Waiting

A girl who smiled whenever she saw a windmill met a boy from Foosha Village.

In the end, the girl followed the boy out to sea from Orange Town.

Oranges signified both a steady flow of wealth and the tender beginnings of love.

Should he change Nami's current circumstances? That required no thought at all.

Lofan had once seen a flower field near his home where frost had caused most of the flowers to wither.

The unexpected change in weather had killed many of the delicate blossoms.

Yet when Lofan passed by again several days later, he saw a small patch of flowers unfurling their branches and leaves once more.

They were more beautiful than any flowers Lofan had seen there before.

Hardship nurtured beauty. This was no glorification, merely the inevitable cause and effect of having to cross mountains and ridges to reach a height with a distant view.

Even with a warship's sailing speed, it still took a day to reach Foosha Village.

The mountains lay hazy, and the bright moon rose in the east.

The mortal world shared a single lamp in the sky.

After Garp's training during the day, Ace and Luffy had long since fallen asleep.

Dressed in short sleeves, Garp sat idly on the pier with a cup of barley tea in his hand, enjoying the breeze.

"Vice Admiral Garp!"

Smoker and Tashigi felt even greater reverence before this living legend.

His publicly known achievements alone included tearing Rocks apart, pursuing Pirate King Roger several times, and taking down Golden Lion-feats of unparalleled merit.

He was practically the ceiling of combat strength among all the Marines who had appeared so far. There was not a soldier in the entire Navy who did not know Garp the Hero.

As for Lofan's role, what the higher-ups actually had in mind was for him to succeed Garp.

Although Garp was immensely powerful, he refused to obey trash like the Celestial Dragons.

He simply would not accept promotion to Admiral and place himself under the Celestial Dragons' direct command.

But neither the Navy nor the World Government could do anything about it.

They could hardly leave a man like him unused, let alone drive him away, could they?

And that was the freedom Garp's strength afforded him.

"Vice Admiral Garp, where's Ain?"

Looking at Lofan, who had been making quite a name for himself lately, Garp was rather fond of him.

He felt the joy of finally having a successor.

Unlike Akainu and the others, who ultimately lacked the kind of achievements that could make them into heroes.

Their records involved too much of the Celestial Dragons and the World Government.

They could not win the whole world's trust.

"The girl's already asleep. Leave tomorrow.

"She's been training like her life depended on it for over a month. Let her get a good rest tonight."

"Mm."

Lofan sat down on the ground without any reservations and chatted with Garp.

Neither of their warships was docked at the harbor, because it was simply too small.

A single warship would take up almost more than half of it.

So both had been moored off the side of the island.

Smoker and Tashigi seemed to have become sentries, standing in the sea breeze as they listened to the two heroes laughing and talking.

Totto Land.

King had gathered the remnants of the Beasts Pirates, but he had only found two of the Flying Six.

The remaining pirates had either been driven out of their former bases or survived that battle.

They had all gathered here for one operation alone: to take Kaido's son away.

Kaido had not come in person. His injuries still would not allow him to fight Big Mom at full strength.

If they met, he would certainly be unable to resist attacking, so it was better to wait for news.

That peerless slash of Lofan's would probably become the only lingering injury left by his lifetime of warfare.

Finding out where Yamato was had not actually been difficult.

Since Big Mom had taken control of Wano Country, they only needed to search Totto Land.

To their surprise, they really had found their young master.

But taking Yamato away right under Big Mom's nose was no easy task.

After weighing their options, they concluded that charging in blindly would be suicide. They could only act in secret and take the young master straight out.

But the abilities of King and the others were not suited to this sort of operation. In the end, Who's-Who of the Flying Six stepped forward.

Both horns on his red, horned helmet had been broken off.

His upper body was still wrapped in bandages, but his red suit remained clean and tidy.

"I'll handle this. You know what I used to do."

He was ambitious and had always wanted to become one of the All-Stars.

He had also once been one of CP9's strongest agents. Unfortunately, losing the Gum-Gum Fruit had landed him in prison.

As things stood, the other member of the Flying Six was not up to the task either.

With his experience as an agent, Who's-Who was indeed their best choice right now.

"All right."

"But I have one condition."

King naturally knew what he wanted. This was the moment for them to rise again, and he knew what choice to make.

"If you succeed, you'll naturally become the second All-Star. But if you fail, we won't come to rescue you."

They had only one chance at tonight's operation. The Beasts Pirates could no longer sustain another battle against Big Mom's forces.

"I understand."

Putting out the cigarette in his mouth, Who's-Who turned and vanished into the night.

Morgans had found the girl Lofan had asked for by name, but he had not expected her to be so dangerous.

She went by the alias Lace and had spent years moving through the first half of the Grand Line.

She was a vicious character who could easily abandon all her companions, or even betray them, when faced with danger or profit.

More importantly, this Miss Lace's real name was Nico Robin.

At the age of eight, she had been branded the Devil of Ohara.

For destroying six Navy warships, she had been given an enormous bounty of seventy-nine million Beli.

The World Government had pursued her for fifteen years without managing to put her behind bars.

"Ohara, the place known for archaeology... Could this Admiral Yun'ou be with that side?"

Morgans thought of the force that called itself the Revolutionary Army. Their revolution meant overthrowing the World Government.

They also paid extremely close attention to the Poneglyphs.

"Then should I hand over this information or not..."

As someone who dealt in intelligence on both sides of the law, he naturally welcomed business from both the World Government and the Revolutionary Army.

But once he handed over this information, it would be tantamount to acknowledging that he followed Lofan.

Their cooperation would have to deepen afterward. Yet he had seen no benefit for himself; the other party had not even dangled any promises before him.

Investigating the person Lofan had named had merely been an attempt to uncover his intentions and guard against that Admiral's hidden moves.

But not even the slightest irregularity had appeared, leaving Morgans completely uncertain.

Just what did Lofan have to rely on that made him so comfortable trusting him?

He had plucked out who knew how many feathers, yet he still had no clue.

Did Lofan not know his own limits, or was he deliberately being mysterious?

"Indecision won't solve anything."

Doflamingo's words suddenly surfaced in his mind, and Morgans finally remembered.

He had been so caught up in his contest with Lofan that he had actually forgotten there was still Joker.

That man was a Celestial Dragon, and even held secrets the World Government feared.

If even he was willing to play second fiddle to Lofan, just what sort of enormous plan were they laying?

Morgans grew thoroughly excited as he considered it from another angle.

An Admiral was involved, along with that mad Celestial Dragon Doflamingo, and the other party wanted to bring him into the fold as well.

Judging by his attitude back then, it seemed this was not even the end of it.

And now an Ohara scholar who could decipher the Poneglyphs had appeared.

"The history of the Void Century!"

"Now that's big news!!!"