New World! (Two-in-One)

Drum of Liberation.

As the name implied, just as those ancient survivors who knew the truth of the world had long hoped, the day the Drum of Liberation sounded in this world would be the day people like them were freed from lives of adversity.

And on the very night Tsugikuni Yoriichi utterly destroyed the Holy Land, the Drum of Liberation rang out across the entire world.

Whole Cake Island.

Kuma and Abel, both asleep, seemed to sense something and woke almost simultaneously. The drumbeat came from afar, distant and lingering, yet it echoed clearly in their ears. But it seemed only the two of them could hear it. No one else on Cake Island had noticed anything, and the night there remained as peaceful as ever.

"What is that drumbeat?"

Abel quickly climbed out of bed. After casually throwing on a coat, he hurried outside. As a high-ranking officer of the New Marines, he had his own house on Cake Island. Though it was not large, it stood in the island's most central district.

Everyone living in this area was among the New Marines' highest-ranking decision-makers.

Yet when Abel stepped outside to trace the sound, he found the other residences completely quiet, without the slightest abnormality.

It seemed he was the only one who had noticed anything.

Abel looked around. The drumbeat ringing in his ears soon faded away, and once it disappeared, a hint of confusion appeared on his face.

"Was it just my imagination?"

At that moment, Abel could not help wondering whether there was something wrong with his hearing. There were countless powerful people on Cake Island. There was no reason only he had heard that drumbeat and come outside to investigate.

Just as Abel was about to return to his house, someone leaped onto the