He Can't Just Lose His Head, Can He?

On the road from Goa Imperial Palace to New Town.

"Everything you wanted while following Red-Haired Shanks—freedom, fame, wealth—you can still have it here in the Goa Empire."

"Beckman, with your intelligence, staying in a pirate crew like the Red Hair Pirates is simply a waste of your brain."

Holding Uta in his arms, Wang Shi rode slowly atop the Kirin Lion as he spoke leisurely to Beckman and the others.

"Shanks used to be our captain, so it was only natural for us to obey his decisions."

"But now he has disbanded the Red Hair Pirates, returned to the Holy Land, and severed his ties with us."

"From now on, please guide us well, Your Majesty."

"And we hope Your Majesty will treat Uta well."

Beckman took a drag of his cigarette, a flicker of red glinting deep in his eyes. Regardless of what Shanks truly intended, everything had already changed.

Shanks, having become a Celestial Dragon once more, could no longer become a pirate again.

Perhaps the outcome had become irreversible the moment Red-Haired Shanks decided to take part in this war.

As an apprentice crewman of the Pirate King and a man with Celestial Dragon blood, Shanks had been influenced too deeply by Roger and his bloodline. In the end, he could never become a truly free pirate.

The Red Hair Pirates had followed Shanks's decisions, living beneath the shadows of the Figarland Family and the Roger Pirates all along. They had never truly lived freely.

Every time they followed Red-Haired Shanks to maintain some so-called balance in the New World, they could never figure out what it had to do with them.

In truth, the Red Hair Pirates could either enjoy absolute freedom or go seize territory.

There was no need to live so exhaustingly, constantly