The End

The navy suffered considerable losses, with only a dozen or so naval officers still alive, many of whom had lost their fighting ability and were fortunate enough not to have been killed by Esdeath.

To be Pirate Kill is truly a disgrace.

"I hope you won't be so reckless next time, otherwise it won't be so easy to talk to you then."

Teach glanced at Borsalino, Teach turned and left; this kind of thing should only happen once.

Borsalino breathed a sigh of relief, transformed into a flash of light, and caught up with the departing Marines.

They are currently in poor condition, and if they are targeted by a top-tier power, the losses could be significant, requiring his full protection.

"Not bad, in a few years he'll be able to stand on his own."

Lafitte exclaimed in admiration.

Even with only a sliver of strength left, Esdeath continued to fight; such fighting spirit is unmatched by most people.

After a short rest, Esdeath had regained some strength and was able to walk. She didn't have any fatal injuries, so she recovered quickly.

With a strange light in his eyes, he looked at the Haki figure on the throne, who had never been so close.

To be honest, this was only the second time she had seen the leader of the Dark Night Pirates, Dark Emperor Teach, since being brought to the Night Pirates by Gari.

The first time was during the Night Pirates' battle, which was too far in the past.

Now, the two are only a few dozen meters apart.

"Yes, she still needs more training." Teach nodded. Esdeath's performance was outstanding, but she still needed to accumulate experience to become a true powerhouse, not only in terms of Devil Fruit, but also in terms of training through gravity.

High-efficiency exercise under strong gravity is often several times more efficient than usual.

Its effect on physical enhancement is even more pronounced; even now, Esdeath still needs this kind of accumulation.

After all, compared to other core members, there is a huge gap in physical strength alone.

It's important to know that in Kake pure physique and physical strength, Clemons is stronger than Gaji in his Human-Beast Form; it's just that Kake possesses powerful regenerative abilities.

It will take a long time to bridge this gap.

Becoming a Demon King isn't easy. While she's progressing, other Demon Kings are also progressing; they won't stop and wait for you.

The age gap and the difference in training time cannot be bridged in just a few years.

Her primary goal was still to become a demon general.

Only through prolonged honing can one become a true powerhouse.

"Let's get the Temperature Fruit first." They are still very young, only thirty years old. For many, it's just the beginning, and the Night Pirates already have a new generation emerging.

This is an upward cycle that prevents the Night Pirates from disappearing as they age.

To be honest, Teach didn't want to use Pure Gold. Using it would mean that he had reached a certain limit and lost the room for further improvement.

The long passage of time is terrifying. Teach doesn't know what he will become hundreds of years from now, or whether his thoughts will go to some extreme.

That's why he doesn't want to lose his desire to become stronger and pursue the evolution of the human body. He will be exploring the Starry Sky next. If he loses his goal, what's the difference between him and a walking corpse?

He had also thought that, after looking down on everything, he might become like the king of the World Government, waking up only once every few decades and sleeping the rest of the time.

"Let's go. We can expand our influence further. Head east. Wano Country has fallen. We're pirates, we don't need to worry about so much. Just go slowly."

Territorial expansion is necessary. Although the Night Pirates have a large amount of territory, they will not stop striving to become stronger.

Throughout the entire Night Sea Domain, the number of members of the Night Pirates will continue to increase. Currently, they are able to train tens of thousands of people every year, and reaching one million is only a matter of time.

This definitely needs to be considered for the future, continuing to expand eastward, openly and secretly controlling the area surrounding Wano Country, and taking control of Wano Country in one fell swoop.

That land contains 95% of the world's Seastone, making it no exception to be called the Golden Country. After all, Wano Country has exceptionally abundant mineral resources, and treasures are everywhere.

Several countries or islands in the New World containing Seastone are all rich in oil, located in the Night Pirates, the Beasts Pirates, and the Big Mom Pirates, respectively, and are all important strategic locations.

Unless there are undiscovered Seastone on some island.

The World Government can only place its hopes on Wano Country.

But in this respect, they will not concede to the World Government.

The World Government has a large demand for Seastone, and in the future, the Night Pirates will control it, eventually taking control of the entire Seastone production in Wano Country.

Wano Country has neither the ability to refuse nor the resources to mine it, and is now deeply mired in Rat Plague. After a period of recovery, the Rat Plague seems to be on the rise again.

