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Chapter 262

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The marines were devastated when they learned about Tsuru and Tokikake's death. Sengoku was the one to announce the news, and his expression was colder than any of the marines had ever seen.

Garp knew the reason. Sengoku was listening to the sound of Tsuru's fight and so he heard the explosion that took his comrade's life. He could only imagine the internal pain Sengoku must have felt at that moment.

"You got anything on your mind, Sengoku?"

Under the brilliant blue sky, Garp put a hand on Sengoku's shoulder as both of them stood in front of a cemetery. "Remember, you can always talk to me."

The wind breezed past his grey-goatee, as Sengoku gave a nod. "I do have something in my mind."

After a short silence, he spoke again. "Since the Lust Sin has made a move, we can be certain the other Sins would also start moving." He raised his head in the sky. "The moment we get news of any Sin close to any Marine base, you and I would go there immediately. Then…"

He let the words hang in the air as Garp sighed from beside him. That wasn't exactly a bad idea, but for a Fleet Admiral to move by himself… This would make the newbie Marines assume each of the Sins to be as strong as the Fleet Admiral.

But Garp agreed that even sending an Admiral might not guarantee victory, so it was time for the two of them to start moving again.

After spending five more minutes in front of Tsuru's grave, her two old friends walked out of the cemetery. However, they stopped at the gate as Koby, a kid Garp took in to train, was waiting for them with a newspaper in his hand.

"I… think you'll want to see this, sir Garp." Koby handed the newspaper to Garp who accepted with a casual sigh.

He had just experienced the worst already, there shouldn't be many things that'd enrage him further.

...That thought was crushed in his mind as his eyes flashed by the headline just as veins popped up in his head.

``Lo and Behold! The savage beauty from Revolutionary, the Cat Burglar from Straw Hats, and finally, the sweetheart of Red-Haired Shanks! Each three of them are now available for a night! Only in Sky Fall Brothel!``

There were pictures of the three women, and Garp recognised them all. However, he had personally a good relationship with two of them. Nami, and… Makino.

Someone was selling Makino, the woman who's been an older sister figure to Luffy for years, as a whore.

...There was only one person in this entire goddamn world who would dare do such a thing. Garp knew exactly who.

Garp clenched his jaws as he raised his face in the air. "The next time I meet that bastard, he is going down, Sengoku."

Though that was bound to happen the moment he killed Ace ruthlessly.

—★—

After the war of the best ended, Shanks had come to the HQ of the Revolutionary Army, on Dragon's permission, to meet Luffy.

After Luffy accepted the proposal to train under Shanks, Monkey D. Dragon used his devil-fruit to teleport his entire HQ inside a large hollow and empty spot within the wall of redline.

They've been staying there since, along with a few more people. Sabo, Koala, and Shanks' entire crew. Shanks suggested that his crew be in here too because he feared Amon might use them to try to reach him—even if his crew were to be oblivious about his location.

Dragon accepted it since there were no problems with that. Seeing that, Luffy asked to bring his crew here as well, but Dragon rejected that idea. Because Amon had no reason to harm the Straw Hats, on top of that they were also training in the respective island they were sent to. Taking them away from there would be a mistake if anything.

But there's been an anomaly…

Amon got his hands on some weak spots of Luffy and Shanks.

The Emperor of Sky was selling Betty—one of Dragon's own commanders, Nami—one of Luffy's crewmates, and Makino—who's apparently Shanks' sweetheart, though Dragon never heard about her.

Dragon honestly didn't worry much about Betty. She was a strong woman, and had already accepted death when she joined the Revolutionary. Her… 'sacrifice' was respectable.

Neither did he care about Nami. She was just… the crewmate of his son, the same son who Dragon had left alone at birth. He had no emotional connection with her.

However… while he didn't care about Makino either, Shanks did. While Amon mistook Betty as his weak spot, he didn't seem to mistake the other two girls as Luffy and Shanks' weak spot. He got them good.

