Clearing Out the Parasites

Leaving the noisy mess hall, Rain seemed to melt into the sea like a drop of water, silently disappearing into the shadows of G-2 Base's labyrinthine corridors.

Ace's appearance was only a minor interlude. As a transmigrator familiar with the course of the world, Rain knew very well that Ace's visit would not cause any major trouble. On the contrary, because of a letter, he would accidentally help the base's vice admiral solve the problem of that bitter coffee.

With someone drawing the patrolling Marines' attention out in the open, it was simply perfect cover for a hunter lurking in the shadows like him.

Rain pulled his hood lower and rapidly pieced together every clue in his mind.

The secret ledger Odel had left behind was carefully concealed. It did not state the traders' real names, only a vague codename, "W," and an incomplete Marine seagull seal. But as a top hunter accustomed to unraveling mysteries thread by thread, Rain saw through the trick at a glance.

Most of the goods listed in the ledger had been disguised as "scrapped military supplies," "training ammunition losses," and "inferior Seastone powder." Strategic materials of this level were not something officers fighting on the front lines could casually requisition. Only someone who controlled the warehouses and handled the books year-round could erase the traces of those weapons so cleanly.

More importantly, Rain had made an observation when he exchanged the bounty at the finance office earlier.

When the finance officer confirmed Odel's identity, Rain's exceptional eyesight swept over a stack of supply approval forms that had just arrived on a nearby desk. The handwritten notes on those forms, with their distinctive habit of ending strokes tilted toward the lower right, along with the red seal whose seagull's right wing bore a tiny notch from a worn stamp edge, matched the traces on Odel's secret ledger perfectly.

And the final signature on that approval form belonged to the head of G-2 Base's Logistics and Equipment Department, Marine Brigadier General World.

At that moment, every fragment fell into place.

As the man with real authority over material allocation at this large base, World had every convenience his position could offer. He only needed to tamper slightly with the monthly warehouse inspections, listing fine artillery and Seastone weapons tightly controlled by the World Government as "combat losses" or "rusted scrap," then quietly smuggle them to pirates in Paradise desperate for firepower in exchange for enormous profits.

Seventh floor of the base, high-ranking officers' office area.

Security here was exceptionally tight. Fully armed soldiers stood guard at both ends of the corridor, while Visual Den Den Mushi had been installed along the walls to guard against intruders.

But such defenses were meaningless against a Logia-type Rock-Rock Fruit user.

Rain arrived at an empty storage room beneath the seventh floor. He raised his right hand, and gray-white stone skin quickly covered his palm. He pressed his hand against the ceiling, and his thoughts shifted.

"Assimilation: Rock Submerge."

The hard stone ceiling became as soft as water the instant it touched Rain's palm. His body merged into the rock without obstruction, silently swimming upward through the base's internal load-bearing walls.

At that moment, inside the logistics director's office on the seventh floor.

Brigadier General World was pacing irritably around the room. He was fat, and the once-crisp Marine coat of justice looked rather bloated on him. On his desk sat a cup of long-cold black tea, along with a report that had just arrived from the front island's harbor.

The report clearly stated: bounty hunter "Grayrock" Rain had delivered the head of "Dreamweaver" Odel and was currently resting within the base.

"Damn Odel! That useless trash who came crawling back from the New World couldn't even deal with a lone bounty hunter!" World cursed through gritted teeth, cold sweat beading across his forehead.

Odel's death was a tremendous blow to him. Not only had it cut off a source of income, but worse still, he did not know whether Odel had destroyed the ledger documenting their dealings. If that ledger had fallen into the bounty hunter's hands and been handed over to Marine Headquarters' inspection department, he would not only be stripped of his rank but might even be thrown directly into Impel Down!

"No, I can't sit around waiting to die. While that hunter named Rain is still on the island, I have to find a way to silence him, or search his ship directly!"

A vicious glint flashed through World's eyes. He walked to a massive oil painting behind his desk and pressed the edge of its frame.

With the sound of mechanical gears turning, the painting slid apart to either side, revealing a heavy refined-steel safe embedded in the wall. It contained all the wealth he had accumulated through smuggling and bribery over the years, along with false identification documents he could use to flee at any time.

Just as World reached out to turn the safe's combination lock—

"If you're looking for this, there's no need to go through so much trouble."

A hoarse, cold voice suddenly sounded from behind him without warning.

World's entire body trembled violently. He spun around as if electrocuted.

