Dragon tossed the Vivre Card through the air in a lazy arc.
Argentus snatched it smoothly from the air with one hand, his reflexes honed from months of training. He examined it briefly—the paper was warm, almost alive, pulsing with a subtle energy—before tucking it securely into an inner pocket of his sleeping clothes.
Just as the paper disappeared from view, the sliding door at the far end of the room snapped open with violent force.
SLAM.
The calm, contemplative atmosphere of the late-night meeting evaporated instantly, replaced by something sharp and dangerous.
Standing in the doorway was Koushiro, but the gentle village teacher—the soft-spoken instructor who patiently corrected children's grips on wooden swords—was completely gone.
In his place stood a master swordsman.
His eyes were fully open for the first time since Argentus had met him, no longer hidden behind those perpetually closed lids and gentle smile. They were sharp as shards of broken glass, glinting with lethal focus in the lantern light. His hand rested on the hilt of his katana with casual confidence, fingers already positioned for an iaijutsu quick-draw that could decapitate a man before he registered the movement.
The perpetual smile had been wiped completely clean from his face, replaced by an expression of cold, deadly seriousness that made the temperature in the room seem to drop several degrees.
Beside him stood a boy who appeared to be roughly Argentus's age—maybe thirteen, maybe fourteen. He had wild, unruly yellow hair that stuck out in several directions despite clearly having been slept on. A distinctive scar, pink and puckered, cut diagonally across his left eye.
In his right hand, he gripped a length of metal pipe—the end jagged and broken, wrapped in old cloth for a better grip, but held with the easy familiarity of someone who'd used it as a weapon hundreds of times.
The boy's stance was practiced, balanced, ready to explode into violence.
Koushiro's piercing gaze locked onto Argentus standing in the room with the Revolutionary Army's most wanted commanders.
"Argentus-kun," Koushiro said, and his voice had dropped to a terrifyingly low octave—the tone of a man who had killed before and would not hesitate to do it again if necessary. "I did not take you for a spy."
The accusation hung in the air like a blade.
The blonde boy didn't speak. Didn't waste breath on questions or threats.
He simply stepped forward, his boots making heavy, deliberate sounds against the wooden floorboards. He raised the broken pipe smoothly, pointing the jagged, sharpened end straight at Argentus's throat with unwavering steadiness. His knuckles were white from the tightness of his grip on the metal.
"Back away from them," the boy commanded, his voice raspy and dangerous despite his youth. "Slowly. Hands where I can see them."
Argentus didn't move.
Instead, he stared at the pipe pointed at his throat, his silver eyes tracking from the weapon to the boy's face. He studied the stance—low, balanced, knees bent and ready to spring. The way the boy held the pipe, angled for maximum piercing force.
And most importantly, he stared at that scar crossing the boy's left eye.
Oddly familiar, Argentus thought, his mind racing. That fighting stance. That scar. That face...
The air in the room grew thick and suffocatingly tense.
Koushiro began to draw his blade with agonizing slowness. The sound of steel sliding against the wooden scabbard hissed through the silence like a serpent's warning—shing... shing...—each millimeter of exposed blade adding weight to the threat.
The blonde boy tensed his legs, shifting his weight forward onto the balls of his feet, clearly preparing to launch a skull-crushing strike the moment Koushiro gave the signal.
The situation was seconds away from erupting into lethal violence.
"WAIT! HOLD THE PHONE! HEE-HAW!"
Ivankov suddenly leaped between the two groups with a speed that completely defied his massive size and flamboyant appearance. His enormous hands shot up in a universal "stop" gesture, his cape swirling dramatically.
"Put ze toys away!" Ivankov shouted, looking rapidly between Koushiro and the blonde boy, then back to Argentus. "There is no spy here! This candy-boy is not an enemy!"
Koushiro paused, his blade frozen an inch out of the scabbard—still sheathed, but ready to be drawn fully in a heartbeat.