Shanks usually read the newspaper after Dragon is done, and that was an important thing to do for both of them since the outside world was in chaos now that Amon declared a grand war against the World Government. Because of that, he wouldn't be able to hide the newspaper from Shanks…

So, when Shanks asked him for today's newspaper, Dragon simply handed it out with a deep sigh.

"...I indeed feel sorry, but you should have told me about her before." Dragon said as he watched Shanks' looking at the newspaper with a frozen expression. "I could have brought her here, too."

Shanks stayed silent for a long moment before he opened his mouth to say something. However, he closed his mouth again and licked his dry lips. In the end, his remaining hand softly slapped his forehead as he sighed deeply.

"I… I didn't want to bring her here, in case Amon somehow found out about this place. I was certain the blues would be fine, and I was certain Amon didn't know about her." Shanks' voice started to shake at the end. "I haven't talked to her at all for months, I haven't even told her about my hiding. She must have been so worried that I didn't contact her for so long… All so that I could make it seem like I didn't have any connection with her."

They were also supposed to have a kid together in the upcoming year, though Shanks had put that idea on the back of his mind because he wasn't even sure if he'd survive the upcoming year.

"..." Finally, Shanks looked at Dragon with slight expectancy. "Do you think you can teleport her here…?"

Dragon gave an apologetic smile. "You know I can't teleport to a place I can't sense, or can't see, or haven't been to before. I have been to Alabasta before, but unfortunately the island the brothel is situated on isn't Alabasta. It's an artificial island made with germs tech, from what I understood through the pictures." He continued. "I can't directly teleport there, meaning I would have to teleport to a nearby island first, and only then slowly travel there in the normal way. I believe Amon already guessed how my fruit works, or at least it’s basics."

"..."

"Continuing, as you know, Amon's clones are everywhere." Dragon continued while observing Shanks' expectant expression crumble down somehow. "He would notice me if I am out too long, which would make the rescue mission meaningless, and even more damaging if he somehow kills me before I can escape."

Shanks stayed silent for the next few minutes. At that, Dragon spoke again, this time more softly.

"Shanks, think this through. We have had a single goal, to overthrow the government. But now we have another one on our hands. If you make any rash decisions, all of our plans would be meaningless. Luffy hasn't awakened his fruit yet, and we two are no match for Amon." He let the silent suggestion sink in before speaking it out loud. "The best way is to let Amon destroy the government slowly, which would complete our initial goal. In the meantime, we will try to make Luffy awaken as soon as possible, and only then commence this rescue mission. You do realise, she isn't dead."

After a long second, as he took the words in, Shanks clenched his jaws tight. He agreed with everything Dragon said except for the last part.

She wasn't dead, sure, but she would be used by hundreds, if not thousand men if they delay even a month. Was that any better?

Any average joe would want a taste of her knowing she was the lover of an Emperor of the sea… she was nothing more than a whore, to their eyes.

But…

"Fuuuh."

...Dragon was right.

Not like going out would mean he'd be able to free her, anyway.

It would rather guarantee his death.

So he must hold on.

By putting all his trust onto Luffy's shoulders, he must hold on.

Like that, as Shanks released a deep sigh, the deepest sigh of his life, 9 months passed... in a blink.

—★—

"The Crownless Pirate King," Morgan muttered to himself as he looked at the article he wrote with a satisfied smile. "How does that sound?"

His assistants, looking at the article from behind him, gave applause as they showed their favouritism with the title.

"Good, good. Time for Big News Morgan to make another breaking news!"

Along with Morgan, everyone else laughed in the room.

With Shanks being out of the public's eyes for more than a year, Amon was rumoured to be the sole remaining Emperor.

On top, since he owned the biggest army in the entire world now, with both the number of Marines and the Revolutionary Army—who have been actively going against Amon in the hope to get revenge for Betty—lower than ever, he was basically the ruler of the strongest faction in the world.

That faction just happened to be a pirate crew.

