The pink coat snapped in the salt-laden wind, setting off his impeccably tailored dark suit.
He surveyed the pale faces below from on high, his lips curving upward.
"People of Dressrosa, there is no need to panic."
His voice was quiet, yet it strangely carried over the wind and waves, reaching everyone's ears clearly.
"The vermin who attacked have been wiped out, every last one."
A brief, deathly silence followed.
Then another figure in a jet-black feathered coat appeared soundlessly beside him.
Rossi held something in his hand-a middle-aged woman wearing shattered glasses, long since unconscious. Blood soaked her clothes and dripped down her dangling arm onto the mottled deck.
"Allow me to introduce her."
Rossi's voice was calm and level, as though stating something ordinary. "'Dead Hand' Meiteer.
"Bounty: 340 million Beli."
He paused, his gaze sweeping over the crowd holding its breath below.
"'Fire Fox,' 'Ogre,' 'Edge Bulwark'-those three fleets, each led by a criminal with a bounty exceeding a hundred million, have likewise been left at sea.
"From this moment on, not a single pirate sail will appear within a five-hundred-nautical-mile radius of this island."
The silence lasted several seconds.
Then the eruption of voices nearly overturned the docks!
Some people collapsed onto the ground, covering their faces as they sobbed incoherently; others dropped to both knees and knocked their foreheads heavily against the cold ground with dull thuds.
In this era, pirates inspired far greater terror than storms and **.
Each year, the number of civilians who died at the hands of those lawless villains far exceeded the combined toll of all natural disasters.
Having a sufficiently powerful protector meant sleeping peacefully at night. It meant one's family would not suffer utter ruin over a careless remark, an accidental meeting of eyes, or even simply because