A Revelry Feast, and a Bunch of Fools Courting Death

In the banquet hall, Whiskey Peak's musicians sang without pause while dancers performed lively dances to stir up the atmosphere.

"Miss Nami, another drink!"

Miss Monday, dressed like a nun, raised her glass toward Nami.

"Sure, bring it on!"

Nami showed no fear and drained a 500ml mug of beer in one gulp.

Her face had flushed by then, clearly showing a hint of drunkenness, but her spirits were higher than ever.

"Amazing! She's already drunk fourteen people under the table, and she can still keep up with that nun for so long!"

"She can drink a thousand cups without getting drunk. She's practically a female saint of wine!"

The people around them stared at Nami in shock. They had never expected a girl to be such a heavy drinker.

After finishing that cup, Nami poured herself another and raised it to return Miss Monday's toast.

Miss Monday's face twitched, but she still clinked glasses with Nami again and poured the barley brew down her throat.

She was beginning to suspect that Nami was drinking fake alcohol. Nami had drunk fourteen people under the table, yet she was still this Bravery when drinking against her.

Her gaze drifted toward Luo Wen and Tashigi nearby, giving her an even worse headache.

"Nami is amazing! I want to drink too!"

Tashigi's inexplicable competitive streak had been roused, and she wanted to compete with Nami.

Luo Wen sighed and let the flushed Tashigi struggle in his arms.

What a lightweight. She was bad at drinking but loved it anyway; she had collapsed into his arms after just two cups, yet she still wanted more.

Luo Wen picked up a piece of roast meat and stuffed it into her mouth.

"Mmm~"

"Luo Wen, this is so delicious!"

With a piece of roast meat in her mouth, Tashigi instantly forgot all about wanting to drink.

"If you like it, eat more."

Luo Wen had just picked up another piece to feed her when he discovered that the plate was already empty.

"Chef, bring me another hundred portions!"

Luo Wen turned and shouted at the chef beside him, acting completely at home.

By then, empty plates stacked as high as two people had already piled up on his table, along with three empty oak barrels.

Tashigi had only eaten two plates of food and drunk two cups of beer. Everything else was Luo Wen's doing.

"What? Another hundred portions!?"

Sweat beaded on the foreheads of the three chefs, and their legs went weak.

Looking at the five colleagues collapsed nearby, all foaming at the mouth, they seemed to see their own future.

Vivi and Igaram held wine glasses as they talked, occasionally glancing toward Luo Wen.

The other Baroque Works agents did not suspect anything and merely thought they were exchanging intelligence.

More than ten minutes passed, and Nami, who had been drinking against fifteen people, could no longer hold on. In the end, she fell soundly asleep beside Luo Wen.

Among the people from the Windrider, only Luo Wen remained sober. He ate fine food, drank good wine, and watched the performances of Whiskey Peak's residents.

The Baroque Works agents were dumbfounded. This man was a complete monster.

He had drunk over two hundred liters of alcohol and eaten food three or four times his own volume, yet Luo Wen's body had not changed in the slightest.

At last, Luo Wen seemed to grow a little sleepy. He propped an arm on the table and closed his eyes as if dozing.

Vivi stood beside Luo Wen, gave an OK gesture to the others, then remained on guard nearby.

The Baroque Works agents looked uncertain. Under Igaram's lead, they finally left the banquet hall after quite a while.

Under the moonlight, Miss Monday's face was pale and frightening, nothing like the warmth she had shown at the banquet.

"Today's guests have all gone down. It's time for us to close the net."

"Those bastards ate more than half the town's food stores. If we don't get enough out of this, they'll suffer for it."

Miss Monday, still dressed like a nun, stared toward the banquet hall with greed filling her eyes.

"Cough, cough. That man is the strongest Bounty Hunter in the East Blue, a monster who forced East Blue pirates to flee to the Grand Line."

Igaram's expression was grave. It was not that he wanted to harm Luo Wen's group.

Vivi had already told him that they were Alabasta's hope of liberation.

He was simply worried whether Luo Wen truly had any chance of winning against that Shichibukai, Sand Crocodile.

He had never seen Luo Wen or Crocodile fight, so he could only compare the gap between them based on their reputations.

One was a Bounty Hunter who had only become famous in the East Blue within the past half year, while the other was a renowned Shichibukai even on the Grand Line. Their reputations were worlds apart.

Igaram was worried. No matter how he considered it, Luo Wen's chances of victory were far too slim.

"That weakest sea isn't anything to fear."

Miss Monday dismissed it.

They had a hundred Baroque Works subordinates here, all of them normally Bounty Hunters.

Miss Monday believed that a hundred against one would be enough to deal with Luo Wen.

"Cough, cough. Don't underestimate him. He's no simple man."

Igaram glanced at the arrogant woman and handed Miss Monday a newspaper.

It was a newspaper from the Baratie, containing news of Luo Wen wiping out the Krieg Pirates, along with a photograph of him cleaving a pirate ship apart with a single slash.

Only because so many East Blue pirates had recently come here had he managed to get his hands on this newspaper.

"What!?"

"He wiped out the main force of the Krieg Pirates alone and cut apart a massive pirate ship fifty or sixty meters long with one strike? That's far too ridiculous!"

Miss Monday's pupils contracted as she read it. That record was terrifying.

Don Krieg had a bounty of seventeen million Beli, and he was stronger than anyone in Whiskey Peak.

The hundred Bounty Hunters in their entire town were vastly inferior even to the Krieg Pirates.

Against Luo Wen, they had no chance at all.

As she looked toward the banquet hall now, it was as if she were staring at some savage beast. Her heart was filled with fear.

"Damn it, what about our losses!"

Miss Monday gritted her teeth. Thinking of that mountain of empty plates made her heart bleed.

That single meal had cost them four million Beli. (About 240,000 RMB; not an outrageous amount for a banquet of one hundred people.)

She truly could not accept simply letting Luo Wen go.

"We can't let him go!"

The other Baroque Works employees nearby were equally furious.

Luo Wen had eaten most of their supplies. If they did not keep him behind, they would have to live on nothing but the wind for a month.

"He drank three huge barrels of alcohol and ate hundreds of pounds of meat. He definitely can't fight anymore."

"If over a hundred of us attack together, we can absolutely take him down."

Luo Wen had eaten so much that his strength had surely been severely affected.

They refused to believe that, as fellow Bounty Hunters, a weakened Luo Wen could defeat over a hundred of them.

"Fine, we'll all go in together and take him out!"

Encouraged by her subordinates, Miss Monday felt that they made sense and decided to gamble everything.

Besides, the Krieg Pirates were failures who had retreated from the Grand Line. Perhaps they had only been overrated, and Luo Wen, who defeated them, might not be ridiculously strong either.

Gritting her teeth, Miss Monday led her subordinates and charged into the banquet hall.

Igaram followed them in as well. He was not there to deal with Luo Wen; he merely wanted to witness Luo Wen's abilities for himself.

Whiskey Peak was only an outer outpost of Baroque Works, not part of its core strength.

The people here were merely Crocodile's low-level thugs, not even one percent of all his forces.

If Luo Wen struggled even to deal with these people, there would be no point hoping that he could defeat Crocodile.

Filled with fury, Whiskey Peak's residents stormed into the banquet hall.

They had no idea what kind of monster they were about to face!