Chapter 62: The Nature of Evil
In a sense, they were all the same.
Axel, Zephyr, the pirates on the island—every last one of them had been reduced to pieces on someone else's board.
He had already known what kind of thing the World Government was, but understanding it in theory and brushing against its malice firsthand were two different experiences. The feeling left a sour taste in his mouth.
A faint, self-mocking smile tugged at his lips.
Vergo noticed it immediately.
He calmly wiped the blood from his fingers, then asked, "What are you thinking about? Is there a problem?"
The question snapped Axel back to the present.
He forced his thoughts into order at once. His face did not change as he replied, half honest and half false, "I was just thinking about this whole transaction. It's ironic, that's all. The World Government dresses itself up as justice and peace, yet behind the curtain it looks like this."
There was a brief pause.
Then Vergo said, "I followed the Young Master precisely because of that kingly nature of his."
He deliberately steered the subject away from the World Government, as if even giving it too much weight was unnecessary.
Instead, he spoke only of Doflamingo.
The "kingly nature" he meant was not kindness, nor nobility, nor some grand heroic charisma. It was Doflamingo's innate cruelty. His arrogance. His certainty that he stood above others. His instinct to trample, dominate, and destroy.
And for some men, that kind of evil was more attractive than any form of justice.
Axel understood Doflamingo only through the fragments he knew from his previous life.
A child born in heaven, thrown into hell. A former Celestial Dragon dragged down by his father's naive idealism, forced to taste the hatred of the world with his own skin. He lost his mother. Later, he killed his father with his own hands and carried the severed head back to Mary Geoise, only to be denied even then. Years later, he murdered his own brother as well, cutting down the last blood tie he had left.
His life had been one long distortion.
Pain had ground him into something warped and vicious, and that warped thing now called itself family while remaining willing to sacrifice those same people when necessary.
Axel had no desire to dig deeper into the matter. The more he said, the easier it would be to slip. And right now, one wrong word meant death.
So he changed the subject.
"What are you going to do with the Marine's body in the room?"
Vergo hadn't expected the turn in the conversation. He paused for a moment, then replied, "He was one of my men. Even if I killed him, I'll still bring him back."
That answer revealed something strange and difficult to pin down.
Vergo could kill a subordinate without hesitation, then still speak of retrieving the corpse like a proper superior who cared for his men. It was twisted, but that very contradiction was probably part of what made him so difficult to expose. Men who worked under him likely saw only what they wanted to see.
He understood loyalty well enough to fake it perfectly.
Just then, three black dots appeared in the distance.
Axel and Vergo both noticed them at once.
As the figures drew closer, they became clear—Smoker in smoke form, carrying Ain and Binz as he drifted over the jungle.
Axel's heart sank.
Idiots.
He had told those two to retreat. If they were going to bring someone back, they should have gone straight to Zephyr, not dragged Smoker here. If Axel had not already managed to deceive Vergo, this would have been no different from delivering fresh prey to his doorstep.
Luckily, the lie was still holding.
That meant he could keep building on it.
Vergo watched the approaching figures without any visible concern. "So that was your trick," he said. "Your two companions went to fetch reinforcements."
His suspicion had resurfaced.
Axel could feel it.
But Vergo still had not made his move.
That was because Axel's ability had worked against him earlier in a way Vergo could understand. From Vergo's perspective, Axel's power resembled some sort of defensive barrier. Since a person could only eat one Devil Fruit, the possibility that Axel possessed some kind of mind-reading power was easy to dismiss.
And if Axel already knew Vergo's identity, then in Vergo's mind there were only two possibilities left: either Axel truly belonged to the Family, or the entire world had already somehow uncovered him.
The second possibility was far more dangerous. So Vergo was leaning toward the first.
Axel did not hesitate.
He had to lock the logic in place before Smoker arrived.
"There was no helping it," he said. "At the time, they didn't know who you were. They saw a strange man come out of the house while a pirate went in, and then they saw me talking to you. Of course they'd be suspicious."
He continued before Vergo could interrupt.
"That's why I deliberately acted familiar with you earlier. It was a signal to them. If I had acted openly hostile, they would've assumed the danger was immediate and attacked or fled on the spot. But if I acted like I knew you, then they'd hesitate. They'd go for help first. That buys us control."
Vergo said nothing.
Axel pressed on.
"Now think about what happens next. When they return, the pirate is dead. I'm still alive. You reveal yourself as Vice Admiral Vergo, say you killed the pirate to avenge your fallen subordinates, and the story becomes simple. The only one who saw what happened inside was me. Ain and Binz didn't. Smoker didn't. From their perspective, I misjudged the situation and called for help because I thought you were dangerous."
Vergo's gaze sharpened behind his sunglasses.
Axel kept his breathing even.
"I can say I was being cautious. That when I saw an unknown man standing over a Marine corpse, I assumed the worst. That's normal for a recruit. Once your identity is revealed, the misunderstanding resolves itself. In fact, it makes you look better, not worse."
There was a silence.
Then Vergo said, "It's a flimsy explanation. But perhaps it is the most workable one."
Axel almost laughed.
He actually bought it.
It was absurd, but then again, Vergo was precisely the sort of man who trusted his own judgment too much. He believed he could read people. Believed he could control situations. Believed no one beneath a certain level would dare deceive him.
That arrogance was saving Axel's life.
Soon, Smoker landed with Ain and Binz.
The moment their feet hit the ground, Axel flicked them a quick signal to stay quiet.
Ain froze, then immediately swallowed whatever she had been about to say. Binz did the same. Smoker, however, was not so easy to silence.
He took one look at the man standing there and blurted out, "Vice Admiral Vergo!?"
As a Marine, Smoker had far more experience than the recruits.
Even if Vergo had entered the recruit camp years before him, Smoker had still heard the stories. Vergo had been one of the standouts of his generation, a monster among recruits who had piled up merit after merit until he eventually became one of the Navy Headquarters' vice admirals.
.....
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