"Collier!"
The kick was so fast it left an afterimage. Before the pirate lackey trying to take advantage of the chaos could react, the toe of a black leather shoe slammed into the side of his neck.
With a sharp crack of displaced bone, the unlucky man flew sideways without even managing a scream. He splashed into the sea dozens of meters away with a thud, sending up a small spray.
"In this restaurant, no one gets rough in front of a lady without my permission."
The blond young man with curly eyebrows lowered his right leg, took a handkerchief from his suit pocket, and gently wiped the dustless surface of his leather shoe.
He seemed completely unaffected by the oppressive atmosphere left by the lingering Conqueror's Haki. His one visible eye instantly turned into two pink hearts, and he writhed and slid over to Nami and Carina.
"Oh! A miracle of the sea! A fated encounter!"
Sanji dropped to one knee, produced a red rose from nowhere, and offered it to the bewildered Nami and the amused Carina. "To think there would be two such beautiful ladies on so crude a battlefield! This wreck full of stinking men is unworthy of you. Why not let me accompany you both to..."
Thump!
A dull impact interrupted Sanji's declaration.
A hardwood prosthetic leg kicked Sanji in the back of the head. The tremendous force sent him face-first into the Baratie's hard teak deck, leaving a face-shaped dent.
"You damned eggplant! Who gave you permission to leave your post?!"
Zeff withdrew his prosthetic leg, his two braided blond mustaches bristling with anger. "We've still got hundreds of people to feed! Are you trying to starve the customers? Get your ass back to the kitchen and peel potatoes!"
"You shitty old geezer!"
Sanji yanked his head out of the deck, a large lump on his forehead, and turned to grab Zeff's towering chef's hat. "You cranky old bastard! Can't you see I'm performing the sacred courtesies of a knight?! I've had enough of this place stinking of grease and sweat! I'm joining their ship! I'm going to find the All Blue and protect these two beautiful ladies along the way!"
"You want to leave? Pay off the plates you broke first! You couldn't clear that debt in a hundred years!"
"Then I'll tear down this lousy restaurant to pay it off!"
The two cooks, one old and one young, instantly began grappling, their punches and kicks cutting through the air more fiercely than the pirates' brawl earlier.
Neither showed the bearing of an expert. They used nothing but street-fighting tricks, pulling hair and stamping on toes, yet every blow made the deck beneath them groan under the strain.
Lin Xuan sat at an outdoor dining table nearby, holding a freshly roasted piece of meat on the bone and tearing into it as he watched the farce.
"They sure are lively," he mumbled, crunching through a piece of cartilage.
The hollow feeling left after releasing his Conqueror's Haki was rapidly fading as he ate.
This bustle of everyday life, with arguments over dreams and scuffles over a little wage dispute, finally relaxed his taut nerves and made him feel alive.
Meanwhile, in the first half of the Grand Line, at Marine Headquarters in Marineford.
There was none of the East Blue's briny smell or the aroma of roasted meat here. Inside the towering fortress building, the air carried a solemn atmosphere and the dry scent of ink.
The atmosphere in the huge round-table conference room was extremely grave.
"Say... Fleet Admiral Sengoku, do we really need three meetings of this level in a month?"
A languid voice broke the silence.
Borsalino, Kizaru, was clipping his nails in his yellow-striped suit. His mouth crooked as he complained, "Newcomers have certainly been springing up at sea lately, but surely there's no need to keep us working overtime? My tea's gone cold~ How frightening, this workload."
"Shut up, Borsalino."
Seated opposite him, Sakazuki, Akainu, wore his cap pulled low. His voice was deep and unyielding. "Justice takes no days off. As long as scum remain on the seas, the Marines have no reason to let their guard down."
Between them, Kuzan had pulled down his sleep mask and was snoring softly, apparently already asleep.
At the head of the table, Fleet Admiral Sengoku felt his temples throbbing.
He grabbed a handful of senbei, stuffed them into his mouth, and chewed viciously.
The white goat beside him took the opportunity to snatch a document from the table and began eating it with relish.
"All of you, take this seriously!"
Sengoku slammed the table, jolting Kuzan's sleep mask halfway off.
He took a deep breath, pulled a freshly printed bounty poster from a thick stack of documents, and tossed it into the center of the round table.
"I called you here because a situation has arisen in the East Blue."
Everyone's eyes converged on the bounty poster.
