Morgan Joins the Crew

The heroes' status panels made it clear that Teacher Ma Qiao, a longtime denizen of the heights of Silver, had his own unique insights into item builds and skill allocation.

First of all, as a support, Garen naturally had to absorb plenty of damage for the ADC.

So it made sense to max his W first.

Garen's W skill, [Courage], could reduce a great deal of damage, making him a powerful warrior unafraid of sacrifice.

There was also a reason Garen had been equipped with a [Long Sword] and a [Ruby Crystal].

They could later be built into [Phage], commonly known as the little wooden mallet.

This item had the [Tenacity] attribute, allowing Garen to recover 2% of his health in combat.

Without a doubt, it suited Garen's characteristics perfectly and made for a very good transitional item.

Later on, using [Phage] to build either [Hullbreaker] or [Sterak's Gage] would also be an excellent choice.

Not a thing would go to waste.

Meanwhile, Gangplank had adapted to his circumstances by putting two points into his W, [Remove Scurvy].

That would greatly improve Gangplank's chances of survival while he was on his own among the pirates.

To further boost the health he recovered from eating oranges, Ma Qiao had thoughtfully put Gangplank on an AP build with his W maxed first as a temporary measure.

It showed a deep understanding of the heroes.

Lastly, as for Ma Qiao's own equipment...

For now, the Brawler's Gloves were also just a transitional item.

The two [Ruby Crystals] made it clear what his first major item would be: the mythic item [Frostfire Gauntlet].

There wasn't much else to say about it.

It had armor, magic resistance, and health, and it was a gauntlet like the ones Ma Qiao usually used. Its freezing effect also suited the Penguin-Penguin Fruit's characteristics perfectly. It really was ideal.

As for those [Rejuvenation Beads]...

Each one provided a good boost to health regeneration, they were relatively cheap, and they could be built into many things. They would all come in handy later.

Before their price increase, they had once been one of the favorite starting items for dedicated top-lane passengers.

But now the price of [Rejuvenation Beads] had gone up to a whopping 3 million Beli apiece. Six cost a full 18 million Beli.

It wasn't really that Ma Qiao wanted to buy so many "green beans," nor did he want to be a passenger.

It was just that the cost of building items here differed from the game. For higher-level equipment, the combine cost rose according to the Fibonacci sequence, which was quite frightening.

In fact, given Penguin's usual habits, Ma Qiao was already very grateful that the price rose according to the Fibonacci sequence rather than exponentially.

After comparing his options repeatedly, Ma Qiao decided that rather than pursuing advanced equipment that was still out of reach for the time being, the ancient "green bean passenger build" was better suited to his current circumstances.

If he wanted to protect the justice in his heart, he naturally had to protect his own health bar first!

The Rejuvenation Beads were small, so Ma Qiao tucked them into his scarf.

With his health regeneration greatly improved, Ma Qiao even felt a flicker of ambition to compete with King Luffy at doing sit-ups.

Of course, it was only a passing thought.

Given how much King Luffy relied on cheats, let alone six Rejuvenation Beads, even Warmog's Armor and Spirit Visage might not guarantee an advantage over him.

Fortunately, Ma Qiao had no desire to become the Pirate King and no intention of practicing the divine skills of sit-ups and near-death enlightenment.

At that moment, songs and work chants rang out aboard the Good Guy Twitch.

Like Kuro, Morgan had initially taken the Good Guy Twitch for a junior officer's warship.

But once the two sides exchanged their unit designations aboard the ship, Morgan was immediately startled.

This ship was actually a branch commander's flagship!

Although he was the commander of the 16th Branch, which had an awful reputation, rather than Morgan's own 153rd Branch, he was still a superior officer and a genuine colonel!

Morgan also learned that Commander Twitch, who was known as a great guy, had been sent here from the Grand Line.

His mission was to restore discipline at the 16th Branch and root out the **local bullies entrenched there.

In a sense, the information Morgan had learned wasn't wrong.

As a bunch of freeloaders from the Grand Line, the first thing Twitch and his people did upon arriving at the 16th Branch was eliminate the local freeloaders.

In ecology, this was called competition for ecological niches.

When an animal underwent a mutation and evolved, its rise threatened not its prey or its predators first, but creatures occupying a similar ecological niche.

Grass-eating wild horses had been driven to the brink of extinction by a host of even-toed ungulate big shots—sheep, cattle, camels, and others—that had put skill points into rumination.

If they hadn't happened to latch onto the terrifying upright apes ten thousand years ago, their genes would have died out long ago.

Put simply, this phenomenon could be summed up in one word: involution!

There was only so much military funding to go around, so of course the freeloaders had to compete too!

Come to think of it, bad Marines had their advantages: Nezumi's men generally lacked the pride of Headquarters Marines, who considered themselves a cut above everyone else.

With Twitch and Garen leading by example, they quickly hit it off with the East Blue Marines under Morgan's command.

Twitch ordered a small banquet held to thank Morgan's troops for helping repair the storeroom.

At the banquet, both sides sang and danced, drinking and eating meat.

If lyrics like "Pillowing our heads on the waves, our home is on the ship, the skull sails and skull flags flutter in the wind???~" hadn't been so inappropriate, Ma Qiao even suspected these drunken men of the sea would have belted out "Binks' Sake."

Morgan wasn't a carefree, thoughtless sort.

Although he was a hulk of a man standing nearly three meters tall, he was quite attentive.

He noticed that the unremarkable-looking but surprisingly approachable Commander Twitch ate nothing but rotten food at the banquet, leaving all the fresh ingredients for the soldiers and Teacher Ma Qiao to enjoy.

Is this the righteous force of Marine Headquarters? It's completely different from our East Blue, where the officers throw their weight around and the rank-and-file soldiers are treated like servants!

Morgan couldn't help feeling moved and admiring him. In over twenty years as a Marine, this was the first time he had seen such a good leader who led by example.

"What do you say? Want to join us and rebuild the 16th Branch together?"

Holding a cup of sour milk, Twitch walked over to Morgan and asked with a smile.

"Join your command, Commander Twitch? Cough, cough, cough..."

The smell of the sour milk was choking, but Morgan's heart felt warm.

He very much wanted to agree, but in the end he shook his head and said, "Transfers between branches are very difficult, Commander Twitch. Please don't joke about it."

"Lord Twitch isn't joking."

Before Twitch could answer, Lieutenant Qiangsen, whose rank was roughly the same as Morgan's, threw an arm around his shoulders and proudly explained, "Our Lord Twitch is no ordinary man. His uncle is a Marine Headquarters Vice Admiral!

"And our Lord Garen too—don't let his low rank fool you. Two Headquarters Vice Admirals have both recognized him as an outstanding junior with the mindset to grow into a Headquarters officer..."