Brook did not bother poking at Teach's acting anymore.
It did not matter how well the boy lied. He was already inside Brook's grasp, and there was no slipping out.
On top of that, Redfield and the Memory Seahorse had received Brook's orders. They were already on their way at full speed.
Brook glanced sideways at Teach.
"Teach, is your mother still alive?"
He had heard it from Miss Bakin, Teach's mother had once been a doctor with terrifying, high level medical skills. That detail alone was enough to make Brook curious about the Marshall line.
Teach's brows twitched. He answered fast, too fast.
"My mother died of illness a long time ago. That's why I became a pirate."
Brook smiled faintly.
"What a pity. Then where's your sister?"
Teach's heart lurched.
How does he know I have sisters?
"I… I have two sisters," Teach said, forcing the words out. "But they're lost."
He followed Brook onto Punk Hazard, and the moment they fully landed, Teach's scalp went tight.
Vegapunk and the others were already gathering around, closing in like a circle of hungry scholars.
Teach could feel it.
Those eyes were not looking at a person.
They were looking at a rare experiment.
Brook's tone stayed pleasant.
"Then I hope we find them soon."
He patted Teach's shoulder, almost kindly.
"Now, let Dr. Vegapunk and the others do a detailed examination."
They brought Teach into the PX laboratory.
The tests began immediately.
Blood draws.
Measurements.
Internal scans and organ checks.
Strength, speed, defense, endurance.
One after another, neat and merciless.
Teach did not dare resist. Brook was right there.
An hour later, Teach stumbled back to Brook, pale and dizzy, like he had been pulled apart and put back together wrong.
Brook leaned down slightly, voice smooth as honey.
"Want to eat a Devil Fruit?"
His hand lifted, displaying options like a merchant showing wares.
"I've got Paramecia and Zoan fruits, even Mythical Zoans, and Logias too."
Teach's eyes flashed.
His greed sparked so fast it nearly burned through his mask.
He wanted the Dark Dark Fruit. He wanted the Tremor Tremor Fruit. He wanted Shiki's Float Float Fruit. He even wanted Brook's strange Yomi Yomi Fruit.
But he also knew better.
Those were monsters at their peak. He was a child.
So Teach lowered his gaze and chose caution.
"Master… I haven't decided yet. I'll choose after I find the right fruit."
Brook nodded slowly, like he was considering a student's future.
"Then how about a Paramecia Swallow Swallow Fruit?"
Brook's smile widened.
"Swallow another ability user, and you can use two Devil Fruit powers at once."
He continued, calm and deliberate.
"Or the Paramecia Copy Fruit. It can copy physical skills, maybe even Devil Fruit abilities."
Teach's breathing caught.
For a heartbeat, the longing in his eyes was real.
Then he remembered himself and stiffened.
"Do those fruits really exist?"
Teach had already read the Devil Fruit Encyclopedia. He knew the known fruits by name, shape, and pattern. If such a fruit existed in the open, he would have known.
Brook watched him carefully, then chuckled.
"Since you love using claws so much, I'll give you a Dog Dog Fruit."
His tone stayed light, playful.
"Do you want a pug form, or a dachshund form?"
Teach froze.
His face drained.
"Master! I… I don't really like claws that much!"
He clutched his iron claw like it was cursed.
"I don't want to become a dog!"
His ambition would die the moment he turned into somebody's pet.
If it were a Mythical Zoan, something like a three headed hellhound, that would be different.
But a normal dog?
That was a nightmare.
Brook laughed.
"Yo ho ho! Relax. I'm just scaring you."
He tilted his head, amused.
"Your claw skills are decent. Maybe one day you'll leave a scar on someone important, something they'll remember forever."
Teach's throat went dry.
In the back of his mind, a certain red haired face flashed through, then vanished like smoke.
At that moment, Redfield arrived.
So did the Memory Seahorse.
Teach's expression cracked instantly.
He knew those names.
He had heard rumors.
They could pry open memories.
They could rewrite them.
Brook had also instructed them to investigate Teach's mother and his two sisters.
Brook was not the kind of man who let anything walk away with its feathers still on.
If a beast passed through his hands, it left skin behind.
Brook stepped closer and smiled at Teach, warm and terrible at the same time.
"Teach."
"Serve me well, and you can still climb to the top of this world."
His voice softened.
"But you should give up ambitions that are too big."
