The man-faced bat, Hildon, flapped his wings swiftly through the misty skies above the Thriller Bark, carrying Lord Moria's orders.
"I must quickly deliver Moria's-sama command to Lady Perona, Absalom-sama, and Hogback-sama," Hilton muttered to himself.
The three names he mentioned were the most powerful figures under Moria, commanders of the entire Zombie Army, known with respect as the "Three Weirdos."
His first destination was the castle where Lord Hogback resided—the creator of all zombie bodies.
As the outline of the fog-shrouded castle came into view, Hildon was already considering how best to convey Moria's orders accurately.
Suddenly, a girl's voice rang out above his head.
"A bat? With a human face? A vampire? Yahahaha… wow, you're really ugly."
Hildon was startled. He looked up and saw a doll-like girl floating in the air, holding a parasol.
The David Jones Pirates had already set foot on the Thriller Bark.
Several of the crew, intrigued by the eerie aura of this monstrous ship-island, split up to explore on their captain's orders.
Mikita had originally only wanted to use her Kilo-Kilo Fruit powers to float into the sky and get a bird's-eye view of the area. Unfortunately, the thick fog obscured everything in the distance.
Just when she was feeling disappointed, she spotted Hilton.
An unexpected stroke of luck.
Hilton froze in shock. He could tell at once that Mikita was a stranger. Since she clearly wasn't one of the Thriller Bark's zombies, there was only one explanation left.
"You're… a member of the David Jones Pirates!"
Hilton still remembered the conversation between Lord Moria and Lord Kuma. Back then, Lord Kuma had addressed this crew by that name.
"Oh? You know about us?" Mikita's eyes sparkled with curiosity. "Yahahaha… so this ship in the Devil's Triangle isn't completely cut off from the world after all."
Floating closer, she grasped her parasol in one hand and suddenly seized Hilton's neck with the other.
Then her body dropped like a stone, dragging him down with her. The force was so great it nearly ripped his stitched-on head right off.
"Ahhh!" Hilton screamed in terror as the ground rushed toward him.
Boom!
The earth cracked open on impact, sending dust flying.
Mikita landed unscathed, tossed Hildon aside, and calmly folded up her parasol.
So terrifying…
Hildon, shaken and gasping, clutched his throat and coughed violently as he scrambled to his feet, intent on spreading his wings and escaping.
But before he could act, a white-tipped metal baton pressed into the back of his head, while a spiked iron mace rested heavily on his shoulder.
"Eh—?!"
Cold sweat trickled down as Hildon glanced to either side. Standing next to him were a black-haired beauty and a blue-haired girl.
In an instant, he was surrounded by three women.
"How disgusting. This thing's hideous…" Porche said in her coquettish tone, planting a hand on her hip. "Mikita, does this ugly bat actually know anything? He looks like a low-level flunky to me."
Mikita adjusted her yellow round hat and blinked her big eyes. "I just overheard him muttering to himself about some 'Lord Moria' and 'Lady Perona.' Sounds like he knows a thing or two."
"Moria?" Porche's eyes widened. "Don't tell me you mean that Moria—the Warlord of the Sea? Ugh, what rotten luck. We just fought the Navy back at Water 7, and now we bump into another Warlord…"
They didn't realize that back in Water 7, their enemies hadn't only been the Navy but also CP9. They simply assumed all those intruders belonged to the same side.
Porche kept chattering complaints, but with her cuteness, no one minded.
"Whether he does or doesn't—he'll talk once we interrogate him," Alvida said, far more composed than the other two.
She tilted her chin up, her eyes cold and disdainful as she pressed her mace's iron spikes so close they nearly touched Hilton's eyeball.
Hilton nearly fainted with fear.
"I—I'll talk! I'll say everything! Just don't hurt me!"
A coward. Perfect.
Alvida's crimson lips curved into a smirk as she slowly circled him, mace resting on her shoulder.
"When I ask you a question, you answer truthfully. Understood?"
"Y-Yes!"
"The 'Lord Moria' you mentioned… that's the Warlord of the Sea, Gecko Moria, correct?"
"Yes. This entire ship is Lord Moria's—the Thriller Bark. He also commands a smaller vessel called the Terror Bark Roar."
Alvida raised an eyebrow. "This entire island… is actually a ship?"
"Yes."
"And what about you? Why do you look so grotesque, neither man nor beast?"
"I was created as a zombie by Lord Hogback, one of the Three Weirdos under Lord Moria. My body is a corpse, but I can move because Lord Moria implanted a stolen human shadow inside me."
Alvida, Mikita, and Porche exchanged astonished glances.
But then again, considering their own crew was full of misfits and monsters who often pulled off bizarre feats, Hilton's words weren't beyond belief.
"Then tell us everything you know about Moria and these 'Three Weirdos.' Don't leave anything out."
"Uh…" Hildon hesitated.
"Talk!" Alvida barked, smashing a nearby gravestone into pieces with a casual swing of her mace. "Or are you telling me your head is harder than that rock?"
Hildon instantly grasped the situation. If he spilled his masters' secrets, he risked being executed later. If he stayed silent, these three women wouldn't kill him—zombies couldn't die easily—but they would torture him endlessly. That would be far worse than death.
So he gave in. He spilled everything: Moria's operations, the roles of the Three Weirdos, and even revealed the zombies' greatest weakness—salt.
The only detail he concealed was that another Warlord, Bartholomew Kuma, also happened to be aboard the Thriller Bark.
"Yahahaha… salt, huh?" Mikita mused. "If I recall, Hachi bought a whole bunch back in Water 7. Worst case, seawater will do. Looks like these zombies won't be too hard to deal with after all."
"Don't get too fixated on the zombies," Porche added, wrinkling her nose as she jabbed her baton against Hildon's head while still keeping her distance. "The real problem is Moria and his lieutenants. They'll definitely think we've invaded their territory."
Pls drop some power stones supper me at my
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