Breaking Into the Plaza, the Final Battle Arrives (34)

As everyone knew, after this point in the original story, there had been no such thing as saturation bombardment.

Let alone artillery pieces—Akainu had handled the entire process manually.

Why?

Because it had achieved very little!

Pirate crews in this world were like that. The captain was everything; the captain was the sky.

Just like how the Revolutionary Army at G-10 had failed to understand Luffy before, no matter how many crew members were killed or wounded, as long as the captain had not fallen, the pirate crew was not finished.

By the same logic, no matter how many pirates were killed or wounded in this bombardment, as long as Whitebeard had not fallen, the results would still be "minimal."

Since that was the case, why had Sengoku agreed to Ron being so extravagant and wasteful?

The answer was actually very simple.

Attack what the enemy must save!

Would Whitebeard just stand by and watch his own crew die?

Of course not.

Then, under such dense and ferocious bombardment, his actions were easy to imagine... A dike a thousand miles long could collapse from an ant hole. Every bit of stamina Whitebeard wasted now would reduce losses in the decisive battle later.

Exchanging the power of money for the survival of Navy soldiers—this was the purpose of Ron's two gifts.

The Art of War said: Know your enemy and know yourself, and you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. Know yourself but not the enemy, and for every victory gained, you will also suffer a defeat. Know neither the enemy nor yourself, and you will be in peril in every battle.

With Ron's help, the Navy's battle against Whitebeard had achieved exactly that: knowing both themselves and their enemy.

When the enemy's entire pattern of action had