From deep within the forest came the thunderous sound of rocks shattering.
An abrupt silence followed.
Zaraki brushed the dust and blood from the plain nameless sword in his hand and gave the blade a small shake.
Smoke and dust billowed from the collapsed section of the forest in the distance.
The "White Hunter," Smoker, remained embedded in a slab of granite with his limbs splayed, unable to move.
"Hey, can you still move?"
Zaraki called out toward the cloud of dust.
Zero response came, save for a few loose rocks sliding down the stone surface.
The thirty Marine elites at Arlong Park's entrance stood completely frozen.
They glanced at the distant human-shaped crater, then back at the teenager standing in the center of the ruins.
Unscathed aside from some torn clothing, they swallowed hard, unable to utter a single word.
That was a Marine Headquarters Captain!
He was a Logia user, a monster who dominate the East Blue!
And the kid had... swatted him away with one strike?
Suddenly, several dull explosive booms echoed from overhead, as if someone were charging down by stepping directly on the air.
Zaraki's heart skipped a beat.
An intense sense of danger made his hair stand on end. It surpassed even what he had felt facing Smoker moments earlier.
He leaped backward instinctively.
The instant his toes left the ground—
BOOM!
A burly figure crashed heavily onto the exact spot where he had just stood.
The ground shook violently. The already shattered courtyard of Arlong Park was completely transformed into a massive circular crater.
As the dust settled, the broad back of the newcomer revealed itself.
The man wore a Justice cloak and a dog-shaped cap on his head.
Gray streaked his temples, but the aura he exuded felt far more terrifying than Arlong's.
It was the Hero of the Marines, Garp the Fist.
"You brat..."
Garp turned around slowly.
His gaze swept over the Fish-Man corpses littering the ground.
He glanced at Smoker embedded in the distant rock, and finally settled on the plain nameless sword still in Zaraki's hand.
"Why do you running away by yourself backthen? and on top of that, here you are taking up demolition work instead!"
Garp's booming voice made Zaraki's ears ring.
The old man picked his nose while pointing at the devastation around them.
"Look at all these fish lying around, you went way too hard! If Sengoku finds out you caused such a commotion before officially join the Marines, he will dock my rice cracker rations again."
Zaraki rubbed his ears and rolled his eyes. "Drop the act, old man. If we waited for you Marines to follow procedure, the graves in Cocoyashi Village would already be overgrown with two-meter-tall weeds."
"Hmph, sophistry," Garp cursed, but little anger remained in his eyes.
A flicker of approval sat there instead.
He scanned the surroundings and his brow furrowed suddenly. "By the way, where is the officer in charge here? That... what is his name... Nezumi? Tell him to get out here and clean up this mess. I can't be bothered dealing with this disaster."
The air froze.
The surviving Marine soldiers shivered in unison. Their eyes drifted involuntarily toward a nearby stone pillar.
Zaraki gestured with his chin in that direction.
His tone stayed flat. "Over there."
Garp followed his gaze.
Beneath the broken stone pillar, Captain Nezumi lay with his eyes wide open.
He was long dead.
Garp's finger froze mid-pick in his nose.
For a moment, the Marine Hero's face went blank.
He blinked, as if checking whether his old eyes were playing tricks on him. He looked back at Zaraki, then at the corpse again.
"Dead?" Garp's voice sounded hoarse.
"Yeah, dead." Zaraki nodded, as if stating the obvious. "The guy pointed a gun at me and tried to pocket a hundred million Beli bribes. It was self-defense, so I just offed him."
"Just... offed him?"
Garp's eye twitched.
That was a branch captain!
Even if he was useless, the World Government had appointed him!
Killing pirates earned merit. Killing a Marine officer meant rebellion!
"You brat! Do you have any idea what you have done?!" Garp stepped right up to Zaraki, spraying spittle everywhere. "This will land you in a court-martial! Do you want me to haul you off to Impel Down personally?"
Garp's spit practically hit Zaraki's face.
Zaraki still had the leisure to brush the dust off his clothes.
"Stop yelling, it is not that big a deal." Zaraki looked up, meeting Garp's eyes—the kind of glare that could make a Sea King cry—and curled his lips into a smile.
"Old man, help me smooth this over. Say Nezumi died in a fight with pirates, dead men tell no tales after all."
"You dare to bargain with me?!"
Garp raised his famous iron fist.