It showed a black-haired youth in an orange cowboy hat, smiling brightly.
"Portgas D. Ace, known as Fire Fist." Sengoku's voice was steady and forceful. "Given the destruction he has caused in the East Blue and his record of defeating branch forces several times, Headquarters' intelligence department has conducted a comprehensive assessment and proposed an initial bounty of fifty million Beli."
"Fifty million?"
At the outer edge of the round table, Marine Vice Admiral Onigumo frowned around his cigar and exhaled a thick cloud of smoke. "Fleet Admiral, isn't this too hasty? The average bounty in the East Blue is only three million. Putting such a high price on a newcomer will embolden the pirates."
Another Vice Admiral, Yamakaji, smiled and nodded in agreement. "Indeed. Thirty million would already be the upper limit for deterrence. Fifty million is the level of a veteran in the first half of the Grand Line."
The officers' discussion echoed through the conference room, most of them puzzled by the figure.
"If he were an ordinary troublemaker, he naturally wouldn't be worth that price."
Sengoku pushed up his round glasses, a cold gleam flashing across the lenses. "But intelligence indicates that this Ace possesses the Logia Flame-Flame Fruit."
The somewhat noisy conference room instantly fell silent.
Even Kizaru paused his nail clipping for half a second. His perpetually half-lidded eyes opened a little wider, and his tone grew more amused. "Oh~ A Logia... That explains it. In the Four Blues, where they have no concept of Haki, that really is invincible."
Logia.
In the Four Blues, that word meant natural disaster.
"A newcomer who possesses a highly destructive Logia Devil Fruit will become our next major problem if we let him enter the Grand Line and develop even a little." Sengoku swept his gaze over everyone present, his tone stern. "We must eliminate him before he matures, or... recruit him."
At the mention of recruitment, Akainu snorted, plainly disdainful of the policy.
Sengoku ignored him, tapping rapidly on the table as he began issuing orders. "Sakazuki, keep a close eye on the Beasts Pirates' movements in the New World for now. That madman Kaido seems to be plotting something again."
"Understood." Akainu lowered the brim of his cap.
"Borsalino, some Celestial Dragons in the Holy Land of Mary Geoise have complained about insufficient guards. Go show your face and reassure them."
"Oh dear~ Another troublesome assignment..." Kizaru pursed his lips, looking thoroughly reluctant.
"As for Kuzan..." Sengoku glanced at Kuzan, who was still rubbing his eyes. "Although the Shichibukai's ranks are full, Crocodile has been making constant moves in Alabasta lately. Go check the situation."
"Ah, all right, got it." Kuzan yawned and pulled his sleep mask back down.
The assignments were complete, but Sengoku did not adjourn the meeting. Instead, he took another top-secret file from his drawer.
His fingers gently brushed the cover, his expression even graver than when they had discussed the criminal with the fifty-million bounty.
"There is one last matter, and it is today's most important agenda item."
Sengoku lowered his voice slightly. "Given the instability in the New World and our current shortage of top-level combat power, Headquarters has decided, with approval from the World Government's senior leadership, to launch a selection process for an additional Admiral candidate."
At those words, the air in the entire conference room seemed to freeze.
Admiral candidate.
They were the reserves for the Admirals, the Marines' greatest fighting force, figures who truly stood at the pinnacle of power and strength.
The only two current candidates, Momousagi and Chaton, were both monsters who had spent more than a decade as Vice Admirals.
And now they were adding another?
"So suddenly?" Vice Admiral Onigumo could not help asking. "Are we promoting someone from among the existing senior Vice Admirals?"
Everyone involuntarily looked around at one another.
"No."
Sengoku shook his head, a complicated expression on his face, both troubled and faintly expectant.
"This nominee does not come from the ranks of Headquarters Vice Admirals. In fact... he doesn't even come from the Grand Line."
He slowly opened the file and pushed a service record with an identification photograph attached into the center of the table.
The photograph showed a black-haired youth in an ordinary Marine uniform, his eyes languid and seemingly unfocused.
"His sponsor is Vice Admiral Garp. And this young man, whom he described as someone capable of ending the Great Pirate Era..." Sengoku paused, looking over the shocked and puzzled faces before slowly speaking the name.
"Lin Xuan."
Sengoku's voice was not loud, but the name brought an unsettling silence to the quiet conference room.
Then he gently pushed the service record toward the center of the table.