"He is in this room, Ivankov," Koushiro said, his voice carefully controlled but laced with suspicion. "With you. With Dragon. He found you despite all precautions. How does that happen unless—"
"He found us because he knew Dragon!" Ivankov interrupted, gesturing dramatically toward Argentus with both hands. "They are acquainted! Previously connected! In fact—"
Ivankov's voice rose with theatrical emphasis.
"—this boy grew up vith Dragon's son! He trained under Garp himself! He is practically family!"
The blonde boy froze mid-stance.
The pipe lowered slightly—not dropped, not fully lowered, but the immediate killing intent faded fractionally. His guard remained up, but confusion now mixed with the wariness in his expression.
He looked at Argentus with searching eyes, studying his face as if trying to solve a puzzle whose pieces didn't quite fit.
"Dragon-san's... son?" the boy whispered, and something strange flickered across his face—a flash of pain, of longing, of recognition that didn't quite connect to conscious memory.
His free hand unconsciously moved to touch the scar over his eye, fingers trembling slightly.
Argentus lowered his own defensive posture, though he kept his weight balanced and ready.
His eyes remained locked on that scar marring the boy's left eye—the burned, puckered skin that spoke of terrible heat and impossible survival.
He stepped closer despite Koushiro's warning glare, his boots making soft sounds on the tatami.
"You..." Argentus murmured, his brow furrowing deeply as fragmented images from years ago began clicking together in his mind like puzzle pieces. "I saw you die."
The room went absolutely dead silent.
The blonde boy stiffened as if he'd been struck by lightning, his entire body going rigid. His eyes went wide, the pupils dilating.
"I was there," Argentus continued, his voice completely devoid of emotion—just stating facts, reciting history. "With Dragon. On the cliffs overlooking the harbor."
He took another step closer.
"The day the Celestial Dragon arrived at the Goa Kingdom. There was a small fishing boat—barely more than a dinghy, really—trying to cross the shipping lane. Trying to sail past the Government vessel."
Argentus's silver eyes never left the boy's face.
"The Noble didn't even hesitate. Just raised a bazooka—a fucking bazooka for a child in a wooden boat—and fired."
He paused, the memory crystal-clear.
"I watched that boat turn into a fireball. Watched it disintegrate. The explosion was so bright I had to shield my eyes. The wreckage sank in seconds."
Argentus pointed directly at the scar crossing the boy's left eye.
"That burn... that's from the flames, isn't it? From the explosion and the burning oil on the water. Everyone—the Marines, the nobles, the townspeople—everyone thought you were ash at the bottom of the sea."
His voice grew quieter, more intense.
"The noble kid who tried to run away from his family."
The boy—Sabo—staggered backward as if Argentus's words had been physical blows.
The pipe clattered from his nerveless fingers, hitting the floor with a metallic clang that echoed in the silent room.
He clutched his head with both hands, his breathing becoming rapid and erratic—hyperventilating.
"Noble...?" Sabo gasped, his voice breaking. "Fire... boat... explosion... I—"
Images flashed behind his eyes. Fragmented. Distorted. Painful.
A massive ship with white sails and a seagull emblem.
Flames reflecting on dark water.
The smell of burning wood and flesh.
"Stop—I can't—it hurts—"
"Enough."
The single word cracked through the room like a thunderclap, sharp as a whip.
The Revolutionary leader moved with blinding speed despite his size, crossing the room in two strides. He placed a firm, grounding hand on Sabo's shoulder—not restraining, but anchoring.
The physical contact seemed to pull the boy back from the edge of whatever mental abyss he'd been teetering over.
"Breathe, Sabo," Dragon commanded gently but firmly. "You're here. You're safe. The past cannot hurt you anymore."
Sabo's hyperventilating gradually slowed, though sweat still beaded on his forehead and his hands trembled.
Dragon turned his head, his storm-grey eyes locking onto Argentus.
"Do not dig further, Argentus," Dragon said aloud, his voice low but carrying an edge of steel. "The past is ash and smoke. Sabo is who he is now. That's all that matters."
