Hearing Norton's question, the pirates aboard the twenty-nine ships of the Krieg Pirates exchanged glances with one another.
Admiral Don Krieg was already dead, and the man who killed the admiral was known as the most dangerous man in the East Blue in a century! Now, a man like that was offering to recruit them...
"All hail Admiral Norton!"
Some smart people made a decision instantly, dropping to their knees and shouting Norton's name.
Seeing this, the rest hurriedly followed suit, terrified of meeting the same end as that blown-up pirate ship.
They had taken to the sea in the first place to follow the strong, and their allegiance to Don Krieg had merely been due to his strength-there was certainly no loyalty to speak of.
Since Don Krieg was already dead, following Norton was only natural. No hothead would defy Norton for the sake of a dead Don Krieg.
No... If it were Captain Gin, he might have done so, but Captain Gin was already unconscious!
"Long live Admiral Norton!"
Amidst heaven-shaking shouts, Norton nodded with satisfaction.
"Norton! What about that treasure turtle? Did you catch it?" Nami hurried over and asked.
The legendary treasure turtle-with its nine treasure chests, just how much Beli must be inside!
"I caught it," Norton tossed the treasure chest in his hand to Nami. "Here, this is it."
Nami caught it and opened it, a look of disappointment appearing on her face.
"What is this! Whose idea of a prank is this? Isn't this just a fruit?"
The thing inside the treasure chest was a patterned fruit that exuded an ominous aura.
"No... It's not an ordinary fruit," Norton shook his head. "It's a Devil Fruit."
"A Devil Fruit?!"
Funing, Kuro, Sanosuke, and the others gathered around as well.
Devil Fruits were known as the treasures of the sea, granting those who ate them abilities that defied common sense, and even the cheapest one was worth at least one hundred million Beli!
"What kind of fruit is it? Zoan? Paramecia? Or Logia?" Funing, the most knowledgeable of them, asked first.
"I'm not sure yet; I haven't read the Devil Fruit Encyclopedia." Norton casually tossed the Devil Fruit back into the chest.
He had no intention of eating a Devil Fruit; even if he did, it would be one with a known ability, not one of unknown powers. Norton disliked this kind of gamble with an unknown outcome.
Only top-tier fruits like Kaido's Fish-Fish Fruit, Model: Azure Dragon, Big Mom's Soul-Soul Fruit, and Enel's Rumble-Rumble Fruit could possibly give Norton pause.
"If any of you want to eat it, think it over and come find me. I'll leave this Devil Fruit for you," Norton said to the crowd.
"King! A new pirate ship has been spotted! It looks like a ship from the Buggy Pirates!" At that moment, someone in the crow's nest shouted loudly.
"Ignore them! Buggy is already my subordinate!" Norton waved a hand.
After displaying sufficient strength and aura, Buggy's submission was a matter of course; after all, Buggy was still very afraid of death.
"Register these twenty-nine pirate ships! Remember their captains' names! Since Krieg is dead, hand this fleet over to someone new to manage!" Norton instructed.
He already had a candidate in mind; the fleet could simply be commanded by Gin, whose strength was no weaker than Don Krieg's, and who was the person most familiar with the fleet.
"Understood!"
"King, where are we going next?" Kuro pushed up his glasses.
"Loguetown!"
The voyage to Loguetown was not smooth.
Perhaps Sanosuke's bad luck and the bad luck of the White Pearl had acted up once again. After leaving the sea area where they had subdued the Krieg Pirates and the Buggy Pirates, Norton's crew entered a new area of dense fog.
Many ships in the massive fleet lost their bearings and became trapped in the mist!
Guided by Nami, the White Pearl did not get lost, but the Baratie and more than a dozen pirate ships from the former Don Krieg Fleet were all lost in the fog.
"King! The Den Den Mushi have lost signal; we can't reach them at all!"
Thick fog billowed, and anything beyond five meters was invisible-nothing remained except a vast expanse of white. Funing had to feel her way forward along the gunwale before finally reaching Norton in the deck area.
"We can't keep going like this! Never mind those guys from the Don Krieg Fleet, but we can't lose the Baratie!" Nami also waved her hands, parting the thick fog as she walked over.
"How strange! There shouldn't be sea fog in this area!" Nami said.
Norton, however, did not answer Funing and Nami. At that moment, he quieted his mind, whereupon the surrounding sounds became exceptionally clear, and the surging of the ocean currents below felt as though it were right beside his ears.
And amidst all the sounds, one stood out as immensely massive, sounding like rolling thunder!
It was the heartbeat of some living creature!
"Right beneath the sea!"
Norton suddenly opened his eyes and spoke these words.
Funing and Nami looked at each other, somewhat bewildered and not understanding what he meant.
"What is beneath the sea?" The two asked at the same time.
"The fellow causing this predicament is right at the bottom of the sea!" Norton said, pronouncing each word distinctly.
This mist was not natural sea fog; the reason they had encountered it was because of that creature!
"Have you ever heard the legend... of the Mist Whale?"
"A Mist Whale?" Nami was puzzled.
"An old fisherman named Sham told me about it. In a certain sea area of the East Blue, there exists a gigantic whale!" Norton explained.
"Although that whale lives in the ocean, just like land animals, it breathes with lungs! But unlike other whales, the Mist Whale doesn't spout streams of air-it spouts fog! It's a giant whale that breathes out clouds and mist!"
"Are you saying this fog is being spouted by that Mist Whale?" Funing couldn't help questioning. "Are you serious? This fog covers an area of at least ten nautical miles around. Just how big would a whale have to be to have lungs that massive?"
"Of course it's true! I heard its heartbeat!" Norton exclaimed with emotion. "Originally, I thought it was just a legend, but I didn't expect the Mist Whale to actually exist! This ocean is truly amazing!"
"If a whale that massive exists, it's basically a natural disaster, right? If it just rolls over, the White Pearl might capsize! How do you plan to deal with it?" The sound of a blade cutting through the air came from the fog, and Zoro's figure emerged.
"Should we kill it?" Sanosuke appeared as well.
Without needing to think, he knew his bad luck had flared up again, so he stepped forward to take responsibility. A legendary giant beast like this was simply a once-in-a-century encounter.
Almost all the officers on the White Pearl had gathered.
"Kill it?" Norton grinned broadly. "A creature like that is something only I can kill!"
"But I have no intention of killing it! A giant beast capable of spewing thick fog possesses immense strategic value!"
Right now, the Norton Pirates' force was too large. The White Pearl, the Black Cat, the Baratie, the twenty-nine ships of the former Don Krieg Fleet, and the Buggy—added together, they already totaled thirty-three ships.
Their troop strength exceeded three thousand people.
That was nearly ten times larger than the military force of a Marine branch!
With such a massive pirate fleet, their whereabouts were very easily exposed.
However, if they had the cover of dense fog, everything would be different!
Ordinary methods could never pin down their location out on the vast ocean!
"I am going to subdue that Mist Whale! If I do, perhaps the matter of founding a nation can be brought forward by a lot!"
"We might even be able to start preparations once we enter the Grand Line!"
Norton took off his black woolen coat. "Nami, catch!"
Nami reached out and caught the coat Norton tossed over as Norton leaped into the sea and disappeared.
"This willful guy!" Nami cursed resentfully, wrapping the coat around herself.
"What do we do now?" The others looked at Nami.
"What else can we do? We wait for that guy to come back!"