You Are My Friend for Life, Thatch

"But on the day the captain died, that guy suddenly said he wasn't going to look for the Great Treasure anymore. What a despicable bastard, right?!"

"The captain placed all his hopes on him, and that guy told me he's not going to look for the Great Treasure anymore. What a bastard!"

"Does that bastard even know what it feels like to give up hope and dreams? He made me eat Devil Fruit and be trapped on land for over twenty years..."

"Just because you've become a landlubber, do you choose to give up your dream, or do you believe that Shanks will make your dream come true, so you choose to give up?"

Before he could finish speaking, Buggy was interrupted. He stood there, stunned, and instinctively looked at Huayue, whose eyes were indifferent, completely bewildered.

"A person's dream doesn't die completely when they give up; it's just buried in the soil, waiting for the opportunity to take root and sprout..."

"I'm not interested in the Great Treasure buried in Laugh Tale. What really interests me is the history hidden within the World Government, and that guy sitting on the Throne of Emptiness."

"Work hard, I think you have the potential to become king, Buggy..."

Huayue drank the wine in her glass in one gulp, smiled and nodded, then turned and left.

The campfire crackled, Buggy stared blankly at the leaping sparks before him. Huayue's words were like a red-hot blade, melting away the ice that had been pressing down on him with a wave of her hand.

"I have... I have the qualities to become king. Can I really become king? Can I really fulfill my dream?!"

"If I could, I'd like to compete with Shanks too. I want to become the Pirate King!"

At that moment, Buggy's shout startled a flock of birds, and the members of the Buggy Pirates waved to their captain, who was making such a bold statement.

"Forget it, Captain, you can't do it with your abilities..."

"Yeah, yeah, fighting so many monsters is just unthinkable!"

"Sigh, poor Buggy, getting all fired up over just one sentence. Is this a common trait among men?"

Alvida shook her head repeatedly, looking at Buggy with pity.

"This nagging is so annoying! Do you even know who that guy is? He's a powerful figure that even our captain couldn't defeat, a great pirate who has roamed the world for nearly forty years!"

"I don't trust myself, I trust his judgment. He would never say these things to me for no reason..."

"Just you wait, one day I'll stand against Shanks and fight him for the Great Treasure, hahahahahaha!"

"Why? Why did you incite that guy to fight for the Great Treasure? You really want him to die in pain and struggle?"

Inside the lone boat swaying with the waves, Kuina looked on with a questioning expression, while Huayue slowly shook her head.

"No, I'm telling the truth. This guy has luck that rivals Shanks's, and he'll definitely be one of the contenders for the Great Treasure in the future."

As soon as he said it, Kuina looked puzzled, but ultimately didn't ask.

She will find out what she is meant to know sooner or later, and what she is not meant to know will not be told no matter how much she asks. Having been by Huayue's side for nearly ten years, she understands that this person is shrouded in layers of dark clouds.

They will never reveal their true purpose until the very last moment.

"Just wait and see, the winds that are sweeping across the world have already begun, and in the alternation of the old and the new, the era will eventually come to an end."

At this point, Huayue raised an eyebrow and looked toward the South Blue with great interest.

"Oh my, Bonney has finally left the South Blue. Among this batch of Supernovas, there are a few guys who are quite worth paying attention to, especially the unexpected betrayal that happened on Whitebeard's ship a few months ago."

Her exquisite, intricate blue eyes shimmered, as if everything that had happened a few months ago was a story from yesterday, vividly clear in her mind.

Slightly ahead of time, in the New World, in some unknown sea area.

"Hey, hey, hey, what spoils did you guys get? Anything you'd like to trade?"

"Get out of here! You still haven't paid me back the two bottles of wine you owed me last time. Get out of here!"

"What a stingy little thing..."

At this moment, Marshall D. Teach sighed softly. In this battle, he still hadn't found the fruit he had seen in his childhood, the Devil Fruit he had longed for.

"Hey, Thatch, what did you get? I saw it! You got some treasure from those guys!"

Thatch, the captain and cook of the Whitebeard Fourth Division, snorted and took out a purple Devil Fruit with unusual patterns.

"Tch, that's the ship's rule: whoever gets the Devil Fruit gets to keep it. You guys are all Ability User, how could I, the captain of the fourth squad, fall behind!"

Devil Fruit?

Marshall D. Teach, lost in thought, looked up, and the sight that came into view made his pupils tremble.

"Wait, what if we eat the bad fruit? Our fourth squad leader might be implicated. We should think this through carefully..."

"No, I think this fruit is pretty good. It might be a rare Zoan- Mythical Zoan. Then I'll be someone who can rival Marco!"

"Stop dreaming and go cook, you idiot."

"Hey! Izo, you've gone astray..."

Unbeknownst to the group, who were arm in arm, a pair of eyes were fixed intently on the fruit in the hand of Thatch, the captain of the fourth squad, in a corner of the Moby Dick.

"There's absolutely no mistake, absolutely no mistake! That's the Dark-Dark Fruit, the real Dark-Dark Fruit, capable of suppressing the abilities of all Devil Fruit in the world, the strongest Logia!"

"Why? Why! Why did it have to fall into Thatch's hands..."

At this moment, an unprecedented rage burned within Marshall D. Teach. He had imagined countless times his encounter with the Dark-Dark Fruit, but he had never expected this scene.

"The ship's rule Devil Fruit, you can only give it to someone else if you don't eat it yourself. But that's why Thatch got this fruit. Why him?!"

Thick dark clouds obscured his eyes. In the Whitebeard Pirates, his relationship with Thatch was not the closest, but they were good friends. Yet the Devil Fruit he had been longing for had fallen into someone else's hands!

The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, and before you know it, night has fallen.

It was late at night, and most of the Whitebeard Pirates were asleep, but the sounds of clinking glasses and revelry continued in the room of Thatch, the fourth division commander.

"Is there really no other way, Thatch..."

"Sorry, Teach, among the first few teams, I'm the only Ability User, and I don't want to fall behind Ace..."

"Really? Then I'm sorry, Thatch, you're my friend for life."

Pfft!