Teach stared at him.
To Teach, Brook looked omniscient.
Like a man who already knew the ending and was only waiting for the page to turn.
Despair rose in Teach's chest.
There was no room left to play.
No shadow left to hide in.
Teach's legs gave out.
He threw himself down and wrapped both arms around Brook's legs, tears spilling fast, face twisted into a pitiful mask.
"Master! Master!"
His voice shook, desperate.
"I'm your student! You can't treat me like this!"
"I'll be loyal! I'll never betray you!"
It was the same posture.
The same shameless survival instinct he had used when he begged Newgate for a place on the ship.
Brook looked down at him, then lifted him like a child.
"Then find your mother and sisters. Bring them to me."
Brook's gaze sharpened.
"When that happens, you'll have resources, you'll have power."
He smiled.
"All I require is loyalty to the Hell Pirates."
Teach trembled in Brook's grip, eyes darting, searching for a path that no longer existed.
"I…"
Redfield's voice cut in, cold and flat.
"Any secret will be revealed."
Then, even Redfield's expression shifted slightly, a flicker of shock hidden behind his calm.
There were three voices inside Teach's mind.
Three.
No wonder he never slept.
Even if one soul was exhausted, another could seize the body and keep moving.
That explained it.
The sudden mood swings.
Sometimes cautious.
Sometimes arrogant.
Sometimes strangely wise, filled with wild dreams.
Teach's shoulders sagged.
He had been peeled open.
He looked up at Brook, the last of his resistance turning into bitter acceptance.
"Master… you knew from the beginning, didn't you?"
Brook did not deny it.
Redfield's eyes narrowed at Teach, his tone sharp with contempt.
"Captain Brook knows everything."
"Don't try tricks in front of us."
Redfield had seen people with strange bodies before.
Two hearts.
Four kidneys.
But this was different.
This boy's body had mutated.
And his soul had mutated with it.
A monster born wrong.
----------------
Marshall D. Teach clung to Brook like his life depended on it, begging him not to let the Memory Seahorse touch his mind. He swore he would become Brook's most loyal student, no matter what it took.
He even promised to find his mother immediately, bring her to the Hell Pirates, and devote himself to research for Brook.
Brook accepted the terrified surrender with an easy smile.
Without the Dark Dark Fruit and the Tremor Tremor Fruit, Teach was nothing more than a kid with some claw technique and a strange body. He was only eleven. He was not a threat.
So Teach was left behind on Punk Hazard, kept under watch and assigned to research work.
Brook, however, had already set his sights on someone else.
Marshall D. Tim.
If Teach's mother was truly still out there, then catching her personally might connect directly to Brook's own path to greater strength.
While Teach stayed trapped in laboratories, the Hell Pirates' blades moved.
The First, Third, and Fourth Divisions sailed for New Beehive Island to crush the remnants of the Rocks Pirates.
The Second, Fifth, and Sixth Divisions moved against the remnants of the Diger Pirates, including Barbossa and his daughter.
Linlin held the base camp steady, ruling the rear like a fortress.
Even the rookie squad, Hell II, marched alongside the main force toward the New Beehive battlefield.
Far away, in the South Sea, the Sorbet Kingdom was burning from the inside.
The World Government had framed the king and queen, stirring chaos until the entire nation began to doubt its own royal family. Discontent spread like a plague.
Prince Bartholomew Kuma understood the root of it.
His Devil Fruit.
He could not comprehend why the World Government would go so far for what the encyclopedia called a simple Paramecia, the Paw Paw Fruit. Why would the Five Elders smear an allied nation's rulers just to get their hands on him?
Unless the fruit was not as simple as the book claimed.
So Kuma began to push his power further, day after day, driven by stubborn curiosity.
Bare hands that could stop blades.
Paws that could repel bullets.
To suppress rebels, he compressed air into cannons, blasting shockwaves that tore through lines.
To evacuate the wounded, he could send them flying in an instant, bouncing them from the battlefield straight into the hands of medics far behind.
He could even repel pain and fatigue themselves, forcing suffering out of bodies like dirt from cloth.
Only then did Kuma finally understand.
This ability was not ordinary at all.
No wonder the Five Elders wanted him in CP0.
No wonder they hinted at an even darker path, a God's Knight.
And as Kuma continued crushing rebel groups that had been fueled from the shadows, his reputation twisted.