At some point, the man in the dark gray cloak had appeared atop his desk like a ghost! He was casually toying with the copy of the ledger that had kept World awake at night.

"You... how did you get in?" World's eyes widened in terror. The doors and windows were clearly locked, and the Visual Den Den Mushi had not sounded any alarm!

"Through the walls. The stone in this base is fairly decent." Rain set down the ledger, his black eyes watching the Marine brigadier general as though he were already dead. "Brigadier General World, your partner Odel asked me to pass along a message. He thought Hell was too cold and wanted you to go down and keep him company."

World had risen to the rank of brigadier general, after all. After his brief panic, he quickly forced himself to calm down. This was the heart of a Marine base. As long as he could make the slightest sound, the guards outside would rush in immediately.

"So the ledger is in your hands. Hunter, you're smart, but you're greedy too." World took a deep breath, his hand quietly moving toward the pistol at his waist. "Tell me, how much will it take for you to hand over that ledger? That man earned you eighty-five million Beli. I'll give you double! I can even use my authority to arrange a legal privateering permit for you in the Marine system!"

He was stalling for time, trying to keep Rain steady.

"Double? That's quite the temptation." Rain sneered, but did not move an inch. "Unfortunately, I have a habit. Rather than accept what others offer, I prefer taking it myself. Open the safe."

A murderous gleam flashed in World's eyes. He suddenly drew the flintlock pistol from his waist. At the same time, he pushed off with his feet and used Shave from the Marine Six Powers, vanishing from his original spot in an instant as he tried to open the distance and fire a warning shot.

However, he had underestimated Rain's reaction speed and battle instincts, while overestimating his own combat ability after years of pampered living.

At the very instant World vanished, the stone floor beneath Rain abruptly rose.

Bang!

A half-meter-thick wall of Granite instantly formed beside Rain like a shield, blocking World's bullet with perfect precision.

Then Rain's left hand shot out like an iron clamp, seizing World by the throat the moment he reappeared. He forcibly lifted World's two-hundred-pound body into the air and slammed him against the steel safe's door.

"Ugh... let, let go..." World struggled wildly, clawing desperately at Rain's arm with both hands.

"As a Marine Headquarters brigadier general, why are you so weak? Have you been living comfortably for too long?" Rain's gaze was ice-cold.

To keep the man from shouting, Rain's right arm instantly completed its stone assimilation. Gray-white stone skin rapidly spread over it as he crushed World's jaw, forcibly choking every cry for help inside his throat.

The bone-cracking sound was especially piercing in the silent office. World's eyes rolled back from the pain, yet he could only make muffled whimpering sounds.

"The combination." Rain leaned close to his ear, his voice utterly flat.

World had been scared out of his wits by then. Faced with such an utterly unreasonable monster, he could only tremblingly extend a finger and fiddle with the safe's combination lock several times.

Click.

The safe's heavy door sprang open.

Inside were neatly stacked bundles of high-denomination Beli, several bags of exceptionally pure diamonds, and several specialized daggers inlaid with Seastone powder.

Rain glanced over them and nodded in satisfaction. He released the right hand covering World's jaw, then picked up the ledger from the desk and casually slipped it into his coat pocket.

"You... you took the money, so you can't kill me..." World begged incoherently, blood continuously spilling from his mouth. "If you kill me... G-2 Base won't let you go..."

"Don't worry. There won't be any commotion."

The left hand Rain had pressed against World's chest suddenly lit with dark red fire.

No lava erupted in every direction. Rain displayed extremely precise control over his Fruit power. He compressed the heat entirely into a single point in his palm. A scorching current of heat reaching thousands of degrees, like an invisible poisoned needle, instantly pierced World's uniform and flesh and injected itself directly into his heart.

Sizzle—

World's body suddenly stiffened, his eyes bulging from their sockets and bloodshot.

There were no burn marks on his exterior, not even a wisp of smoke to trigger the fire alarm on the ceiling. Yet the instant his organs, especially his heart and lungs, came into contact with that immensely compressed heat, they had already been completely cooked and carbonized.

It was a cruel death that left the outside intact while utterly destroying everything within.

World's life force rapidly faded. His body slid down the safe door like a heap of mud, collapsing onto the floor and becoming nothing more than a breathless corpse.

Rain tore several sheets of paper from the desk and carefully wiped the blood and grease from his gloves. He calmly packed the cash, diamonds, and Seastone daggers from the safe into a sturdy cloth bag.

