Just a name.
Yet it turned the plaza, which had been seething with excitement only a moment ago, completely silent.
Although they had not seen Maud's figure, the pirates still reacted instinctively.
Some were shocked, while others were terrified.
After all, even Ribis, who was worth 300 million, had been frightened into this state...
A moment later.
The many pirates slowly came to their senses and, as if in unspoken agreement, looked toward the passage entrance at the bottom of Ryugu Palace.
"Was that Bagard. Maud who fired the shot just now...?"
The gunshot had come from the entrance to Ryugu Palace.
If the shooter really was Maud, then Princess Shirahoshi, who had been dragged out bound hand and foot, might also have been his doing.
"We didn't even see anyone. It might not have been Maud, right?"
Among the crowd, many pirates had merely been intimidated by Maud's reputation at first.
Once they recovered, they began voicing their doubts while greedily looking over Princess Shirahoshi's body.
Could they really determine the shooter's identity solely from Ribis's inexplicable reaction?
That was far too rash.
"Exactly. Black Robe was only shot once, yet he swore that the shooter was Bagard. Maud. That's ridiculous."
"I remember that two years ago, Maud killed several Supernovas in the Sabaody Archipelago. Black Robe Ribis was also a Supernova that year. According to the rumors, unlike the other Supernovas, he didn't challenge Maud. He was scared away by Maud outright."
"Did it leave him traumatized?"
"But it shouldn't have affected him this badly."
After suppressing their initial shock, most of the pirates remained where they were.
A vast, almost unimaginable profit lay before them. Having always lived by the blade, they naturally had no intention of giving up so easily.
Thus, even as doubts spread across