Departure! Amazon Lily

Luo still had not received the latest newspaper. If he knew that someone had dared to slaughter Celestial Dragons, he would probably be shocked!

"Hello?"

Seeing the astonished look on Luo's face, Swain asked uncertainly.

"I really did... save someone remarkable."

Luo spoke slowly.

His tone was neither servile nor overbearing.

One had to know that Luo's bounty at this moment was not yet the 200 million Beli he would have two years later at the Sabaody Archipelago.

To Luo, Swain was practically an Admiral. However, Admirals had no time to hunt down an unknown Luo.

And pirates did not bother with so many twists and turns. Swain could kill Luo at any time.

To remain this calm, one could say he had been born with it—or that his miserable childhood had forged it into him.

But when his companions learned that the man before them had a bounty of 1.6 billion Beli, they could not stay so calm.

"Huh! What?!"

Everyone retreated in astonishment toward the doorway.

Swain laughed. "Don't look so frightened. I'm not that scary."

Yet Swain secretly admired Luo.

The more he looked at him, the more pleasing he found him.

The current crew of the Neptune was simply missing someone as resourceful as him.

What was more, Swain was also lacking a ship's doctor!

In his heart, Luo was the most suitable candidate.

However, now was not the time to say it. Besides, Luo had his own crew.

If he refused to board Swain's ship, there was nothing he could do.

Surely he couldn't tie him up and drag him onto the Neptune?

Huh!

At that thought, Swain felt it might actually be possible...

He rubbed his chin, his mind full of schemes for tying Luo up.

Poor Luo! He had not received any benefits yet, but someone was already plotting against him.

"Where are you going?" Swain asked.

"I'm going to Water 7 first..." He stopped halfway, as if considering whether he should say it.

"To visit an old acquaintance in Water 7."

Two years later, when Luo met Luffy, he was twenty-five years old.

Swain had calculated this before. He had set sail three years earlier than Luffy.

Luo had gone to sea at seventeen, which meant it had taken him eight years to travel through the first half of the Grand Line!

Luffy, meanwhile, had taken only two years!

In less than five years, he had ascended to the position of one of the Four Emperors.

The thought left Swain sighing with emotion.

Not everyone possessed talent like Luffy and Swain, able to cross the first half of the Grand Line in just two years.

In fact, Swain's talent was even greater than Luffy's!

At this point, Luo was heading to Water 7 earlier than Luffy. He had probably encountered quite a few dangerous enemies along the way, which was why their progress had coincided with Luffy's first voyage ending at the Sabaody Archipelago.

"Perfect. I'm going to Water 7 too."

Swain was obviously planning to cling to Luo.

"Swain, you really don't need to."

"If you want to go somewhere, I might be able to take you there!"

Luo could naturally tell that Swain did not really want to go to Water 7.

What a joke!

Would a pirate with a 1.6-billion-Beli bounty not have finished traveling through the first half of the Grand Line?

No one would believe that if they heard it!

"Uh... well..." Swain looked awkward.

Luo had actually left him a little dignity by not exposing him outright.

"Really? Then I'll have to thank you!!"

He spoke with an extremely "sincere" expression.

His acting was so clumsy that even Bepo scratched his head, clearly embarrassed...

"Mm."

"Then you should get some rest," Luo said, ending the conversation.

He left Swain sitting there awkwardly.

He swore!

This would be the first stain on his life.

There had been no humiliation through strength—only verbal humiliation!

But for the sake of his future ship's doctor...

Endure!

However, on the following day,

Luo took the initiative to find Swain. He had forgotten to ask where Swain wanted to go the day before.

"Amazon Lily!" Swain replied.

"Amazon Lily? Why are you going back to the Calm Belt?"

Amazon Lily was located in the Amazon Lily region, within the Calm Belt.

This left Luo in a difficult position. Going elsewhere would have been fine, but the Calm Belt was the place he least wanted to visit.

To him, this would be putting the cart before the horse.

Sea Kings over a hundred meters long lived in the Calm Belt. If they rashly entered the Grand Line from there, they would probably become Sea Kings' food after a couple of bites.

Moreover, the Calm Belt was a lifeless death zone for pirate ships powered by wind.

