Marine Headquarters, Marineford.
At Port Oris, the black battleship Loyalty sat docked in the harbor. All the damage it had suffered during the battle against the Golden Lion had already been repaired.
On the deck...
"Lieutenant Hans, Lieutenant Fal... um... we haven't received any orders authorizing your departure."
The marine in charge of the harbor spoke nervously. For one simple reason: on the deck of the somewhat comical battleship, which resembled a giant cola bottle, the members of the Marine Detention Unit, who were usually carefree and joking around, stood in perfect formation, making final preparations.
"Kazu, my friend." Hans looked down at the harbor officer. He knew people everywhere and happened to be acquainted with the port supervisor. "We're preparing to set sail under direct orders from our superior."
But the look in his eyes was sharper than ever.
"Are you saying... that you're planning to stop the Black Kirin's battleship from leaving port?" By the end, he was practically growling.
"N-No, that's not what I mean. I-I just... the people above..." Kazu stammered awkwardly.
Then he abruptly stopped talking, because at that moment, every marine aboard the Loyalty straightened their backs and stood at attention. Their arms rose in unison.
"Chief!" ×N
The deep chorus of salutes echoed across the harbor. Realizing something, Kazu instinctively turned around.
And sure enough, the marines who had arrived under emergency orders had silently moved aside, opening a path.
At the end of that path...
Flap! Flap!
A marine coat billowed in the wind. Its sleeves were black, decorated with faint star-like patterns.
Step.
Step.
Step.
A lone figure approached. Each footstep felt as though it landed directly on everyone's heart.
They had witnessed his power during the Three Forces Military Exercise. They had heard stories about his personality throughout Marine Headquarters. Not long ago, he had personally brought a legend of the previous era to an end.
And thanks to the World Government's and Marine Headquarters' deliberate publicity, his title had already spread far and wide: 'The Legend of the Marine New Era.'
"Vice Admiral Roy, you..." One marine tried to speak.
Roy merely glanced at him. The sharpness in that gaze robbed the man of his words.
And so, under everyone's watchful eyes, Roy reached the edge of the harbor and jumped. His body landed lightly on the deck.
"Everyone here?" His calm voice echoed across the ship.
"Yes, Chief! All personnel of Marine Detention Unit DT-31 are present!"
"Ready to move?"
"...Of course!" ×N
The exchange was brief.
Then...
"Set sail."
"Yes, Sir!" ×N
The order fell. The Loyalty raised anchor, and throughout the harbor, despite the emergency orders they had received, not a single marine dared step forward to stop it.
But just then...
"Vice Admiral Roy! Vice Admiral Roy! The Den Den Mushi, it's Fleet Admiral Sengoku!"
At the harbor, Kazu held up a special Den Den Mushi that had only recently been delivered to him, shouting desperately toward the departing ship, trying to make Roy stop.
But at that moment...
Buzz!
An invisible force spread outward. The Den Den Mushi suddenly flew from Kazu's hands and rose into the air.
"Roy! Don't act rashly! I'm already discussing this matter with the Government..."
"Fleet Admiral Sengoku." Roy's voice carried across the sea breeze and into the Den Den Mushi. "I've never acted rashly."
His tone remained calm.
"And I already know what you're going to say."
Just as before: compromise. The bigger picture.
Fleet Admiral Sengoku was always burdened by those concerns, always constrained by them.
Roy understood Sengoku's way of thinking. More than most people, this Fleet Admiral understood the darkness of the world. He had witnessed the chaos of the seas for decades. Naturally, he knew that pirates, the World Government, and the underworld were all festering wounds upon the world.
As long as those cancers remained, the importance of maintaining order could not be overstated. Only through order could this sick patient called the world continue to survive.
And so Sengoku chose compromise. He tolerated darkness in order to preserve stability. He wanted to rely on the Marines and the banner of justice to slowly eradicate evil, one wound at a time, one cancer after another. Until then, enduring the pain caused by larger tumors was simply the price that had to be paid.
But...
"Fleet Admiral Sengoku..." The Den Den Mushi slowly began falling toward the sea. "There are some things that cannot be compromised."
Its final transmission carried across the ocean.
"Once even matters of principle become negotiable, you're no longer protecting the greater good. It only means you've become a slave to order."
The words ended. The Den Den Mushi sank beneath the waves as the battleship unfurled its sails and cut through the sea.
---
At the same time.
Marineford. Fleet Admiral's Office.
Listening to the bubbling sounds of seawater entering the Den Den Mushi before the connection died, Sengoku's expression had darkened to the extreme.
In his hand was a newspaper that had been published only recently by the World Economic News Paper. And just as Kuma had been informed earlier, the paper contained news regarding the Seven Warlords.
["Great Pirate" Edward Weevil and "Tyrant" Bartholomew Kuma to Become New Warlords of the Sea. This reporter will conduct exclusive interviews with both candidates in the near future.]