Tired of dealing with the Rat Plague, they need the supplies from the Night Pirates.

The entire Seastone has been occupied by members of the Night Pirates. The Night Pirates already had a mining team in Wano Country, and now they have expanded it again.

That area could be considered the territory of the Night Pirates, who continuously transported the Seastone they had mined to the Night Sea Domain.

With the protection of the Night Pirates, the World Government cannot intervene, and cannot even obtain Seastone through the Withered Snake.

In Wano Country now, any unusual activity is easily detected. The Withered Snake dares not make any rash moves, and transporting Seastone also requires ships, which are easily discovered.

This situation meant that the only task the Withered Snake could do was continue to secretly cultivate Rat Plague Wano Country.

The expansion of power does not require violence; it requires subjugation, cooperation, and various other means, though the use of force is not unacceptable.

The Night Pirates have once again demonstrated their power; it is believed that those forces will recognize the situation.

He clenched his fist lightly, feeling the power within his body. This was just a minor incident; it was time for Teach to relax. The Night Pirates had many more plans ahead.

Various figures flashed through his mind, Teach made a decision: he still intended to target the World Government.

He needs to test the power of the Twist Fruit through battle, not just through testing, but through practical application.

Teach wants to find an opponent to truly test the extent to which he has developed his Twist Fruit. In this process, it is foreseeable that many people will die.

I've sparred with Rediat before, but it never felt like that intense, competitive battle.

He also needs a real fight, to find a powerful opponent to test the power of the Twist Fruit.

The various developments of the Twist Fruit are mainly aimed at offensive applications using pure twisting power.

The Twist Fruit is a spatial ability that creates a distorted space, within which one can manipulate distorting forces, whether it's distorting light, distorting space, distorting gravity, or anything else.

What is the current limit of the power of distortion?

He ate the Twist Fruit because it gave him powerful attack capabilities, making it a viable alternative to the Tremor-Tremor Fruit.

However, the Twist Fruit power he ultimately acquired was somewhat different from the simple release-type power he had imagined, such as the Tremor-Tremor Fruit or the Smash Fruit.

Maybe I need an alias?

Thinking this through his mind, he realized that given his current status, he couldn't act rashly. His status was one factor, but he also needed to consider the potential consequences of his actions.

He has a disguise, creating another identity, and acts as Devil Fruit User, appearing on the sea. As long as he is careful, he is difficult to be discovered.

However, this is somewhat wishful thinking and underestimates the Navy and the World Government. There's a high probability they'll find the Night Pirates.

The reason Teach thought this way was that he realized he lacked a kind of passion, or rather, a desire to fight against strong opponents. The ability test was not important; Teach had a general idea of what he was capable of.

Ordinary strong individuals would find it difficult to withstand his power; compared to the directness of the Tremor-Tremor Fruit, the Twist Fruit is even more unpredictable.

The ability to manipulate distortion within a certain range makes it even more difficult to resist.

He once used his twisting power to twist a ferocious beast repeatedly until it was finally transformed into a giant "blood ball".

The various organs and tissues were deeply damaged, twisted, and mixed together; the sight was horrifying.

It once turned a mountain into countless fragments.

No one's body can withstand the power of distortion, because the distorted space is Doriki, and as long as it is within this space, Teach can affect the fragile human body.

Teach is now fully capable of capturing someone's heart remotely.

Unless one possesses a powerful Haki to isolate oneself and constantly cover one's entire body, one will still be affected by Teach from within.

How many people in the world can constantly cover their entire body with Haki and fight for extended periods?

This isn't just a few tens of minutes, but several days and nights. Using Haki consumes stamina, and recovery also requires stamina. Therefore, during a battle, Haki often runs out before stamina does.

Often, Haki only covers a specific part of the body, effectively reducing energy expenditure.

Covering the entire body for an extended period will increase the rate at which both Haki and physical strength are depleted several times over.

The future Sun God's own Haki is only enough to cover his entire body in his Gear Fourth form for about ten minutes.

Once exhausted, they will lose their fighting power. If it weren't for the powerful regenerative ability of the Mythical Zoan, how could their stamina and Haki be restored in just about ten minutes?

