Four days later.
After four days of relentless newspaper coverage, the whole world knew about the Greedy Gold Mine on North Yak Island.
The first to act were not pirates or ambitious schemers, but reporters who usually seemed rather mild-mannered.
To get the best story, those reporters proved endlessly inventive.
With the major Newspaper Offices working together and the World Government tacitly allowing it, they hired several unusually clever News Coos and strapped a Surveillance Den Den Mushi to each bird's back.
With the major Newspaper Offices working together, they had somehow turned the coming war into a live broadcast.
More than ten Surveillance Den Den Mushi were broadcasting from around North Yak Island.
From the Sabaody Archipelago to the Grand Line and the four seas, every place capable of receiving the feed was watching North Yak Island.
People could feel the Gold War approaching.
The day after the story appeared in the papers, several groups near North Yak Island landed and carried off small amounts of gold ore.
At first, there was no fighting. The pirates and trade associations simply picked up fist-sized chunks of ore around the island. Once their ships were loaded to capacity, they hurried away, their holds full.
And so the gold began to leave the island, all in apparent peace.
The countless civilians watching were envious, but secretly disappointed as well. No one had even clashed. Perhaps the broadcast was pointless after all.
But that afternoon, a fight broke out. It began not over Gold Ore, but over a cane sword.
It was the blade Devil Sheriff Lafitte had left behind when he died. The Great Explosion had blown it away: Silver Flash, one of the 21 Great Grade Blades.
When a pirate who knew swords spotted it, he could hardly believe his eyes.