"The annoying brats are finally gone. Heh… made a decent profit today."
As the sun dipped toward the horizon, Wapol packed up his stall.
He despised children, but to survive he was forced to deal with those little pests.
"It's all that damned Straw Hat brat's fault… and those filthy commoners!"
A former king—reduced to this.
Not only stripped of his title by the World Government, but now living off garbage and selling toys just to eat.
He hated it.
Hated those who humiliated him.
Hated the people who defied him.
Fueled by that hatred, he stubbornly clung to life.
"Just you wait… I'll reclaim my throne someday, and everything I suffered—I'll return a hundredfold!"
As he seethed, a small dog with a plush-toy head trotted up to him and casually lifted a hind leg.
"Damn mutt—go piss somewhere else!"
Wapol kicked it aside, scowling.
For some reason, this dog loved peeing on him. He already stank like a public latrine.
He'd tried eating it once. But afterward—thanks to his own Devil Fruit—it had turned into a toy dog, which the children adored.
To sell more toys, he had to keep the disgusting thing around.
Truly, a king fallen—bullied by a dog.
"Buy a toy."
Tch.
Can't you see I'm closing?
Wapol forced on a merchant's smile and turned around.
"This honored customer—what would you like?"
He opened his bundle of toys with exaggerated flourish.
"I want a toy as hard as steel, as flexible as rubber, lighter than cotton, smaller than a fist."
"…Your request is…"
Wapol's face twisted. Was this guy screwing with him?
"Can't make it?"
"It's not that I can't…" he hedged. "But something that high-grade would require custom crafting. The price would be—"
"Money isn't a problem."
Wapol's eyes gleamed.
"How much are you willing to pay…?"
"How much do you want?"
"One million—! No, one hundred million!"
He named a price outrageous enough to choke a Celestial Dragon.
With that money he could rebuild everything—
Buy a ship.
Gather subordinates.
Live as a king of the seas again!
"One hundred million?"
The young man smiled.
"Yes—one hundred mil—!"
Wapol froze.
The smile… had changed.
"Your head," the man said softly, "is it worth one hundred million, former king of the Drum Kingdom—'White Iron' Wapol?"
Wapol's face drained of color.
"W–Who are you?! How do you know who I am—?!"
Before he finished—
A shadow appeared behind him without a sound.
A blade flashed.
Under the combined effects of the Smooth-Smooth Fruit and Silent-Silent Fruit, the strike made no noise at all.
The sword—Red Princess, infused with a soul—sliced through Wapol's neck like warm butter.
Then again.
And again.
Dozens of cuts in a heartbeat, reducing Wapol's body into segmented scraps—
Until his soul tore free and was seized by the Ghost Ship.
The former king died without ever entering a real fight.
He—who prided himself on ambushes—had fallen to a perfect ambush.
"The Baku Baku Fruit… quite a pleasant surprise," Davy murmured. "With this, that idea might finally be possible."
He picked up a hippo-shaped mechanical toy and tossed the captured soul into it.
Green fire lit inside the toy's eyes.
It sprang upright and bounded to his feet like a loyal pet.
"Grrr… rrrr…"
A small plush-headed dog crouched low, baring its teeth at Davy—its former master's last servant.
The toy hippo lunged.
Its tiny frame swelled to two meters tall.
Its gaping mouth snapped down—
And the dog vanished between its jaws.
The hippo toy resumed cleaning up the remains, dutiful and silent.
"You're just a beast," Davy said softly. "Protecting your master isn't wrong. You simply followed the wrong one."
…
On a blood-soaked pirate ship elsewhere—
Penny, covered in wounds, struggled to her feet.
Before her stood a burly man in a strange mask, casually wiping blood from his scythes.
To avoid dragging Davy into trouble, she had come alone—
And walked right into a massacre.
The man had killed an entire crew in minutes.
She barely survived a few exchanges and was already injured.
"You're impressive," the masked man said.
"You… aren't mute?" Penny frowned.
"Fa—fafafafafa—FAFAFAFA!"
He burst into bizarre laughter.
Penny blinked.
What was wrong with this man?
"What are you laughing at?"
The laughter stopped instantly.
"I've tested you," the man—Killer—said calmly. "Join us. You have potential. Even Kid will acknowledge you."
"…No thanks. I refuse."
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