This is the real world. Unless you are a true monster with a powerful physique honed over many years and possess ample stamina and Haki aura, many people need to conserve their Haki in battle. The New World is an even more Haki world.

Without Haki defense, Whitebeard's body couldn't even stop bullets.

Unless it's Big Mom's body of steel, Kaido's monstrous physique forged through hardship.

Even Teach needs to conserve his Haki. When facing monsters of the same level, which one doesn't have an inhuman physique? Under normal circumstances, he wouldn't do something as foolish as covering his entire body with Haki.

It's a completely wasteful and foolish act.

Of course, his situation is different from Bullet's; he doesn't have a special burst form.

Even Clemons, in his fully unleashed form, is enveloped in a Haki, enhancing his defense and making him invincible.

Everything varies from person to person.

The existence of the Distortion Field itself creates a home field for Teach, allowing him to rapidly deplete the enemy's stamina, use spatial teleportation to evade powerful attacks, and even possess Observation Haki can foresee the Future Sight.

Soon, Teach set his sights on one target: Marine Vice Admiral Garp. Nothing was more suitable than this legend to test his abilities.

If you think about it carefully and are careful, no one will guess his identity.

By distorting light, making it impossible for the human eye to perceive light, it can completely blind a person, kill Den Den Mushi), and conceal one's presence, leaving no trace.

Teach wouldn't actually make a move; he would merely use the power of the Twist Fruit to record the effects of the Twist Fruit on Garp through his superb Observation Haki, thus gaining a sense of just how destructive his own power truly was.

Some abilities and moves may seem destructive, but they can be easily blocked by some strong individuals, especially from a distance.

Whitebeard's Quake Punch generally causes the air to vibrate, generating a powerful impact. However, if the distance is very close, this move can completely break a person's bones.

Teach was also worried that using only the Twist Fruit's power might be too overconfident and lead to a disaster.

That powerful Haki is enough to ignore many attacks, and choosing the Three Admirals would be fine; their strength is enough to make Teach seriously. However, the elemental nature of the Logia counter to the distortion power of ranged attacks.

Without the application of Armament Haki, even Whitebeard's Vibration Force could not harm a Logia Devil Fruit User.

Whether it's vibration or distortion, both are physical damage. Distortion is less harmful, as it can alter the shape of the ability user through tearing.

If he were to attack someone weaker, he would be ridiculed in the future, which would be completely inconsistent with his current status.

In addition, Teach wanted to see Garp's true strength. In his eyes, Garp was the biggest threat to him in the Navy, of course, in terms of offensive power.

If he didn't want to fight Garp couldn't even touch him, and there was no way to stop him from running away, since Garp was only a master of physical combat.

Even when facing an enemy head-on, Teach is not afraid at all now. Teach has come a long way in the path of the Armament Haki and has now initially tempered it. He can feel the improvement that the Haki Body tempering has brought to his body, especially the fragile internal structure.

Garp certainly wouldn't temper his entire body like Teach did; he would focus more on the surface of his body, the internal muscles, flesh, bones, and vulnerable organs. Garp couldn't operate like Teach did.

Especially those iron fists; Teach wanted to see just how powerful they were.

Teach was confident that he was more efficient than Garp in refining, but Garp was more focused and took longer than Teach. If we were to guess now, it might have been more than twenty years, possibly even close to thirty.

Perhaps this is a closely guarded secret of the Navy, or perhaps it was passed down from Cyborg to Garp. Cyborg's body also bears traces of Haki tempering, but it cannot compare to Garp's, because very few people can endure such training. Perhaps Cyborg discovered it relatively late.

Currently, the World's Strongest, aside from himself and the Celestial Dragons, is most likely Garp, according to Teach's conjecture.

After chatting for a short while, Teach left the warship and headed back to Pagila Island ahead of schedule.

He will take action next, but he will have to wait for the right opportunity, when Garp leaves headquarters.

But the impact wasn't over yet. Esdeath's fame soared, and the world's people, especially those in the Grand Line, began to criticize the Marine Headquarters.

They can no longer control global public opinion, and the continued influence of those with ulterior motives is a significant problem.

This is also a fact; these so-called elites of the navy are really too weak, to be beaten so badly by seventeen-year-old Esdeath.

The next morning, news of Esdeath's bounty spread throughout the world, reaching 90 million Beli on its first attempt.