He looked back down at the blonde boy, his expression softening fractionally.
"He remembers nothing of his life before I pulled him from the water that day," Dragon explained, his voice dropping to something almost gentle. "His body was burned. Broken. Half-drowned. His mind... shattered by trauma."
Dragon's hand tightened slightly on Sabo's shoulder.
"Except his name—just the name 'Sabo,' repeated over and over in delirium—he has no past. No family. No history. Just hatred for nobles he can't explain and a burning desire to be free that he doesn't understand the source of."
He paused.
"We gave him a home. A purpose. A future. Don't drag him backward into flames he's already escaped once."
Argentus looked at Sabo, who was still panting, sweat dripping down his face, clearly fighting against some internal storm of half-formed memories.
It was strange.
Argentus had no personal connection to this "noble kid" he'd watched die years ago. They'd never met. Never spoken. They were strangers separated by class and circumstance.
But seeing him standing here, alive, when Argentus had been so certain he'd witnessed a senseless death...
It gave him a sudden, unexpected sense of relief.
Perhaps because that innocent kid had died right in front of his eyes.
Argentus took a deliberate step forward, closing the distance between them.
Slowly, deliberately, he extended his right hand—palm open, fingers uncurled. A gesture bridging the gap between them.
"Argentus," he said, his voice steady and stripped of the earlier mockery and edge. "Argentus D. Drake."
Sabo stared at the offered hand for a long moment.
The pain in his head still throbbed—a warning from a past locked away behind walls of trauma and amnesia. Memories trying to surface like bodies floating up from deep water.
But he pushed the pain aside with practiced determination.
He looked at Argentus—really looked at him—and saw something recognizable. Not in the physical features, but in the eyes.
A kindred spirit, even if they'd walked different paths to reach this point.
Sabo wiped his sweaty palm on his coat, took a breath, and gripped Argentus's hand firmly.
"Sabo," the blonde boy replied, and despite the confusion still swirling in his head, a determined grin broke through the pain. "Just Sabo. That's... that's all I need to be."
They shook hands—a silent pact between two survivors who would one day shake the world in very different ways, though neither knew it yet.
The grip was firm. Honest. Neither trying to dominate, just acknowledging each other's existence.
When they released, the suffocating tension in the room finally dissipated like morning mist, replaced by something more somber and conspiratorial.
Dragon gestured to the low wooden table in the center of the room, the one with the tea that had long since gone cold.
"Sit," he commanded, though his tone had softened from the sharp edge of moments before.
Argentus sat without argument, folding his legs beneath him.
Sabo took the spot directly next to Dragon.
Ivankov squeezed his massive frame onto a cushion that looked ready to burst at the seams, somehow managing to make even sitting look theatrical.
Koushiro knelt at the head of the table with the fluid grace of a lifetime martial artist, already reaching for the kettle to pour fresh tea.
"Although I am labeled the World's Worst Criminal," Dragon began, his voice low and measured. He looked down at the steam rising from his freshly poured cup, watching it curl and dissipate. "The Revolutionary Army still doesn't pose a threat to the World Government. Not a real one."
He looked up at Argentus, his gaze unyielding and honest.
"They hunt us. They fear us. They've placed the highest bounty in history on my head. But they're not afraid of our strength. They have far more of that."
Dragon paused, letting the admission hang in the air.
"They're afraid of our thoughts. Our ideas. The possibility that we might convince people to stop being sheep."
"We cannot operate in the open," Dragon continued, his tone matter-of-fact. "Not yet. The World Government has resources that dwarf ours a thousand times over."
He ticked off points on his fingers.
"The Marines—hundreds of thousands of soldiers, dozens of battleships, Admirals who can level islands. Cipher Pol—assassins, spies, agents embedded in every corner of the world. The Seven Warlords—pirates so powerful the Government bribes them to stay neutral. And behind it all, the Five Elders and whatever monsters they keep hidden in Mariejois."
(END OF CHAPTER)
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