"Current assignment: the East Blue's 153rd Branch. Rank... Seaman Recruit."
Boom!
Those few words instantly set everyone's nerves ablaze.
If Ace's fifty-million bounty had merely seemed somewhat hasty, then to these battle-hardened officers, the current proposal was nothing short of a farce.
"What kind of joke is this?!"
Vice Admiral Mole was the first to slam the table and rise.
His flamboyant long hair trembled with rage, and he nearly bit through the cigar in his mouth. "Fleet Admiral! How important is the position of Headquarters Admiral candidate?! A Seaman Recruit from the East Blue? This isn't merely skipping ranks in a promotion. It's an insult to the ranks of everyone here!"
Vice Admiral Doberman did not stand, but his scar-covered face was frighteningly dark, his knuckles tapping sharply against the tabletop. "Mr. Sengoku, if you intended to tell a joke, that one was far too flat. The East Blue? The 'strongest' there might not even qualify as a foot soldier in the New World."
Voices of doubt rose one after another throughout the conference room.
What entitled a boy who had never appeared on the Grand Line and had no achievements to soar straight to the top?
"That old bastard Garp..."
Seated in an Admiral's chair, Akainu slowly raised his head. Beneath the cap bearing the word "MARINE," his eyes blazed with menace, as though magma churned within them.
He did not look at the service record, instead fixing Sengoku with a stare, his low voice chilling. "Has he gone senile? What does he think the selection of Marine Headquarters' greatest fighting force is? Playing house? If he wants to find a relative a job, he can put them in logistics. Yet he dares reach for the highest threshold of justice."
Under that abruptly heating pressure, the surrounding Vice Admirals instinctively held their breath.
Admiral Sakazuki was truly furious. Even the moisture in the surrounding air seemed to evaporate.
Only Kizaru remained as nonchalant as ever.
Tilting his head, he picked up the service record and squinted at it beneath the overhead lights.
"Ooh~ What a frightening look, Sakazuki."
Kizaru's leisurely drawl seemed out of place in the tense atmosphere. He pointed at the harmless-looking youth in the photograph, an amused curve lifting his lips. "Still, although Vice Admiral Garp is usually unreliable, I don't recall him ever being wrong about something this important. For him to use words like ending an era... could this young fellow be hiding some frightening secret?"
"Secret?" Akainu snorted, his right arm instantly transforming into its element as thick smoke rose with the smell of sulfur. "The only secret is that a peaceful place like the East Blue has raised a pack of fools who don't know their place!"
"Everyone, be quiet!"
Sengoku slammed the table again, the tremendous force of his palm making the sturdy round table shudder violently.
Traces of Conqueror's Haki leaked out, forcibly suppressing the room's clamor and Akainu's anger.
He rubbed his throbbing brow, feeling his stomach begin to ache faintly again.
In truth, his reaction when he first heard Garp's proposal had been even fiercer than Akainu's.
But Garp had then shown him some things...
"I know this sounds insane." Sengoku took a deep breath, his gaze becoming unusually deep. "If anyone else had recommended him, I would have thrown the file into the shredder long ago. But when Garp submitted this nomination, he attached a physical assessment report on Lin Xuan, along with some... combat footage from an East Blue branch."
"Footage?" Kuzan had lifted his sleep mask at some point, a trace of alertness flashing through his sleepy eyes. "What value would combat in the East Blue have as a reference? Did he capture some pirate with a bounty in the tens of millions?"
Sengoku did not answer. He simply rose in silence and walked to the projection Den Den Mushi in the conference room.
His finger hovered over the play button for two seconds, as though giving everyone one last moment to prepare themselves.
"No, he wasn't capturing pirates."
Sengoku pressed the button. Light projected onto the huge white screen, and the image shook, focused, and finally settled on a devastated training ground.
"This is the result he produced through physical strength alone, without using any Devil Fruit abilities or Haki."
As the footage unfolded, the disdainful Mole, the grim-faced Doberman, and even the furious Akainu all froze.
The only sounds left in the conference room were the projector's faint hum and their increasingly heavy, disbelieving breaths.
Chapter 49: Taking Down a Vice Admiral in Three Moves? Is This Recruit a Monster?!
No explosion appeared on the projection screen as expected, nor were there any visual effects from a Devil Fruit ability.
The image shook violently. The person filming seemed to have been extremely unsteady at the time.
The shot contained only a stretch of sea and a lone, towering rocky island.
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