Nearby nations began whispering that Sorbet had raised a tyrant.
Fear turned into hostility. Countries that once treated Sorbet as a respected veteran member state started looking at it like a loaded cannon.
They feared the bear prince might turn those paws on them next.
At the same time, Monkey D. Dragon accepted a mission that led him into the South Sea.
On paper, it was simple, hunting down a pirate crew that had fled back from the Grand Line.
On the road, he crossed through the Grand Line and passed Kamabakka Kingdom. When he stopped there for supplies, he met the strange "queen" of that island, Emporio Ivankov.
The two clicked instantly.
They drank, argued, laughed, and somehow walked away as friends.
To Dragon, it felt like gaining another ally who saw the world the way he did.
In the West Sea, there was Morley of the Self Defense Army.
In the Grand Line, there was Ivankov.
In the North Sea, there was a young man Dragon had rescued by accident, Karasu, cold on the outside and burning hot inside, known as Crow.
If the South Sea gave him one more like minded friend, then all that remained would be returning to the East Sea to find someone who truly longed for peace.
Dragon stood on the deck of his Vice Admiral ship and looked at the marines under his command.
None of them had the determination to resist the Celestial Dragons.
Not even in their thoughts.
The disappointment sat heavy in his chest.
For an organization that claimed to uphold justice, the Navy's training was terrifying. They had turned men into tools and called it discipline.
And the ones who did not fit were pushed away.
Demoted to the Four Blues.
Or sent to die on "important missions."
Few troublesome minds remained at headquarters long enough to matter.
Brook's order had been framed as recruitment, but Dragon could see the deeper intent.
Brook wanted Kuma shaped into a symbol, a benchmark against the World Government, like the West Sea's Self Defense Army.
Brook had even urged Dragon to rebel quickly, to form a real revolutionary force that could unite every person in the world who craved equality.
Dragon's heart split down the middle.
Between the Navy his father believed in.
And the ideal Dragon himself could no longer deny.
Yet even now, he still could not choose a day to leave.
While Dragon hesitated, the New World roared.
The war of extermination had begun.
The Hell Pirates would allow only one voice across the sea.
Join, or be destroyed.
New Beehive Island.
The moment Wang Zhi saw the vast flying fleet blot out the sky, he knew the final reckoning had arrived.
If Brook had not vanished for eight years, the remnants of Rocks would have been swallowed long ago.
Since Miss Bakin joined the Hell Pirates, the Karns brothers and King Eric Dane had fled the old flag, rebuilding themselves as pirate captains once more.
To avoid being hunted down, they hung their lives under Brook's Pirate Guild and pretended to be harmless, smiling captains.
Captain John had tried to do the same.
He wanted the Hell Pirates or the guild.
But his reputation as a traitor barred every door.
Even the Golden Pirate Woonan and his people were hunting him now, thirsty for the Silver Silver Fruit.
With the John Pirates despised by everyone, panic spread through their crew. Some even began thinking about killing John themselves.
The Hell Pirates sending multiple divisions proved one thing.
They took Wang Zhi seriously.
Shiki's Flying Division could probably crush the remnants alone, but casualties would be heavy.
This time, Shiki, Newgate, and Kaido struck together.
They did not come to negotiate politely.
They came to force surrender.
And if surrender did not come, then death would.
They would reclaim Devil Fruits, reclaim souls, and turn everything into fuel for the Hell Pirates' rise.
Shiki floated forward in the air, mane lifting like flames, laughter shaking the battlefield.
"Jihahahaha! Wang Zhi, we let you live a few extra years out of kindness! If you won't surrender now, you'll die as our stepping stone!"
Wang Zhi's gaze swept the enemy formation.
He did not see Brook.
His face darkened immediately.
"Brook didn't even come himself, and you expect me to kneel?"
His voice sharpened with humiliation.
"Does he think we're not worth his time?"
Newgate threw his head back and laughed, the sound rolling like thunder.
"Gurarara! Our captain's busy."
He grinned, eyes heavy with menace.
"If you can hold out for two days, maybe you'll get your wish."
Newgate's smile widened.
"Otherwise, you won't even be qualified to see him."
The pressure fell like a mountain.
Because whether Wang Zhi wanted surrender or war, the truth was simple.
Two days.
That was all he was being offered.
Two days to survive Shiki and Newgate.
Two days to earn the right to speak Brook's name face to face.
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