This "pirate-eats-pirate" hunt had gone exceptionally smoothly. No one noticed that this Marine brigadier general had silently died in his own office.

Rain walked to a corner of the room and activated his Fruit power again, his body gradually sinking into the stone floor. However, he did not return directly to the harbor. Instead, he silently traveled through the base's complex load-bearing wall structure like a gray phantom, heading toward the classified materials warehouse at the bottom of the base.

Since he was already here, merely taking World's private stash was not enough. He needed more reliable and secure protection for navigation.

Relying on his memory of the warehouse blueprint he had glimpsed on World's desk earlier, Rain precisely avoided every internal patrol post and the blind spots of the Visual Den Den Mushi. Before long, he silently passed through walls several meters thick and stood inside the classified warehouse, which was packed with World Government strategic materials.

Countless specially made sealed crates stood in neat rows, containing various prohibited drugs, fine firearm components, and rows upon rows of Eternal Poses bearing different numbers.

Rain's gaze swept over the rows of Eternal Poses before finally stopping on an exquisite pointer resting on black velvet padding. Three intimidating words were engraved on its base: Enies Lobby.

As the gateway from the first half of the Grand Line to Marine Headquarters and Impel Down, Enies Lobby's Eternal Pose was tightly controlled by the World Government and extremely difficult to obtain on the black market.

Rain reached out, picked up the Eternal Pose pointing toward the Island That Never Sleeps, and unapologetically tucked it into his clothes.

Looking at the indentation left in its original spot, Rain raised an eyebrow.

From the suitcase he had just filled with World's gold, he casually took out two heavy bars of pure gold and gently placed them on the velvet padding where the Eternal Pose had originally rested.

The value of those two gold bars was enough to buy that Eternal Pose on the black market.

"This counts as a fair trade." Rain muttered, the corner of his mouth curling upward.

After dealing with every trace, Rain activated his assimilation ability again. His body instantly merged into the warehouse's stone floor, leaving behind no signs of damage or intrusion, just as when he had entered.

Half an hour later, G-2 Base Harbor.

Rain carried a bulging pack onto the deck of the Bedrock.

The harbor remained bustling, but the atmosphere at one pier was unexpectedly comical and cheerful. Rain's sharp vision caught sight of the Marine officers on a distant dock. Those men who were usually stern and murderous, including Vice Admiral Gumier, who commanded the base, were each holding a steaming cup of milk coffee, their faces filled with happiness so intense they looked ready to cry.

Across from the coffee-drinking Marines, a small speedboat of unusual design had already left the shore, flames shooting from its stern as propulsion.

The young man in the orange cowboy hat stood on the speedboat, smiling as he waved farewell to the Marines onshore. At the front of the crowd on the dock, a couple dressed in Marine chef uniforms were also excitedly embracing, waving large ladles at the boy and weeping in gratitude.

"Pirates and Marines peacefully waving goodbye to each other... only on this sea could such an absurd yet reasonable scene happen."

Rain watched the scene, a teasing smirk appearing on his lips. It seemed Ace's letter from the milk-squeezing girl Moda had not only been delivered successfully, but had also conveniently solved the vice admiral's age-old problem of bitter coffee and reunited a family.

In return, the Marines at the base had turned a blind eye to this notorious pirate with a bounty of more than five hundred million. They had not only given him information about Blackbeard, but collectively seen him off as well. Though that might not necessarily be a good thing for Ace.

Meanwhile, in the high-ranking officers' area, World's corpse likely would not be discovered by his adjutant until dinner. By then, both Ace, who was pursuing his sworn enemy, and the hunter "Grayrock," who had returned laden with rewards, would already have sailed out of these waters.

"Set sail."

Rain withdrew his gaze, untied the mooring ropes, and turned the wheel.

The massive sails swelled under the sea wind. The Bedrock crushed through the azure waves and slowly departed from the steel fortress.

Rain stood at the bow, feeling the cold touch of the Seastone daggers in his clothes. This trip to G-2 Base had been a full harvest. Not only had he collected Odel's enormous bounty, but he had also silently emptied a corrupt brigadier general's vault.

But this was only an appetizer.

He took out the Eternal Pose pointing toward Enies Lobby and watched the needle inside, which pointed steadily ahead.

"The storm of Aqua Laguna, the Straw Hat Pirates' resolve, and that supposedly invincible CP9 assassination agency..."

Facing the wild sea wind, a sharp light gleamed in Rain's black eyes.

"I can't miss such a classic scene."