"Tch. Weak as a stray dog, yet barking all day about becoming this king or that tyrant."
Xiao spat on the ground in open disdain. He waved his hand sharply and issued his order without hesitation.
"Take them away. Lock up every last one of these fools who don't know their own limits."
At once, the soldiers of the Wapol Legion dropped to one knee. Their eyes burned with near-fanatical reverence as they shouted in unison toward the supreme figure they worshipped.
"Yes, Your Majesty!"
At the same time, the remaining three members of the Blackbeard Pirates finally snapped out of their daze. Panic-stricken, they dropped their weapons one by one and raised their hands high in surrender.
The Blackbeard who had once rampaged arrogantly, unleashing darkness like a natural disaster, had been crushed outright by Xiao's overwhelming power. One punch had stripped him of all resistance.
Faced with such an absurd gap in strength, they knew they were completely outmatched. Rather than resist stubbornly and suffer a worse fate, surrendering early was the only way to preserve even a sliver of hope.
That punch alone had shattered their courage beyond repair.
"Honestly… why did Teach insist on coming here to provoke Drum Kingdom?"
Lafitte sighed inside the cell, shaking his head in frustration.
"I told that idiot long ago—this wouldn't end well."
As pirates active in the first half of the Grand Line, Lafitte and the others had tried to dissuade Blackbeard before setting sail.
Drum Island's medical science was renowned throughout the Grand Line—even acknowledged by the World Government. Its weapons and high-grade alloys circulated worldwide.
A nation with that level of industrial and technological strength could easily rank among the top powers of the World Council… and might even conceal an invincible monster.
Yet Blackbeard refused to listen.
Now look at the result. One punch. Total defeat. The Blackbeard Pirates had barely been formed before they were annihilated.
Worse still, they themselves had been dragged down with him.
And running away? That was never an option. In front of someone like that, fleeing would only guarantee a more miserable death.
"It's over… it's really over…"
Burgess clutched the iron bars and burst into tears.
"Wapol Xiao is that strong—what are we supposed to do now?!"
"Quiet," Van Augur said calmly.
"The fact that His Majesty didn't kill us means we're still useful."
Now all they could do was wait.
If they were lucky, they might be taken in. If not, they would simply be discarded.
"Yes! Yes!" Burgess suddenly brightened.
"We can work for Drum Kingdom! Alabasta next door is loaded!
Isn't Crocodile there? I can knock him flying with one punch!
We're useful! Weihahaha!"
Van Augur: "..."
Lafitte: So easy to fool…
Xiao brought the half-dead Blackbeard to the Kingdom Hospital, sealed off a laboratory, and prepared to conduct a detailed anatomical examination of this peculiar specimen.
According to Marco of the Whitebeard Pirates—and corroborated by both Shanks and Buggy—Blackbeard's body was fundamentally abnormal. More importantly, he was known to never sleep.
This alone was enough to spark Xiao's intense curiosity.
Holding a scalpel carefully forged from Wapol Alloy, Xiao opened Blackbeard's chest with calm, precise movements.
And what he saw caused even Xiao to pause.
Blackbeard was indeed abnormal.
His internal structure was completely different from that of a normal human. He possessed three hearts, along with three complete and independent sets of internal organs.
Even more bizarre, two of those systems were tightly fused to the original set like parasites—yet none interfered with the others. Each could function independently.
"I see… a parasitic twin?"
Parasitic fetuses most commonly occur in fraternal twins, where one fetus absorbs the other during development in the womb.
Though rare, such cases were not unheard of even in modern society—roughly one in every five hundred thousand births.
There had even been documented cases of parasitic humans with additional heads who survived into adulthood, obtained driver's licenses, and attended university.
What made Blackbeard exceptional was the perfection of the condition.
No extra limbs. No malformed organs. Just three fully developed systems hidden within one body.
Yet something still didn't add up.
Even with alternating organ function reducing physical fatigue, that alone couldn't explain how Blackbeard could remain awake for months on end.
Mental exhaustion couldn't be bypassed so easily.
"Then the problem isn't just physical…"
Xiao narrowed his eyes.
"Is it the soul?"
If this were merely a matter of biological modification, it posed no challenge to Xiao.
But anything involving the soul demanded absolute caution.
"Let's see what state your soul is really in."
Xiao took a slow breath, then pressed his palm gently against Blackbeard's temple.
This ability originated from Professor G — John S. Godolkin, the leader of the G-Men.
A psychic superhuman modeled after the legendary Professor X, Professor G possessed terrifying mental powers capable of controlling minds across an entire city.
Ranked second among the world's superheroes—second only to Soldier Boy in terms of bloodshed and influence—his strength was unquestionable.
To the public, Professor G was a gentle symbol of charity and protection, a refined patron of orphans and the oppressed.
In reality, he was obscenely wealthy, morally bankrupt, and deeply obsessed with psychological manipulation.
Hypnosis, memory alteration, personality rewriting—
he had destroyed countless families.
His favorite indulgence was using psychic interference to twist others' desires, turning ordinary lives into carefully engineered tragedies.
And now, that power flowed quietly through Xiao's hand.
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