Only the Navy and the Kuja Pirates led by the Empress could sail there.

That was why Lily Island and Impel Down could be established in the Calm Belt: to use the Sea Kings as a natural defensive barrier.

Otherwise, the famous country of women would have long since become a paradise for male pirates.

Swain naturally noticed Luo's reluctance and confidently assured him:

"Don't worry! I'll deal with any Sea Kings we encounter along the way!"

Even after hearing his assurance, Luo still hesitated.

"This is something I need to discuss with my crew."

After hearing Luo's refusal, Swain was not disappointed.

This had only been a spur-of-the-moment decision. For now, he could simply keep Luo occupied!

To his surprise, Luo actually gave Swain an answer that afternoon.

"Swain, we can take you to Amazon Lily first."

"However, you must guarantee that nothing will go wrong along the way!"

Although Luo trusted Swain's strength and believed that crossing the Calm Belt would not be a problem for him,

he was afraid Swain might truly disregard the lives of everyone aboard along the way.

There was only one reason he could agree to this.

Swain had the power to wipe out their entire crew right now, seize the ship, and escape!

Rather than refuse him, it was better to befriend him and make Swain owe them a favor.

Perhaps it would prove useful at a critical moment!

Pirates had to understand human relationships and social niceties too.

Just look at the Summit War. Whitebeard's crew rescued people at the front while Red-Haired guarded their home turf, preventing Teacher Kaido's plan to seize territory from succeeding.

"Then thank you, Luo," Swain said.

In the Kingdom of Sokafia,

a restaurant was thriving, stealing away the business of several nearby competitors.

"Wow! Miss Roland really has a talent for cooking!" the restaurant owner praised.

"That's right! She only started learning ten days ago, and she's already this good!"

The young and beautiful proprietress praised her as well, making Roland blush instantly.

"N-No, not at all!"

"I only learned because I put in extra effort!"

"Boss! Another plate of fried noodles!"

"Me too!"

"I ordered first!"

The two customers were practically about to fight over the fried noodles.

Meanwhile, on some isolated island,

Boom! Boom-boom-boom!

A chain of explosions rang across the entire island.

After the noise stopped, a soot-covered figure walked out.

"Cough, cough, cough!"

"The data is still slightly off! The ratio of explosives was wrong this time."

Jordi immediately began recording the results with a pen.

Elsewhere,

Swain finally reached the Calm Belt.

Although people said that without wind there could be no waves, that rule did not apply to him.

The Polar Tang had its own power source, but the journey to Amazon Lily was ultimately rather long. Swain simply altered the flow of the seawater to assist the ship's progress.

When he first displayed this move, it still left Luo and the others stunned for a while.

After all,

the ability to alter the flow of seawater at will was no different from a fantasy.

Swain had his own reasons for going to Amazon Lily, but his ultimate goal was still to become stronger.

His plan was simple: have the Pirate Empress, Hancock, help him contact Rayleigh!

One had to know that the previous Empress of Amazon Lily had been Shakuyaku.

The reason she had stepped down was that she had come to the Sabaody Archipelago because of " lovesickness." And the source of that lovesickness was naturally Rayleigh, the handsome old man.

As for the new Empress, Hancock, she definitely still had connections with Shakuyaku.

Otherwise, when Blackbeard, who would later become one of the Four Emperors, attacked Lily Island to seize the Empress's Devil Fruit ability, Rayleigh would not have been able to arrive in time, save the situation, and drive Blackbeard away!

Shakuyaku's assistance had naturally been indispensable!

He intended to use this connection to draw Rayleigh over and have him teach Swain how to use Conqueror's Haki Infusion!

As for why he did not seek Rayleigh out himself, even without receiving news from outside,

he could guess that the World Government was probably hunting him across the entire world at that very moment.

The moment he showed himself, another bloody storm would inevitably follow!

However,

whenever Swain thought of this Empress, he felt a headache coming on.

She was too proud and hated men.

But once she fell for a man, her intelligence would drop straight to zero, and she would evolve into a lovesick fool.

What could he do?

Could he make her fall in love with him?

Swain sat at the bow, looking at his reflection in the sea.

After thinking it over, this method seemed feasible after all.