After a brief investigation, Captain Jess's men located several witnesses who claimed they had seen children running out of the alley shortly before the explosion. Others reported seeing a group of homeless men chasing a child into the same alley.
All testimonies pointed to one possibility.
This clue was crucial.
Captain Jess didn't believe it was mere coincidence. Something was definitely off about those two kids.
He wasn't convinced that they were the culprits, but his instincts told him the two children knew something.
Who would deliberately blow up a group of vagrants? No one hated them enough to waste a bomb on them. They weren't worth the materials.
That could only mean the bomber wanted to silence them.
So Jess ordered simple wanted posters drawn based on the minimal information they had, hoping to locate the children and learn what happened.
At the same time, Jess wasn't letting the bomb vendors go. Old Jack had admitted recently selling explosives, and the crime scene made it clear: a bomb had been used.
Following the trail of buyers was the most reliable path forward.
…
At that moment, Abel — now in different clothes — was gathering information on ships, preparing to get Law out of the country.
The world was vast, yet somehow there was nowhere suitable for them.
Passing a bulletin board, Abel immediately spotted two wanted posters featuring his old outfit and Law's recognizable spotted hat.
Clearly, their actions had caught the authorities' attention.
Fortunately, the identifying features were vague, and Abel's current outfit had been stolen from someone's clothesline. Parts of it were still damp.
At a glance, he looked no different from any other street kid.
On the way, he had even brushed off a few little girls trying to talk to him.
Just then, two soldiers approached holding fresh copies of the wanted posters.
Abel didn't flinch. He stayed calm.
Sure enough, the soldiers barely glanced at him before walking on, not making any connection between Abel and the face on the paper.
Trying to hunt someone based on a scrap of description was almost impossible.
But it was all they had; they couldn't just start arresting every boy in town.
Soon, Abel arrived at the port.
Dozens of ships were docked, and the area bustled with activity.
Most were merchant vessels; passenger ships were rarer.
Abel even spotted two pirate ships openly moored, flying Jolly Rogers without fear of naval attention.
This, of course, was thanks to the "White Town."
To bury Flevance's secret, high-ranking officials allowed neighboring countries to wage war, and they even withdrew nearby naval forces under that pretext.
If any loose ends remained, they could turn a blind eye while pirates finished the job.
It was a flawless plan — and Flevance had indeed been burned to ash.
So pirates showing up on this island before new marines arrived was no surprise.
After observing the port for a long while, Abel headed back.
He identified only a few methods of escape by sea:
Buy a small boat or raft and trust your fate to the ocean.
If a storm hits and you capsize — tough luck.
Abel rejected this instantly.
Better to stay wanted on land than die at sea on the first wave.
Buy a passenger ship ticket and leave legally.
Safe and stable, but risky — they might expose their identities.
And more importantly… they had no money.
Being poor was a tragedy. You couldn't even take the first step.
Join a pirate crew and sail with them.
Abel didn't hate the idea of piracy, but he and Law were too young. Most crews wouldn't accept children.
And if their identities came out, who knew whether being wanted would be a selling point or a death sentence.
Abel had no illusions. Not all pirates were like Luffy, shouting about freedom and dreams.
Most of them were treacherous, greedy, and cruel.
Those two "little lambs" might escape one den only to end up in another, and cry to the heavens with no reply.
Just then, a large ship slowly docked.
Abel was about to leave — until he noticed the flag.
It looked familiar.
…
The next day, Abel didn't rush to act. He continued to observe.
With help from a few talkative sailors, he finally figured out the origin of the flag.
It belonged to the Donquixote Family.
During the war that destroyed Flevance, at least half the weapons used by neighboring countries had been purchased from the Donquixote Family.
Now the war was over, territories divided, profits made.
And yet, they were here again.
More precisely, they were here looking to sell even more.
Weapons, ammunition, supplies — everything needed to start another war.
Those countries had no choice but to buy. They had already purchased Donquixote arms once; why not again?
After all, war could break out anytime — and it certainly wouldn't be the Donquixote Family that suffered.
When it came to instigating conflicts and profiting off bloodshed, the Donquixote Family were professionals — unmatched in the North Sea.
And Sodaranxia and nearby nations had no choice but to start a new arms race.
You might not need weapons now — but you absolutely couldn't afford to be without them.
The Donquixote Family understood these weaknesses perfectly, making a fortune every single time.
Abel hid in the shadows, watching crates of weapons offloaded and crates of money loaded in their place.
A plan began forming in his mind.
It appeared he wasn't the only one eyeing the Donquixote Family.
The two pirate crews moored earlier now stared with jealousy burning in their eyes.
Despite Doflamingo's booming underground business, he was not yet the underworld emperor, nor a Shichibukai.
Even in the North Sea, there were still plenty of people who hated the Donquixote Family.