Faced with such a hospitable and disarmingly calm host, the Golden Lion Shiki seemed particularly delighted.
"GYAHAHAHAHA!" he boomed, his laughter echoing across the small island.
"Kid, I can tell at a glance you're a dragon among men! As for the tea—that's exactly my taste!"
With that, he sat down without a hint of hesitation, picked up a cup of tea from the stone table, and downed the entire thing in one gulp.
He didn't even bother to check if it was poisoned, a gesture of absolute confidence in his own strength and a surprising show of trust in Ron.
In stark contrast, Doflamingo acted with far more caution.
With a cold, almost imperceptible snort, he took a seat opposite Shiki, his movements fluid and predatory.
He slowly picked up another cup of tea, but only took a small, testing sip, his eyes, hidden behind his sunglasses, never leaving Ron.
He still maintained a high level of vigilance toward the seemingly friendly vice-captain of the Whitebeard Pirates.
Ron, for his part, didn't seem to mind.
Watching the palpable tension growing between the two, he simply smiled and decided to cut straight to the point.
"I know why you two are fighting," he said, his voice calm and clear.
"Time is tight for all of us, so I'll be blunt."
Hearing this, a glint flashed in Doflamingo's eyes, followed by the faint curl of his signature, unsettling smirk.
'As expected of the vice-captain of the Whitebeard Pirates,' he thought,
He waited quietly for Ron to continue, clearly intrigued by what would come next.
Shiki, however, was openly skeptical.
His brows furrowed, and his eyes betrayed a clear doubt and displeasure.
'Why would they go to such lengths just for my blood?' he wondered.
'And now this brat who just arrived claims to know the reason? Don't think that just because I praised you a little, you're invincible.' Shiki curled his lips disdainfully while secretly focusing his energy on recovering his stamina.
At the slightest sign of trouble, he'd make his escape.
"Of course I know why," Ron said, his tone soothing as he addressed the old lion.
"Shiki, don't be so impatient." He then turned his calm gaze to Doflamingo, his voice firm.
"It's just some blood, right? Perhaps the three of us can cooperate on this."
These words stunned both men into silence.
Doflamingo narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing Ron with a new, intense focus.
The Golden Lion, meanwhile, looked even more confused.
He couldn't understand why Ron was so confident, nor did he grasp what this so-called "cooperation" could possibly entail.
Ron didn't avoid speaking openly in front of Doflamingo.
After all, the man was also one of his major clients.
There was no irreconcilable conflict between them; in fact, to some extent, their interests aligned.
"Cooperation?" Doflamingo repeated, the word tasting strange in his mouth.
He hadn't expected Ron to make such a suggestion.
"You knew he was here to take my blood?!" Shiki roared, his confusion instantly twisting into a furious snarl as he shot to his feet.
"Are you two working together?!" His voice was filled with the rage of a man who felt he'd been betrayed, shattering his brief trust in an instant.
However, Ron remained completely unfazed, showing no fear in the face of the legendary pirate's rage.
He calmly met Shiki's gaze, as if waiting for the storm of his anger to pass.
"Your thought process is truly something," Ron said flatly, his tone laced with the kind of bone-deep patience one reserves for a misbehaving child.
"Haven't you been keeping up with the news lately? We just left Marineford."
Shiki froze. "..."
'News? What news? How long has it been since I last bothered to read a newspaper?'
"Pathetic ignorance," Doflamingo sneered from his seat, finally breaking his silence.
His gaze shifted to Shiki with a flicker of pure, undisguised disdain in his eyes.
Shiki's fury burned like a volcano on the verge of eruption.
His fists clenched, sparks of rage flashing in his eyes as if he were about to reduce everything before him to ashes.
But just as he was about to flip the stone table and restart the battle, his anger was abruptly extinguished by a newspaper that Ron casually tossed his way.
On the front page was a massive, horrifying image of the Navy Headquarters building.
But it was no longer the towering symbol of authority it once was.
Instead, it lay in ruins, the shattered remnants exuding an air of desolation and chaos.
"Hiss…!!!" Shiki's eyes widened in utter disbelief as he stared at the image, a sharp intake of breath the only sound he could make.
Still reeling from the shock, his gaze continued to scan the newspaper—and then, an astonishing number leaped out at him, sending a fresh, cold chill down his spine.
WHITEBEARD'S BOUNTY—7 BILLION BERRIES!
The figure struck him like a physical blow, leaving him speechless once more.
But what truly defied all belief was what followed—Ron's own wanted poster, alongside an equally staggering 4 BILLION BERRY bounty, and a long list of titles that spoke volumes of his power and status.
'HOLY FUCK'
The barrage of impossible information hammered into Shiki's mind like a sledgehammer, leaving him utterly numb.
He stood frozen, his thoughts completely blank.
Just how much had the world changed while he'd been buried in his research, planning his grand return?
Amidst the shocked silence, Ron clapped him on the shoulder with an innocent grin and teasing him.
"Hey, stop hissing like that. Are you trying to boil the air around us to death? Hahaha."
The Whitebeard Pirates behind him burst into laughter at their vice-captain's joke.
Yet, despite the lightened mood, the profound astonishment in Shiki's eyes remained.
He still couldn't comprehend what was happening, nor could he fully accept the reality before him.
"Seven billion… Newgate's bounty actually reached seven billion?!" Shiki muttered, his tone still filled with a dazed disbelief as he struggled to digest the shocking news.
His eyes darted back and forth across the newspaper, as if searching for any hint of a flaw or a mistake between the lines.
But no matter how hard he looked, the glaring, world-altering numbers remained.
"What kind of joke is this?! How could Newgate's bounty surpass mine!" His voice suddenly rose, now carrying an unmistakable anger and a deep, personal resentment, as though something precious had been snatched away from him.
He kept shaking his head, trying to calm himself down, but the turmoil within refused to settle.
"Back in my day," he roared, his voice filled with the fury of a forgotten king.
"I was someone who stood shoulder to shoulder with Newgate and Roger! And now, Newgate has far surpassed me!" He crumpled the newspaper in his fist.
"That fool Sengoku! How the hell did he set these bounties?! He must have deliberately undervalued me!"