A moment later, Mad Dog Torf, who had climbed aboard, was on his knees, weeping and begging for mercy. The other pirates swimming toward the ship had already turned around and were desperately swimming away from Dunn's vessel.
Just moments ago, their captain had been the first to board. While the other pirates were thinking they could take over the ship, they saw a horrifying sight.
The people aboard had pinned their captain down and were pounding him with clenched fists.
Even from far away, they could hear their captain's wails.
The sound was enough to make anyone who heard it weep with sympathy.
But their captain could bear this miserable fate alone.
Though there was a ninety-nine percent chance you'd end up as fish food without a ship on this vast ocean, boarding that ship could get you beaten to death.
Dunn watched the pirates desperately swimming away, then turned his gaze to the weeping pirate in front of him.
"Know any pirates?"
At Dunn's question, Mad Dog Torf's sobs stopped abruptly.
"Yes! Yes, I do!"
Torf nodded over and over.
"Do they have bounties?"
"Yes! Yes, they do!"
"Do you know where they are?"
"Yes, I—no, I do! I know!"
Torf quickly corrected himself.
"Take me there."
After speaking, Dunn sat down at the bow.
At Dunn's order, Torf hurriedly got to his feet. Enduring the pain in his body, he grabbed an oar and began rowing. But as he turned away, a sinister smile spread across his face.
"Heh heh heh!"
There really were pirates there, but not just one—they were a whole group. It was a place where pirates commonly gathered, and where they sold off the goods they'd stolen.
That bastard had dared to beat him.
Once they reached the place, he'd make him pay a hundredfold.
What Torf didn't know was that Dunn was watching his every move with Observation Haki.
Dunn could even guess what the man was thinking.
But for Dunn, that was actually a good thing. It saved him the trouble of searching. After all, he only had a vague understanding of nautical charts and such. He might be able to read a small-scale chart and use it to find a location.
But he couldn't make sense of a large-scale chart; he knew too little about navigation.
Having a fish to guide him was a good thing.
It was just that the voyage took several days.
People in the pirate world really did have extraordinary constitutions.
Torf wasn't being treated like a prisoner. He'd gone several days without a drop of water or a bite to eat, yet he could still just barely keep going.
When he finally spotted a strange island in the distance, shaped like an upside-down mushroom, despair gave way to delight on his face. He rowed even faster.
Dunn tossed the orange peel in his hand into the sea and stood up to look at the distant island. He spread out his Observation Haki and immediately saw what was happening there.
There were lots of people. Most were pirates, but there were also some merchants of uncertain identity.
It looked lively enough.
Dunn sat back down and watched Torf row frantically, nodding slightly.
As expected, nothing brought out a person's full potential like the instinct to survive.
At the island's dock, a heavy pirate ship pulled in and stopped. A large crowd of pirates eagerly disembarked.
After all, chances to land and rest like this were rare.
"It's Lone Wolf Asong!"
"What's that bastard doing here too?"
Seeing the pirate step off the ship wearing a wolf pelt and a wolf's head over his own, many people looked wary.
With a bounty of 7.8 million Belly, he was one of the most formidable pirates in the East Blue.
Not only did he frequently attack inhabited islands, he also liked to raid pirate ships.
Even pirates didn't want to run into him.
Most who did never met a good end.
In fact, plenty of pirate crews who'd crossed paths with him had vanished completely, never to be heard from again.
"You bastard. You came here too?"
Some feared a pirate with a bounty of 7.8 million, but others weren't afraid of him.
The pirate who spoke was nearly four meters tall. He looked at the giant axe—bigger than an ordinary pirate—and sneered.
"It's Giant Axe Onwa!"
"Giant Axe Onwa, with an 8.5-million-Belly bounty!"
Quite a few pirates swallowed nervously and quietly backed away.
Were these two going to fight?
If they did and you got caught in the crossfire, you'd probably lose your life.
Pirates were vicious toward ordinary people, but even they feared those stronger than themselves.
"Onwa, I don't want trouble with you right now. Since you're here, you should know why I came. That dog-faced bastard is back."
Lone Wolf Asong snorted and tightened his grip on his sword.
The people around them turned pale.
Dog-faced bastard?
Garp, the Marine Headquarters Vice Admiral from the East Blue?
That man had come back to the East Blue?
Everyone fell silent.
If that man had returned to the East Blue, it made sense for these infamous pirates to hide here.
After all, whenever Garp ran into pirates, he'd casually hurl an endless barrage of cannonballs at them.
The pirates lucky enough to escape had never forgotten the sight.
Just as the two pirates with bounties of seven or eight million faced off, a burst of wild laughter rang out from the dock.
A small boat had just pulled in. A figure who looked as if he'd been hollowed out rolled off it, laughing wildly.
"Hahaha! You fell for it, you bastard! This place is a pirate den! You're going to die here!"
Torf, who had rolled off the boat, cackled uncontrollably.
His laughter drew the attention of the pirates on the dock.
Then they saw a young man holding a sword stand up aboard the small boat.
Damn!
The pirates who saw him froze, then looked disgusted.
How could someone be that handsome?
That bastard deserved to die.
That was what every pirate there thought.
Dunn's gaze swept over the dock. Then he pulled out a stack of wanted posters from behind his back.
"Let's see. Lone Wolf Asong, 7.8 million. Giant Axe Onwa, bounty of 8.5 million. Bloody Hand..."
He flipped through the wanted posters and read the names aloud, estimating the total bounty in his head.
But his words only made the pirates on the dock look more and more menacing.
Torf, who'd rolled off the boat, no longer had the strength to laugh. He'd been running on sheer adrenaline, but now that it was gone, he could barely breathe.
"Hmm. Thirty-three million, two hundred and twenty-one thousand Belly."
Under the pirates' hostile stares, Dunn contentedly tucked the wanted posters behind his back. Then he looked up at them again.
"You're surrounded!"
Dunn raised his voice and shouted.
"Wahaha! What did that brat say?"
"Gahaha! He says we're surrounded. That's hilarious!"
"What a braggart. Could this guy be a Pirate Hunter?"
One of the pirates had guessed the truth.
But the pirates didn't care.
After all, there were hundreds of pirates here, and only one of him.
By any measure, there was only one possible conclusion.
We've got the advantage!
Before you continue