Because of all this, Amon was almost called the second "Pirate King". But he made a debut in Morgan's office, saying he wouldn't claim such a title before reaching Laughtale and claiming One Piece, and Morgan honestly agreed.

Amon met the qualities of the Pirate King and even exceeded some. But without getting his hands on One Piece, which Morgan wasn't sure why Amon wasn't claiming even though he had the eternal log pose, Amon couldn't be called the Pirate King.

Thats why, this new title would be replacing the one that was recently getting popular.

"Hehe, I am so eagerly waiting for his next moves."

Precisely, Morgan was waiting for The big news.

For the last few months, Amon's new action was giving him a chance to make the biggest news in recent history. The New World part of Grandline was entirely conquered by his people and even Paradise was halfway taken over. The amount of blood spilt for that though was more than the last decade combined.

Amon's people weren't invincible, either, of course. That blood belonged to his people, as much as it did to his enemies.

At the initial stage, his Sins sometimes came face to face with the Fleet Admiral and Garp, who ran to the base that was under attack at a moment’s notice. In such scenarios, the winner was clear. Amon was stronger than two Emperors combined, people knew that from the war of the best. However, his Sins weren’t that strong. None of them would be able to take on Garp and Sengoku, who Morgan knew were as strong as two Emperors of the Sea.

That’s why Amon made the smart move. Just when Garp and Sengoku were about to defeat the Sin under attack, Amon simply teleported between them and vanished with the Sin, leaving two enraged old men behind.

By now, each six of the seven sins had met Garp and Sengoku more than once, and while they have yet to win, they could last longer than before.

In other words, as Morgan had observed, Amon was using the two Marine Heroes as… mere training dummies.

However, not everything was bright and sunshine for Amon.

Amon sends a lot of pirates at a single base attack, but if the said base had a Vice Admiral in it, almost all the time things got dirty for the Enherjars. The soldiers were, after all, mostly unnamed pirates who didn't even have that good of a bounty.

But, in some cases when the targeted base was important but the Enherjars still lost, everyone got to see something... magnificent.

Sea Kings, sizing from a house to an entire island, rose from under the sea before crashing on the island that survived the assault. Thus killing both the Marines and the soldiers Amon had sent.

Because of the latter point, people of the world almost thought the sea-kings were controlled by an outside party. But… Morgan was different.

Amon was instead, making an example out of the people who failed their missions even though it was an important one.

“But how did he summon the sea kings?”-That was the question in everyone’s mind.

It took Morgan a great deal of research to figure out what was up with that… But being the man whose whole life’s about poking out secrets, he learned the truth. The truth, that The Ancient Weapon, Poseidon, was working under Amon.

The weapon was the infamous Mermaid Princess, Morgan learned.

That was the 'Ah!' moment for Morgan. Only a few people in the world even knew about the Ancient Weapons, but amongst them, Morgan was an expert. As a journalist, he knew things that no one else did.

For decades, the Government was theorised to hold Uranus, one of the three Ancient Weapons. Morgan only got the confirmation of that when Skypiea was destroyed, and he let the news out as soon as possible—which was just two days after Amon declared the War.

That had put the world at a standstill. Amon had Pluton, and the World Government had Uranus. This made the two factions look equal, in the eyes of the citizens at least. However, when Morgan learned that Amon also held Shirahoshi, the Poseidon, he knew who would… come winning out of this War.

After all, the Government only had one Ancient Weapon, but Amon had three as long as he counted himself.

With more than a few fruits, each capable of destroying islands, it was no wonder that Amon had raw power equalling, if not surpassing the power of a weapon of mass destruction.

—Chuchut~

Suddenly, the earpiece on Morgan’s ear buzzed as a piece of interesting news came flowing in. Morgan chuckled in his beak.

“Guess Big News Morgan’s gonna be busy again.”

It seemed that the world’s gonna flip after the current move Amon was taking.

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Author's Note: 😂 RAS lived more than I thought it would, but it has finally ended!