A little boy in torn clothes was being shoved to the dirt by a Marine guard. "Scram, you little rat! No beggars at the gate!"
The sound of Zoro's swords shifting in their sheaths was like a sharp intake of breath. Without a word, he moved. There was no grand announcement, only the blinding flash of a single blade. The massive iron gate screamed as it was cleaved in two, the halves crashing inward with a thunderous boom that shook the very foundations of the town.
The guard stumbled back, dumbstruck. Luffy was already past him, kneeling before the sobbing child. "What happened?" he asked, his voice a low, steady calm.
"It's them!" the boy wept, pointing a grimy finger into the heart of the compound. "Th-they took my big sister! She didn't do anything! They just... took her!" The raw, helpless fury in the child's voice was the spark.
Luffy's face, usually a mask of composed calculation, went cold. A terrifying stillness radiated from him. Zoro's killing intent became a suffocating pressure. Coby looked physically ill. Nami's expression hardened into grim recognition; this was the true face of the power that had abandoned her village.
After ensuring the boy was safe, the group turned. Their pace was no longer investigative. It was judicial.
They walked into the courtyard. Before them, a squad of Marines fumbled into a nervous formation. And behind them, a monster appeared: a man nearly three meters tall, with a colossal axe-head cruelly grafted where his hand should be. Colonel Morgan.
"WHO DARES?!" his voice roared, a brutish echo of misplaced authority. "This is my base! My law! You will be made an example of! MEN! FIRE! EXECUTE THEM!"
The Marines, faces pale with a fear of their commander that outweighed their fear of the intruders, obeyed. Rifles were raised. A dozen muzzles aimed.
Nami and Coby ducked. Luffy didn't flinch. Zoro didn't move.
The gunshots cracked the air.
And then, silence.
Luffy hadn't used his Conqueror's Haki. He hadn't needed to. In the time it took for the sound to fade, Zoro had become a green typhoon. The sound of three swords sliding back into their sheaths followed the gunfire. Every Marine soldier was on the ground, disarmed and unconscious, struck down by the flat of a blade or a disabling kick.
In the same fleeting moment, Morgan blinked. His world view tilted. He saw the sky, then the cobblestones. He never saw the attack. He only felt a final, searing line of fire across his chest before darkness took him. He was on the ground, cleanly bisected, his reign of terror ended with utter, ignominious finality.
A profound silence fell, broken only by the moans of the wind through the shattered gate.
Then, from the barracks windows, a few brave souls emerged. Their faces cycled through shock, disbelief, and then, dawning, delirious relief.
"He's... dead?"
"Morgan is dead!"
"WE'RE FREE! IT'S OVER!"
The cheers were not for their liberators, but for their own deliverance. They celebrated the absence of their monster.
Luffy watched, his expression unreadable. He shook his head once, a short, sharp motion. These were not warriors; they were broken men in uniforms, a symptom of a diseased system. They were not his enemy today.
"Are you... going to kill us?" a corporal whimpered, clutching a bruised arm.
"Mr. Luffy... please..." Coby whispered, his voice thick with conflict.
Luffy's answer was flat. "No. Your punishment is to remember your cowardice. And to choose better next time."
Nami, however, surged forward, her own trauma boiling over. She stabbed a finger at the cowering Lieutenant. "*This* is Marine justice? You're only brave when pointing guns at children! Where was this courage when Morgan was stealing and killing? Were you hoping for a scrap from his table? You're not soldiers; you're parasites! You make me SICK!"
She was ready to unleash the full torrent of her rage, but Luffy's hand settled on her head, firm and calming. She shot him a furious glare but fell silent, her chest heaving. Luffy's eyes were on Coby, ensuring the lesson was searing itself into the boy's soul.
Then Luffy's gaze found the trembling Lieutenant. A cold, sharp smile touched his lips. "Do you know who I am?" he asked, his voice dangerously pleasant.
The Lieutenant could only shake his head, mute with terror.
"My name is Monkey D. Luffy." He paused, letting the name hang. "My grandfather is Vice Admiral Monkey D. Garp." The blood drained from the Lieutenant's face. The name was a death knell to any defiance. "I suggest you call your Den Den Mushi. Now. Inform Headquarters that Monkey D. Luffy is here, and he is waiting for his grandfather to come and clean up this... mess."
The Lieutenant scrambled to obey, shouting frantic orders.
Within the hour, Morgan's wretched son, Helmeppo, was dragged from his room, weeping and begging, his prized wolf subdued with a single look. He was thrown into a cell, his legacy of privilege ended.
As the base scrambled into a pathetic semblance of order, Luffy looked out past the harbor, to the open sea. This was more than removing a tyrant. This was a declaration. He had signed his name to the act and invoked the most famous name in the Marines. The message was sent: the change he promised would be loud, it would be personal, and it had already begun.