[According to reports, Edward Weevil recently suppressed pirate-led uprisings throughout the North Blue and demonstrated overwhelming strength. This newspaper firmly believes...]
And it was this very newspaper that had triggered today's incident.
"That's right~ Zephyr-sensei has been out of contact for a while now." In the Fleet Admiral's office, Admiral Kizaru, Borsalino, spoke in his usual leisurely tone. "If I remember correctly, he'd been hunting that Edward Weevil for quite some time. It sounded like he'd finally tracked down his whereabouts~"
"With the old man's personality, what do you think he'll do~? Scary, isn't it~"
His words touched precisely on what Sengoku was most worried about.
"And also~" Kizaru continued, "the latest report says there seems to have been a problem with Kuma's appointment as a Warlord too~"
That was the other issue weighing heavily on Sengoku's mind.
After forming the Pirate Guerrilla Force, Zephyr had spent all his time hunting pirates with his students and subordinates. During those operations, they had gradually followed the trail discovered by Ain and eventually located Edward Weevil. In fact, they had already been pursuing him for some time.
So when Zephyr learned that Edward Weevil was about to become a Warlord, he immediately disappeared. And Sengoku didn't need to guess what he intended to do.
Unfortunately, troubles never came alone. At this critical moment, he had also received word that Kuma, the government's chosen Warlord candidate, had suddenly gone off the radar yesterday and appeared to have torn up his agreement with the World Government.
That instantly made Edward Weevil even more important. After all, the World Economic News Paper had already begun publicizing the new Warlords.
If one candidate refused the position now, it would already be a major embarrassment. If Edward Weevil also ended up causing problems, then the already fragile reputation of the Seven Warlords system would become a complete joke.
That was why Sengoku had called Roy earlier. The situation was already complicated enough; he had hoped to persuade him to stop.
But judging from Roy's response... that clearly wasn't happening.
"Want me to go stop him~?" Kizaru slowly rose from his seat. "If I leave now, I should still be able to catch him~"
Then he added thoughtfully, "Though honestly~ that kid's getting stronger at a terrifying rate. Really scary~"
As he spoke, he was already preparing to leave.
"..."
Then he stopped, because he saw Sengoku slam a clenched fist onto the desk.
"No," the Fleet Admiral spoke through gritted teeth.
His mind replayed Roy's final words. Normally, someone as steadfast as Sengoku wouldn't be shaken so easily, but this time...
"Zephyr..."
Things were different. Zephyr wasn't just a colleague; he was a friend. A true friend. A comrade who had fought beside him since the day they joined the Marines.
So when it came to Edward Weevil becoming a Warlord, Sengoku's anger was no less intense than Zephyr's. He had simply buried it deep inside.
He wasn't sure whether the World Government knew about the grudge between Zephyr and Edward Weevil, but one thing was certain: the people at the top of the Government...
They probably don't care about something this insignificant.
Knowing the Five Elders as well as he did, Sengoku could practically hear their reasoning. And that thought only made him angrier.
A former Marine Admiral. One of the Marines' most loyal veterans. A lifetime of pain and loss.
And in their eyes, it amounted to nothing?
As those thoughts surfaced, Sengoku found himself questioning his own choices.
For years, he had endured. Compromised. Tolerated darkness. All so he could gradually remove the world's cancers one by one.
But had he succeeded?
He had captured and executed the Pirate King, yet Roger's final words had ignited the Great Age of Piracy. The Four Emperors rose to dominate the seas, and crime spread everywhere.
Only recently had one Emperor finally fallen, but even then, it wasn't the Marines who defeated him; he had been brought down by a new force of chaos born from the sea itself.
The era had not calmed; it had only grown more turbulent, more chaotic.
Sengoku suddenly felt like a repairman endlessly patching a collapsing wall, compromising again and again, doing everything he could just to keep the era from completely falling apart.
And now Roy's words had become the final straw. For the first time, Sengoku seriously began asking himself: had he compromised with the World Government too much? Should he have been more forceful? Could the world's cancers really be removed one at a time as he had always believed?
For now, he didn't have the answers. But there was one thing he knew for certain.
"You don't need to stop him. Let him go." Sengoku's jaw tightened.
Buzz...!
Golden Buddha light flowed around his body as invisible waves of power gathered in his hand.
Bang!
The desk in front of him instantly shattered into dust. Sengoku rose from the wreckage and growled under his breath.
It was the posture he had worn when he was young, back when he had first joined the Marines, back when Garp used to call him...
"That hot-headed guy with the afro."
That's right. He was willing to compromise for the greater good, willing to weigh the costs and make rational decisions. But there was one thing he absolutely refused to accept, one thing he would never tolerate.
"...That damned brat," Sengoku's veins bulged as he snarled. "Who the hell is he calling a slave!?"
(End of Chapter)
You can read ahead up to 30 chapters on my Patreon: https://www.p*treon.com/darkshadow6395