"Or maybe..." Zaraki shrugged, looking entirely indifferent. "I will just run off right now. With my skills, I could easily raise a flag on some random island. Maybe next year you will see headlines about Pirate King Zaraki in the papers. Then we will meet on the seas, you chasing, me running. How thrilling was that!"
Garp's raised fist froze mid-air.
Veins bulged on his arm.
Ace already gave him enough of a headache.
If Zaraki also ran off to become a pirate... Just imagining that scene made Garp's temples throb!
"You... you little brat!" Garp fumed for a long moment before reluctantly lowering his fist.
His old face scrunched up. "If Sengoku finds out about this... Forget it! That rat really isn't a good guy anyway! Just this once, and never again!"
Zaraki grinned.
He knew the old man would fall for it.
"I always knew Vice Admiral Garp was a man of great wisdom."
"Cut the flattery!" Garp glared at him irritably.
He reached into his robe, pulled out a pack of rice crackers, and chewed angrily with loud crunches.
As he moved, a folded piece of paper slipped halfway out of his wide pocket.
Zaraki's sharp eyes instantly locked onto a corner of that paper.
It was a photo of a black-haired boy with a few freckles, smiling brightly.
Zaraki's hand flashed out and snatched it before Garp could react.
"Hey! Give that back, you brat!" Garp was momentarily stunned. He reached to snatch it, but Zaraki had already stepped back two paces.
He unfolded the paper.
Sure enough, it was a wanted poster.
[Portgas D. Ace]
[Bounty: 50,000,000 Beli]
[Dead or Alive]
"Fifty million?" Zaraki raised an eyebrow, looking at the spirited young man in the photo. "Ace has only been at sea for a short while, but he is already making quite a stir."
"Hmph, that foolish grandson of mine."
When Garp mentioned Ace, his face wore an expression of exasperation.
His tone, however, betrayed a hint of pride. "He insist on going to the New World to pick a fight with Whitebeard. He really don't know his limits."
Zaraki stared at the photo on the poster.
The Ace in the photo showed zero signs of Devil Fruit power.
Did he make a name for himself relying solely on his physical skills?
No, that was not right.
Zaraki noticed that in the background of the candid shot, the mast of a pirate ship was burning.
The color and shape of those flames did not look like an ordinary gunpowder explosion.
Instead, they showed a spiral-like pattern.
"Hey, old man." Zaraki held the wanted poster, asking casually. "Ace got pretty lucky. Judging by how fast his bounty is rising, did he eat the Mera Mera no Mi?"
Garp froze mid-chew.
In that instant, the atmosphere grew tense once more.
Garp slowly turned his head.
His somewhat cloudy old eyes became exceptionally sharp.
They fixed intently on Zaraki.
"Zaraki." Garp's voice lowered.
He dropped the boisterous, joking tone entirely. "The fact that Ace ate a Logia-type Devil Fruit is only known to high-ranking officials at Headquarters and a handful of people who have fought him. Intelligence just confirmed and filed the report yesterday. It has not even made the newspapers yet."
Garp took a step forward.
The oppressive aura of a hero enveloped the space.
"You have been stuck in the East Blue since Ace set sail. How did you know the specific name of Ace Devil fruit?"
Zaraki's heart skipped a beat.
He had slipped up!
As a reincarnated person, he was too familiar with the plot and had casually let the name drop.
Ace obtaining his ability was a recent event—information that should be impossible to know in the East Blue right now.
Looking into Garp's sharp eyes, Zaraki knew that if he could not provide a logical explanation, this seemingly carefree old man would grow deeply suspicious.
That would be extremely detrimental to his future plans within the Marines.
He had to cover it up.
Zaraki's mind raced.
His gaze quickly drew connections between the flames on the wanted poster and his own past experiences.
"Don't look at me like I'm some criminal." Zaraki showed a hint of annoyance.
He reached into his robe, pulled something out, and waved it around.
It was a yellowed scrap of parchment, its edges already worn.
"This is the other thing I was about to tell you—about that message in a bottle I fished up while out at sea."
The parchment looked like a torn page from an ancient book.
It held several crudely drawn concentric flame patterns, a line of ancient script, and a rough set of longitude and latitude coordinates.
"Back when I was fishing by the coast of the Goa Kingdom, this was stuffed inside a bottle that an old sea turtle had in its mouth."
Zaraki shook the parchment noisily, his tone full of indifference. "I saw the pattern looked like a flaming pineapple. Since that kid Ace was always going on about making big news, I just copied the coordinates and sent them to him in a letter a while back. Who knew he would actually find it."
In truth, this map was a counterfeit treasure map fragment.
He had exchanged 50 Points in the System Shop for it, specifically meant to patch up any potential plot holes in the future.
He had not expected it to come in handy so soon.
Garp stared at the paper and the muscles in his face twitched twice.
"That is... the Logia-type Mera Mera no Mi..."
Garp's voice squeezed through gritted teeth, trembling slightly.
"That is a top-tier treasure of the seas! You wasteful brat! You just gave away its coordinates like it was some damn pineapple?!"
The surrounding Marines, who had been pretending to be dead, now looked like their eyes were about to pop out of their heads.
A Logia!
That legendary fruit capable of turning people into pure elements?
This kid actually gave away such an invaluable treasure to... a pirate?
"Is this what you meant by Ace being lucky?" Garp slammed the scrap metal ball onto the ground, creating a crater.
"If you had eaten that fruit yourself, even without training in rokushiki, I could have guaranteed you a position as a Rear Admiral at Headquarters!"
Zaraki looked at Garp and his gaze remained clear and unwavering.
"Regret? Why should I regret it?"
He casually crumpled the parchment into a ball.
He flicked it with his fingertip, and the paper ball traced a parabola through the air, landing in a crevice among the distant ruins.
"That kind of thing turns you into an anchor the moment you fall into the sea. I would not eat it even if someone gave it to me." Zaraki pressed his hand against the hilt of Asauchi at his waist.
His thumb gently pushed the tsuba open an inch. The sharp gleam of the blade reflected in his confident eyes.
"Besides.... old man."
"To become an Admiral, the sword in my hand is more than enough for it. Making things a bit harder for that idiot Ace makes the game fun, doesn't it?"
Garp stood stunned.
Looking at the upright young man, he seemed to catch a glimpse of Roger, who had once laughed wildly about conquering the seas.
Or perhaps he saw his younger self, who had believed only in his own fists.
"Hahahaha! Good! Very good!"
Garp threw his head back and laughed.
The sound shook the surrounding ruins and caused dust to fall. "As expected of you! That's right! Devil Fruits are nothing! Only Haki stand above everything else!"
"Alright. Since everything is fine, I will be going now."
Zaraki waved his hand.
He turned and walked away toward the port. "Now that I know Ace has caused such a commotion, I need to hurry. I still have some personal matters to take care of in the East Blue. Once that is done, I will go give him a beating."
He left without hesitation.
He showed zero attachment to the mountains of treasure piled up in Arlong Park.
Nami, who was hiding behind a stone pillar, peeked out half her head.
Her greedy eyes were fixed on the depths of the ruins. Arlong's treasure room held enough wealth to buy ten Cocoyashi Villages.
If she rushed in now, she could grab a small bag of gems amidst the chaos...
Her gaze fell upon the old Marine wearing a dog-shaped hat.
His overwhelming presence felt suffocating.....this was a man who could easily crush 10000 Arlong at once.
"Money... or my life..."
Nami bit her lip.
A fine layer of cold sweat beaded on her forehead.
Under that pressure, she felt her legs trembling.
She made her decision the next second.
The orange-haired girl pulled her head back.
She did not dare look at the treasure pile again. Clutching her navigational chart, she broke into a run, heading in the direction Zaraki had left.
"Hey! Zaraki! Wait for me!"
Watching the two figures leave, Garp's smile faded as he dug his nose.
"Oh, right, you brat!"
Garp shouted toward Zaraki's retreating back. "If you run into a guy named Krieg on the sea, help me clean him up! Save Headquarters the trouble of sending someone!"
Zaraki did not turn his head.
He just gave a thumbs-up gesture over his shoulder to Garp.
Only after Zaraki's figure disappeared into the forest did movement return to the ruins of Arlong Park.
The elite Marines who had been holding their breath finally dared to gasp for air.
They collapsed onto the ground one after another.
"Hey... did you hear that?"
A Marine Lieutenant wiped the cold sweat from his face, his voice trembling. "That Fire Fist Ace of the Spade Pirates and that monster Vice Admiral Garp backs... are actually connected somehow?!"
"One is a famous rookie pirate. The other is a monster trainee valued by Vice Admiral Garp..."
"The seas... are going to change from now on."
...
Meanwhile, at the simple port of Cocoyashi Village.
A small single-masted sloop with a patched sail slowly left the shore.
It cut through the azure sea surface along the ocean current.
The sea breeze carried a hint of saltiness.
Zaraki leaned against the ship's railing. He watched the gradually receding island silhouette while calculating his next course.
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